This announcement of the founding of The Contrarian would be fantastic if it were a comedy sketch.

But these people are for real...

POV: You died and went to hell pic.twitter.com/N6C5J1jSvr

— Libs of TikTok (@libsoftiktok) January 14, 2025

... and that's funny too.

You know, when you've made your mark in writing, as a columnist, you need to get some serious, unbiased advice about whether your material transfers well to audio and video. Jennifer Rubin is behaving on camera in such a ridiculously stilted, fakely enthusiastic manner that I have to assume she had no honest, competent adviser to help her build a social media brand.

And who's the guy? He seems like a character played by Phil Hartman on SNL years ago. He tells us he's Norm Eisen, and I look him up in Wikipedia and see he's "an American attorney, author, and former diplomat.... He was co-counsel for the House Judiciary Committee during the first impeachment and trial of President Donald Trump in 2020." He wrote a book called "Overcoming Trumpery: How to Restore Ethics, the Rule of Law, and Democracy." Why's he coming at us like a parody of a 1970s game-show host? Oh! Wait! This is fascinating:

I don't like this random worker being embarrassed. She didn't ask to be exploited as scenery.

Just a pro-tip for Kamala campaign staffers...

When you film Bill Clinton going to a McDonalds for a campaign stop... you might want to edit out the part where the cashier thinks he's Joe Biden.

What a complete mess. pic.twitter.com/NEKdBVWjs9

— Tim Young (@TimRunsHisMouth) October 14, 2024

ADDED: "Oh, my God! It's Bill Clinton!"

"Some Biden aides think the president would be better off occasionally displaying his temper in public as a way to assuage voter concerns that the 80-year-old president is disengaged and too old for the office."

And that the answer to the question why we are getting this now: "Old yeller: Biden's private fury" (Axios), in which we are told that private Biden is very different from public Biden. He has "a quick-trigger temper" and says things like "God dammit, how the f**k don't you know this?!," "Don't f**king bullsh*t me!" and "Get the f**k out of here!" 

When I first glanced at this article, I thought maybe it was the beginning of pushing Biden out of the 2024 race, but no. It's exactly the opposite. Biden has his public image as "a kindly uncle who loves Aviator sunglasses and ice cream," but his people want to "paint more complicated picture of Biden as a manager and president."

"Most Democrats interviewed, who insisted on anonymity to avoid alienating the White House, said flatly that they did not think Ms. Harris could win the presidency in 2024."

"Some said the party’s biggest challenge would be finding a way to sideline her without inflaming key Democratic constituencies that would take offense. Now with Mr. Biden appearing all but certain to run again, the concern over Ms. Harris has shifted to whether she will be a political liability for the ticket...."

From "Kamala Harris Is Trying to Define Her Vice Presidency. Even Her Allies Are Tired of Waiting. Ms. Harris is struggling to carve out a lane for herself in what may be one of the most consequential periods in the vice presidency" (NYT).

"Politically Incorrect was an American late-night, half-hour political talk show hosted by Bill Maher that ran from 1993 to 2002..."

"... first on Comedy Central and then on ABC. Four guests (usually including at least one comedian) would debate topics across the political spectrum in what Maher once described as 'The McLaughlin Group on acid.' Of the 1300+ episodes produced, 190 can be viewed on YouTube."

At the link (to Metafilter) there are links to those 190 videos, with the date of the show and the names of the guests. What a great resource! What did Bryan Cranston and Little Richard talk about on June 14, 2002? Don't you want to know what Phil Hartman brought to the table on March 14, 1997? Ray Davies (with Suzanne Somers!) on April 29, 1998. Way too many crazy match-ups to mention them all in this little post, so I'll leave you with this:

Politically Incorrect was cancelled by ABC in 2002, thanks to an incident that happened six days after 9/11. Maher and political conservative Dinesh D'Souza had this conversation on the show: