Bill Maher has come in for tons of criticism since he opted to have dinner with Donald Trump, but none of it was as biting as a recent takedown by “Seinfeld” creator Larry David.
In an essay for the New York Times called “My Dinner With Adolf,” David took Maher to task for attempting to soften the image of a fascist strongman. While David never mentions the “Real Time” host by name, the timing of the piece and its main character’s need to hear out all sides past the point of ludicrousness make the target clear.
David’s fictional meeting with Adolf Hitler echoes many of the points that Maher has made in the days since he dined with Trump. Maher, a crochety liberal-leaning comic who has grown more crochety and less liberal as societal norms have passed him by, marvelled at the fact that he could make the commander-in-chief laugh.
oh i know. i’m speaking on this as a rural citizen who’s seen how my neighbors are manipulated. per capita, rural tax payers get more back from their taxes as benefits than city dwellers. the rural voter sees that it’s not enough though and seeths with anger. being isolated by the land around them, they’re easier to manipulate into blaming someone in an apartment than in a penthouse or mansion. the best way to resist fascism is to go out into the world and talk to people. the rural voters who fuel fascism are less able to do this thanks to their material conditions, making them more vulnerable to bullshit propaganda. urban voters meanwhile, are not immune to fascism, but are far more likely to encounter perspectives other than their own by the nature of their lived experience in a large community.
the most terrifying in all this are the suburbs. the places where people actively choose to tune out of being connected in favor of a 1950s vision of america that would be easier to manipulate a la brave new world and 1984 into working against their own best interests.
fuck. i’m gonna have to go listen to nazi by chumbawamba now…
Well put. And oh the suburbs, where the greatest argument always seems to be centered around how much they hate their neighbours and believe that a cut lawn in a development is closer to nature than a full, grown back alley with maybe even a small community garden(fairly common in the major city where I live).