WHEN I’M WRONG, I’M WRONG. WELL, I WAS WRONG. ROSEANNE HATES THE JEWS. AND THE BLACKS. PROBABLY THE MUPPETS.

Mike Binder on July 4, 2023

Last week, I wrote a piece on Roseanne not being a Holocaust denier on Theo’s podcast. I stuck up for her, saying that she was being facetious. I guess I was wrong. I received some serious blowback and was told to do some digging by people who apparently are a lot smarter than I am. They claimed to have evidence that she had been a Holocaust denier for years, with reams of receipts showing old Roseanne to be hating on Jews, and even on Blacks. They made me feel like a simpleton. So, I asked them to point me to these receipts because I had rushed to judgment and was too quick to defend Roseanne and Theo.

One person, who goes by the name MINDOG, (Mindog on Youtube and. Twitter) and claims to be something of a Roseanne expert, called me a bastard and told me to look into her old tweets. Another person, JANE DANE, a multiple email writer with too much time on her hands, told me to read “any of the many” articles about Roseanne’s anti-Semitism and even mentioned a photo of her posing as Hitler baking cookies in an oven. She called me a “pathetic creep” and reminded me of how bad “Mind of the Married Man” was (a show she apparently watched every week).

Since they seemed to have more or less accurate information about me, I assumed they must be right about Roseanne as well. But when I did the research they suggested, all I found was a long history of Roseanne being an ardent supporter of Jews, Israel, and even someone who watched the Nuremberg trials with her mother as a child, and was deeply disturbed by the atrocities. I found evidence of her own sense of guilt over her past  mistakes, dumb tweets, and the apologies she sent out to people she had offended, including George Soros and Valerie Jarrett. It seemed like she was incredibly hard on herself and genuinely wanted to make amends, even though she kept making more mistakes, telling jokes that didn’t land or making unfounded comments. But she was always sincerely a Jewish woman who strongly stood up for her people.

As I said last week, is she a little nutty? Yeah, so what? She’s a comic, an artist. If she hadn’t been a Trump supporter, most of the people criticizing her would simply walk past the comments without a second thought. That’s the truth, and that’s the real problem. We all think our opinions are correct, so much more grounded and well founded than those of others, but guess what? They’re not. We don’t know anything. None of us do. This is God’s world, and we’re just passing the time. The truth will unfold. However, as Americans, we damn well better be open to others having opinions different and opposed from ours.

At worst, Roseanne made a dumb Holocaust joke that didn’t land. I still believe she was talking about the 2020 election and that’s what offended people. But if it was the Holocaust that caused the anger, as my good friend, another comedian, argues, then it’s even worse. He claims we can’t allow people to make Holocaust jokes, to dress as Hitler giving out cookies. This will just trivialize it all and it has to be stopped. I say bullshit.

That kind of thinking leads to cancellations and ostracization. In another twenty-five years, maybe even less, it could lead to jail time. And after that, we’ll be in a place where drawing anti-Holocaust cartoons in a small newspaper justifies sending a hit squad up the steps to kill everyone on the staff as a strong message. Jewish Fatwas on any comic who finds any of this funny. Mel Brooks got off easy. The next fucker will pay!

Canceling Roseanne, Theo, or any stand-up comic for anything is a bad joke. Don’t do it. God bless Elon Musk for airing Theo’s episode, and fuck you, YouTube. Fuck you. You take everyone’s money, wield all this power, and think you have the right to censor us? I was just on a friend’s podcast, and they got all hush-hush when I teased about vaccine jokes because they didn’t want to be demonetized. Fuck you, YouTube! Fuck you Google. I can’t wait for you to become MySpace. Don’t mess with Theo Von or anyone else. Just take the money and shut the fuck up. No one cares anymore about what you think is misinformation or disinformation. Just take the money and shut the fuck up, or we’ll come up with better platforms, and you’ll become MySpace. It can happen. Fast.

And no, Roseanne is not a Holocaust denier. She’s a standard issue nutbag. So what? So is your sister.

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HERE’S THE REAL REASON ROSEANNE NEEDS TO BE CANCELED AGAIN. (MAYBE TAKE THEO VON OUT TOO!)

Mike Binder on June 30, 2023

She thinks no Jews died in the Holocaust? I mean why believe that? Why not just keep trying to make us believe that the World Trade Center buildings were wired in advance to collapse like stacks of pancakes? I mean, do people have that much time on their hands? How bad does Roger Friedman at Showbiz 411 or Room 222 or whatever his sad little website is called need the click bounce from Drudge that he got to start this new forest fire under Roseanne’s ass all over again?

People are saying, “Listen to the whole interview with Theo Von, it vindicates her.” She doesn’t need vindication. You can listen to the truncated one Roger posted to know she wasn’t saying, “Zero Jews died in the Holocaust.” Not at all. It’s damn clear she isn’t saying that. She’s using that as an ironclad, unimpeachable truth to poke fun at something she sees as maybe not seen as so firm and certain: the 2020 election. That’s most likely the heart of the new round of heat.

Yet, ‘they’ just think it’s a better, smarter, more incandescent thing to go after her for. ‘She’s a Holocaust denier.’ ‘She’s evil.’ ‘She’s out of her mind.’ ‘She has to be stopped.’ ‘She shouldn’t be allowed to speak.’

THE REAL STORY

She’s a comic. She was messing around with another comic. That’s the real reason to take her down again. She’s an election denier. And she was being one in a world populated with storm troopers that are poised to jump on anyone that isn’t on their team who say or do anything they think they can exploit. Good one, Roger. You know damn well what she was getting at. Good one, folks that bought Drudge. Good one to all the others that jumped on her this time.

Theo Von thankfully came out in defense of Roseanne.

CAN’T STOP STUPID

That didn’t stop the foolish and the feeble minded. YouTube still took the episode down. Largely thanks to a professional defamer like this guy; Ronald Lauder, the head of the World Jewish League of over-reactors, or whatever Jewish board of whatever he’s the head of, who issued the following stupid statement:

“I am calling on both Apple Music, and Spotify to remove this content from their streaming libraries immediately, for as long as Theo Von’s hateful voice is carried on their platforms, he is in league with those who wish harm to Jews the world over.”

Yeah, sure, Theo Von is in league with those who wish harm to Jews all over the world.

YOU EVER LISTEN TO THEO?

He doesn’t have a mean bone in his body. He probably doesn’t even know what a matzo ball is. He’s got no gripe with anyone. He likes Roseanne because she’s a stand-up. That’s his tribe. She makes him laugh. Roseanne is a great comic when she’s knuckles down and wants to be. One of the best. Was this funny? Maybe not. She was on a podcast, talking about what her truth is. She doesn’t see the 2020 election as having been real. Get the F over it! I don’t see the Gore election as having been real. I’ll whine about it every chance I get.

Hillary Clinton and her back up band were saying Trump was illegitimate his whole term starting ten minutes into the damn thing. They spent the whole time leading up to his inaugural trying to do everything they could to get the election annulled, started a fake Russian campaign on his administration with illegal misinformation that Clinton paid for, and when he was inaugurated they burned the city up, smashing shit to pieces calling themselves the ‘resistance,’ then lived up to it for four years. So don’t memory hole us all, fellas. Let Roseanne whine if she wants, and if she does, don’t try to gaslight her and us into her being a Holocaust denier because she isn’t. She just isn’t.

OUT OF THEIR MINDS

Is she a little nutty? Uh… Yeah. So are all the people going after her. Out of their minds nutty. Like dogs chasing after cars with low bumpers that are gonna smash their heads in when they slam on the brakes at the first red light. They all need to settle down. In the past I gave Roseanne on here, a hard time because she didn’t do a great Fox Nation special. Because she wasted a prime opportunity to speak her mind. To use her platform. Say what she wanted to say. That being said, she’s a strong comic with a unique voice when she’s in the game skipping rope. Joe Rogan and Tony Hinchcliffe and the Austin, TX, new era gatekeepers have given her safe harbor, which I respect. They gave her new wind in a similar way they did Shane Gillis after Lorne Michaels blew his shot with him.

For people to think they can take Roseanne down again now is bullshit.

HOW DARE SHE?

I’d like to see some big-time Democrats, Valerie Jarrett, maybe RFK Jr., or Susan Rice, stick up for her. Tell people to back off. Stick up for cooling the waters. That won’t happen, I know, but let’s be real, no one in their right mind believes this one. Believes Rosanne Barr is a Holocaust Denier. Is it something not to joke about? Maybe. But I don’t know. Are we getting close to not drawing pictures of the big Muslim Kahuna time? Is anything really that scared that we can start tearing people apart for cartoons or sarcastic comments? They just want to hate. That’s at the bottom of this dark pit. They want to hate because she’s talking about 2020 with 2024 up over the next hill. How dare she? We told everyone two nights after the election it was the fairest election ever, and so it was over and that was that. Quit mentioning it. The hell with Roseanne for doing it again. She’s got it coming. She must have taken some horse pills or something.

CAN YOU HANDLE THE TRUTH?

You want the truth? Can you handle the truth? I think Theo Von is CIA. I do. I think he’s a CIA boy. A plant. I don’t even think he’s from the South. I think he’s a Jewish kid from Manhattan who’s putting it all on. Playing dumb. Setting good people like Roseanne up. Getting her to talk shit about the election and the Holocaust. A two-fer. A double banger. You don’t get that lucky and have this kind of publicity if you’re just a funny-as-hell hick with goofy hair. You have to be a Langley-trained Jewish CIA guy. You have to be playing four levels of inter-political-hate chess to know full well how to bring the Hebrew Comic Roseanne, the right-wing hubba-hubba crowd, the anti-Holocaust hoo-hoo-ers,  and all the Bannon boy bootlickers tumbling down with one magic bullet. Lee Harvey Oswald was a CIA boy. So is Theo Von.

Theo Von knew where this was going. Listen to the whole podcast. He sits there playing naive. Playing simple. He ain’t simple. In ‘Theo talk’; he’s ‘setting Mama up’ . He’s good. Sorry Youtube, #4 on Spotify.

 

I guess, what I’m really saying is lighten up. Lighten up on Roseanne, lighten up on Theo, lighten up on the Dems, the Repubs, the North and on the South. Just lighten up. Lighten up on yourself.

As my buddy Milton Dicus used to say, LIGHTEN THE FUCK UP!!

Love you!

 

Check out our Tweet of the day if you want to see a longer version of the exchange with Rosanne than Roger put up.

 

Thanks,

AND P.S. IF YOU’RE IN LA, COME SEE ME AT THE WORLD FAMOUS COMEDY STORE, WEDS JULY 5! 8PM GREAT SHOW.

 

 

 

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NETFLIX DROPS THE WORST COMEDY SPECIAL SINCE HANNAH GADSBY’S NANETTE. WOW!! NOT EASY. 85 SOUTH.

Mike Binder on June 27, 2023

 

Yeah, okay, for the past little while, Netflix has become synonymous with some great stand-up comedy specials. They’ve done so much right you can’t fault them. But like everyone, every now and then they shit their pants and it’s a long walk home at the end of the night. This one is a trek through the woods with a loaded pair of underwear for somebody.

CHICO BEAN, KARLOUS MILLER, DC YOUNG FLY

Look, I know how popular these guys are with their podcasts, and even as separate comedians. I also know their tours sell out like umbrellas on a rainy day in London, but this was their first Netflix special. They had Stan Lathan, one of the best, if not the current premiere stand-up director helming this thing. Rikki Hughes was their producer, who, like Stan, knows her game when it comes to producing, and it had so much more going for it. Have some bits prepared. I get it, it’s an ‘on the fly’ show. It’s cool to call it that, but have some shit prepared! They came off like f-ing amateurs. It took them twenty-five minutes to crack a joke. Not one f-ing joke. Twenty-five minutes in. It was painful. Like watching a pony die.

PREEN AROUND THE STAGE

I really wanted to love this thing. I love to laugh, and I like their stuff, but they just preen around the stage, yelling back and forth at each other with this great set behind them, sharp cinematography, and strong musicians that they keep stepping on, and an enthusiastic audience that is quickly realizing they’re going to have to fake an orgasm if they’re going to have one. It’s so disappointing.

I’m serious. These guys owe Netflix some money back, or at the very least, they owe Ted Sarandos and Robbie Praw some yard work. If you think I’m wrong, view it. You’ll likely agree with me. The only time there’s any joy to the whole thing is when the two musical acts come out: Rich Homie Quan and Goodie Mob, which is Cee-Lo Green’s group.  The music acts are both first class and they do light the audience up, which is a good thing so you know they’re not comatose or high as hell, because they’re truly not laughing very hard at the three funny guys.

Oh and by the way, even here, the three ‘not as funny tonight as ‘Hannah Gadsby is on a bad night guys’ don’t even scoot off and let the musicians do their thing. They stay there and step all over them. Even with the woman Violinist at the beginning and the Tuba player. They go on and on about what a cool move it is to have them both on a show, and when they start to do a solo, cut them off in 10 seconds yammering on about some stuff that once again is void of comedy.

A low point of the special is when they try to do a ‘Bumping Mics’ ‘Roast Battle’ kind of thing. All they do is make you realize how good Jeff Ross, Brian Moses, Dave Attel, and that whole gang are. These guys don’t land any punches on one another at all. It’s like watching three blindfolded old ladies slap fight. Every wallop thrown misses so badly the audience is finally laughing at the futility.  Some of the stuff is their inside jokes that we just don’t get,  Karlous and D.C. making each other laugh at something at Chico Bean’s expense, but it’s such an over the top miss, and D.C. Young Fly, in this special at least, comes off like a weird impression of an old ‘In Living Color’ spoof character. I’ve seen him be so much better

When the crowd at the live taping is just mildly amused, you know there’s a problem. When the band members are sitting right behind you most of the special wondering where this thing went wrong, it’s a calamity.

There are some good moments, don’t get me wrong; Getting to watch D.C. Young Fly take over the drums and realizing that he can. Chico dancing with an old lady in the crowd. A few others. But not a lot.

Improvising a special doesn’t work.  Not on this level. Getting the crowd to jump up and down because you’re having them do it at your command is not the same thing as a spontaneous reaction. I wonder what would have resulted if these three had worked as hard at this as Stan Lathan and Rikki Hughes must’ve. Someone worked their asses off to get it to where it was, as well produced as it is. They just forgot ‘the set list for the guys’. I wish they had had some good bits put together.

‘THIS DUDE IS JUST A RACIST OLD BAT’

I know a lot of people are reading this and thinking, “Wow, this dude is just a racist old bat. He didn’t get any of the jokes. This is comedy for black people by black people, it’s not for him.” Bullshit. Fuck that. Funny is funny. They didn’t bring anything.

‘HEY A LOT OF MY BEST COMICS ARE BLACK!’

It’s true. A lot of the ones that make me pound the table are . Rock, Chappelle, Brian Simpson, Ian Edwards, I just saw this great comic, Heather Jay, the other night down in Long Beach who had me howling. Another one, a young black guy, George K. Burns (no relation), I got all their jokes, so it wasn’t that I didn’t get what 85 South are doing here, but they ghosted us. I’ve watched these three guys do stand-up. I know what they can do when they want to bring it. On this special, they didn’t. They wanted to wing it, and guess what? Maybe that isn’t their skill set? I don’t know. Maybe they’ve ‘wung it’ in the past. I just know they didn’t bring it on this show.

So, sadly, especially if you call me a racist because, my response would be to use the N-word. Don’t hate me…. Na*@eTTE!!

You just made Hannah Gadsby look good. At least she did her homework.

Sometimes Improv works, sometimes it doesn’t,  but at the level these guys are at? Someone should have pulled it back in for a re-shoot. A re-tool. They needed to knock this out of the park and they didn’t even kick it out of the kitchen. Sorry.

P.S. Check out their other, much, much better work here.

https://www.youtube.com/@The85SouthShow

Hey ALSO  if you’re in L.A. this weekend I’m at the Ice House in Pasadena for Mike Binder and Friends. There’s still about 30 tickets left. Not a lot, so get them now. It’s going to be a great show, and if you do come, and you don’t like it, later, you can shit on my stuff like I just shat on 85 South’s. Fair is fair!

https://www.showclix.com/event/ice-house-mike-binder-and-friends-july-1-8-pm/listing

MATT RIFE’S RED FLAG SPECIAL

Mike Binder on June 25, 2023

Matt Rife’s on a heater and he’s not one to waste it. He’s dropped another special right on the heels of ‘Matthew Steven Rife’ onto Youtube a couple days ago. It’s an all crowd work special along the theme of his Red Flag riff’s and it’s smart because A) he’s really good in this lane of his, and B) he didn’t have to take the time to build up another hour or whatever of new material and it just juices up his fans for his upcoming mega tour. He opens by claiming that he’s going to retire the crowd work after this, but it’s done in a clever way, because what he’s really laying a marker down is to not do ‘Red Flags’ anymore. He can do crowd work, just isn’t going to call it ‘Red Flags’. I had a plumber retire once on me. Was done with plumbing. Two weeks later he was over the house when the toilet clogged, he just wasn’t ‘plumbing’. He was doing ‘random water-works.’ Same card trick. Hats off to you, Matt. Clever.

By the way, the specials really good. Especially if you’re into waterworks.

If you’re in L.A. this weekend I’m at the Ice House in Pasadena for Mike Binder and Friends. There’s still some tickets left. Not a lot, so get them now. It’s going to be a great show.

https://www.showclix.com/event/ice-house-mike-binder-and-friends-july-1-8-pm/listing