Observations from Dave Chappelle: The Closer

Last night, I watched Dave Chappelle’s “comedy” show “The Closer” on Netflix.

The word comedy appears in quotation marks because, Mr. Chappelle’s performance is not comedy. Not practically, anyway.  Only virtually.

Did the audience laugh? Yes, a few times.

But a few laughs does not a comedian make.

Is Dave Chappelle a funny man?

He sure is! And, he’s had some absolutely BRILLIANT strokes of comedic genius — at least to my way of thinking.

The list of Mr. Chappelle’s awards for comedic excellence tell but a partial story, and includes:

• 3 Grammy Awards for Best Comedy Album;

• 5 Emmy Awards — Outstanding Guest Actor in a Comedy Series (2021, Dave Chappelle, Host Saturday Night Live “Host: Dave Chappelle”),

• 2-Outstanding Variety Special (Pre-Recorded) (2018, Dave Chappelle: Equanimity; 2020, Dave Chappelle: Sticks & Stones),

• Outstanding Writing for a Variety Special (2020, Dave Chappelle: Sticks & Stones), and

• Outstanding Guest Actor in a Comedy Series (2017, Dave Chappelle, Host Saturday Night Live “Host: Dave Chappelle”); and the coveted

• Mark Twain Prize for American Humor presented by the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C., among others. Of note, Richard Pryor was the award’s first recipient.

He’s certainly not a comedian along the lines, or in the style of comedienne Carol Burnett (also a Mark Twain Prize laureate), and her co-stars Tim Conway, Harvey Korman, and Vicki Lawrence, but when his series “Chappelle’s Show” (2003-2006) was in production on The Comedy Channel, one of his most brilliant pieces (in my estimation) was “Clayton Bigsby, the World’s Only Black White Supremacist.” Perhaps you’re familiar with it.

Neither is Mr. Chappelle’s comedy style like the acerbic, even venomous, late comedian Don Rickles, infamous for his notoriously wicked, and caustic sense of humor.

Nor is Mr. Chappelle’s humor like that of the late comedian Rodney Dangerfield, who, as he constantly reminded us, got no respect. His brand of self-deprecating humor was his iconic comedic trademark.

No, Mr. Chappelle’s style of humor is somewhat a blend of the above-mentioned comics, and incorporates elements of them all.

To be funny, comedy must, and does,

Alpha Phi Recruiting Video In Alabama Sets Off Firestorm Of Criticism

The Alpha Phi Sorority at the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa has come under intense scrutiny recently after a 4 minute “recruiting” video was released on YouTube and promoted through other Social Media (SoMe) venues and sites.

Controversy erupted following publication of an OpEd entitled “‘Bama sorority video worse for women than Donald Trump,” on the AL dot com website by A.L. Bailey.

News of the wretched video quickly went “viral,” and made national and international news in numerous news outlets, from television, to radio, and the Internet.

A.L. Bailey was recently interviewed by representatives from the Alabama Media Group division of Advance Publications and a condensed version of the hour-long interview was published on their website AL dot com.

The video, which was quickly removed after having been posted (though once posted on the Internet, nothing really ever “disappears”), according to some sources, had at least 500,000 views in the day or two in which it was first available.

Following is commentary of a D.C.-based attorney friend and native Southerner whom viewed it, along with the video following the commentary.

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This is at once an impressive and an appalling intro to one of those ugly interracial porn videos. At first you think it might actually be a genuine recruiting video for the University of Alabama chapter of the Alpha Phi sorority. There is a clever use of

American Entitlement Culture

Recently, I happened across an item which read “When they analyze the demise of western society due to the entitlement epidemic, it’ll trace back to giving kids awards just for showing up.”

Of course, it can sometimes be difficult to discern sarcasm when reading, and I rather suspect there is at least a smidgen of sarcasm in that brief remark.

Sarcasm, of course, can, and is often used to convey a truth, or truths about numerous subjects, and is a teaching tool, as well.

Because I often use dictionaries to aid my understanding, I chose to look up the definition of the word “entitlement.” Here’s what I found:
As a verb, to “entitle” is to give someone a legal right, or a just claim to receive or do something.

For example, in the United States, the First Amendment is an entitlement to

Alabama is USA’s 2d most religious state

Alabama also ranks up there in poverty, divorce, sexually transmitted diseases, lack of a high school education, spousal abuse, and…

Thank God for Mississippi, eh?

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Gallup: Alabama 2nd most religious state in America

By George Talbot | gtalbot@al.com
on February 17, 2013 at 10:51 AM, updated February 17, 2013 at 12:31 PM

Alabama ranked as the nation’s second most religious state in 2012, behind Mississippi and tied with Utah, according to a new survey by Gallup.

The Washington, D.C.-based polling firm found that 56 percent of Alabama residents identified themselves as “very religious” – based on saying religion is an important part of their daily life and that they attend religious services every week or almost every week.

Alabama trailed only Mississippi, its Deep South neighbor, where

Mississippi River Flooding, Diaster Response & Economic Theory

The opening lyric to Hank Williams, Jr.‘s – aka “Bocephus” – 1982 song “A County Boy Can Survive,” is “And the Mississippi River she’s a goin’ dry.”

At this juncture, that certainly doesn’t seem to be the case.

The Mississippi River has flooded to such an extent that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has decided to open floodgates and allow excess water from the river to flow toward the Gulf of Mexico through alternate routes.

Weeks of heavy rains and runoff from the melting of an extremely snowy winter have raised Mississippi River levels to historic proportions. Over 3 million acres (1.2 million hectares) of farmland in Mississippi, Tennessee, Arkansas along the river have been flooded, evoking memories of floods in 1927 & ’37.

On Saturday, the Corps opened two of 125 floodgates at the Morganza Spillway, and opened two more today (Sunday, 15 May 2011). The spillway is 45 miles northwest of Louisiana’s capitol, Baton Rouge. The Corps hopes that by opening them, it will

Marriage Tips: Love Boosters for Women

From the beginning of time, marriage of a man and a woman, and the children that naturally result from that union, has created family, and continues to form the foundation of all societies the world over. We learn about relationships and how to treat others from our family. And it is to the benefit of every society to enrich the health of those foundations. Sometimes, it’s not the BIG THINGS that spoil love in marriage, as much as it is vitally important to “catch all the foxes, those little foxes, before they ruin the vineyard of love,” of our marriage relationship.

As I have written previously,

A Short History of “Privacy” in American Jurisprudence

Privacy

[Note: This entry was originally entitled “Privacy,” and was transferred to this site, having previously been posted by me on Monday, May 3, 2010 at 2:57pm.]

“Privacy” is a relatively new term in American jurisprudence, and public dialogue. Former US Supreme Court Justice Hugo Black, an AL native, wrote against “privacy” in his dissent in Griswold v Connecticut.

The development of our right to privacy emerged, interestingly enough, from Griswold v Connecticut, a 1965 Supreme Court Case which challenged the state’s 1879 criminalizing of a married couple’s use of contraceptive devices. Appellants were the