cali1981

I tend to cringe when Sullivan is a guest. He tries to dominate any discussion pounding everyone with his opinions as though they were brought down from the mount by Moses. He often presents himself as the ultimate expert on the American condition, which he certainly is not. I respect Malcolm Nance for engaging in a civil debate with Andrew although I suspect that if they were in the studio together, Nance might not have been so generous. When, in 2017, Nance was on with Milo Yiannopoulos after the latter was blathering on and on about the country, Malcolm asked him "are you an American?". When Milos said no, Malcolm just said "then go f&^k yourself". It was a classic.

I shut the TV off when Bill began the last new rule. It was the same old dogma that he rams down our throats every week. It really gets old.

The first interview was very good as was the panel. Larry Wilmore and Matt Welch are both very smart guys. As soon as the nutrition doc came on said, uh, oh and turned it off. I caught the new rules segment yesterday on HBO Go. They were OK but I think that Bill and his writers may be running out of steam. It's understandably difficult to keep writing A material in this situation but maybe it's time for Bill to go on a hiatus for a while. John Oliver's "One man behind a desk" format, is much better suited for the current times and the writing, even within the serious topics that he's covering every week, has been pretty sharp.

If I remember correctly didn't Mike also say that some destruction of property was OK because it was for a good cause? He's a bit of an idiot.

Last week's show was very good but tonight Bill is so far off the rails on Covid-19 that it's frightening. He is spouting the same crap that you hear from those who are Covid deniers. His trying to equate the 109,000 Covid deaths to the alleged 100,000 who die from hospital infections is absolute nonsense. Yeah Bill, even if the 100,00 number is true, it is spaced out over the course of a full year. Covid-19 has killed more people than that in a little over three months with no end in sight. His complaints about the lock downs are entirely self-serving. I'd like Bill to tell us how exactly he would have handled the situation once it it was known how deadly the virus was and how efficiently it was transmitted. Maybe he would have had the country conduct business as usual with, perhaps, some mild precautions. The death count would have probably been two to three times what it currently is. I'm just getting tired of Bill's oversized ego producing this kind of gibberish.

I actually shut it off not long into the interview with the doctor. Bill is using this shelter in home format to get on his soap box every week and grace us with his views on how and what we eat, how we live, etc. It began during the Tom Friedman interview and went on in the second interview. I'm tired of hearing it every week. Bill needs the live guest and panel format to keep him in line. Without it's become "why I believe everything is caused by.."

Bill just ignores some basic facts. Of course those with compromised immune systems are very vulnerable but this virus has killed many relatively healthy people in their 40s. It's also caused strokes in 20 and 30 year olds.

I don't know how many shows are left in this season but the more that I've watched, the more I feel that this remote interview only format really isn't working for Bill. As happened last night, some of the interviews get dragged out and sidetracked by Bill's grievances. By contrast John Oliver's non-interview based show has worked extremely well.

Then it will interesting to see where the numbers are next week. One problem with Georgia is that it's seeing a flood of out of state folks and what their Covid status is is gong to be largely unknown. Check this site out as well, https://covid19.topos.com/ I It's got highly detailed forensic/demographic info down to the county level in each state and may be doing a better tracking job than CDC right now.

The interview with Amash was 21 minute plus waste of time. Oh Justin became a hero to some when he bucked Trump and the Republican party but his ultra-conservative views are something out of the early 20th century. I'm surprised thast he doesn't support the gold standard. I say "begone with him"

My bad. It was broadcast on the cable news networks and was base on a Forbes article projecting the 40% increase that was eventually taken down. This chart was on a local news station in Georgia. The problem is that some of these states that are rushing to open haven't come close to meeting the very basic CDC guidelines and now that that Trump has pretty much emasculated the CDC, it's the wild west out there. There's a strong possibility that there will be spread of the virus in many of these states.

I was disturbed by the conversation with Amy Holmes. Bill, and to some degree, Amy seemed to be in a state of denial in regard to how deadly and easily transmitted Covid-19 really is. Maybe both of them should have looked at the latest numbers and how Georgia which couldn't wait to jump start its reopening is now showing a 40% spike in positive test results. I did agree with Bill's comments about Tara Reade and thought that the NY Times demanding that the DNC create a panel to "investigate " Reade's allegations was way out of line. Maybe the Times missed the fact that Reade was an ardent Bernie supporter who routinely bashed Biden during the primary run and, according to NY Magazine, is coordinating her public statements with a group of keyed in Bernie supporters the same ones who are calling on Biden to withdraw. Hmm...

I still enjoy the show but it sure has taken a bleak turn. Ed may have committed the first lunar murder. I'm hoping that he drained the airlock to disable the Russian rather than kill him but the latter did tacitly threaten Ed with his hammer when they met on the surface. The hard look on Ed's face while he watched the Russian gasping for air said a lot. You would also think the Russians would have sent up a cosmonaut who spoke some English since their module was so close to the American one. Obviously back home the cold war must be heating up and the two moon dwellers' paranoia reflects that. The dirtying up of Ted Kennedy is totally superfluous and unnecessary. Maybe one of the show runners has a political agenda here? Next week's episode is the finale so hopefully there will be a glimmer of optimism before the end. The only thing that I can think up is that, if Apollo 24 is lost (with the terrible irony of Deke Slayton, grounded for so many years, finally on a mission which may cost him his life) and the Russian is alive, that Ed goes back to Earth with him. It's probably asking too much though.

How infinite is the universe? Throw in Kellie and Derek and some others and the answer is "by about that much".

I'm sure that we can count on it but, hopefully, the show runners will have learned something about putting controversial political figures on the show. Probably not however. Maybe John Bolton will a "celebrity" dancer next season.