Anyone watching today’s installment of ABC’s morning news program This Week had to feel some measure of pity for out-spoken left wing elite Bill Maher making his first appearance on the show as a round table guest. The condescending comic left the warm cocoon of his Real Time studio (which he routinely packs with like-minded far-left guests and an obsequious studio audience one would think hand-picked by moveon.org) and made the horrific blunder of allowing his abject ignorance and ideological blindness to be systematically exposed by the dissecting and relentless cross-examinations of conservative thinker George Will. And on network television no less!
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The acerbic Maher is used to making outrageous and factually empty statements on his HBO talk-show and getting nothing but an approving nod from his guests and howls of affirmation from his unwashed peanut gallery in return. But when he made this claim: “I could criticize America in general for not attacking this problem [dependency on fossil fuels] in the Seventies. I mean, Brazil got off oil in the last thirty years we certainly could’ve,” he was woefully ill-prepared to be called out on it by the acutely observant Will who pressed him: “Bill, can you just explain to me in what sense Brazil ‘got off oil’?”
It was an uncomfortable moment of reality TV as Maher played the proverbial deer in headlights. “Uh…I believe they did. I believe they, in the Seventies they had a program to use sugar cane ethanol and I believe that is what fuels their country.” A Ralph Kramden “hamana-hamana” could not have betrayed less command of the issue. Will promptly reminded the comedian: “They still burn a lot of oil and have a lot of it off-shore.”
In case Maher needs some help, EIA statistics show that Brazil produces 2.4 million barrels of oil per day and consumes roughly 2.52mm bpd–ranking it #8 on the list of oil consuming nations. It is true that they may soon be a net oil exporter…but this because their production capacity has steadily increased as new fields are tapped while consumption has remained steady, not because they are “off oil.” In fact, the largest oil discoveries in recent years have come from Brazil’s off-shore, pre-salt basins in which Brazil’s state oil company Petrobras is investing $220 billion to explore. Off-shore exploration rights have also been sold this year to BP for $7 billion. That’s a far cry from “off oil” eh Bill? But why let reality and data stand in the way of a good liberal rant? And what was Maher’s final defense in this case? “I want to make sure I read that, I know I didn’t just dream that.” (Try to imagine if Andrew Breitbart said that when making a conservative argument on Maher’s show. One can hear the scoffing hoots from the crowd.)
The beads of sweat must have been popping on his high forehead as Maher’s public skewering at the hands of Will painfully continued when the topic turned to Arizona’s new immigration law. First when asked by moderator Jake Tapper what he would suggest Arizona citizens do Maher replied: “Well I would hope that the Constitution of the country is a little more important to them.” George Will swooped in: “What Constitutional provision does this violate?” Maher again stammered: “I mean nobody has been able to articulate a scenario where the police are sopping people for any other reason than they are Mexican and poor.” In short, Maher really couldn’t say so he whipped out a John Edwards handbook.
Still, the battered Maher valiantly pressed on despite by now clearly having demonstrated he had no place in this forum. Apparently again thinking he was on Real Time where his far-left screeds go unchallenged, he went on to offer up this hateful gem: “Government intrusion, you know, government power’s something that really bothers conservatives unless it’s directed towards people who aren’t white, you know…” Enter Mr. Will again: “Mr. Maher just said, if I heard him right, that conservatives basically are racists and only like government intrusion against people who are not white. That’s their level of argument?” Far-left doyenne Katrina vanden Heuvel rushed to his defense: “I didn’t hear that.” Really? Then what did you hear?
Bill tries to moonwalk his words back a space: “I would never say…that all Republicans are racist. But nowadays if you are racist, you’re probably a Republican.” That is quite an indictment from a man who lives in a 6000-square-foot beverly Hills home on a 2.5-acre gated compound, safely ensconced in a neighborhood that is 83% white and a whopping 1.7% black.
By the time he tried to change his tune, the damage of Maher’s hate-speechifying was already done and his credentials as a bona fide far-left loon with no command of the facts were firmly established for all to see. One gets the feeling that Maher himself is just smart enough to paradoxically understand how much of a fool he looked at the hands of Will–who in turn actually appeared to be enjoying helping Maher self-destruct.
So thank you Bill Maher for exposing yourself on a national stage as the ideologically pompous but intellectually vacant pontificator you are. It must have been a gut-wrenching moment when you were actually challenged to back up your outlandish assertions and accusations against the right you make so freely on HBO. George Will showed that, though you may be a star in the far-left sky, you are not even ready for the minor leagues of informed (key word) political discourse…let alone “the show.” Your rants against conservative ‘ignorance’ have been revealed today for what they are: the pot calling the tea kettle black! And one thing is for sure. George Will’s beloved Chicago Cubs have a better shot at winning the World Series than he does of ever being invited to appear as a panelist on Real Time.