G gle - What Were They Thinking?

Silly me. Stephen said at the beginning of the show on April 1 that "This is not The Colbert Report." And so I turned off the TV machine. Only when I looked at TiVo and found that a whole half hour had been recorded did I figure it out. I watched the show and realized it was his April Fools joke. Guess that makes me his fool. Mea Culpa. What can I say?

Turns out that Easter was not as blessed as it could have been for Stephen. Fox and Friends were upset that Google honored Cesar Chavez as their Google Doodle on March 31. Cesar Chavez was born on March 31 and thus that is why the Google Doodle was there on March 31. Sometimes I think Google just loves putting things up for a Doodle that people don't know about. You know, kind of a, oh what do they call it? Oh, yeah, a teachable moment. I mean, well, did you know it was Cesar Chavez Day?

Anyway, Foxy is upset and wonders "What they were thinking?" Stephen echoed her sentiment, even getting her voice right. What indeed? Imagine honoring the founder of the United Farm Workers who said this, "The truest act of courage... is to sacrifice yourself for others." (March 10, 1968) It was even suggested by Gretchen Carlson that people might boycott Google. I would give you a link to "Google Boycott" but then it wouldn't be a boycott, so there's no way to find out.

After complaining that the new Pope, Pope Francis, was annoying him by acting too humble, Stephen started ripping into Obamacare.  Congressional Republicans are doing what they can, in fact,  they "have voted 39 times... to repeal 'Obamacare,'..."


We learned a lot about health care, specifically TennCare in Tennessee. Under Obamacare, 180,000 people would be added to TennCare which is what they call Medicaid there. Here's what Governor Bill Haslam of Tennessee said on March 13, 2013: "A lot of people say, 'hey, that's an easy call. Just expand three years 100 percent and then walk away at that point in time.' I don't think you can easily walk away." This points up the difference between telling people they are no longer getting health care versus telling them they are never getting health care. In Tennessee they do know a thing or two about health care because they have a health care lottery. Twice a year, residents who have high medical bills can call and ask for an application to the lottery. After about an hour, the lottery is over and if you didn't make it , you can try again in six months. If you don't win that lottery, Stephen suggested that you can call Nurse Brandy for $2.99 per minute.

About this point into the show, I was beginning to wonder if the whole show wasn't just one big April Fools Joke, but I will continue as if it was all sincere as any other day. Utah DNR is having an Earth Day Poster Contest. The theme is "Where Would WE Be Without Oil, Gas & Mining?" The contest is co-sponsored by the Society of Petroleum Engineers." One of the rules is "Do Not Use Glitter." That's right. If you spill that stuff, it is impossible to clean up. Stephen would know. He still has a bad case of Disco Lung due to an accident at a craft fair in 1998. If you want more information about Earth Day, you can look here, or here or here.

Stephen's guest on April Fools Day was Sigourney Weaver. They are mutual enormous tall fans of each other. When Stephen asked her what she topped out at, she told him, "Seven Four in flats." So taller than I would have expected. No wait, she was fooling with him. She's only Five Eleven. Stephen mentioned some of her more famous movies, the Alien series, Avatar, Ghost Busters. Of those, only Ghostbusters brought cheers and applause from the audience!

Currently Sigourney Weaver is in Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike. If you look around a little bit at that link there, you will learn that Sigourney Weaver plays Masha whose interests include jetsetting, signing autographs, and humility. Stephen did actually go to see the play and enjoyed it and even had the Playbill to prove that he saw it. He asked her why she would do theater - wasn't it a stretch to play a movie star since she actually is one? She admitted that it was difficult to play such a deeply shallow person.

Trivia fact. Sigourney Weaver's dad, Pat Weaver, started the Tonight Show. They talked a bit about the old days and Sigourney told Stephen that probably Johnny Carson would be impressed with Stephen Colbert. They talked a bit more about Hollywood, movies, TV and political involvement. I wondered if her views didn't tend toward a more liberal side than those of Stephen, a conservative, but he never tried to put her in her place.

Perhaps you can guess where that interview was headed all along and eventually Stephen did get there. He needed to ask her a question. She was a bit concerned but she let him ask his final question. As a journalist, he had to ask it. It's was a tough one, but a good question to end the interview with, so... "Sigourney Weaver, who ya gonna call?"