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

Authors: Bill Maher

Tags: #Humor, #Form, #Political, #General, #Topic, #Political Science, #Essays

The New New Rules: A Funny Look at How Everybody but Me Has Their Head Up Their Ass (13 page)

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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