The sad, painful death of Dennis Miller
Did his wife cheat on him with a hot liberal vegan yoga teacher with smoother skin and better hair? Did Bill Clinton shun him at some fancy White House dinner back in ‘95 and refuse to get him a decent “escort” at the DNC convention? Did he start taking some sort of nasty medication that makes you impotent and kills your soul and pounds any sort of extant satirical divine spark you may have into gray and choking ash? No one seems to know for sure. But whatever it is, something happened to the once-brilliant Dennis Miller. It started about a decade ago and has since turned the man from one of the funniest and smartest and most intellectually wry observers of culture and political attitude in the country (no one could weave an obscure literary sub-reference into a long joke about, say, the senior prom like Miller) into some sort of warped war-supporting Bush-loving right-wing sycophant.
Time was when Dennis Miller was actually FUNNY. His witty, erudite take on the world was something wondrous to behold. He made me laugh- which is, after all, what a comedian is supposed to do. He also made me think, which is generally not something one would associate with comedy. Somewhere along the way, though, Miller lost his mojo…and his sense of humor. Instead of being funny, he became a shrill, joyless, sel-righteous mouthpiece for Our Glorious and Benevolent Leader © and his neoConservative revolution.
I don’t know when the change happened, but what I do know is that Miller just ain’t funny no more. His mean-spirited, highly-partisan rants are little more than mean-spirited jibes by a bitter shell of a human being intent on humiliating his perceived adversary.
Somewhere along the line, Dennis Miller decided that the very thing that made him successful and made people laugh was no longer sufficient. No, he was going to become a zealot, a joyless, Right-wing troll- one of the very people he used to skewer with regularly. And he’s no longer funny.
I have heard bits of his rants in the past few years. There is no joy left in his perspective. There is no sparkle of lightness or pleasure in his eye. It is only dryness and lashing out and death. He used to be the smart-ass cousin of Bill Hicks and Lenny Bruce. But now you hear him and you can’t help but think: Something hard and sharp and ugly has eaten him alive. Miller claims it was 9/11 that changed him. True enough. He appears to have sacrificed his once-nimble mind and forsaken all perspective to drink the Kool-Aid of the Dark Side, and has become a full-blown Republican. And it’s a sad thing indeed.
I can handle the fact that Miller is a Republican, but what I find so disturbing is that he’s become such a joyless, self-superior drudge. Of course, if the key to being a DUMB@$$ is failing to recognize that you in fact are one, Miller surely deserves his DUMB@$$ AWARD.
Many aspire, but few attain. And few attain as well and as thoroughly as Dennis Miller…which is too bad, because he really is a brilliant, erudite individual. Back in the day, he used to be funny. Now? Well, since when does plying your trade on Fox News Channel portend ANYTHING resembling a functional sense of humor?
