Fashionable Politics

Hey, if you're a supercool guy who's up on all the trendy waves of Progressive thought, if you bill yourself as a Progressive voice and fancy yourself a political pundit (until you're handed your ass - then you protest that you're "only" a comedian), when you're all this and more, when you fancy yourself the very embodiment of the Radical Chic, but you're located in Los Angeles ...

You go where it counts to make a political statement. New York, where OWS originated? Bah, everyone goes to New York these days. I mean, Michael Moore, baby, has been there several times. And Keith Olbermann's broadcast from the protest.

Go where it matters, darling - especially if you've got a new book to pimp, as Bill does - so he shows up in Washington.

I mean, dahlink, it all happened in Washington this weekend. First, there was the MLK dedication, where President Sanford and Son, I mean that liar, I mean the ninja gangsta who's not, I mean the spineless pussy who doesn't promote any Democratic principles gave (rolls eyes) another speech. So bor-ing for us cool kids, ya know.

Then Cornel managed to get himself arrested on the steps of the Supreme Court and went along with the pigs, I mean, policemen as meekly as if he were Dr King, himself. Ya know, I told Cornel that very morning, over latte and organic croissants, that he understood more about black poverty than Barry ever could. I mean, babe, who knows more about anything than an Ivy League-educated professor at another Ivy League institution. Cornel knows. He speaks the language of blackness. I mean, he's driven through the ghettos, man, in a corporately-financed bullet-proof bus. He's even witnessed Brother Tavis push sub-prime mortgages on all the brothahs and sistahs in the hood - after all, better to push sub-prime mortgages than drugs, right?

And of course, there was the real reason to be there - Occupy DC - where I could dress like a smartass fifteen year-old and mingle with the dumbasses just to pimp my book. Dontcha know they think I'm too-cool-for-school? A lot of them skip a couple of meals a week, just to be able to afford to subscribe to HBO, so they can watch my show. Hey, I'm the only thing they watch on HBO, ya know. And if they still live at home with the folks, they stamp their feet and throw hissy fits until Mom or Dad relents and subscribes for them.

Poor? Suffering? Well, if they are, they're too dumb to know they're lining my pockets. I mean, do you think I flew all the way from LA do DC in Economy class? Honky, please!

And just cop these pics that Cornel managed to take of me before the Feds nabbed him ...

(Dig the militant John Carlos salute? Cool, huh? Edgy.)

And then there's ...

(Like the sign? True dat. It's what I want them to think - that is, I want them not to think. Hell, if they thought, they'd realise that I often contradict myself. I mean, how the hell many Progressives do you know who are in favour of the death penalty and who hate unions?)

Indeed, and how many people realise that Bill Maher and his ilk are the natural successors, sons and daughters of those people at Lennie's party some forty-odd years ago, the one Tom Wolfe chronicled. The radical chic, who follow whatever political more seems to be in fashion at the moment.

And Bill's such a dedicated follower of fashion. As it's been mete amongst this demographic of faux intelligentsia, today found so much amongst the mega-rich celebrity talking heads in resident on MSNBC or Current TV, to criticize everything the President says or does, to name-call and ridicule him, Bill's been at the forefront from the very start.

It's important that one remembers what Tom Wolfe pointed out in his essay - that the original radical chic hated the middle class. They thought them hopelessly mundane and bourgeois; and even though the fashionable stance today, amongst them, is to mouth platitudes about both the middle class and the poor, these people only do so to keep their inane credibility up with people too intellectually lazy to think for themselves.

There are as many morons who watch Sean Hannity as there are who watch Bill and believe both of them.

Still, since one of the driving memes of the OWS movement has been to dissuade people from voting in 2012, as the new idealogy being driven is simply that voting isn't worth the effort, Bill would have found disciples aplenty amongst the kids at Occupy DC. He's been subtly pushing the "don't vote" dynamic for a good few weeks now - well ahead of the pack. Gotta be a trend-setter, that Bill.

Then again, he pushed voting for Nader in 2000, and that worked out so well. Interesting too, that his old pal, Ralph Nader, is pushing another ueber-conservative with whom Bill likes to pal around - Ron Paul.

Let's see how Bill Maher likes keeping company with Stormfront.