Every Troy McClure Project List

Troy McClure has always been one of my favorite Simpsons characters. I still remember where I was when I heard that Phil Hartman's wife had killed him in a bizarre murder/suicide; such a loss to entertainment. If you're like me, you'll read each of these in Troy's voice (click to embiggen). Hilarious.

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Lady Gaga's "Telephone" Video Controversy

At my book club meeting yesterday some of my friends were discussing Lady Gaga's newest controversial video "Telephone" featuring Beyoncé, which has apparently been banned on MTV and has been widely discussed in the media lately. Check it out (fair warning, it's rather longish):


Yeah, it's somewhat racy and overtly sexual but I honestly can't say that it's all that shocking or even anything I haven't seen many times before in other venues. In fact, in addition to the obvious Tarantino and Ritchie directorial influences it borrows quite heavily from already established pop culture (MTV's site has a handy guide), whilst also including some not too subtle capitalistic product placement. Now I don't claim to be a Lady Gaga expert (truth be told, I might not even know who she was if not for Internet memes) so I honestly don't know if this is typical of her videos or a radical and tangentially newsworthy departure but regardless, anything deemed controversial by those who know better than you what you should be watching/reading/ingesting/inserting must of course be rightfully decried and destroyed for your own good.

One of my favorite (and I'm assuming somewhat typical of many on the political and social right in this country) reactions comes from Sandy Rios, a FOX News contributor and the president of Culture Campaign, an Illinois-based organization whose mission is "to engage Christians in actively living out and declaring biblical truth in a secular, humanistic American culture" commenting on Megyn Kelly's "news" program America Live today (transcribed by me):

It's the kind of thing we shouldn't even be discussing, much less thinking about from my perspective.

Quite right. Who am I as a rational adult to decide for myself what I should be discussing or even thinking when there are religious folks like Sandy Rios around to tell me what to think? And I'm sure you all remember the clause in the First Amendment to the American Constitution that mentions how free speech that anyone else finds objectionable should be censored for everyone's protection by our nanny state government, right? Oh wait, that clause doesn't exist because that line of thought is total bullshit and just this side of fascist totalitarianism.

But Sandy Rios and her conservative Christian ilk think that it definitely should exist (apparently governmental overreach into the lives of American citizens only exists when it comes to taxes and health care). Here's her reaction to Megyn's incredibly obvious and frankly very patriotic statement that this is art and if you don't like it you should just change the channel and not watch it rather than trying to get it banned for everyone:

You know I'll tell you, I'll give a real simple answer to that: you know that our world is filled with sexual predators. You talk about this every day in the news, these girls that are molested and killed and I don't know if you know this or not Megyn but they've done surveys to find out the men who do these kinds of things to these young girls, something like 85% of them, are involved in some sort of porn. So you may not watch it, your kids may not watch it, but I'm telling you the man next door who's a sexual predator probably does watch it and it has an effect on all of us. This should be outlawed, it should be banned.

What is the phrase "involved in some sort of porn" supposed to mean? Since it seems pretty unlikely that 85% of sexual predators have actually appeared in pornos (not a smart move if you're trying not to get arrested for molestation or rape) I'll assume that she means that 85% of those guys have merely used or seen pornography at some point. Now I have neither research nor polling numbers to back this up but I'd be pretty surprised if someone told me that less than 85% of all men had used or seen porn of some sort or another, much less those who are sexual predators. What kind of sheltered, wishful thinking version of reality is this woman living in where she's this ignorant of the fundamental underlying aspects of human nature and sexuality?

And I think I've heard this argument for why adults shouldn't be allowed to participate in adult behaviour and commit victimless "crimes" with other consenting adults somewhere before. Oh, yeah:


Be it tobacco, alcohol, drugs, gambling or sex I'm sick and tired of hearing the excuse that these things must be forever expunged from every facet of our society because someone else can't or won't be a responsible parent and teach their kids the difference between what's appropriate for children and what's appropriate for adults. Say it with me, soccer moms: "That's only for grown ups!" The problem of course is that for people like Sandy Rios that distinction just isn't enough; adults must also be protected from all things adult because we're just bigger children with the same intellectual and moral deficiencies as our smaller versions.

On that note, one of my favorite quotes/rants ever is by Denis Leary's character Edgar Friendly from the movie Demolition Man:

You see, according to Cocteau's plan, I'm the enemy, 'cause I like to think; I like to read. I'm into freedom of speech and freedom of choice. I'm the kind of guy who likes to sit in a greasy spoon and wonder, "Gee, should I have the T-bone steak or the jumbo rack of barbecued ribs with the side order of gravy fries?" I WANT high cholesterol. I wanna eat bacon and butter and BUCKETS of cheese, okay? I want to smoke a Cuban cigar the size of Cincinnati in the non-smoking section. I want to run through the streets naked with green Jell-o all over my body reading Playboy magazine. Why? Because I suddenly might feel the need to, okay, pal? I've SEEN the future. Do you know what it is? It's a 47-year-old virgin sitting around in his beige pajamas, drinking a banana-broccoli shake, singing "I'm an Oscar Meyer Wiener.

Word. Keep your goddamn government hands off my Medicare and just do your job: telling me and other free adults what thoughts we can have in our heads and what substances/objects we can put into our bodies. That's the American way.

[Update: You can watch an edited clip of the FOX News interview here. And it appears that the reports of MTV banning the music video were false. Good on them for supporting free speech rights.]

The Simpsons A Cappella

I've been an outspoken opponent of a cappella music ever since I got into a knock-down, drag-out bar fight with Bobby McFerrin back in the late-eighties (no that never really happened, although I have found that people who are big fans of a cappella do generally tend to be fairly annoying on many other fronts) but this all vocal version of The Simpsons theme is quite accurate and impressive:


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Something Someone Else Said

"I realize that postage stamps are not issued, these days, with the same serious intent as when they featured George Washington, Abraham Lincoln and so on. But really--the Simpsons? This stamp series will be issued on May 7...

I'm probably one of the last people in America who has never seen an episode of The Simpsons. I've heard it's a funny show. But is this really the sort of achievement that we should use postage stamps to commemorate?" -John Hinderaker, Powerline.com

How to announce to the entire world that you're an out of touch, humorless, right-wing douche: trash talk one of the funniest, smartest, longest-running shows on television, and then admit that you've never even watched it. This is why right-wing attempts at comedy die such quick and spectacular deaths...

Suddenly Last Supper

Jeremy Barker at Popped Culture has compiled 101 satirical versions of Leonardo da Vinci’s The Last Supper, covering everything from the Justice League to the Folsom Street Fair to the Church of Scientology.

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New Simpsons Opening

Sorry it took me so long to come across this new HD opening sequence for the Simpsons. I unknowingly flipped past it on my DVR last week:

Doughnut-Shaped Universe Model

Some readers might remember my post from last year in which I accused Stephen Hawking and other physicists of stealing Homer Simpson's idea of a doughnut-shaped universe. Well, it appears that the idea has caught on and now they've designed a fairly sharp looking scale model:

At first, this polished object looks like an ordinary ring. But it's much more than that. This is a model of the universe, which, according to one increasingly popular theory, is not flat, circular, spherical or saddle-shaped, but more like a "3-torus," or doughnut shape. It's also a whole lot bigger then you may have imagined.

Look closer, and you'll notice a minuscule speck on this model. It looks like a tiny flaw at first, but upon closer inspection, you'll see it's a precise wine glass shape. That's us. The tiny area depicts the known universe, showing a timeline of its entire life, from the Big Bang starting at the glass's stem, expanding to where we live today.

Feeling tiny and insignificant yet? I thought I smelled doughnuts.

Election Day: Please Vote

It's no secret that I hope Barack Obama wins the election today but regardless I encourage everyone to go out and get your sticker just like our man Homer here; let's hope you have considerably less trouble in the booth:

Photoshopped News

After New York Times reporters Jacques Steinberg and Steve Radicliffe wrote a piece critical of Fox News last week, the channel got it's revenge by putting up photoshopped pictures of the two men making them look less attractive. As you can see, Steinberg's teeth were yellowed, his nose and chin were widened, his ears were made to protrude more and the shadows under his eyes were darkened. The antisemitic aspects of enlarging the nose of a man with one of the Jewiest surnames ever aside, this is just beyond the bounds of professional journalism; of course, it's not the first time Fox News has tried to pull something like this:

How are these guys still taken seriously as a news organization?

Homer Simpson, Cosmologist

First, an article published this week in Nature News:

The doughnut is making a comeback – at least as a possible shape for our Universe.

The idea that the universe is finite and relatively small, rather than infinitely large, first became popular in 2003, when cosmologists noticed unexpected patterns in the cosmic microwave background (CMB) – the relic radiation left behind by the Big Bang.

Now, this exchange in Moe's Tavern between Homer Simpson and physicist Stephen Hawking from the episode "They Saved Lisa's Brain" on May 9, 1999:

Hawking: Your theory of a donut shaped universe is intriguing Homer, I may have to steal it.

Homer: Wow, I can't believe someone I never heard of is hanging out with a guy like me.

It appears Hawking and his colleagues made good on his threat.

Every Simpsons Couch Gag Ever

Like watching hundreds of tiny art films; "Night of the Living Couches" has always been one of my favorites, specifically Moe all liquored up and holding his booths at bay with the 12 gauge: