How Bill Maher Inadvertently Exposes the Left
Bill Maher shreds his fellow progressives more than most prominent liberals.
For starters, the host of HBO’s “Real Time with Bill Maher” is one of the few liberals who challenges progressive groupthink. Here are just a few examples:
- He’s called out the Left’s silence on Islam’s treatment of women, earning plenty of heat in the process.
- He praised how conservatives are willing to exchange ideas with liberals, something his fellow progressives too rarely do.
- He said the Social Justice Warriors’ attack on Amy Schumer’s recent film “I Feel Pretty” represents an assault on common sense.
Few of his peers are as pugnacious as Maher when they train their sites on their own team.
He does something else, though, that’s even more damaging to his ideological side. He’s probably unaware of its impact on the modern Left, though.
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For years Maher has said some of the most incendiary things during his comic rants. Terrible, hateful things. The kind of comments that would cost his fellow comedians their gigs, if not their livelihoods. Yet he’s emerged without a career nick or scrape.
- He compared Sarah Palin’s entire family to the inbred murderers from the classic horror film “The Hills Have Eyes.” Palin’s youngest child, Trig, has Down syndrome.
- He twice pined for a recession, which would directly diminish the lives of countless Americans, in order to stop President Donald Trump.
- He made a crude incest joke involving President Trump and First Daughter Ivanka Trump. Naturally, Newsweek ran the story as “conservatives pounce…”
- He dubbed a war widow President Trump’s “prop.“
- He called Sarah Palin the “c-word.”
The closest he came to a genuine backlash? When he used the “N-word” during a telecast. It wasn’t said in a cruel fashion, mind you. He was trying to make a point.
Most recently, Maher mocked the strong bond between Sens. Lindsay Graham and John McCain with this exchange:
“The fact that Trump can either find people like him or make him … Lindsey Graham needs the stabilizing influence of his dead boyfriend,” Maher said later…
Media outlets praised McCain for days following his Aug. 25 death following a fight with brain cancer. The Senator’s funeral received extensive media coverage, bringing together people from both sides of the ideological aisle in a rare showing of unity.
Sen. Graham’s admiration for his fellow legislator moved him to tears shortly after Sen. McCain’s passing.
That would lead observers to think Maher’s “dead boyfriend” crack would inspire instant outrage on two fronts. It’s distasteful to say the very least, and it’s one more example of liberal comics casting gay relationships in an unflattering light.
Just ask Jimmy Kimmel, the unofficial expert in this arena.
A few conservative web sites shared their shock at Maher’s comments. The Outrage Police stood down all the same.
Why?
It’s the same reason they’ve left Maher alone all this time. He’s a liberal attacking conservative targets. Those targets, to their thinking, do not deserve the same sort of protection liberals receive.
It’s important to remember the modern Left and the Outrage Nation are one and the same. Some conservatives decry select events or outburts, but the movement began on the Left and finds its greatest power there, too.
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In a more sober society, comedians could say virtually whatever they wish while pursuing laughs. They’re comedians, after all, not politicians running for local or national office. If their rhetoric turns off fans, they’ll start playing to empty clubs.
That, however, is not the world we currently live in. A comedian’s every utterance is dissected for hate or incorrect ideology.
Just ask Daniel Tosh, Norm Macdonald, Tracy Morgan, “Bob’s Burger” star H. Jon Benjamin.
Today’s comedians have to watch their every joke for fear of upending their career. It’s that serious.
Maher doesn’t follow those rules. He doesn’t have to, to be more precise He’s been an advocate for liberal causes for some time now, which makes him invaluable to the progressive movement.
He can say almost anything he wants without sparking a Outrage Alert. If those in constant outrage mode keep whistling while Maher says awful things over and again it makes one thing crystal clear.
The “outrage” is a pose for political purpsoses. Nothing more.