Former host of Win Ben Stein's Money and Turn Ben Stein On (and also some less important jobs like scriptwriting for Richard Nixon) has been terminated from the New York Times. Specifically, he will no longer be writing his weekly business opinion column. The company took one look at his other job as a spokesperson for FreeScore.com and found it to be a conflict of interest.
There are a number of ways this could be spun. No doubt the conservative press will consider this a strike against their cause since they have always pegged the New York Times as a liberal newspaper. I do admit that I find the business practices of sites such as FreeScore.com to be suspect (they advertise as free, but further analysis reveals that one has to pay for their services). Perhaps he should have supported a less sleazy one like Cash4Gold.com.
The following is one of his commercials for FreeScore.com. Judge for yourself whether the Times was justified.
In the last twelve years, Lewis Black has gone from being "that angry guy on The Daily Show" to a comedy icon. Now, he finally has his own show.
In Lewis Black's Root of All Evil, which airs on Wednesdays at 10:30 PM ET on Comedy Central, two comedians argue why the pop culture item they represent is "the root of all evil." Last week's premiere episode, for instance, pitted Oprah against the Catholic church. Black plays the judge who controls the proceedings and makes the ultimate verdict. Sounds corny, but the first episode, which featured Paul F. Tompkins and Greg Giraldo, was wickedly funny and just a tiny bit subversive, everything you want in a good comedy.
I spoke to Black by phone last week; he was in Atlantic City on his stand-up tour. We discussed everything from the 2008 election to being on a cable news show with Ben Stein to sharing a jail cell with Jim Norton. The interview is after the jump.
Do you miss Ben Stein? Of course you do. Well, the former Nixon speech writer, former host of Win Ben Stein's Money, and former guy who said "Bueller?" is returning to television as the host of America's Most Smartest Model, a series that will determine if being beautiful also means you have the cognitive ability of a lump of Play-Doh. The competition series, co-hosted by Mary Alice Stephenson, pits seven male models and seven female models against one another to determine who's the most intelligent. The winner gets $100,000.
The lackluster response to FOX News' Half Hour News Hour and the continued popularity of The Daily Show and The Colbert Report have led many to conclude that liberals are funny, and conservatives are not.
I say that's a load of hogwash. It's not about being liberal, conservative, libertarian, or whatever else you happen to be. It's about being funny, or not being funny. To paraphrase something comic Doug Stanhope once told me during an interview: 'if you're good, and you're funny, you can find work.'
That's it. You want to be a stand up comic? Be funny. You want to make a funny TV show people will love? Then make a funny TV show people will love.
All that being said, here are three funny conservatives I admire, not because they're conservative, but because they make me laugh:
At the end of my conversation with Jimmy Kimmel, I fired off a question that's been bugging me since my first days at TV Squad: "Why did you start wearing a tie?"
Unfortunately, Jimmy had a meeting to attend, so all he could say before politely kicking me off the phone was "It's a long story." But it's understandable that he might not have time to go over his sartorial choices. His late-night talk show, Jimmy Kimmel Live!, has just been picked up for a fifth season, and his first prime-time special, Jimmy Kimmel Live's All-Star Salute to Jimmy Kimmel Live!, will air on ABC on September 13 at 10 PM. In addition, he has just been named host of a new ABC game show called Set for Life. Oh, and he's also planning his football-watching activities for this coming Sunday (as you'll see, it's quite involved).
I spoke to the 38-year-old host on Tuesday about his football parties, his flirtatious relationship with Ben Stein, and other topics, all of which you can find after the jump.
Ben Stein was not the first person to try and
reinvent the celebrity talk show, and he's also not the first to have failed. Whoopi Goldberg and Chevy Chase each had
spectacular failures in the world of late night gab fests before Ben Stein followed his successful game show Win
Ben Stein's Money with Turn Ben Stein On in 1999.
Former host of Win Ben Stein's Money and Turn Ben Stein On (and also some less important jobs like scriptwriting for Richard Nixon) has been terminated from the New York Times. Specifically, he will no longer be writing his weekly business opinion column. The company took one look at his other job as a spokesperson for FreeScore.com and found it to be a conflict of interest.
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Do you miss Ben Stein? Of course you do. Well, the former Nixon speech writer, former host of Win Ben Stein's Money, and former guy who said "Bueller?" is returning to television as the host of 
The lackluster response to FOX News' Half Hour News Hour and the continued popularity of The Daily Show and The Colbert Report have led many to conclude that liberals are funny, and conservatives are not.
At the end of my conversation with Jimmy Kimmel, I fired off a question that's 
Lord of the 
Ben Stein was not the first person to try and
reinvent the celebrity talk show, and he's also not the first to have failed. Whoopi Goldberg and Chevy Chase each had
spectacular failures in the world of late night gab fests before Ben Stein followed his successful game show Win
Ben Stein's Money with Turn Ben Stein On in 1999.
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