The New New Rules: A Funny Look at How Everybody but Me Has Their Head Up Their Ass

by Bill Maher

  In any event, we here at Real Time have taken the liberty of purchasing the website FreeLevi.org. It’s yours if you want to use it to get folks to contribute to some sort of liberty fund so you can get enough money to get out of that frozen meth lab they call a town. And even if the money doesn’t come in, it’s not too late: Just grab your skull bong, climb out the window, and get on the highway. I can’t actually come get you, or even let you stay at my place, because I’m pretty sure you’d smoke all my weed, but just call me from a pay phone, I know of a safe house you can stay in till after the election; it’s like the witness protection program for baby daddies.

  And remember, Levi: California knows how to party. Trust me, the girls out here are going to love a big, high-sticking farm boy like you. If you play your cards right, in a couple weeks you could be screwing the lesbian right out of Lindsay Lohan.

  —September 19, 2008

  HANNIBAL LECTURE

  New Rule: Stop making horror movies with Anthony Hopkins. I’m not afraid of any evil I can evade by taking the stairs two at a time. Anthony Hopkins was a great young Shakespearean actor. Just ask Shakespeare. But if I wanted a movie where an eighty-year-old made my blood run cold, I’d rent Sex and the City II.

  HARD RIGHT

  New Rule: The next Republican National Convention must be held in a giant closet. Every week there’s a new gay Republican outed. I have a feeling that “big tent” they’re always talking about is in their pants. There are so many Republicans in the closet, their symbol shouldn’t be an elephant, it should be a moth.

  HARDLY MERKIN

  New Rule: Bring back a little pubic hair. Not a lot, I’m not talking about reviving that 1973 look that said “I’m liberated” and “I’m smuggling a hedgehog.” I just want a friendly, fuzzy calling card that’s a middle ground between toddler smooth and “Dr. Livingston, I presume?” It’s supposed to have some hair on it. It’s a pussy, not Dr. Evil’s cat. Call me old school, but there’s a name for a guy who needs it hair-free: He’s called a pedophile.

  HATE-BY-TEN

  New Rule: Khalid Sheikh Mohammed must get a new head shot. I don’t care how long your résumé is, with this photo you’ll be lucky to get a gig blowing up a dinner theater. Look at you. You’re like the Arab Nick Nolte. You look like Ron Jeremy with a hangover. You think you were tortured before—wait until we start waxing off all that chest hair. And by the way, Sheikh, there’s nothing chic about that outfit. That shirt doesn’t say, “Death to America,” it says, “Flashdance: What a Feeling!” I can’t believe we have the same agent.

  HELL SINKY

  New Rule: Restaurant restroom sinks must not be so trendy that I can’t figure out how to turn them on. Do I wave my hand in front of an electronic eye? Is it voice-activated? Does it scan my retina? I know these sinks are supposed to be the state of the art in hygiene, but the guy next to me is peeing in his.

  HEMLINE NEWS

  New Rule: If one of your news organization’s headlines is about who got kicked off Dancing with the Stars last night, you’re no longer a news organization. Sort of like, if you were on Dancing with the Stars last night, you’re no longer a star.

  HESS WE CAN

  New Rule: Stop talking about “the gas prices under Obama.” As if he’s the guy out there changing the numbers on the sign with that long pole. And while they’re at the gas station, Republicans who still think human activity doesn’t affect air quality should poke their heads in the men’s room.

  HIGH FINANCE

  New Rule: Stop acting so surprised that ninety percent of our paper money has cocaine on it. This is America. You’re lucky it doesn’t have gravy on it. Besides, if it weren’t for the coke, a dollar wouldn’t have any value at all.

  HILLBILLY HEROINE

  New Rule: If you’re a baby momma trying to hide your baby daddy’s baby behind your momma’s baby . . . you just might be a redneck. At least when Obama got a convention bump, it wasn’t leaking amniotic fluid.

  HITTING BOTTOM

  New Rule: You can’t make a gay man one hundred percent straight in less than a month. Especially if that month contains Fashion Week. A month to change your sexuality? I’ve spent longer than that on hold trying to quit AOL. Guys like Ted Haggard can’t just claim to be “cured” of homosexuality; they should be forced to blow into some sort of “Dicka-lyzer.”

  HOARDER PATROL

  New Rule: Someone has to make a reality show about hoarders who hoard midgets. I’m too busy to watch all the shows about hoarders and all the shows about midgets. So put them together. I’m also too busy for shows about sexual predators and shows about cake. So put those together, too. Make a show about sexual predators who hoard midgets after they lure them into their homes with cake.

  HOLY SEE-THROUGH

  New Rule: The Pope must wear a slip. I’m sorry, but some people just shouldn’t do “casual Friday.” And I don’t understand, usually the Catholic Church is so good about covering things up.

  HOT TOTTY

  New Rule: Women have to stop using baby pictures in their Facebook profiles. Especially if it’s your daughter as a baby. You’ve taken something nice—your old high school boyfriend looking you up on Facebook to masturbate—and turned it into something creepy.

  HULLS OF MONTEZUMA

  New Rule: A cruise ship to Mexico is newsworthy only if everyone doesn’t get diarrhea. “In the morning, in the evening, ain’t we got the runs . . .” You want the Mexican cruise experience? Let me save you six grand. Put on Univision and eat at Wendy’s.

  EBONY AND IRONY

  New Rule: A candidate for president should not be judged by the color of his skin. To anyone who thinks like this, I say: Please don’t reject John McCain just because he’s white. I think the recent news from Wall Street has made us all less tolerant and only reinforced the stereotype that white people are shiftless, thieving welfare queens.

  Take a look at the CEOs of Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, AIG, and Lehman Brothers. I know—the first thing that jumps out at you about their faces is that they all happen to be white, and they all happen to be responsible for stealing. But what you have to understand is that these whites are a product of a society that made them that way. It was the neighborhoods, and the schools they went to—Harvard, Yale, the Wharton School of Business. They never learned the value of doing real, actual work. And the first step in fixing that is better role models, so kids growing up white today don’t think the only way out of Westchester is corporate crime, or a government handout, or sailing.

  So I get it, the temptation is to look at McCain and vote against him because you don’t see an individual; you see just another typical “welfare whitey.”

  And it’s true, he’s spent his entire life shuffling from one low-paying government job to another. Well, except for those years he spent in prison. Typical! And between you and me, he’s not very articulate. Oh, he may have some “street smarts,” but he’s not what you’d call an educated man. He freely admits that he’s ignorant about the economy, and apparently the only thing his white running mate knows how to do is crank out one baby after another. And now, of course, her teenage daughter is pregnant out of wedlock, because she learns it at home! But that doesn’t mean we should assume all white people are like that just because so many of them are.

  There is hope. I believe even the stupidest, greediest, laziest whites can break the cycle of dependence, like this November, when we finally move George Bush out of public housing.

  —September 26, 2008

  THE HURL OF SANDWICH

  New Rule: Bacon, eggs, and cheese between two waffles isn’t a breakfast; it’s a suicide attempt. This is Dunkin’ Donuts’ new “waffle sandwich.” You can wait in line for yours or, if you’re in a hurry, just snatch the pistol from the cop sitting at the counter and shoot yourself in the head.

  HURLIN’ OLSEN

  New Rule: If you lose your looks at fifteen, you’re doing something wrong. I’ve seen less frightening twins in The Shin
ing. Steven Tyler saw this and said, “Wait. There are two of me, and I’m on the cover of Newsweek? Who did my makeup? I look like shit.”

  HYPE CASTING

  New Rule: Now that all news on CNN and Fox News, no matter how old, is being billed as “breaking news” or “happening now,” news that actually is breaking and/or happening now must get its own graphic that says, “No, seriously, guys, we’re not fucking around this time, this is actually happening now.”

  I

  I SHOT THE SERIF

  New Rule: The Gap doesn’t need a new logo. It needs to stop being the place with the expensive cheap clothes that asks the question, “How can something without any style still go out of style?” Remember, none of us are in the Gap because of the logo. Or because of the clerk who says, “Those jeans look cute on you.” We’re all in here for one reason and one reason only: because some old person, who doesn’t know any better, got us a gift card.

  ICE RACK

  New Rule: Men don’t care how expensive your bra is; they just need to know if it unfastens in the front or the back. The Victoria’s Secret Christmas catalog features a $6.5 million diamond-studded bra. And guys, it’s the perfect bra for mistresses, because she’s almost guaranteed not to leave it in your truck.

  IDIOM SAVANT

  New Rule: Instead of using the expression “It is what it is,” just shut up.

  IMMACULATE REJECTION

  New Rule: For the sake of human existence, K-Fed must not be allowed to mate with Paris Hilton. Or, as I like to call her, “K-Y.” When the Pope saw this picture, he changed his opinion on abortion from “It’s murder” to “Okay, but just this once.”

  IMMODEST PROPOSAL

  New Rule: No more public marriage proposals. When you hire a skywriting plane, or propose to your girlfriend at the ball game, every unmarried woman is looking at her man like, “Well . . . ?” And you’re not helping the married men, either, whose wives are remembering how they proposed to them in flip-flops, cargo shorts, and a “Who Farted?” T-shirt by saying, “What the hell, I’m going bald anyway.”

  POTUS ENVY

  New Rule: The rest of the world can go back to being completely jealous of America. Our majority-white country just freely elected a black president, something no other democracy has ever done. Take that, Canada. Where’s your Nubian warrior president? Your head of state is a boring white dude named Stephen Harper, and mine is a kick-ass black ninja named Barack Hussein Obama.

  That’s right, everybody, I take back every bad thing I ever said about the good old USA. I’ve gone from “God damn America” to “Goddamn, America!” I feel like a hockey mom at the state fair getting felt up by Hank Williams Jr. while fireworks go off and Jesus appears in my cotton candy. It would be stupid not to be stupid about it. So I’d like to take this moment, when we finally got one right, to bask in a little unwarranted, unapologetic, irrational faux patriotism. Or, as Fox News calls it, “regular programming.”

  I might regret this. It’s kinda like grocery shopping when you’re high. But here goes, world: We’re Americans. We built the Golden Gate Bridge, the Hoover Dam, and Joan Rivers. We’re the only country that can look at a sandwich made of ice cream and chocolate cookies covered in fudge and think, “Hmm, you think we could fry that?” And you know what? Yes, we can! They may have seventy-two virgins, but we have thirty-one flavors. You know what our favorite burger topping is? Another burger. We invented rock ’n’ roll, jazz, funk, R&B, and hip-hop. Without our music, your iPods would be filled with ABBA, Menudo, and Men at Work. And you wouldn’t have iPods.

  Not only did we create the Internet, we’re the ones who filled it up with porn. Jefferson lived here. And Miles Davis. And Gloria Steinem and Frank Lloyd Wright. And a lot of other people Sarah Palin never heard of. In America, strippers and Disney stars have an equal right to be named Hannah Montana, and I was freely able to make a movie saying there’s no afterlife, and you could watch it while eating crap that’ll kill you. But that’s okay, because our corn-fed high school sophomores are bigger than your soldiers. And they’re better armed.

  I ask you, in what other nation would they tax young people to make sure old people can afford erections? What you call “football,” we call “soccer.” And what you call “war crimes,” we call “football.” And let me just say it again: We elected a black guy, and it was because he was the best candidate, not because it was some cheap gimmick. And we should know, because we are also the country that invented cheap gimmicks! Yes, America is like Jessica Simpson—sometimes it’s so stupid it embarrasses you, but on the other hand, how about them titties?

  —November 14, 2008

  INCENSED

  New Rule: You’re not allowed to be shocked that breathing smoke might be bad for you. A new study shows that frequently burning incense might cause cancer. What—did you think you were protected by some kind of magic hippie force field? It comes down to what I always say—if you’re going to burn something and then inhale it, it might as well be getting you high.

  INDIAN CAREGIVER

  New Rule: Give America back to the Indians. In reaction to the South Dakota abortion ban, the Oglala Sioux Indian tribe plans to open an abortion clinic on their sovereign lands in the state. Oooh, red man gives paleface heap big screw you! Now women in South Dakota will have an alternative to throwing themselves off a grain elevator. Just look for the teepee with the sign that says, “Papoose? Vamoose!”

  INFERIOR COMPLEX

  New Rule: If Mormons are going to keep putting up temples, their architecture has to suck less. Gee, thanks, Mormons. Another mall parking garage with an angel on top. You’ve answered the design question no one was asking: “What if we up-lit a Soviet-era apartment complex?” “Our religion isn’t strange at all. Now, please, step inside our windowless box of creepy.”

  INSECT ASIDE

  New Rule: Ants have to stop bragging about being able to lift five times their body weight. Fuck you, ant. And by the way, you can wear all the black you want; you still have a fat ass.

  ISLAM FOR DUMMIES

  New Rule: If your people are so desperate that mannequins make them horny, there’s something wrong with your religion. This week, police in Iran confiscated sixty-five mannequins for being too sexy. Guys, I’m sorry, but it’s the mannequins that are supposed to have the sticks up their asses. In the free West, we don’t have impure thoughts about inert hunks of tit-shaped plastic. We have Britney Spears.

  DEATH TO MOOCHY

  New Rule: Stop pretending that other governments have nothing to teach us. From those socialists in Sweden, we can learn how to fix a banking crisis. And from our friends in China, we can learn how to punish the jerks who caused it. The ones who took bailout money and bought private jets made out of rubies and veal. Dick Fuld of Lehman Brothers personally made $500 million in subprime mortgages, and he gets to keep it. While you and I pay off his bad bets. Bernie Madoff stole $50 billion, mostly from Jews. For Jews, this was the worst pyramid scheme since the actual pyramids.

  Which brings me back to China. A couple of months ago, some greedy businessmen in China were caught spiking the milk they sold to children with melamine, a plastic derivative that boosted the protein levels and thus their profits. You know what the Chinese are doing to the businessmen behind their milk scandal? They’re putting them to death. Talk about lactose intolerant.

  Now, am I saying we should treat the bankers who poisoned our financial markets with tainted investments the way China treated its poisoners? Please, we’re not China. We’re just owned by China. So no, I don’t think we should put all the bankers to death. Just two. I mean, maybe it’s not technically legal, but let’s look at the upside. If we killed two random rich, greedy pigs, and I mean killed, like blew them up at halftime of next year’s Super Bowl or left them hanging on the big board at the New York Stock Exchange—you know, as a warning, with their balls in their mouth—I think it would really make everyone else sit up and take notice.

  This crisis
is rooted in greed, and if two deaths shocked a society of three hundred million into acting decently enough to avoid this in the future—well, they’d die as heroes. It’s not like collateral damage isn’t built into our assessment of things. Cars kill almost fifty thousand people a year, but we accept that as a fair price for being able to get around without riding on top of an animal. So two dead bankers really starts to look like a bargain, and isn’t that what they loved—bargains?