Famus

I actually respect Bill Maher quite a bit. He’s a bleeding heart liberal which is entirely his right, but he also publicly acknowledges truths that go against his political grain. He was fired from Politically Incorrect for the same reasons most people get fired, he went off-script. 

It seems you can in fact be fired for things you say on a show called Politically Incorrect.

When the media refers to terrorists who die for their cause as beings “cowards” you do not go off-script in front of the cameras and disagree with the media. 

The security guard who ran away from kids being shot at, is a coward.

Terrorists who murder the innocent by suicide bombs are cowards.

One of those two statements is not true, unless there’s media around.

That’s why you hire writers who know how to use words to their advantage. 

Terrorists who murder and died for their insane causes are not cowards, because we know the definition of the word coward, because we have a firm grasp of the English language, but we don’t say that in front of the cameras, do we Bill.

What he should have said was, “It is heart wrenching when misguided courage is poisoned by hatred and all it’s evils.” 

Or something like that.

It’s catchy, and while Bill and I understand the definition of the word courage, what others will hear are the last three desirable words in that statement, “poison, hatred, and evil” which describes terrorism perfectly. 

You don’t have to play nice with the media. You just have to stay out of it. Especially political media. Political writers aren’t nice people. And they’re not hired to be nice people. They’re hired to make villains out of - whoever they’re hired to make villains out of. And It’s terribly easy sometimes. Especially if they’re public villains to begin with. 

Wisdom

I am reminded of that old pirate sage Captain Jack Sparrow: “The only rules that really matter are these: what a man can do and what a man can't do. For instance, you can accept that your father was a pirate and a good man or you can't. But pirate is in your blood, boy, so you'll have to square with that some day. And me, for example, I can let you drown, but I can't bring this ship into Tortuga all by me onesies, savvy? So, can you sail under the command of a pirate, or can you not?”

If the answer is not, we both drown. Yours however will just be more painful.

And speaking of death

Life insurance commercials are a riot. They refer to death as “leaving”. 

Leaving implies you have the option to come back.

Who the hell wants to come back?