"Political Humor, With Charity for None" II

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"Political Humor, With Charity for None" II

Post by Riddick » 11-20-2011 11:51 PM



Some of the latest remarks from America's Forgotten Satirist (from mortsahl.com)

One thing about being narrow-minded: you'll never be lonely.

Obama says his recreation consists of reading the Constitution…looking for a loophole.

Those who learn nothing from history are condemned to rewrite it.

Now that Obama is at war in a 3rd country, does that mean he has to give back his Nobel Peace Prize?

There's a danger our fiscal bankruptcy might overtake our moral bankruptcy.

Hillary’s explanation of the Libyan action to Congress was so good, I wonder who explained it to her?

Those who the gods would make rich and famous on TV, they first drive mad.

Obama is running again for spite.

When Obama ran, he said, "We can change the world!" The world: CAN YOU CHANGE IT BACK?!


For even more Mort, click HERE
Last edited by Riddick on 06-04-2016 01:59 AM, edited 2 times in total.

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Post by bobbo » 11-21-2011 02:49 PM

I'm embarassed to say, I thought he died years ago. That thud was just his career huh?

"Making it" in Hollywood. Tough nut.
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Post by Riddick » 11-21-2011 02:58 PM

Image
Mort Sahl: Improvising a new life
Excerpted from marinij.com

Mort Sahl, one of the all-time greats of comedy, was nursing a cup of afternoon coffee the other day in a booth at Piazza D'Angelo, an Italian restaurant and occasional celebrity hangout that has become his place of choice for interviews in Mill Valley, his new hometown.

The 83-year-old grandfather of political humor left Southern California a year or so ago and moved into an apartment in Mill Valley to get back on his feet... A decade and a half after the emotional devastation of losing his only child, Sahl is recovering from the heartbreak of a divorce and the lingering physical effects of a minor stroke.

Age and frailty aside, he's kept his post-collegiate look and image. He had on his trademark V-neck sweater, this one a handsome turquoise. He still has a full head of hair, once dark, now pewter.

And in the age of the 24-hour news cycle, he stays on top of current events, just as he did in the 1950s and early '60s, when he was revolutionizing stand-up comedy with a new brand of irreverent contemporary humor, stalking the stage with a rolled up newspaper in his fist, ripping into friends and foes alike.

"Mentally, he can run circles around people," said Lucy Mercer, founder and director of the 142 Throckmorton Theatre in Mill Valley, where Sahl will perform Aug. 14. "He's always current."
...
Sahl may have paved the way for hip topical comics like Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert, but he finds their humor "kind of soft." They don't draw blood like he did in his heyday, he complains. And when reverential younger comics ask his advice, he tells them to "take more chances."
...
Back in the day, Sahl got his start in San Francisco, breaking through nationally while working at Enrico Banducci's Hungry i in North Beach and living for a time in Sausalito.

A year or so ago, he heard about the Mill Valley theater through his friend Woody Allen, who performed there with his band. It would become his sanctuary from the turmoil of his life in Southern California.

"Everything was falling apart for me in L.A. professionally and personally, too," he said. "I lived in the same house in Beverly Hills for 43 years, but L.A. has gotten out of reach. So I came up to where I could talk to people. It was lucky for me here the first time."
...
Saul considers himself a "radical" politically. And unlike most of his Marin neighbors, he did not support Barack Obama. When he points out what he sees as the disappointments of the Obama administration, Throckmorton audiences sometimes have a hard time laughing.

"The last time I was at the theater for Lucy, I went out there and opened up, saying, 'No, he can't.' But they weren't going to acknowledge it. It was like being in a church. There wasn't a sound."

By and large, though, Marin has embraced its newest celebrity resident, respecting his legendary status in the world of comedy.

Asked how he likes his new home so far, he didn't miss a beat.

"You can't not like it here," he said. "Everybody is pretty civilized. Anyway, what you think you don't like is stuff you don't like in yourself. It's not in your surroundings."

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Post by bobbo » 11-21-2011 04:07 PM

"You can't not like it here," he said. "Everybody is pretty civilized. Anyway, what you think you don't like is stuff you don't like in yourself. It's not in your surroundings." //// Easy for anyone living in Mill Valley to say. What would be in "him" if he were moved to Compton (LA) or Downtown Oakland (Flat Lands) or Philly (South Side). All that poverty, disease, filth, commotion, condoms on the benches, needles on the street, no jobs, no education, no where to go==that would be in him?

I'd like to see him run circles around that.
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Post by Riddick » 11-21-2011 05:44 PM

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Post by bobbo » 11-22-2011 12:30 AM

Still thinking in metaphors. Sharp as a whip.......ummmm.....sharp as a stick?-------fast as a whip?.........

I'm no Mort Sahl. Hope I'm half as sharp at his age.
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Re: "Political Humor, With Charity for None" II

Post by Riddick » 06-04-2016 01:56 AM

A mind should not be so open that the brains fall out; however, it should not be so closed that whatever gray matter which does reside may not be reached. ART BELL

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Satirist Mort Sahl Riffs On Jon Stewart

Post by Riddick » 06-04-2016 02:42 AM

On the night Jon Stewart departed the air, Mort Sahl took the stage at the Throckmorton Theatre in Mill Valley, caustic, topical, angry, maybe a little paranoid, and funny, still funny.

As Bruce Springsteen rocked Stewart off the stage, Sahl, at 88, relied on a friend and a cane to steady him as he made his way to the spotlight. He didn’t bring his trademark rolled up newspaper, and can’t see as well as he did when print was king.

But for comics who riff off the news and politics, Sahl is the model, though he is unimpressed with the new breed, Stewart included.

“He is so reverent with Democrats,” Sahl told me.

Showing zero reverence to the Democrat in the Oval Office, Sahl points out that Obama failed to close Guantánamo, and remains engaged in Middle East wars. The full story of CIA torture has not been told, in his view, nor has that of the 9/11 attacks.

“The liberals want to feel noble. ‘I voted for a black guy made in a lab by white guys.’ ”

Are there no sharp young satirists? “None. … It is not political satire to be a Jewish kid working in New York and pretend to worry about poor people and talk to people like yourself. They idealize Obama. … That is not political satire. It is soft.”

“You have to hold people up to the mirror, and if the mirror cracks, so be it.”

What about the current presidential candidates? He appreciates Rand Paul for going after the National Security Agency. He sort of likes that Trump has made money. He likes that Bernie Sanders seems to believe in the need to help poor people. But it’s not the job of satirists to love politicians.

“The CIA is running the country. I said that in 1964. They’re more powerful than ever.”

Sahl will make you think while you laugh. He’s far angrier and more pessimistic than Stewart. But maybe Stewart will get there when he is 88.

Read more here: http://www.sacbee.com/opinion/opn-colum ... rylink=cpy


BONUS VID!
Mort Sahl 2016 Presidential Election-A Voters Guide

https://www.facebook.com/mortsahl/video ... 702501789/
A mind should not be so open that the brains fall out; however, it should not be so closed that whatever gray matter which does reside may not be reached. ART BELL

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Re: "Political Humor, With Charity for None" II

Post by Riddick » 07-03-2016 01:53 AM

A mind should not be so open that the brains fall out; however, it should not be so closed that whatever gray matter which does reside may not be reached. ART BELL

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Mort Sahl RIP

Post by Riddick » 10-27-2021 11:06 PM

* “I’ve arranged with my executor to be buried in Chicago. Because when I die, I want to still remain active politically.”

Mort Sahl, who strolled onstage with a newspaper and shook up the comedy world in the 1950s and ’60s with a groundbreaking critical look at American life and politics, died on Tuesday at the age of 94, the New York Times and Washington Post reported.

Widely considered the father of modern political satire, Sahl was credited with influencing comedians such as George Carlin, Woody Allen and Jonathan Winters. He was also a friend of another comedy mold-breaker, Lenny Bruce, although his act did not include profanity as Bruce’s did.

Sahl took the stage with a newspaper and only an outline of an act while perching on a stool and relying on improvisation and responding to his audience. He would read from the newspaper to launch his comic riffs on the day’s events with a quick-fire delivery that earned him the nickname “Rebel Without a Pause.” He simply declared: “Onward” when he was ready to change topics.

“It wasn’t that he did political comedy – as everyone keeps insisting,” Allen was quoted as saying in the book “Seriously Funny: The Rebel Comedians of the 1950s and 1960s.”

“It was that he had genuine insights. He made the country receptive to a kind of comedy it wasn’t used to hearing. He made the country listen to jokes that required them to think,” said Allen, the filmmaker and comedian.

As Sahl often told his audience: “I don’t tell jokes. I give little lectures.”

Sahl described himself to the New York Times in 2004 as a populist, a Puritan, a dreamer and a “disturber.” He would ask his audiences: “Is there any group I haven’t offended yet?” and he spared neither Republican nor Democrat.

Even in his 90s, Sahl performed weekly at a theater near his Mill Valley, California, home, with the shows being livestreamed on the internet. He had been a close friend of Robin Williams, who lived nearby, before the comic actor’s suicide in 2014.

FULL STORY

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