Kimmel Taken Off The Air And Johnny Mac And Mike Are Mad As Hell

Hey, I'm Steve Young and you're watching the Letterman podcast. I hope you enjoy.

Welcome once again to the Letterman podcast. My name is Mike Chisum. Uh been away for a few weeks, been traveling a lot, seeing lots of concerts, things like that. I actually have two uh episodes in the can, but it's been a couple weeks since we have released anything. So, thank you very much for joining us once again. And uh you know what? This week was I wasn't sure if I was going to get to releasing an episode, but then the sky fell again like it did not that long ago um with the bombshell uh event, epic event, another epic event happening in the world of uh late night television. Jimmy Kimmel uh being suspended. Um so what do we do? Johnny Mack, host of the Daily Comedy News podcast, uh, and I have once again, uh, come together to say what the f is going on in the world of late night television versus, uh, all of the entities that seem to be um, wreaking havoc in this thing that we love and the the confluence of situation uh, when it comes to technology and platforms and all the things, the changes in broadcasting, changes in thing. They seem to be coming to a head.

And uh like Johnny Mack and I talked about before, if Bill Carter hasn't been started started the book yet, I I believe I wouldn't be surprised if he's into it because um Jimmy Kimmel after saying some comments that were offensive to a very influential set of ears and uh who knows what is going on uh pulled off the air, suspended indefinitely. And Johnny Mack and I talk about this. Now, now here's the thing I love about John is that um you know, he actually has legitimate play. He has he has legitimate um you know, he's he's got credibility. Um I have enthusiasm, but my credibility, I'm not sure where that lies. Uh John, however, having done what he has done for so many years in the world of comedy, in the world of broadcasting, he was the guy that I wanted to talk to. There's a few people I wanted to talk to. I I I had a good conversation, really nice conversation with Scott Ryan. Shout out to him. Author of Last Days of Letterman and uh many other books as well.

Owns a publishing company now. Um just so proud of that guy. I love him. We had a really good conversation. He's going to be coming back on the show. Um and and John uh Johnny Mack. Um I really wanted to talk to him. We decided to put it on camera and I'm glad we did. Uh he answered a lot of my buffoonish questions. uh had infinite patience with me and uh and and and and and I'm my bewilderment to what's going on here right now. And we talk about uh by the way about an hour after Johnny and I recorded um the footage of David Letterman speaking with the uh the Atlantic uh on stage um talking about Jimmy Kimmel. Go to that. It's in the Letterman podcast Facebook group. We have uh we have the clip there highlighted. I think it's at minute 33 of the broadcast of the digital broadcast I should say.

Um, and and and it was cool because many of the things that Dave touched on or the topics in that in that in that interview touched on were things that Johnny and I talked about and and Johnny does a really good job of outlining, you know, the FCC uh broadcast standards, what um, traditionally they have done and and has a really good um, handle on things. Then we talk about of course the idea of freedom of speech, what it means and then the the role of the late night host. I mean is social commentary really necessary? It evolved in when did that evolution start? Um a lot of people have reached out to me and and asked about how uh I thought that Dave would have related to this situation. I I I monologue about that in this episode, but it's just us two friends coming together and talking about this thing that we love so much. By the way, again, I highly recommend uh the Daily Comedy News podcast. It's one that I frequent all the time.

Um because it's such a really unlike this show um which many times is a bloated mass of audio jargon um that no one cares to understand. Um his show succinct, entertaining, all the information is pertinent and um it has a really nice flow to it if you listen to it every day or if you if you get behind. I got behind a little bit and I had to catch up. Listen, three or four episodes in a row in a in a half hour period. Um, even faster if you speed up your podcasting the way that I do. I do the two times speed thing. Have for years. It is like a really it's like a power up of knowledge about what's going on in standup and the the big strokes, but then also sometimes he gets into the smaller stuff and then he has special episodes. Um, really a very very cool uh place to frequent. Also, shout out to Mark Malov. I've gotten a lot of response about Mark's uh book. Um, Love Johnny Carson. We had the podcast about that. He's going to come on. We're going to talk about it.

Uh, you know, little C. I I have the book. I've read it. It's incredible. It's a masterpiece. Um, so uh we're going to be talking about that moving forward as well. But yeah, great to be back uh with another really fresh episode. Not that the ones that are in the can aren't fresh, they're just, you know, canned. They're in a can. Take the can out, it's delicious, right? It's very, very good. But when it's fresh, it's a little bit of a different experience. This guy here uh is being released less than 24 hours after it was uh recorded. Uh I hope you enjoy. Um so anyways, thank you for people who have reached out and whatnot. Uh please join the Letterman podcast Facebook group.

It's robust. It's more robust than it's ever been. That might not have taken that much to make happen, but it's exciting nonetheless. Um yeah. I hope you enjoy my conversation with Johnny Mack, host of the Daily Comedy News podcast. All right, Johnny Mack. Um, I like that we do this. Uh, I do not like the reasons that we do this uh lately. Um, I I will talk with you all the time. I I just I appreciate you so much and everything that you uh contribute to the world of this thing that we love so much, which is comedy. Uh, everybody, Daily Comedy News podcast, subscribe, listen to it every day. It's awesome. Johnny, what the heck is going on with Late Night?

This is insane. I'm still, as we record, we're what, 19 hours into this new story, 20 hours in.

Y

my my head is still spinning. I dropped a bonus episode on my feed on um Wednesday night.

Yeah,

I was just reacting Colted. I I'm just so stunned by this and and forget about what I I have been calling Co Beargate. This is a whole other level for reasons we will get into. This this is not, oh, your show's losing $40 million and we didn't want to ruin your vacation. This is something else entirely.

Yep. I I could not agree more. Um, you know, I've got two things going against me. Number one, I'm Canadian, so I don't quite understand the nuances of of of everything going on down there. So, I've got some questions on that. Number two is that I'm a buffoon, and so I need to talk to people who know more about these things than I do. Uh to me there's a couple of issues here. People are talking about free speech, free speech, free speech. Okay. But then there's also broadcast standards, uh the rules that need to be adhered to and um and if those were violated and and and and and perhaps there's a third one which is uh personal taste. So everything with free speech checks out, everything with broadcast standards checks out. But the personal taste is now such that uh it has irked people who can make decisions on that. In your opinion, what are we dealing with here?

Sure. So, let me speak to the the FCC part of it and I'll approach this the way I do in my college classes. Legal scholars will be able to nitpick what I'm saying here. I I don't want to use the phrase dumb it down, but I'm I'm simplifying generalizing to to get the point across succinctly. So the FCC governs the airwaves as we used to call them, AM and FM radio, broadcast television. Those are scarce resources. So if you look at the FM dial in in the United States, if you look at the New York City FM stations,

yeah,

there's one at 92.3, the next one's at 93.1, the next one's at 93.9, etc. They're all 8 apart.

Yep. That is so that the radio stations don't step over each other and we regulate that. If you and I started a pirate radio station at 92.5, it would interfere with 92.3. So we have government oversight to say, okay, this station goes here, that station goes there. Got it?

Same logic applies to television.

Okay?

Because those are scarce resources. We don't have infinite band. We want to make sure that they're properly taken care of.

In the public interest is a phrase you hear a lot. In the public interest,

right?

As part of that, you shouldn't be reckless. And there are are things you can do that could have your license to broadcast on such frequencies AMFM television taken away. Yes, the government cannot asterisk maybe they can but uh up until yesterday morning I would have said cannot take your station away because they don't like what you're saying

right

now there are rules um there can be corporate rules there can be federal rules for example uh you can't swear on broadcast television on HBO swear all you want but HBO is coming to you and again I'm simplifying through a wire It is cable television is the term. Now maybe you're getting it via satellite or over the internet, whatever. You're not using the spectrum to receive HBO. So it does not apply,

right?

I worked at satellite radio.

Same thing.

That wasn't governed by the FCC. We still chose not to yell fire in a crowded theater, but we could drop Fbombs all we want.

Right. The other thing about things like swear language is the FCC is not staffed and does not spend their day going around playing gotcha. So you could go on 923 92.3 FM and go fff and just curse for two hours

and if no one complains there won't be an investigation because no one has complained.

Yes. If someone complains, then they'll investigate and uh you know you there's recordings and whatever will be like, "Oh, this guy Mike, he broke the rules. We're" and then that would normally be a fine. We will fine your radio station for the 23 times Mike broke the rules and you're scolded.

To go straight to taking away a license is off the charts extreme. Uh I used to work for W radio

under Buckley Broadcasting who had acquired the station from RKO. Now at some point my memor is foggy here. RKO was uh I'll ceue it up. Strongly encouraged to sell all their radio stations and get out of the business for whatever they did wrong. Um you know so it was

was there a horse head involved?

Something like that. Right. So, sell the stations or we're taking them away.

Okay.

I I and I heard Keith Overberman say this on his podcast. Keith was unable to think of he could not recall a time when a TV license was taken away. I cannot

and I can't easily recall a radio license being taken away other than for maybe for like um you know, you haven't actually broadcast on your frequency in years. You've clearly abandoned it so we're taking your license away. That sort of thing. Okay, let's hit a pause here for a question. Let's go back to um perhaps an example that that we would remember. When the Smothers Brothers were pulled, it had nothing to do with what you're talking about here, licenses being pulled and the actual uh right to be in business and and and broadcasting. Correct. That's that's that that's not the same thing.

No, not at all. The the Smothers Brothers, much like Jimmy Kimmel,

um said some things that were based in opinion.

Yes. the network chose not to back that opinion. And I want to get into the the Let me sidebar here for a second, too. Okay. Um, I've worked at a lot of big companies. You back your talent. I mean, that was drilled into me by those who came before me.

You back your talent. You may have a conversation in the back room and be like, "Hey, Mike, can you can you cut it out with the the Canadian stuff?" You know, less

I get that a lot. Yes. Yes. Um, but you know, publicly I'm not going to shun you. I'm going to say u, you know, Mike Mike's been an outstanding host for us. We love the Letterman podcast and we continue to, you know, we're going to continue to work together for years to come. Now, in the back room, we might be like, dude, the advertisers are like, "All right, enough with the Co Bear stuff. Get back to Dave." You know, but that's a whole separate thing. Publicly, we're going to support you. Um, so this news on Wednesday that uh, you was in the car, I was telling the story in my show. So, I was picking up my nephew at the train station. I played on my phone and while I was playing on my phone, it was that the NextStar stations were pulling Kimble, which was a big enough story. And within 10 minutes, it had evolved into ABC is pulling Jimmy Kim alive. Pulling not not even like uh you know, we're going to run a rerun tonight because he has a cold, which is you know, something you could do. Jimmy's not feeling well today. That kind of stuff goes on.

Um straight to pull. Are you kidding me? And ABC is owned by Disney. Like, but these are big. These are big players, big numbers. These are these are big things here is what I'm saying.

So, I was talking to some friends about that. You know, hey, you know, we're mad. We're going to boycott uh ABC. We we're we're going to take this out on ABC. Okay. Boycotters, and I emotionally support you. Yeah. But uh I'll ask the boycotters. While you're boycotting ABC, are you also boycotting Disney, Hulu, Star Wars,

Marvel, Marvel?

Yep.

Are you boycotting all that, too? Cuz you're either boycotting or you're not. And I'm, as much as I support Kimmel in all this, uh I I think you're not.

Yeah, that's right. Uh well, okay. So, I'm really grateful that you framed it that way. and even in the aside because my phone started blowing up at the moment of the Kimmel announcement and I think a lot of people um don't even know what you just said is that well hold on a second 20 minutes before a very important piece of the puzzle uh was placed and it was done so in plain sight but many people aren't talking about that right now. So can we go into that a little bit? How big of a deal is that within the broadcasting world?

Uh to have stations pull a show has happened in the past. Um there were ABC affiliates that didn't show NYPD Blue until they got over themselves and aired NYPD Blue. Um there have been

and affiliates have switched networks because of things like this as well, right?

Sure. You do you. You do you. Yep. Uh, I I think there were, forgive me if this is inaccurate, I think there were some stations that didn't air the Carol Oconor series in the heat of the night for whatever reasons one might make that decision. Um, so, you know, affiliates can do this and then you get into the discussion of, well, hey, if you guys are going to be an affiliate, you probably should air our programming and, you know, you can break up and all that.

Yeah. Um, but to to further the timeline, a few hours before the NextStar piece of it, the FCC chair was on a YouTube podcast and made some comments about Kimmel and how Disney better do something and uh, you know, it it was a little loaded and I think things escalated very very quickly.

Yeah. Uh many people are looking at this story as through the lens of Jimmy Kimmel said horrible things. He shouldn't be on the air. But the real story is the FCC chair going, "Hey, you know, wouldn't be the worst thing if Jimmy Kimmel weren't on the air. I'm just saying, you know, sometimes people lose licenses. You know, you never know what happens in this world." And it's really about the FCC pressure on the stations, which again to come full circle, Jimmy Kimmel didn't get on and go f FFF, which would have resulted in a fine.

Yep.

This is, oh, we've got a late night host who said things that somebody doesn't like and things rolled downhill.

Yes. Um, and then factually the president of the United States later in the day tweeted that NBC should get rid of Fallon and Seth next. Now, let's stop off there. Even in a world where we're like, you know what, we shouldn't be criticizing our leaders. We shouldn't be making jokes about our leaders. So, this uh this Seth Meyers fellow, he has to go, too.

Yep.

Even if I flip that card, we're coming after Jimmy Fallon. Jimmy Felins biting cuttingedge political commentary night after night. What's going on here?

Yeah. So, so let's precurs that what you just talked about there to when the announcement of Steven Colbear uh came to light. I think the last time we did an emergency podcast, uh President Trump at that point, what was the first thing he said?

Celebration about Coar. Kimmel's next. Camel's next

and and now and then you have people who now okay so here's the other question that I have is the FCC an independent organization or are they a full-on government organization where literally like you said things roll downhill from the top a decision could be made and it could roll downhill and just be this is now our mandate i.e. uh we don't like Jimmy Kimmel.

Uh I don't know uh the legal structure of where on the on the government organizational chart the FCC falls, but they are the government regulator of the public airwaves. Again, if on the Jimmy Kimmel podcast, he could do whatever he wants and he could broadcast from his boat in the middle of the Pacific and if he has an RSS feed, he can get his thing out there and that has nothing to do with

for now. What you're saying is for now he can

well for now. Um but the crux here even a version of Jimmy Kimmel Live airing on um ABC doesn't have their own Peacock. But if you know Jimmy Kimmel Live on Peacock

Oh Disney Plus

or Disney Plus straight to Disney Plus without touching the public airwaves that has nothing to do with the FCC. you can frown all you want. Or you could say when when um when Disney Plus wants to merge with Peacock, maybe we'll throw uh a wrench in the in the wheels, you know, maybe that kind of thing. Uh but the crux here is you're using your airwaves to say things we don't like and we're going to take your license away. And the stations went, "Oo, we don't want to lose our license." Because then your business goes from X million dollars to you have no asset at all, right? which is scary.

Yes.

Uh but you and I were I think I did this publicly in the Facebook in your Facebook group.

Yep.

And uh I I keep thinking of Edward or Marorrow. I can't stop thinking of Maro.

Yep. Uh good evening and good night indeed. Um okay, so let's let's connect it just a little bit more. Okay, so this this thing that's happening with NextStar, there's a merger as well. Is there not? Did I read that?

I I I'm not sure. I haven't.

Okay. I thought I read that there was a merger as well, but that could have been The one thing that I do I do not appreciate about the world right now is the amount of fake like headline like clickbait type news that's out there. And that was something that I did read that there is a there's some sort of merger that's upcoming as well. But the the startling thing about this is um like you said, two different issues here. The idea of taking a host's unpopular opinion in certain circles and allowing that retribution to occur in your mind has that ever happened like has on this scale has this ever happened?

So there's the court of public opinion. Um, you know, you nothing is coming to mind, but there could be a scenario where someone on TV says something and then there is public outrage and then this person either gets put in timeout or, you know, I'm sure if I took took a second to think here. Um, there's plenty of examples of people having gigs that abruptly end because they said something.

Totally. Yeah.

Right. Uh, Jimmy the Greek, I I think I think his career may have ended. the old uh CBS betting guy. I think his career may have ended abruptly and my apologies to the Greek family if I'm misremembering that, but uh you know there have been a couple things like that.

I think it's the Greek family. Yeah, apologies to the the Greek family. But yes,

um there have been some things like that. So sure, but that's the court of public opinion or that is the court of yo the advertisers aren't going to support this anymore. um you know that that's a thing but this is seemingly pressure from the Federal Communications Commission.

Yes. And that is just um I want to get to what he said like I've had a lot of people maybe we can Okay. So so you've Thank you so much for that background. I appreciate it very very much. It it provides a lot of insight. There's a lot of people I don't think that even knew about again that previous 15 minutes. Um, proverbiably, uh, uh, I I I want to talk about I've had a lot of people reach out to me. I've talked to like eight former Letterman staffers, all of which, um, I'm not going to name any of what we've said in our conversation. One of them said, and soberingly, uh, this is the end of democracy as we know it. Um, I want to talk a little bit about what he said. A lot of people have said to me, "Oh, what would have Dave how would Dave have handled the Charlie Kirk situation?" And and I mean my word um you know we could go to that too but I want to talk about what he said and let's get to the free speech aspect of it and the and the and the was what he said really like I'm not going to say it's not import taste.

Somebody just was killed uh very publicly and and they've got a family and they've got like so there's always that part of it. There always is. Now the asterisk is many times late host comics too soon. Is it too soon? No. Can I start making fun of this now? And they make fun of things, right? So, we know that this is the culture that does exist. Was what Jimmy Kimmel said over the line?

Uh, as I put together my podcast this week on Wednesday, when I was putting together Friday's show,

I saw that Newsweek had an article about people reacting to Jimmy Kimmel's comments. I clicked on it, I read it, and I didn't even put it in my script. It wasn't a thought in my head. I did not read that. And let me say loudly and clearly,

no one should be murdered. No one.

100%. Yeah,

I read the comments. I didn't react to it at all. And I and I didn't put it in a script. And a lot of things make it into Daily Comedy News. And I didn't even put that one in. So, I personally didn't read Kimmel's comments. I still haven't heard him speak them. I've only read them. Yes. And I personally

did not freak out. Um, now if we want to get into the too soon or all that, um, the opposite of too soon is if you go back to last week, the first thing Kimmel said, um, and maybe as you talk, I'll pull it up on my phone. He said something like, "Can we all just be decent people for a day and not get into this?" So, I I I'm going to look that quote up.

Yeah. No, please do. Um, I'll talk a little bit to I One thing I do want to throw out there real quick, like I've had so many people saying, "Oh, Dave would have said this and Dave would have said that." Hold on a second. In my opinion, um, David Letterman, like, let's go back to OJ for a second. The OJ Simpson thing, and many people attribute Jay Leno and the Tonight Show going past Late Show and the ratings partially because Jay Leno made fun of the hoopla around the OJ Simpson trial, which was back in the day, believe it or not, uh, you know, one of the top things that all of pop culture was talking about was this OJ Simpson trial. Dave famously said, "I don't find double homicide funny." And said, "Let's steer away from that." And and and and Jay went full force into making fun of all of that. So to me, the sensibility of of late night/ late show when making any political humor was to celebrate to me it was to celebrate the buffoonery of it. uh President Bush uh II uh you know walks into a wall, you know, nose first. Okay, let's let's celebrate that. Let's let's let's make fun of that. Um you know, he he called President Clinton Bubba. Okay.

So, so, so it's not like it's not like he didn't make fun of things, but he made fun of buffoonery as opposed to trying to weave into it, which is I don't know if it was the Daily Show or whatever it was, but weave into it political commentary or social commentary into the joke at the same time. In my opinion, that wasn't Dave's thing. That wasn't Dave's thing. He might go for a hidden meaning and or some irony maybe under the surface of the joke, but that would be the limit of it. I don't believe Dave would have touched this uh with a 12-oot pole other than to maybe book people who talk about the polarization of our of our of our society and and and you know people are listening to words and going out and and and inciting violence. Those words are inciting violence. I think Dave would maybe comment on that in a serious way with a guest. I don't think he would have touched in his monologues making fun of I don't think he would have touched Charlie Kirk. That's just my opinion and that's to answer probably 30 people's questions. They've asked me the same thing. So, or or they've talked about it. So, I just want to throw that out there.

I I've noticed more and more on my own show just how much of a Letterman influence there is. Uh I will I will

one of the reasons I like it, John.

I will drop an uh that I don't need to and it's not me doing a filler word, but I will do the letterman the uh quote from Jimmy Kimmel. And I didn't need to do that uh there. And that that is a thing that's just in my brain from Dave. The uh thing we're going to talk about here is just a Davism that's in my brain from when I was 14 years old.

Yes,

I share his sensibility.

I've struggled with this if you listen to my pod.

Yep.

I I

Please do.

I have been Thank you. I have been saying what I want to do is make fun of Jim Gaffigan signing bottles at a Kroger that which is a thing that happened last weekend. Uh, I feel Jim Gaffigan doing a bottle signing for his whiskey at a Kroger is exactly what I want to do. I want to nitpick Adam Sandler movies. I don't want to talk about somebody being assassinated, but I do have to talk about Jimmy Camel not being pulled off the air and to do the story properly. Now, I have to There's clearly some political things to it. I'm not trying to debate uh Mr. Kirk's work or not. Although I have

I have um just now before I started talking to you, I did some research to learn more about him. Um I will encourage people Google the phrase controversial Charlie Kirk quotes

and then choose an international source of your choice so you're not being biased by the US media. Why don't you read some European articles about it? Yeah.

And then you can form your own opinion on how you feel about what he had to say. Again, no one ever ever should be murdered.

Right. Exactly.

Jimmy Kimmel on day one, I found the quote. Jimmy Kimmel said on September 10th, instead of the angry fingerpointing, can we just for one day agreed that it's horrible and monstrous to shoot another human? On behalf of my family, we send love to the Kirks and to the children, parents, and innocents who fall victim to s to senseless gun violence. And you hear me choking up even reading that.

I know. Um, I know

I'm going to run this guy out of town.

Exact. Yeah, that's right. And that's that that's that uh we talked about clickbait earlier with headlines and whatnot. That's a sentence or two with no context is how we live. People will pull out

the eight words that somebody says, the fragment of a sentence that somebody says on a podcast and say, "Oh," and they'll point at it completely out of out of out of context. Um and I believe that that is certainly certainly happening here on a larger scale when you go back 6 days 5 days whatever it was um at the same time I look at what he said so let's take yes murders and again taste too soon all of that I don't know that what he said is something that in a in a sane world is actionable. I I I can't I'm having a hard time seeing it. And I tried to put it through the lens of okay, what if it was uh a very liberal person and and and and and some stereotypical uh situation, you know, a gun to son of a gun showed up and and did what they did. Uh would it be the same reaction? And I've been looking at it that way as well. And I'm trying to put the words over. And I don't I can see why people would be upset about that commentary or that uh that opinion if you want to take the humor or the attempted humor out of it.

But I don't see it being actionable. But again, Canadian and a buffoon. So, you know, I don't know why. But is it actionable?

Again, the network can have their own standards. Yeah,

the advertisers do have influence on all these things,

right?

Um it it's that it's a federal thing. I mean, what happens if uh someone doesn't like the opinion piece in tomorrow's New York Times? What happens if somebody doesn't like this podcast? Can I stay in your extra room, Mike? Um you know, like this is just not the way things have been up until this point. Are you hip to the Brian Kilme comments from over the weekend?

I'm not. No.

Okay. Uh I have to pull this up correctly because again I don't want to misquote people. I know it's lame. The guy playing on his phone um during a

No, no, no. We're good. We're good. I I'm I'm about 4 days behind everything right now cuz last week I was in Calgary uh seeing Public Enemy interviewed Chuck D and he's like a huge Letterman fan. Talked about his I I interviewed him for six minutes. That's that's going to come out. Hopefully Chuck D's coming on the show and he's going to talk about his love for Letterman. Um but uh yeah. No, no, no. I So if you if you put these in your in your show already, uh, forgive me. I'm I'm a couple days behind it.

So Brian Kilme was on Fox and Friends.

Yeah.

They were discussing the mentally ill, homeless challenges the United States is facing.

Yep.

Uh,

we are too, by the way.

Uh, reading verbatim here. Then Kilme chimed in, quote, or involuntarily or involuntary lethal injection or something. Just kill him.

Oh, okay. So yes, the headline. Yes, yes, yes, yes. I am familiar with that. I haven't gone into it deeper. Is there more context to that quote?

Uh, it was just a discussion of what are we going to do with these homeless people? Let's kill them. Excuse me. What? Um, Mr. Kilme has apologized.

Yep.

And he still has his job.

Uh, I don't know what Jimmy Kimmel was going to do during Wednesday's monologue. He apparently was going to address this situation. Yeah, I don't know if he was going to comment, apologize, uh, you know, maybe he changed his own opinion, maybe he was going to double down, maybe he was going to meet in the middle and be like, I, you know, I I didn't I I'm Jimmy Kimmel. I don't come out here to be a jerk Monday night. And, uh, you know, some people took it the wrong way. Let me clarify further and do one of those type monologues. Or maybe he was just going to do Trump jokes for 12 minutes. I don't know.

Yeah.

Um,

but, you know, we gave Mr. Kill Me the benefit of the doubt. He's still got a gig.

There we go. Um, yeah, we'll talk about context. That adds a tremendous amount there. That's that that's right. Now, I mean, we're again, if there is a merger happening or this big business behind the behind the scenes with him, you know, doesn't sound like there was any. There's plenty with Kimmel. Um, and again, it's just so the idea that if if if President Trump behind closed doors, you know, when he makes that Here's the thing about me as a Canadian listening to the things that come from down south and and and come up. Um, one of the things the opinions that myself and a couple of friends who, you know, talk about the dumpster fire that is your government right now, uh, is is things like, um, Trump will say, "This sounds ridiculous and it's proven ridiculous. This sounds ridiculous and it's proven ridiculous. This sounds ridiculous. Uh, okay. But this sounds ridiculous. It's and then one of them in the middle will come to pass and and and it will happen.

Um, you know, and this does feel like uh they're coming after late night. And I mean I the from up here the level of eerie uh tension that I'm feeling is palpable. How is it down there in New York?

Uh so a lot of people like team A, a lot of people like team B.

Yes.

But things have challenged our mutual friend Alex Bennett. Um, so, so back in the day, uh, he and I would do friendly discussions about politics in the hallways of Sirius and they were very friendly and we would give each other the business and depending on the news cycle, you know, he'd be like, "Hey, I saw your boy D." And then I'd be like, "I saw your candidate D." And we would just do that and we were friendly and we're still friends 20 years later.

Yes.

That's kind of gone now. that uh if you open up any sort of discussion uh and you're not rooting for the same team, there's no friendly banter anymore. Nothing gets solved. We're not going to meet both ways. Um and there's just so much noise. Uh you know, for example, we're all talking about Jimmy Kimmel today. There are some other things that we might be need to talk about that are, you know, should we have a discussion about guns? Um, Charlie Kirk had a clear opinion about guns.

Um, but, you know, maybe the events weren't Let's have that conversation and let's have the respectful version of that conversation. Let's just take a look at things. So, let's not yell and scream and um you know, let's not set out on a course of I'm going to take away your rights or no, you're not. Um let's just talk things through. um you know somebody uh factually and I don't mean to laugh there at all um so let me wipe that off but uh somebody

say uh

somebody uh who had advocated um for the right to bear arms simplifying

um was assassinated

y

might be a good time to just have the conversation you know it's funny um I know that uh certain parties whenever like a school shooting happens uh there were people the too soon thing that we were talking about. Um when when when there's a school shooting that happens and people start bringing up the idea of of of of that uh this it's the second amendment, right? Um people who are in favor of that say start to stop trying to take this and uh and make it, you know, uh it's a manipulation almost. And to me that is a that is a crazy argument. and and and when somebody who I would love to hear with civil discourse as you're as you are are are talking about like we have gun control in Canada now. I mean, don't get me wrong, my dad, uh, rest in peace, and all of his friends, hunters forever, all of my dad's friends had guns, mostly rifles and things like that, but we we have gun control up here, the gun crimes and the murders, a fraction of what they are down south.

This guy is a guy that rallied people, like what he rallied them about, don't like what they rallied about. This is a center of influence down there. one of your centers of influence in your country was just killed. Is it not the best time to talk about this? And again, Canadian and a buffoon, so I don't know. But wouldn't that be the time to talk about it?

Uh the time to talk about it was after a few dozen children were murdered at San Hook, Connecticut.

We didn't then,

right? And that's when I heard

I'm getting choked up even bringing that memory up that we didn't have that conversation that day boggles my mind. And again, what form that conversation should take. Um, your dad would like to go hunting. I would like to buy an AR-15 with many, many stocks that can fire off more rounds in one second than a farmer in 1792 may have imagined.

Yeah, but you'll get the deer. You'll get it.

So, let let's what what what are we talking about? Let me just try and lighten this up about So, you you've talked about too soon.

Okay. Um,

in terms of comedy

in Too Soon,

you just have to nail the joke. Um, I actually saw a good joke within 12 hours. I'm paraphrasing it, but the gist of the joke was that the head of the FBI uh or the the assistant head of the FBI was a podcaster.

Yep.

And we're investigating the murder of a podcaster. This is exactly what podcasters are into. True crime. And there was a joke based around that premise.

There you go.

That that's a sol in terms of crafting a joke.

Y

that is a good joke premise. Absolutely. Now, do you now do you show up at Charlie Kirk's funeral and tell that joke? No. What are you, an a-hole? No, of course not.

Um, but you know, a Yahoo on social media firing that off. You know what? Clever writing. Uh, if you told that at the chuckle hut at 10:30, that is what comedians do. And okay, you know, at some point it's too soon. It's environmental. It's, you know, are you joking among friends or you're at the comedy club? Are you hosting a late night show?

You know, you, like I said, you don't show up at the funeral and do that material.

Yeah.

But at the Chuckle Hut, it's a well-crafted joke

and it needs to stay that way. I've been hanging out with standups a lot um lately. I've been I've been I've been trying to get the skill under my belt and so I've been uh doing some local open mics and things like that. And I mean the level of that balance is so important to know publicly um especially when you hang up with when you hang out with standups because a lot of the time when you're at the table after the place is closed. The joke there is no too soon because it's a free form and this is just my experience. I'm not saying it's like this with all standups, but I've been through a couple of different pods and to me the similarity was you could say anything you want at that table and nobody is going to be chastised for it. Nobody's going to be, you know, they might say, "Oh, man, brother." No, like they might give advice about it or whatever, but you're free to say that stuff. And uh but time and place is extremely important. Of course, I want to pivot a little bit with you, John. I I was just on the phone, not to name drop, but I'm going to name drop. Uh Scott Ryan, who wrote Last Days of Letterman, which is my favorite book uh about uh about about all things Dave. I even like it an edge more than the Bill Carter books because of just what it is.

Scott Ryan, awesome guy, friend. He's going to come on the show again soon. We were talking about this as well and he said to me, he goes, "Okay, I want you to go into your memory banks here. We might need Don Giller for this." Um, but but do you remember when Dave started in his late show run somewhere along the line, Dave started while he was doing his monologue, um, he would throw to a video piece of some sort. It never used to be like that. like people might come in and interrupt the monologue or something like that, but he would never throw to a piece of video and and that started and we think it started around the time that Jimmy Kimmel started around then. Um just the evolution of this and so we got into this big conversation about this and then it goes back to the Daily Show and to me you take Weekend Update on Saturday Night Live.

Okay, it merges comedy and and and and commentary, but The Daily Show really really was, in my opinion, the first thing to really blew the line blur the lines between the two on a giant scale. Is what we're seeing here in your opinion the the eventuality of doing that? Like is this the extreme like like like if the extreme of I don't know is this is this the extreme of it where where where where political commentary is so interlaced with comedy that it will incite violence. Is that the eventuality that would come from mixing those two mediums together?

Uh I've never met any of the No, I have met Jimmy Fallon. Other than Jimmy Fallon I haven't met the rest of the current generation of late night hosts. their public personas. They don't seem like they're trying to incite violence. I feel like they're joke tellers. I feel Coar and Kimmel and John Stewart and John Oliver maybe uh truth tellers to use a term that gets thrown around in lexicon.

Um I feel and Seth I feel is like hey it's the Tonight Show. I'm going to do karaoke with Johny. Yep.

That's not a dig. It's we've we've had this conversation many times. Yep. That's Jimmy Fallon understanding what the Tonight Show is.

That's his lane. Yep.

Kimmel, his public persona has always been more outspoken. I don't at all think he's trying to incite violence. I think he is wearing his politics on his sleeve, whereas uh maybe a previous generation did not.

And that's okay. You, you know, we're all smart people. I know what I'm watching. Uh you know, now back to John Stewart. Yeah,

he was the first one to he freaked out when he found out he was the most most trusted man in America and he was like, "No, no, no. I'm doing a comedy show. What? No, no, don't trust me. I'm I'm telling jokes." You know, he was the first one to say it.

Um, you know, Kimmel's monologues have been a little more loaded, for lack of a better term, but but I don't think he's hiding it. Uh um so no

ask your original question. Is this the evolution?

Uh I I think it's just the who's in the the current chairs and you know we're going to have to see what happens on the other side of this now.

Right. So it's uh okay. It's it's it's okay. We have this medium that's mixing these two things together. Um you know maybe it's three things actually now that I think about it. It's it's not just com it's comedy commentary and it's also news. Um because like you said Stuart talking about there was a lot of I remember reading when I was growing up an article that talked about how a lot of people were getting their news from Weekend Update on Saturday Night Live and then later on you you referred to John Stewart people saying that all the time that they go in to check in with the Daily Show just to see the major headlines of the day but now it's grown and evolved from that and twisted to people forming their comment getting opinions from from these things. Um, I've heard Colbear say it as well. People have flat out asked him, uh, you know, about him. The truth teller part that that he's like, I'm just trying to make it's just jokes. It's just jokes.

And and fairly recently, I think it was during the, you know, the Biden run is when the last time I heard him say that on an interview, I think all of them say that. Do they really believe it? They they like John Oliver. I watched John Oliver show a couple weeks ago and I love I love last week tonight. I do think my wife and I both uh think that over the run it has gone from silly and interesting to certainly in my opinion it is the uh expression of mandates from above you know it's moved in that direction um but I think today if you still ask John Oliver you know if he should be a trusted source for whatever I think he's still going to side on the idea of being a comedy show.

Yes. Yes. Absolutely.

Is that but is that reasonable? Like they they these guys are all brilliant guys and and some gals too who've been who've taken the mantle a little bit. Um they must understand because they're fans too. They must understand that there's some responsibility on that side of it. They must understand that really like wouldn't you think? I I think just it's been the evolution of the media, how we communicate in general. Uh you know, so if we go back many presidents, uh you know, Ronald Reagan was the whale and we all we all did the whale impression, whoever started that, then we all did Dana Carvey's Bush.

By the way, Johnny Carson did a phenomenal Ronald Reagan.

Yeah.

Right. You know, but you know, it was less about the politics and more about this old cowboy.

It was caricature.

Yeah. And that's what the Bush impression was. And Clinton and I want to dance delicately here because I don't want to offend um but you know Monica Lewinsky jokes. There is a person named Monica Lewinsky. Yes. But generally speaking, Monica Lewinsky jokes were about Bill Clinton and the intern, not specifically the intern Monica Lewinsky. It was about the married dude and the intern and he's the president and that sort of joke. That's what that was.

It was a way to talk about you could say Lewinsky instead of the word which you're not allowed to say on TV.

You say Lewinsky and everyone knows what you're talking about. uh you know we get into George W and we got into the malipropisms of it all and that was sort of a harmless harmless character meanwhile people were very much debating the politics of the times but the you know from a comedy standpoint it was you know what will Ferrell did and you'd say strategery and words like that it was just funny uh no one really nailed Obama um nobody really nailed Biden

and then we have Trump who almost every comedian says it's not it's too hard to lampoon because you can't keep up with the actual news cycle.

Yeah.

Now, if you're hosting a show, if you talk into a live mic long enough, you're going to just you're going to say things. I'm going to listen back to this hour we're doing and I'm going to be like, I wish I had phrased that better. I wish I had I wish I had explained that better. Oh, I misspoke there.

Y

I taught a class today for two and a half hours. I'm sure I said something stupid. Uh, and when you're live or if you're you're live to tape, you you do enough things, somebody's going to get wrinkled and you're going to wish you had phrased something better or differently.

Yes.

Um, but over time, if you listen to somebody for, you know, 20, 30 years in some cases with the late night hosts,

Yeah.

you get a feel for what they're about. Yes. uh you know, they might not outright say I'm on team A or team B, but you'll kind of sort of get a vibe. Uh you know, you know, if you told me um Jimmy Kimmel were uh I don't know, hunting was hunting with George W this weekend, I'd be like, "Oh, I didn't expect that." That doesn't seem like it matches Jimmy Kimmel's persona. Um, if you told me Theo Vaughn went hunting with George W this weekend, I'd be like, "Yeah, okay, cool.

Sounds about right.

Great example." Yep.

Yeah.

Yeah. The uh I'm still I'm still dumbfounded by this. Um my my my original I think the Facebook quote that you that the Daily Comedy uh podcast or Daily Comedy News podcast uh commented on was my first line of that one. on if it's the one I'm thinking of. And by the way, go to the Letterman uh podcast Facebook group, everybody, and and enjoy the come enjoy the talk outside of this viewing and listening pleasure.

And the very respectful talk, too. Um, you know, I was in that chat on Wednesday night this very topic.

Yeah.

All respectful.

It was It was totally like, you know, I think part of it is that we're all on both sides kind of baffled by it. I really do. Um but but my my uh my initial sentence was I hope Disney supports Kimmel. And this is kind of to go back um to something you said earlier. What do we think like what are we taking are we taking is Vegas taking bets? Is there odds on this? Is is because I mean yeah like you say um you know it's a lot of stations potentially in play and Disney of course is going to is going to look at that. Um, is it a foregone conclusion that he's gone?

I think he's gone. Uh, wow.

His contract only goes to May.

Yep.

The whole you back your talent. You did not back your talent.

He's floated the idea of retirement. I've been quite loud about not believing him at all because what else are you going to do?

But

the network didn't back the face of the network and just his public persona personality. I think he's gonna tell them to buzz off. Now, it's a payor play contract, I imagine, as most are.

So, they could compel him to perform,

right? We're here's the money. Um, we do want a show tonight. So, pay or play is

uh I I've signed you for $16 million a year, whatever the number is. Yeah. And in exchange for that, probably your holding company will provide Jimmy Kimmel to provide the duties of host. That's probably how the deal is. Um, so ABC can say, "Well, the money and the deal here says Jimmy Kimmel has to host Jimmy Kim live and we'd like our Thursday night episode, please."

I think he may tell them to go buzz off and walk away from the money, in which case he would get fired, and that would be the story. Jimmy Kimmel gets fired.

Y

um

I I could see them going, you know what? Uh bigger fish at play here. We want to get other deals done. Um, we didn't, nobody complained about Celebrity Family Feud. Let's just run that and who cares and CBS gave us cover and we're out of the late night business, too. And we're also going to save X million, so we're out. Uh, I I I think he's gone just based on his public persona. Like, how how do you come back from that if the network didn't back you, especially with, you know, nine months to go on your contract? Um, sit home, collect the money, and figure out what you want to do. And uh you know, much like Obi-Wan Kenobi, he may become more powerful than you can possibly imagine. Uh yeah, the uh I you know, I want to talk a little bit. Okay, so let's let's put a pin in that because the whimsical part this I knew how I wanted to finish this podcast uh today with you because I mean like it seems like it's just body blow after body blow after body blow and and and and there's so many reasons to be sad. I wanted to end with a little bit of whimsy. So we're going to end with that.

But just to just to go into what you just said too about the contracts and whatnot. If you want to learn more and do a deep dive in this subject uh including that talks a lot about payorplay contracts. Um Bill Carter's second book on this subject called The War for Late Night. Highly recommend. I highly recommend both The Late Shift and The War for Late Night. Uh they're phenomenal books. I believe that they are uh books one and two of a trilogy because the third one is being written right now. I am positive that that's happening. Um, even though I try I I I' I've reached out to him and he's not he's not answering that question. He's being very elusive about it. Um, but um, if you read the war for late night, it talks about this cuz the Jay Leno deal back in the day when he was on 10 p.m. the contract that he signed was actually it wasn't just a pay or play contract like what you just talked about. It was a pay and play. He was guaranteed that he would be on the air.

And because of that part of that word and that was the reason that u NBC was so intent about keeping him either putting pushing Conan back, pushing the Tonight Show back, whatever it was because of that contract. So these contracts very very important when it comes to when when when stuff starts hitting the fan. Very important to know that stuff. And it's going to be very interesting to see how uh uh you know the the I'm I'm curious what James Baby Doll Dixon and Jimmy are talking about today. I'm curious about a lot of these things. Um one of the things that where the whimsy comes in is the idea of what these guys are going to do next. Like I have thought about a Conan O'Brien Steven Colbear sketch show four times a year, you know, like where they could really come up.

I I mean I said it uh jokingly kind of in the in in the group, but there's a lot of people that are saying to me, "Oh my gosh, Strike Force 5 could be a weekly podcast that could come out and be absolutely huge." Um these guys, all of them, no matter what happens, they're going to land on their feet, aren't they? Like I get this feeling that even though, yeah, it feels bad now, they are going to land on their feet.

Yes. Asterisk. Um I I just did a hit spot on Allison Lip's podcast and I brought this up. Um so let's go.

Shout out to Allison. Greetings from the idiot box. Let's go back to Conan. Um, Conan gets fired from the Tonight Show and we all love Conan. We all rally behind Conan. And you know what? We never talk about, Mike, the 11 years on TBS. No one cared. Sorry, we all love Conan, but no one cared. It just kind of went away. Yeah. So, you've got on on the big three or the big four networks, but you've got one of the big three 11:30 shows that that that's something that's a big platform even in the diminished era of 2025 when it's not Johnny Carson's Tonight Show. It's still an 11:30 network show. You're somebody with a capital S.

Yes.

Um I'm a podcaster. No, you know, whatever. Um you know, Amy Polar is awesome. We love Amy Polar. She had a great sitcom. She was great on SNL. She's got a big podcast, but like is Amy Poler's podcast the Tonight Show? Yeah.

No, it's not.

We're watching reruns of Parks and Wreck, not the Amy Polar Show. Um, you know, and it's super popular and I'm sure she's being paid well and she's really good at it and we all love Amy Puller, but it's not the Tonight Show. It's not 11:35. So, will they land on their feet? Will they work again? Sure. Um, Conan O'Brien has landed on his feet. Uh, and he he won the Mark Twain Prize and everybody loves Conan and he's St. Conan and it's all great, but we're kind of glossing over those 11 years in the wilderness on Turner. I got to take a little exception for that because my my gold, it's so funny. I love My okay my golden age of late night was actually late in in in in the late show run by by a nose. I loved late night growing. It's what created the sensibility that I have was late night. It it was literally weird fertilizer for the plant that was me. But my favorite run in late night was when I had Late Show, Craig Ferguson's Late Late Show and Conan's TBS show.

And I will throw this out there by a lot of people say what you said there. Maybe they weren't habitual viewers of it, but we wouldn't know guys like Jordan Slansky. We wouldn't know Sona. We wouldn't know um Reggie Watts. Uh there there was there are some things from that show. I think that show um is probably the most underrated part of Conan's work. And a lot more from that show has entered, you know, our our our culture. But I do hear where you're coming from when you when you talk about the idea of him doing Late Night and then the Tonight Show

and then that show complet. It's a completely different deal. But people still talk about the Chris Rock show. People still talk about the Dennis Miller show. It's just in a different way than they talk about the Tonight Show is what I would throw out there.

Yeah. I'm not saying it's bad.

No, but if Jimmy Kimmel gets a show on Hulu,

yes,

it's nice. I mean, the first week we'll be like, "Jimmy Kimmel's back. Good for him." Yay. But let's check back two and a half years into Jimmy Kimmel's Hulu show and let's just see where it is in the Zeitgeist.

Yes. And and that of course I I that can't be um you know that can't be argued. Uh you and I have seen it where it's gone from one late night show with outliers to two late night shows um solid but both on the same network um to it then expanding into kind of a an entertainment/broadcasting subculture of its own. We've seen that happen. So everything uh you know you know you got the the the expanding and the other thing uh the contracting the expanding and the contracting of things. Um, we're watching that happen right now, but we're also watching a contraction of the medium itself. And um, it's we are living in fascinating times. Like I got the popcorn made and I'm glad that I have you to talk about this with and so many other people to talk about this with. Um, because you know obviously some parts of this are heartbreaking. um you know certainly the real life events things like that but at the same time when you kind of take that emotion out of it this is fascinating to watch right now

it it's it's a good news story and I always like a good news story and sitting in in front of the television watching things like you said eating the popcorn

um the thing the thought I do want to put in everyone's mind before we start heading for home

yep

is what what's really worrisome here is the departure from the norm so uh if you report. Uh, if you think Jimmy Kimmel should be gone, he said horrible things and um all that, okay, when President Democrat comes for Joe Rogan and and Theo Vaughn and Andrew Schultz. Yep. That's going to be just as bad.

Absolutely. Absolutely. Well, and again, I hope that you and I can keep doing what we do. I hope it doesn't then move to that the the down the layers like is YouTube next? um you know will is there going to be some sort of mandate that anything that gets put out there contentwise you know that that to me seems unthinkable but at one time there was a comic books code and so you know we it's it seems unthinkable because of our time and place but oh no no no no like this could easily happen and uh I I think perhaps um us talking about this and certainly uh you know if there was not an incentive to at least get if not getting fully involved. At least get competent on um you know who it is that is setting the the standards, the laws, the regulations politically around us. Making sure you know who your local leadership is, who you're you know you know the next level and then up to federal. It couldn't be more important.

And uh I hope that this if there is an optimistic thing I hope this can serve as a wakeup call for people to get involved and create the country um the world that they want to create because we do currently it seems like we have that opportunity still but it boy does it feel like it's slipping away.

I hope you're right. I do think um there are those whose initial reaction to the story is good he should be fired. Um, and then, uh, you know, good. It's good Co Bear's gone. He, he deserves it. And, uh, you know, maybe you don't find either of them funny or you don't like their politics.

Uh, you know, but I could rattle off, you know, should we all come for Tucker Carlson? Tucker Carlson shouldn't have a show anymore. We're going to get rid of Tucker Carlson.

Um, yep.

I I personally don't watch Tucker Carlson. Um, but I have no problem with Tucker Carlson existing. Do your thing and I'll choose not to watch. I feel the exact same. Um, I choose to listen to your podcast because I can't watch it. Uh, although you do have the YouTube stream now, but with the with the graphic, but uh, the Daily Comedy News podcast, um, I can't endorse it enough. It's on all the major podcast platforms and there's a YouTube version of the show too, similar to this one as well. Um, Johnny, I thank you so much. I I I know we're going to talk again sooner than later. I hope it's with with happier uh circumstance, but I just appreciate everything that you do and thanks for taking some time uh kind of spur the moment to come on here and and we can do this together. And it's an honor always to even be mentioned on your show. I appreciate your shout outs. I appreciate everything that you're you do. Thanks for being such a good friend, bud.

Uh back at you and let's hope the next one is a happier episode.

I couldn't agree more. Thank you so much. This has been another episode of the Letterman podcast with Mike Chisum. Coincidentally, I am Mike Chisum. Thank you and good night.