Ty: The good news for our regular readers is that you have two TV pieces by Ava and C.I. You have two articles by them because the edition fell apart and to try to help they went off and wrote a second piece. We have highlights by Mike and the gang. We have . . . Nothing else currently and it is 8:00 a.m. PST as I say that.
Dona: Now we have things we've worked on and expect Jim to do a solo piece on Halloween. But other than Ava and C.I.'s TV commentaries and highlights we have nothing else completed or that we can even guarantee will post. And, to be honest, I've felt several times since we started last night, maybe it's getting time for us to think about ending. I'm not trying to call an end to things but I am saying that's how I've felt.
Jess: We really did hit a wall and we only got a second wind a few seconds ago when I grabbed the guitar and C.I. hopped on the piano and we started playing songs and getting everyone to sing. We were completely defocused and I don't want to go through another weekend like this ever again. I propose a best of edition should something like this happen in the immediate future. And I know Dona's not saying, "Pack it in." And I agree with what she's saying about feeling like maybe we've passed our point.
Jim: Okay, so that's where we're at. I'm grabbing some e-mails quickly. Raed Jarrar wrote again. To whine again. He wants to talk about the law. Study it, Raed, study it. And stop wasting our time.
Dona: I actually wrote back to him already and told him that unless he gets off the pity pottie, I don't need to hear from him again.
Jim: Louise e-mails asking what we think of the Balloon Boy.
Jess: The Bubble Boy? From Seinfeld?
Jim: No, the Balloon Boy.
Ava: That's some little kid. I don't follow that story. I only know it's a little kid from going to Google News and scrolling past those non-stories.
Jim: Okay, so that's what we think. It's a non-story. It has nothing to do with your life or our lives and it doesn't really matter. Brandi wants to know what our favorite episodes of American Dad are?
Ty: "A.T. The Abusive Terrestrial." That's where Roger is abused by a new friend, Henry. When Hentry says, "You're as fat as a fort" and Roger says, "I beg your pardon," it's just so funny the way he says, "I beg your pardon." Then when Steve finds out that Henry's beating Roger and Roger defends him, Steve says, "You sound just like Daphne Zuniga from that Lifetime movie and you remember what happened to her." "Oh my God," Roger worries, "she ended up on ABC Family! Well I'm not going to let that happen to me!"
Jess: Mine's either "The Vacation Goo" or "Haylias." In the latter, Hayley's childhood spy training is activated by Stan in an attempt to control her and it backfires. In the former, Roger goes out for acting roles as a woman explaining that the idea just came to him -- while watching Tootsie. He ends up blowing the job and stuck on a cruise ship performing an Olivia Newton-John tribute only to be fired from that job and stuck stripping in Puerto Rico. There's also a funny scene with Hayley and her boyfriend assembling a piece of equipment.
Dona: I'll go with the one that aired last Sunday where Roger disguised himself as a little girl named Caitlin Miracle for a plane ride and then got upset when they wouldn't serve him alcohol.
Ava: We'll go with "Stan's Night Out," C.I. and I. We've actually discussed this over and over. When you're on the road in cars and airplanes every week, you discuss a number of topics. Kat, Wally, C.I. and I agreed that "Stan's Night Out" is our favorite. It's our favorite due to "nip slip" at the start of the episode when Hayley and Roger are the make up counter of a department store.
C.I.: And then they have a contest to see who is sexier. Roger seems to win the contest and prepares for his date which appears to include using a lint brush as an IUD. It's a very funny episode.
Jim: Mine would be "The One That Got Away" where Roger's being screwed over by one of his rogue, runaway personalities. It's a funny episode. Robert had a related question: Family Guy or American Dad, which is funnier?
Jess: American Dad. And Family Guy's sucked with the new episodes so far this year. It's just not that funny. The Spies Like Us parody last week was awful.
C.I.: Like the real bad opening of the episode of Friends that Billy Crystal and Robin Williams guested in. Only it was pretty much the entire episode. But Family Guy's really not that funny to begin with. It really doesn't do the subversion the way American Dad does.
Ava: And there's the whole attack Meg b.s. that just leaves a bad taste.
Jim: Family Guy had some funny ones last year but the first two this year have been so bad I felt like they were in their last season. The best American Dad's revolve around Roger. And I think the community consensus is that when Roger and Hayley are paired up, you've got a great episode. I'd agree with that, by the way.
Ty: One topic on our list of topics that we haven't worked on -- list of topics for articles -- is Barack and LGBT rights. I'll toss that out for here.
Dona: I am deeply depressed by the liars who continue to provide cover for Barack. I loved Marcia's "Why Urvashi Vaid has nothing to say to me" because she was nailing a liar to the wall for her little stunt.
Jess: I don't think any of us believed that Barack was going to end Don't Ask, Don't Tell before he was president. He was a liar repeatedly by then. He had already appeared to argue that Loving v. Virginia was either decided wrong or else he thought it was a lawsuit against a church and not against a state. He's a moron who used homophobia repeatedly for his campaign.
Jim: What really makes me sick are the liars who say that he's the first one to welcome gays. Whatever, you damn liars. They hate Bill Clinton so much, it's just a sickness with them. And I'm talking about people on the left.
Ava: I want to note that at the end of the spring and early summer, there were those tours that were supposed to 'change' things. And they weren't going to. As C.I. pointed out, it wasn't about anything other than providing Barack cover. They lied and said Ted Kennedy was spear heading the effort in the Senate. The same Ted who couldn't attend meetings and would be dead shortly. The Democratic leadership doesn't want to vote on this and the White House has no plans to push it.
C.I.: Which means it's not happening. It's not going to happen now. They're all in campaign mode, in Congress. And 2010 may see the Dems lose some seats which means we would hear them whine: "We don't have a super-duper, extra fudge on top majority in both houses so we can't do anything." By 2011, opposition to Barack will be even greater and, no, in 2012, it's not going to happen. The public --as polls repeatedly demonstrate -- approves of killing Don't Ask, Don't Tell. The ones who need to be convinced -- or forced -- is Congress. And it's the sort of thing an administration needs to do in the first year or it doesn't get done. Add in that Barack could sign an executive order barring any discharges based on sexuality while the US is fighting two wars.
Ty: He won't even do that. Maybe because he knows how long these two wars are really going to last? But Lt. Dan Choi, for example, on the verge of being kicked out of the military because he's gay, one signature by Barack to an executive order and Choi and every other gay and lesbian service members is able to do their service and not worry.
C.I.: I think that's a really good point you're making and one that's not being talked about. Which is that Barack continuing to allow the military to kick out gays and lesbians puts an incredible pressure on the gays and lesbians serving. I don't just mean the normal pressures of being in the closet, I mean pressures of, "Oh, I'm going to be found out any day now and then I'll be kicked out!" If you're constantly worried that you're going to be kicked out, how effective are you? Think about how much more effective you'd be if that worry was removed.
Ty: I agree with that completely and I also liked Choi's speech because what he talked about. It was so different from the embarrassing speeches I was hearing and we've talked about this before. You can't argue for gays and lesbians to be in the military and pretend they're not gay. And if you're an activist and you're coming off as ashamed don't think it's not going to be picked up by your audience.
Jim: And I think you're right on that. And Barack's never been forced to explain why he won't do an executive order on this issue. He's not even being asked to overturn it, just to halt it while the wars are going on. He won't do it. If he won't do it when the military needs to keep every service member they can, I don't see him doing it any other time.
Ava: And while that annoys me on every level and while I'm sorry for those who will suffer, the fact that he repeatedly used homophobia in the campaign goes to who he is and what he believes in so no one should be surprised now.
Ty: And while it's not surprising, it is appalling. Barack and I would both be drinking at "Colored" water fountains if it weren't for past presidents who showed far more bravery.
Jess: But he doesn't get that. He doesn't make that association. That's what Ava and C.I. were pointing out back in January 2008. Anderson Cooper tried to make the comparison and asked him, "Senator Obama, the laws banning interracial marriage in the United States were ruled unconstitutional in 1967. What is the difference between a ban on interracial marriage and a ban on gay marriage?"
Ava: And Barack responded it should be up to "denominations." States makes marriages legal, not churches. If Loving v. Virginia had been left up to "denominations," the laws against interracial marriage never would have been pulled.
Ty: You just can't trust him. That's the reality about Barack.
Jim: And Dona's waiving to indicate time. So this was a rush transcript to a rush roundtable.