Bullet Points and Punch Lines

Lee Camp

Description

Our US empire is in steep decline. In order to wrest complete control over the globe and feed a rapacious thirst for resources and wealth, the American ruling elite is wreaking havoc around the world. Meanwhile, average Americans are suffering, legs trembling under a mountain of debt as they toil at unfulfilling, underpaying jobs. And those with enough time and energy to get angry and fight back are told that the answer is to vote for one of the two pro-war, pro–Wall Street corporate parties claiming to be their savior.

This epic tragedy does not sound like the beginning of a joke. But somehow comedian and TV host Lee Camp makes it both funny and interesting. Whether he is setting his sights on the scandal of $21 trillion worth of unaccounted-for financial adjustments at the Pentagon or the scorching environmental and human tragedy caused by climate chaos, it’s unsurprising that one of our most incisive political commentators is technically a comedian. Camp knifes his way through the jungle of fake news, alternative facts, mainstream media lies, and government blackouts, trailblazing a path between Hunter S. Thompson and Jon Stewart.

Perhaps the present-day story of America can only accurately be told by a comedian, otherwise no one would believe it. In a world where con men are heralded as leaders, locking up peace activists is perceived as justice, trumpeting state propaganda is considered journalism, and mocking environmentalists is championed as strength, it’s only appropriate that a comedian is viewed as more reliable than the evening news.

Sujets

• Bill Hicks

Informations

• Publié par: PM Press
• Date de parution: 01 mars 2020
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781629638027
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

One of a handful of comedians keeping my father s torch lit.
-Kelly Carlin, daughter of George Carlin
Lee Camp is not just a comedian. He challenges the corporate war narratives and calls out the American empire s bullshit better than anyone. His passion and anger are infectious and far too rare.
-Abby Martin, journalist, host of The Empire Files , former host of Breaking the Set
Lee Camp is a rare prophetic voice in a field of formulaic blowhards and political opportunists. He has the unique ability to tear our political establishment to shreds, and to then smash those shreds with a righteous hammer until we see the elite forces that rule our lives in their truest form-as an utterly hilarious farce of bipartisan idiocy.
-Max Blumenthal, journalist, author of Goliath
There is no better voice to analyze the bizarre combination of absurdity and catastrophe facing us today than that of Lee Camp. Drawing on his experience in both satire and politics, Camp uses his critical insight and sharp sense of irony to offer readers compelling political commentary that is as powerful as it is witty.
-Sophia McClennan, author of Is Satire Saving Our Nation? Mockery and American Politics , professor of International Affairs and Comparative Literature at Penn State University, and founding director of the Center for Global Studies
Lee Camp has found the hole in America s brain where reason has been replaced by Walmart. Lee s rants channel the gunk oozing out. You have to admit, that s why he s so fucking funny.
-Greg Palast, journalist, author of The Best Democracy Money Can Buy
Camp s show is a master class in politically driven comedy. Razor-sharp, witty, acerbic, and somewhat off-the-wall at times, he delivers his on-point political and social messages with the biggest dollop of humor going.
-Steven Topple, The Canary
Incisive humor that inspires both bouts of uncontrollable laughter and moments of reflection about the country s troubling political realities.
-Whitney Webb, Mint Press News
For those comedy fans still in mourning for Bill Hicks, you ll find plenty to enjoy in the work of DC-born stand-up Lee Camp.
- The Guardian
Like Jon Stewart from the Daily Show but with sharper teeth.
- The Herald
Lee Camp is an integral part of a long-standing satirical tradition. He has the rare ability to make you laugh and think simultaneously.
-Paul Krassner, satirist
Lee is the Che Guevara of comedy. Congrats to him on his balls and integrity. Everything he does is so good. We need more comedians with his kind of fearlessness. It s so rare to find such artful, thoughtful passion in comedy these days or in life. He s waiting for a generation to catch up with him.
-Paul Provenza, comedian, filmmaker, The Aristocrats
Lee is totally inspiring. I kinda wanna be like him when I grow up.
-Rain Pryor, actor, comedian, daughter of Richard Pryor
[Lee Camp is] developing a reputation for fearless political comedy, with some calling him an heir to the crown of the late, great George Carlin. He gets our seal of approval.
- Time Out Sydney
Gets the crowd roaring!
- Rolling Stone
A Time-Bomb of Reason ready to destroy anything that seeks to pollute our culture and restrict our possibility as a species.
-Peter Joseph (creator of The Zeitgeist Movement )
Lee Camp can be devastating.
-NPR s Weekend Edition
Some of the best satire I ve seen.
-Scott Dikkers, cofounder and former editor of the Onion
Lee has one of the funniest shows on television. I watch it every week.
-Jesse Ventura, former governor of Minnesota

Bullet Points and Punch Lines
by Lee Camp
Lee Camp
This edition 2020 PM Press
All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations in critical publications or reviews, no part of this book may be reproduced, used, or stored in any information retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise in any manner without prior written permission from the publisher.
ISBN: 978-1-62963-785-3 (paperback)
ISBN: 978-1-62963-821-8 (hardcover)
ISBN: 978-1-62963-802-7 (ebook)
Library of Congress Control Number: 2019945900
Cover by John Yates / www.stealworks.com
Photo by Deneka Peniston
Interior design by briandesign
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
PM Press
PO Box 29312
Oakland, CA 94623
www.pmpress.org
Printed in the USA
CONTENTS
FOREWORD
INTRODUCTION
The Pentagon Can t Account for 21 Trillion Dollars (That s Not a Typo)
How to Create a US-Backed Government Coup for Fun and Profit!
The Pentagon Failed Its First-Ever Audit amid a 21 Trillion Dollar Scandal
The Top Four Times Americans Have Been Lied into War
I Know Which Country the US Will Invade Next
Nearly 100 Thousand Pentagon Whistleblower Complaints Have Been Silenced
Everyone Has Fallen for the Lies about Venezuela
Artificial Intelligence May Destroy Humanity by Accident (but It Won t Apologize)
Trump s Military Drops a Bomb Every 12 Minutes, and No One Is Talking about It
The Media Never Mention the Number One Cause of Climate Change
Our Planet s Wonders Never Cease
The Mainstream Media Is Lying about the California Fires
We Have Less Than a Second Left
Wall Street Is the Definition of a Ponzi Scheme (Literally)
Goldman Sachs Just Admitted Curing Diseases Is Bad for Business
One Man Could End World Hunger, but He Won t
The Silver Bullet to Stop the Corporate State Pillage
A Good Day on Wall Street Is a Bad Day for Most Americans
The Pentagon and Microsoft Are Quietly Hijacking All US Elections
A Foreign Internet Company Rigged Our Elections (and It Wasn t Russia)
A New York Times Story Just Accidentally Shredded the Russiagate Hysteria
While Our Police Kill Thousands, Congress Works to Protect the Police
Our Criminal Justice System Serves to Protect the Villains
Three New Studies That Will Make You Rethink Systemic Racism
Eighteen Ways Julian Assange Changed the World
Six Ways the Resistance Gave Trump a Dictator s Toolkit
A Brief Digression on Whether Consumerism Changes Love
Debunking the Washington Post s Lies as They Debunk Donald Trump s 1,950 Lies
How to Write Propaganda for the New York Times , as Seen in an Attack Piece on Me
American Society Would Collapse If It Weren t for These Eight Myths
INDEX
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
Many of the following columns first appeared on Truthdig or as monologues on my show Redacted Tonight with Lee Camp on RT America. While several wonderful editors have made small changes, I wrote every piece myself. So if you love the book, please give me all the credit. If you hate it, blame the editors.
This book wouldn t have been possible without the help and support of many people at RT America and Truthdig, Eleanor Goldfield, John F. O Donnell, Naomi Karavani, Natalie McGill, Yoki Danoff, Rhys Baker, Michele Greenstein, Abby Martin, and the millions of people fighting for peace, sustainability, and equality around the world.
Things always seem most desperate and hopeless just before large-scale change . Keep fighting.
-Lee Camp
FOREWORD
by Chris Hedges
In his essay Shooting an Elephant, George Orwell wrote that power for the ruling elites entails one long struggle not to be laughed at. Withering criticism and cogent analysis of their crimes and peculiarities they can stomach. But when the entire ruling class is reduced to ridicule, when the very presence of the elites evokes derisive laughter, the powerful shrink in size before our eyes. Stripped of pomp and power, they become clowns. And once they are transformed into clowns, they become ruthless.
There are two types of comics. There are those who focus on the foibles and excesses of the powerful, and there are those, such as Lee Camp and Jimmy Dore, as well as the late George Carlin, who focus on how the powerful are the public face of oppression and exploitation.
Comics who take aim at buffoonish figures like Donald Trump have little to fear. Trump or Jeff Sessions or any of the other half-wits in the White House are an embarrassment to the ruling elites. Trump and his coterie of imbecilic enablers provide daily fodder for mainstream comics, who night after night hold up their absurdities and gaffes and studiously ignore the crimes of the corporate systems that makes them rich.
Those comics who take aim at the entire ruling establishment, who are as withering about Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton as about Trump, who expose them all as hypocrites and puppets of global capitalism and imperialism, are swiftly marginalized, demonized, and censored. The followers of these types of comics are blocked on Facebook and YouTube, something Camp and Dore have experienced. These comics, the ruling elite understands, are dangerous. They expose the nature of power itself. They damn and ridicule all who serve the system. And totalitarian regimes, including our system of corporate totalitarianism, are often more frightened of these artists, who have a mass appeal, than writers like me whose analysis of the system is not much different from radical comics but who do not turn this analysis into biting satire and humor.
The language of satire, which Camp uses effectively in his shows and his writing, is often more successful in exposing reality.
Here is Camp, for example, on how the Pentagon cannot account for how it spent 21 trillion dollars:
There are certain things the human mind is not meant to do. Our complex brains cannot view the