The Best Thing About Being Stubborn, Mary Walsh, Is That You Always Know What You'll Be Thinking Tomorrow

Mary Walsh pretending she did nothing wrong

Apparently, the shock that she isn't funny -- or talented -- is too much for This Hour Has 22 Minutes "comedian" Mary Walsh.

In the wake of her invasion of Toronto Mayor Rob Ford's privacy, frightening his six-year-old daughter, Walsh is refusing to admit that she's done anything wrong.

The best thing about being stubborn is that you know what you'll be thinking tomorrow. Apparently, what Walsh is thinking today is that she was trying to give Ford advice.

“He obviously was not going to listen to any advice I had ... or have anything to do with us whatsoever,” Walsh complained. (The detail that no one in their right mind would the advice of a tragically unfunny comedian is clearly one that has entirely evaded her.) “I’m a 60-year-old woman with a plastic sword. I was just going to give him a bit of friendly advice.”

If Walsh was really trying to offer him some friendly advice -- everyone who isn't entirely numb between the ears knows full well she wasn't -- she might have attempted to get in touch with him at City Hall. As she told Sun News' Joe Warmington, she didn't even try.

This Hour Has 22 Minutes producers explain that they asked Ford to appear on the program in August. He declined. So their decision was to ambush him at his home. Now they're stubbornly refusing to admit that they crossed the line.

When Walsh and the producers of 22 Minutes have become so disjointed that they can't keep their behaviour firmly on the rails, it's time to go. If they won't resign, it's time for CBC to fire them.

The CBC, Unhinged

No laughs to be found when comedy comes second to politics

The CBC has a problem with its comedy. Or, rather, a new problem.

For a very long time, the biggest problem with CBC's comedy was that -- unless it was airing Just For Laughs -- the comedy mostly just wasn't funny. Rick Mercer would have the occasional moment, but the political sanctimony of what was passed off as comedy overwhelmed any sense of humour.

This Hour Has 22 Minutes has long been exhibit A in the sheer unfunniness of CBC's comedy offerings. The cast of 22 Minutes has long been made up of untalented hacks more interested in grinding their own political axes than in making the audience laugh. They could elicit the occasional giggle from left-wingers who found their offerings ideologically soothing, but very little from anyone whose political opinions veer even slightly to the right of a Phish concert.

(BTW, Phish sucks.)

Mary Walsh has pretty much set the bar for unfunny comedy on 22 Minutes, but in recent years she's had some competition from Geri Hall. Consider a Sun News Network parody featuring Margaret Atwood in which Hall and Atwood take token potshots at the fledgling news network and generally take turns at being incredibly unfunny.

Apparently "the home of real news spoken by fake blondes" is Hall's idea of a rolling-on-the-floor laugher. And while some cretins delighted in it, most rational people quickly tire of watching something that makes it clear that it's a malicious hit-piece cobbled together by far-lefty "comedians" who were outraged by a challenging interview that wasn't nearly as outrageous as they want to pretend it is.

That the CBC had previously employed Krista Erickson, the target of the comedy sketch-cum-smear, only further reveals just how unhinged the cast of 22 Minutes has become. In dumping so eagerly on a former CBC journalist -- one who served the CBC, although not without controversy, until she chose to go elsewhere -- is making an undeniable statement about the quality of journalism at the CBC.

They're evidently unafraid of dumping all over their own colleagues in order to direct their rage at a former colleague, now turned adversary by way of her employment at a rival network, one one which differing viewpoints have proliferated.

But just how unhinged has the cast and crew of 22 Minutes become? Just ask Toronto Mayor Rob Ford.

Cue the terminally-unfunny Mary Walsh once more. In staging an "ambush interview" for the show, Walsh wasn't interested in waiting for Ford at Toronto City Hall. No, instead she decided to ambush him in his driveway, as he was taking his 6 year-old daughter to school.

Walsh apparently frightened Ford's daughter, and to be frank: who wouldn't be? To behold Walsh, in the pitch of her demagogic fury, raving at the top of her lungs would frighten a lot of adults. Adults, fortunately, are well-equipped to deal with the appearance of a crazy lady on their drive way. Children, not so much.

What's become the most remarkable thing about the confrontation is just how much the 22 Minutes cast and crew just don't get it.

“We were actually surprised at how humourless his response was,” remarked 22 Minutes producer Michael Donovan.

Perhaps if Ezra Levant were to turn up on Donovan's driveway, waving around a plastic sword and shoving a microphone in Donovan's face while his children are present, Donovan would better understand.

Thank You For Your Advice, Sarah...

...But Canadians will make our own decisions about health care

Ever since she was vaulted into the international spotlight during the 2008 Presidential Election, Sarah Palin has made a bad habit of coming out on the wrong end of interactions between herself and various comedic pranksters.

In November, 2008, Palin was pranked by a Montreal radio host.

Just over a year later, Palin has now been burned by Mary Wash, also known as This Hour Has 22 Minutes' Marg Delahunty, who solicited some health care-related advice from Palin.

"We told her we're from Canada, and we're just looking for a few words of encouragement for the Canadian conservatives who have worked so tirelessly to destroy the socialized medicare that we have," Wash later recounted.

Palin's answer was frank.

"Canada needs to dismantle its public health-care system and allow private enterprise to get involved and turn a profit," Palin replied during a later encounter (the first one was ended by the intervention of security).

"Basically, she said government should stop doing the work that private enterprise should do," Walsh added.

But even as Canadians' attitude toward private health care has apparently softened -- a recent survey indicated that 56% of Canadians support increasing the number of private health clinics in Canada, so long as they operate alongside -- and do not adversely affect -- public health care.

And while many Canadians may forget that Canadians were initially as resistent to the introduction of socialized health care as the United States has been -- then-Premier Woodrow Lloyd and then-former-Premier Tommy Douglas were burned in effigy during the health care debates in Saskatchewan -- Canadians have embraced public health care very deeply.

Many Canadians are in favour of reforms -- and sadly, Canada seems to be wasting this goden opportunity to discuss the options -- but abolishing public health care is on the agenda of very, very few, even among conservatives.

And while the very idea of Mary Walsh speaking on behalf of conservatives is perverse and laughable, that is, in its own sense, the purpose of comedy.

(It's also worth reminding people like Walsh that it was the Liberal Party, not the Conservative Party, who last slashed billions of dollars from public healthcare.)

Outside of the world of comedy, Walsh would have no such place. Just like Sarah Palin has no place telling Canadians what we shoud do with our health care.




Other bloggers writing about this topic:

The Intrepid - "Sarah Palin Tells 22 Minutes' Marg Delahunty That 'Canada Needs to Dismantle Its Public Healthcare System'"

Dan Shields - "FunnierThanGerryDeeNotAsFunnyAsCancer"