comment #1

Ray DeRousse says ...

I just love people like Carlin, Bill Hicks, Sam Kinison, and Bill Maher telling truths like this. You can almost feel Carlin beating his head against a brick wall here, desperate to get this point across. Awesome.

comment #2

nightheat says ...

100% true.

comment #3

62Lincoln says ...

Tea Party commentary from the Left. Awesome.

comment #4

DiscoNap says ...

I believe this is from his second to last special, which aired few years before his death. Even from someone who tends toward the right, it's great.

I think this is his masterpiece though:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eScDfYzMEEw

comment #5

nightheat says ...

I like how railing against the corporate control of America is left-wing propaganda and not a non-partisan issue. just illustrates how clueless right wingers are.

comment #6

https://me.yahoo.com/a/6DHg0xkGgeL2Wl2nUeBcLdK4FhKauA--#e78e2 says ...

One of the things that really torques me is the fact that the economy is in shambles yet we're encouraged to keep spending. Does it occur to anyone that we're in this mess because people were spending more than their means allowed? Don't mind that, just get back to spending! Oh, you can't? Uncle Sam will do it for you!

Carlin was spot-on.

comment #7

lazarus says ...

With all due respect to Carlin, and I applaud him for sharing this with his audience, but Bill Hicks built much of his routine around these ideas back in the early 90's, and did so a lot more eloquently and humorously.

Nothing's changed, obviously, and it's only gotten worse, so it can certainly stand to be restated.

comment #8

Ray DeRousse says ...

Disconap that was great, too.

Listen to that and then even try to get through five minutes of shit like Dane Cook. Impossible. Carlin was a word artist, a stand up version of Michelangelo.

comment #9

Hollis Mulwray says ...

That's an evening of entertainment? A condescending, knee-jerk, know-it-all, pony tailed sourpuss. An eloquent crank who never appeared to enjoy what he was doing. If the guy next to me at the bar started that spiel, I'd hit the bathroom and head home.

comment #10

DiscoNap says ...

Ray tell me about it, ugh. There are few comics today in Carlin's tradition, because even the most out-there are still trying to be 'funny ha-ha'. While nowhere in his league, someone like Marc Maron is rare.

Hey Hollis, if you don't get it, you don't get it.

comment #11

clockwork taxi says ...

Hicks was good, but he was NO Carlin. I am sorry but NO. Lacks the charisma that made Carlin so great. In the top five greatest comedians ever.

comment #12

Todd says ...

So Jeff your just realizing this?
To be like Dee Zee
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rothschild_family
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/07/26/neel-kashkari-tarp-guru-s_n_659423.html

comment #13

MikeSchaeferSF says ...

"The PTB are aggressively trying to keep this video off YouTube and Google..."

Meaning, who? The government? The Repubs? The Dems? HBO?

comment #14

TATE K. says ...

The man is a genius. He is sorely missed.

comment #15

hunterd says ...

The same Powers That Be that gave him about a dozen nationally televised specials? The same Powers That Be that published his books and gave them the proper marketing dollars so as to get them on best sellers lists? The same Powers That Be that allowed him and his consistent message to become a household name? The same Powers That Be that gave him a big honking microphone and made him a multi-millionaire?

This isn't Gary Webb and Dark Alliance, dude. Cut the conspiracy theories.

comment #16

MathewM says ...

Carlin had an air of authenticity about him but his spiel doesn't quite connect with me. I find him humorous in his word play but he's not really like his audience as he portrays here. He became rich pissing and moaning about the system. So like a lot of rock stars and celebrities who tend to berate the same system that grants them their podium and riches, I treat him as entertainment and nothing more.

comment #17

DiscoNap says ...

Todd, did you really just link the Rothschilds? Don't forget the Illuminati.

comment #18

Rusty Never Sleeps says ...

Not to mention the fucking Bilderbergers.

Seriously, the guy's a pothead sitting around smoking doobies and getting mad about everything "THEY" are doing. He talks about critical thinking, but he doesn't want to do any himself. It's just ranting. Who are they? If we ever find them sumbitches, we gonna hand 'em they asses.

comment #19

lazarus says ...

clockwork taxi: because Hicks died at 34, it's hard to say what heights he would have reached. Personally I think he's funnier than Carlin. But in addition to pointing out how fucked up things were, Bill left his audience with a very uplifting, inspirational feeling that they (and the world) could change, whereas Carlin's "we're all screwed and the human race is shit" sentiment got old after a while.

comment #20

Josh Massey says ...

The people trying to keep this off Youtube are the same ones keeping The Devils under lock-and-key.

comment #21

MathewM says ...

So if this is so controversial then why was it filmed in HD and shown on paid cable?

Another thing that annoys me about Carlin are his die-hard fans. I know a few. They tend to worship his sermons and then turn around and buy a new iPad or Honda Element. Hypocrites. Jeff Wells is one of them.

comment #22

bluefugue says ...

I do find Carlin very funny and view him as a sort of sage and felt after he died the same way Gore Vidal felt when Eleanor Roosevelt died: "Well, we're really on our own now."

I don't substantively disagree with what he's said here. I exist on a pretty low rung in a power structure that was set up long before I got here. On the other hand, I *was* (I think) given a pretty good education on the government's dime -- yes, there was a lot of indoctrination in there and I may never fully transcend that. But I also got a sense of the sweep of history, of the major thinkers and documents that have built our culture over the centuries, and I have had the ideas of literacy and critical thinking beaten into my head for a long time. I have now at my fingertips at any time a ridiculous wealth of information from all sources, centuries, minds, writers, whatever. I can read everything I want to read about communism or anarchism or capitalism or utilitarianism or philosophy or political science or whatever. A lot of it for free, a lot of it instantaneously.

So I think that even if "they" are stacking the system in their favor -- and sure, in many significant ways "they" are -- we still have to acknowledge the paradox that in this world of supposedly shitty education and ignorant lazy people and us all being bred to be consumer sheep, literacy and access to literature are at what must be an all time high, at least relative to overall percentage of the population.

Most of us submit to the power structure, probably for the same reason people have submitted to power structures throughout history. As long as the situation is tolerable, it's better to go with the devil you know than the devil you don't. If "we" all got together and rebelled against "them" it's not clear that the power structure which subsequently emerged would be preferable.

All that said, it's good and right that Carlin and similar "truth-telling fools" keep nagging us and goading us and urging us to question ourselves and kick us out of our complacency. Sadly, or maybe not sadly, "bucking the corporate system" happens to be rather low on my list of life priorities just now. I do work and I do consume manufactured goods, it's true. This perhaps makes me a sheep. Well, I am a mammal at any rate...

comment #23

bluefugue says ...

>I think this is his masterpiece though:

>http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eScDfYzMEEw

Nice bit, but his abstract "let species go extinct" argument means very little to me when I consider the Siberian tiger or the blue whale. Yes in the Darwinian sweep of time, species go extinct, it's nature's way, yada yada. To let such magnificences vanish in our time, when we have the power to affect the situation... no, sorry George, can't agree with you there.

And environmentalism is less about "saving the planet" for its own sake than it is about maintaining a habitable place for humans to live in. This seems pretty damn common-sensical to me.

comment #24

dangovich says ...

The gap between the wealthiest Americans and the middle- and working-class has tripled since Reagan first took office. And, as Carlin predicted in this video, "they" (Obama's deficit commission) are getting ready to plunder Social Security.

And the commenters here just yawn, or worse, attack Carlin. It's depressing.

comment #25

ivavi says ...

Truthspeakers like Carlin are worshiped by many but what do they effectuate or influence exactly? In the case of Carlin, in line with what MathewM wrote, the audience calls it a night at the of the show (expensive tickets they paid for probably online from their precious MacBooks at home) and then it's back to the grind the next morning after the initial high of knowing how deeply fucked we all are is long gone. The only is outcome is other intellectuals and deep thinkers rising up and proclaiming how the man has fucked us over since before we were born but actions speak louder than words right? We already knew we were fucked in small and individual ways so what the fuck, unless Mr. Carlin or another of the truthspeakers is at the front of the crowd with a pitchfork and a torch, it's just another rehash like that plot about the government keeping ET's underwraps.

I agree that it's depressing, but not because I'm attacking the messenger but because the messenger sees the big picture yet does nothing. Talk is cheap, inaction is makes it entertainment only like doing a stand-up routine about it, writing a book, filming a documentary.

We need to storm the gates of TTPB. Not pay taxes. Not go to work. Burn the dollar. Storm banks everywhere.

comment #26

LexG says ...

I count AT LEAST three commenters above who don't seem to realize that Carlin is no longer alive.

comment #27

ivavi says ...

LexG, and what's his legacy? YouTube? DVD Sales? Challenging the mind of an audience for a few hours? Fuck that, it means nothing.

comment #28

TATE K. says ...

But if he "did something" instead of just "talking" most people on here would be bitching that he's just an entertainer who should stay out of politics.

comment #29

EdHavens says ...

"The PTB are aggressively trying to keep this video off YouTube and Google..."

Which is why other versions of this same clip have been up on YouTube for years, and have hundreds of thousands of views.

comment #30

Travis Crabtree says ...

Dare we say anything against a legend like Carlin.......

I watched this entire show and realized how sad it was that Carlin went from being one of the most insightful and humorous voices on the planet to an unfunny, tired old crank.

He sounds like the homeless guy in front of 7-11.

It's not funny. I want George to by funny. If I want to hear this kind of babble I'll hang out at the CSUN Starbucks.

So, the world is really run by corporations and billionaires and they're all out to screw the little guy.
Whoa, man. That's heavy.

comment #31

michael says ...

I had the pleasure of seeing Carlin live twice. Once in 1993 in Chattanooga, Tn which was a kind of greatest hits show with very little new stuff, just reworked the older stuff and it was great. Then in January of '96 I saw him in Tampa, Fl on the warm up tour for his special live HBO show that aired that March and he was still working through the new material and tweaking things. I had front row seats and it was amazing. Seeing him reading bits off paper and rewording stuff right in the middle of the show and then he gave us two different endings, he said he would judge how well each one went over each night and then decide what one he would close with on the special. It was truely one of the great nights of comedy that i've ever been apart of. Carlin was the first comedian that I ever really latched onto as "one of mine" it felt like he spoke not only to me, but for me as well. He was saying all the stuff that I couldn't and wouldn't even know how to. And to the guy who was saying Bill Hicks was doing stuff like this in the 90's, guess what? So was Carlin. Go back and watch "Jammin' in New York" in 91 and watch him talk about the Gulf war, Bush and the enconomy. It was killer then and it's killer now. He was one of the top five greatest stand-ups that has ever lived. He made it look effortless and he is missed each and every day. Everytime there is a new disaster or govermental fuck up, I always wish he was around to put his spin on it. God, he was amazing.

comment #32

Terry McCarty says ...

Travis Crabtree wrote:
I watched this entire show and realized how sad it was that Carlin went from being one of the most insightful and humorous voices on the planet to an unfunny, tired old crank.

One could say almost the same things about Dennis Miller.

comment #33

Travis Crabtree says ...

Nice try, Terry.

comment #34

Terry McCarty says ...

Re Travis' comment:
Nice try, Terry.

I'll also throw in Steve Allen for the sake of political balance.