S05.E11: Crisis in Venezuela

[Athena]

Quote

Other segments: Michael Cohen consulting payments
Guests: Wilmer Valderrama

 

[Lantern7]

FYI: Tonight’s episode is scheduled to run from 11:20-11:51.

[ahisma]

John could have mentioned that the Bush White House had actually supported the short-lived coup against Chavez in 2002. The point stands that Maduro is screwing up Venezuela all on his own, though, by being a moron about economics.

[attica]

To John's point about Hoover: "They didn't know how vaginas worked back then." John, honey, they really still don't.

[ganesh]

The mark "working" for InfoWars and the super chill Bernie girl killed me. Because yeah, Bernie being elected automatically would cause our systems of checks and balances to immediately evaporate and he'd become a dictator. The droll delivery of "I just want people to have healthcare" just killed me. And when the mark started doing her deal, the other one just drank her latte and just looked at her. She was so over those people. 

Edited May 14, 2018 by ganesh

[atlantaloves]

My favorite line from the snotty Bernie Chill Chick was "Your brain is just full of worms man".  God she was stoned. 

[VCRTracking]

Both "Sassy Popeye" and the InfoWars blonde would be infuriating to me in different ways, but I could still probably hang out with the ridiculously chill Bernie supporter just getting blazed and wearing nautical outfits together.

Edited May 14, 2018 by VCRTracking

[ganesh]

13 minutes ago, atlantaloves said:

My favorite line from the snotty Bernie Chill Chick was "Your brain is just full of worms man".  God she was stoned. 

It was so great because InfoWars was all gearing up to do her deal and the other one is just drinking the coffee or whatever. 

[Lantern7]

Wilmer Valderama in a parrot suit, referring to John as “Zazu.” I think that we get such “twists” not because it’s HBO, but that John tries to keep up with the increasingly bizarre landscape.

[meowmommy]

2 hours ago, ganesh said:

It was so great because InfoWars was all gearing up to do her deal and the other one is just drinking the coffee or whatever. 

What I don't get is why InfoWars didn't just bury this clip, since it didn't exactly promote their cause very well.  And yes, she was clearly baked to a crisp.

[attica]

Based on the gasp/groan of the audience, I think "Jim Jones's Juice Cleanse" is a joke I'll have to work into repertoire. It's macabre x a million.

[ganesh]

44 minutes ago, meowmommy said:

What I don't get is why InfoWars didn't just bury this clip, since it didn't exactly promote their cause very well.  And yes, she was clearly baked to a crisp.

From their pov, it's probably used as like, "look at this stupid liberal who doesn't know Bernie will make people eat rats" when in reality, as she stated, she voted for Bernie because she wanted people to get healthcare, so she actually knew something about something. 

I've watched it 3 times. I love this woman so much. How she was holding the coffee and casually unaffected by the ranting woman in front of her. There's a hard beat after the InfoWars woman snots, "But I just told you they eat rats!" where she seems to blink and get that these people are crazy - "oh my god you people have worms for brains."

[Victor the Crab]

I don't give a bowl of pig's shit just how "super chill" (stoned) that Bernie girl was. I consider her as big a fucking idiot as the InfoWars "journalist" who was lamely asking such unbelievably ignorant questions.

[TV Anonymous]

My regret from this episode is that Valderrama did not address Maduro in Spanish.

[OneWhoLurks]

Quote

 

Ambassador Camilo Reyes rejected the joke.

“The scourge of drugs is no laughing matter for us,” said the former foreign minister of Ernesto Samper, who became president in 1994 with the financial support of the now-defunct Cali Cartel.

“Colombia and Colombians have paid the highest price — the price of human lives — in the global fight against this scourge,” according to the ambassador.

 

Colombia rejects John Oliver corruption joke

[Danny Franks]

On 14/05/2018 at 5:32 PM, ganesh said:

It was so great because InfoWars was all gearing up to do her deal and the other one is just drinking the coffee or whatever. 

InfoWars girl was exactly what I'd expect her to be. Ramping up her own outraged anger, predicated on a cause that was completely imagined. That seems like the way the right wing media operates, in the vast majority of cases.

The other girl seemed fairly clueless about the risks of such straight-line thinking socialism, coupled with unwise policy choices, and not really interested in learning anything (though what could ever be learned from someone brandishing an InfoWars microphone, I can't imagine). But she did point out, accidentally, that having socialist medicine, or progressive taxation, or any one of a number of left-leaning policies, does not mean that a country will become Venezuela or Soviet Russia.

But I see plenty of people who use Venezuela as though it's some argument-destroying example, and as soon as someone points out that it's not as simple as saying "socialism = people eating rats and throwing poop", they can't handle it.

Edited May 17, 2018 by Danny Franks

[ganesh]

13 minutes ago, Danny Franks said:

Ramping up her own outraged anger, predicated on a cause that was completely imagined.

She thinks she's going to be the next Coulter, but she's an unpaid intern spouting intelligible nonsense for a confirmed snake oil salesman. 

15 minutes ago, Danny Franks said:

But I see plenty of people who use Venezuela as though it's some argument-destroying example, and as soon as someone points out that it's not as simple as saying "socialism = people eating rats and throwing poop", they can't handle it.

This was actually a common bot narrative on social media at the time. 

[Annber03]

4 hours ago, Danny Franks said:

InfoWars girl was exactly what I'd expect her to be. Ramping up her own outraged anger, predicated on a cause that was completely imagined. That seems like the way the right wing media operates, in the vast majority of cases.

The other girl seemed fairly clueless about the risks of such straight-line thinking socialism, coupled with unwise policy choices, and not really interested in learning anything (though what could ever be learned from someone brandishing an InfoWars microphone, I can't imagine). But she did point out, accidentally, that having socialist medicine, or progressive taxation, or any one of a number of left-leaning policies, does not mean that a country will become Venezuela or Soviet Russia.

But I see plenty of people who use Venezuela as though it's some argument-destroying example, and as soon as someone points out that it's not as simple as saying "socialism = people eating rats and throwing poop", they can't handle it.

All of this. A lot of people throw around terms like "socialism" and "communism" nowadays without really understanding the definitions of those words, or those systems of government, or stuff like that. Apparently anything even vaguely left-leaning is automatically some kind of socialist/communist takeover or whatever in some people's eyes, which...no. 

[Hanahope]

I so appreciate John's stories about other topics we don't normally hear from our 'regular news' like Venezuela.  I had no idea of the problems they have from their incompetent leader.  Course, maybe this is all a warning story about incompetent leaders.

[Annber03]

2 hours ago, Hanahope said:

I so appreciate John's stories about other topics we don't normally hear from our 'regular news' like Venezuela.  I had no idea of the problems they have from their incompetent leader.  Course, maybe this is all a warning story about incompetent leaders.

I suppose that's one weirdly comforting thing about this show-we're reminded that our country is far from being alone in having shitty people running it.