Stanhope in '08 has Quit in '07!
Thursday, May 3, 2007 at 12:00PM |
We're done, at least so far as being a candidate. For all of our false optimism, forced enthusiasm and the tireless effort of a small team of close friends, we couldn't get past the wall of bureaucracy.The Federal Election Commission proved insurmountable in their spiderweb of legal fingerfucking. The idea that I could run an effective campaign rested on the fact that I tour constantly for a living and have a built-in audience and media wherever I go. FEC rules would not allow for me to campaign at paid gigs while also retaining a personal income from those shows. If I can't recruit from my shows, I'm about as effective as standing on a milk crate in the city park. Even our crafty attempts at creating our own loopholes in the laws - like jailhouse attorneys trying to invent and employ makeshift last-minute defenses - still came up short in the face of the Federal Election Commision. The system is set up to keep the two-party monopoly as free from competition as possible. The penalties for fucking up with FEC rules make IRS penalties look like fetish spankings and I fuck up quite a bit. The other problem was simply in making the whole thing fun. The more rules, paperwork and bullshit we'd run into the less creative and funny it was becoming. The process started to feel like when we had to "clean it up" for the Man Show - and we all know how well that worked out. Our intention in this campaign was to try to get media attention for the Libertarian Party and we have no intention of giving up that campaign. It's frustrating to see this country bordering on totalitarianism and having viable options like the Libertarians completely blacked out. We'll still put our efforts into getting the LP into the mainstream and eventually get behind a candidate. But it was better to bail now before announcing as opposed to plowing through with our pants half down only to fall apart later, looking like complete shitheads at the expense of the Party. The amount of high-level people that went out of their way to support us was amazing. On the day that we have our shit together - more organized and better prepared to deal with the powers that be - we may just take another stab at it. So jump on board, join the Libertarian Party www.lp.or) and stay involved. We still plan on making some noise this year and turning the Libertarian National Convention in Denver next May into the Animal House of the Next Revolution. Be sure to get on our mailing list so you can get involved in the trouble we'll be causing.
For those of you with Stanhope in 08 t-shirts, I promise I will try to die in some horrible fashion that makes them vaulable some day.
Many people have said that it doesn't matter who you vote for, that the whole game is rigged. That's why our next project will be to start our own Illuminati, Skull & Bones and New World Order that will secretly control the current New World Order without them even knowing. Our secret society will be so secret that many of it's member will not even know they are members. America has laws against monopolies and there is no reason that there cannot be free market competition when it comes to covert, world-ruling cabals and all-powerful, mystical fraternities. My deepest thanks to all who went out of your way for this truncated attempt at giving the whole system the finger. We still intend to say "Fuck You" loudly and repeatedly. We'll just have to find more unique, exciting and unregulated ways to do it. No matter who is elected to what man-made office or put on whatever throne, you are still the leader of your own free world. Stick around. ~stanhope |
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This week's shows at Sal's Comedy Hole (May 3-5) has been moved to Comedy Village.http://www.comedyvillage.com/?gclid=CPqIw5vM64sCFRlmWAodIidkVg Their site might not have the date listed as it just got set up. Check here for any further updates. Sal's Comedy Hole shows have been moved to Comedy Village, May 3-5. Thanks stanhope |
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The Showtime special and new DVD should be out in the next few months so stay tuned.
In the meantime, don't wait for good comedy. Sean Rouse's first CD is finally coming out after years of me, Dave Attell and a hundred other comics breaking his crippled balls to release it.
He's my favorite comic ever depending on who's asking and always in the Top 3 no matter who asks. You can get his new CD "Spilled Milk" at www.seanrouse.com.
And speaking of overdue CDs...
Joe Rogan finally came through, too. It's a good month for comedy.
Get Rogan's "Shiny Happy Jihad" at www.joerogan.net.
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I wrote an update regarding the Don Imus The relevent points of the update were... Imus didn't come across as racist to me so much as old white guy trying to sound young and hip by knowing the street lingo. Like your Grandpa talking about you smoking "mary jane" or your Mom saying something is "grody to the max". Either way, who gives a fuck? If a man that old and obviously addled-of-mind spent his whole show every day attacking me directly and specifically, I'd give it as much mind as if it came from an elderly dementia patient in a long-term nursing facility. |
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Who cares? Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson, that's who. The civil rights movement is very much like Mother's Against Drunk Drivers. Started out as a legitimate cause only to have the Mad Mother's and MLK's driven out and replaced by blind capitalists scouring the fine print for another reason to stick their greed 'n' power loving fingers in someone elses feedhole.
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Bottom line is that Imus was calling those chicks ugly. There were two basketball teams playing that night. If it were about race, he would have mentioned them both - unless the other team was all white. That kinda basketball hasn't been around since Naismith chucked a dead cat in a peach bucket in the 1800's. Imus called them ugly and thankfully for them he included something that could be maligned into the race card. You'd much rather have national press exposure for being a victim of racism than to be on the front page for being called dog-dick ugly. Ugly is something you carry alone. There's no Al Sharpton self-appointed spokesman for the ugly because ugly isn't a minority. |
The only racism I saw was Imus apologizing to Al Sharpton rather than to the specific people he insulted, as though if you insult one black person you can simply apologize to any neighborhood franchised negro and it will get where it needs to go.
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Girls Gone Wild keeps creeping back like life-herpes on my resume. If you saw news about Girls Gone Wild owner Joe Francis getting arrested, you likely saw my face on the broadcast. We saw it twice in two hours on Fox News. They gave the story with footage that started with a fraction of a second of Joe Francis and then to endless footage of me hosting Girls Gone Wild looking as drunk and stupid as any man could appear on television, all with the graphic under my face saying "Girls Gone Wild Owner Arrested At Airport" or whatever the specifics happened to be. That's the same as if the owner of NordicTrack was indicted for exploiting minors and all the newsreel footage was of Chuck Norris. Only the general public would be more likely to know that Chuck Norris was not the guy they were talking about. |
A Quiet Place to Eat Your Own Shit
Anytime I get an email that says "I know you'll never do this but..." or something to that effect, I'm always a little more interested.
A high school kid wanted me to come to her government class and speak as her candidate in 2008.
I'm well aware that I have nothing to teach a high school about government in general - in fact, probably the opposite - but it happened that the school was right in the path of my tour in small-town middle America. I know I'm going to have to start doing this shit soon enough - talking to non-partisan people who don't know me and without saying "fuck" - so I figured this would be a quiet and anonymous place for me to eat shit.
I found it quite easy to avoid any preparation since I had no idea what to prepare for, having not been in a school for 22 years and not remembering much of the school I did attend save for the loathing.
All I had was jumbled notes (that I never got to) and a whirlwind of random knowledge from the too-many books I've read in too short a time, not to mention a thrift store suit with the torn lining hanging out of the sleeves. I like dressing like a homeless person even when I'm dressed up. I bought the whole suit including shoes for five dollars nearly ten years ago. I'd like to try to return it to the store and ask for my ten years back.
High school hasn't changed at all. The air went out of both me and Chaille when we pulled into the parking lot and it was immediately that greasy feel of a soft rape from authority and peers that you can't understand.
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I have a vivid recollection from middle school of being in the hallway and so uncomfortable and afraid of everybody that I couldn't seem to walk correctly. It felt as though my gait had become visibly and overtly awkward or that it always had been and I was just now acutely aware of it. I felt like Billy Hayes in Midnight Express, trying to appear normal while smuggling 4 pounds of hash through a Turkish airport. Terrified and unable to control my legs. |
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Now I'm terrified and in front of seniors only today my mouth won't work and I can't shake the audible tremor in my voice when I start to talk. The flop sweats started when we checked into the front office only to meet a woman who introduced herself as a reporter who'd be covering my presentation.
So much for anonymously chewing the pipe.
There was no point in trying to make a speech. The last thing high school students need is another boring old fuck telling them how to think without a word in edgewise. Instead I made it into a chaotic roundtable discussion to find out what they were passionate about. Of course, the subjects that they came alive for were the ones I care about most which is encouraging.
Still, I couldn't help but wander into subjects where I'm the least knowledgeable. It's the same tendency I have on stage to force in bits that are not prepared at all if only to test myself or fail miserably. Nothing motivates me after a show like coming up shamefully short and there was plenty of that at C-Ville High. All the information that I've poured into my brian spilled out in abortive half-sentences and unfinished thoughts, the art of the seemless dodge & redirect not yet learned. Partial-birth platform. Thank god I still had the jokes.
If I didn't change any minds, I had a hell of a lot of fun. If I wasn't presidential, I was a guy that soiled the monotony of another hour staring at a clock in that inhuman life-conditioning factory. If I didn't get 'em to vote, maybe I got 'em to think - even if they were thinking, "Who the fuck is this guy and why does he smell like bar vomit?"
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It felt like open mic comedy all over again when I left and I haven't been that excited in a long time. All the mistakes and blank looks secondary to the challenge of doing it right next time and doing it again soon. All those heads who still have hope and aren't completely demented by the system as opposed to the drunken meat that shuffle into comedy clubs and gave up years ago. Special thanks to Manda and Mr. S for inviting and allowing me to come to your class. I'll keep you anonymous so that the stain doesn't appear on your permanent records. Just know that I will watch tape of that class often while wretching into a mop bucket and you invitation alone will be the reason I'll be much that better the next time. |
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The road is endless and the current Presidential workload is a constant struggle against a mind that is wired for sloth.
Thanks to all who came to Vegas for the "Summit" to help with this moribund stab at an absurd goal.
Greg Chaille, Hennigan, Joe Vernon, Erica & Steve Bell, Penn Jillette, Bev & Horse and of course my lovely Bingo who finds all my boneheaded plays amusing and never ruins it by calculating the odds.
[L to R - Joe, Bingo, Doug, Greg and Hennigan]
Also Tommy Rocker and L'il Ronnie Putnam for taking care of us and of the hounds at the gate.
Only those who take great risks reach glory but most of those risk-takers just end up wide and to the left, failing like chumps and looking like assholes. Yet, looking like an asshole is the only thing that gives me motivation. I think it's a no-lose situation.
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I won't even try to describe the weekend at the Lakeshore Theater in Chicago. All I will say is that I've never seen any club go that far out of their way to show that they are more for the artform than the profit. Babbit was the closest. Chris & Jessica Ritter at the Lakeshore have stolen the throne.
They were giving away - not selling, mind you - t-shirts that said "Dane Cook Sucks and You Know It" with their logo at the bottom. Same with full-page ads in the weekly. I would support that place if they had my name instead of Dane's, just because you knew they were more concerned with the type of comedy than the comment cards or chicken wings sold. That's hard to come by these days.
Rogan, Attell, et al, take note.
Chicago patrons as well.
Spread the word.
Lakeshore Theater.
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Check the schedule for new dates and keep checking back - they come up quickly and a lot short notice. That's why it's best to be on themailing list. I show up in weird places and one of 'em might be down the street from you.
It's gonna be a strange 18 months.
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