It’s Been a Busy Week
Or rather, a busy, chaotic, infuriating, and comedy ammunition-filled two months since John Oliver wrapped Season 11 of Last Week Tonight. In that time, as Oliver noted, momentous things have occurred.
The dictatorial Assad regime in Syria fell, while South Korea almost lost its democracy to a presidential coup. The English Labour Party inadvertently put out a campaign video utilizing unnervingly A.I.-jacked animal mascots dancing to what turned out to be a deeply inappropriate Brazilian song nobody bothered to run through Duolingo.
Kendrick Lamar performed a Super Bowl halftime show that Oliver aptly described as a simultaneous “concert and public execution” (RIP, Drake, metaphorically), and a bunch of German guys performed deeply, lovingly inappropriate deer calls involving some hand and mouth work you have to be on HBO to get away with. Oh, and Duolingo executed its own adorable owl mascot, publicly.
Our Main Story Tonight
But seriously, folks, John Oliver knows what alarmed and confused viewers have been waiting so eagerly for—a cheeky British guy to find some way to make the first month of Donald Trump’s second presidency somehow hilarious rather than terrifying.
And, bless him, Oliver did his level best, first piling up outrage after Trump administration outrage: attacks on trans people and diversity, withdrawing from the Paris Climate Accords and the World Health Organization, trying to end constitutionally protected birthright citizenship, replacing a distinguished Black general with a drunken Fox News weekend host, flooding billions of gallons of much needed water nowhere near the Los Angeles wildfires to own the libs, and more. Reacting to his audience’s boos at the intro to his story about Trump 2.0, Oliver noted, “Sorry if this is how you found out. Honestly, I’m not nuts about it either.”
Taking the first of several onscreen deep, cleansing breaths, Oliver then offered up and then followed the advice to cut through the “flood the zone” assault on our attention and sanity promoted by Trump adviser and guy who “looks like he was recently pulled out of a wet hole,” Steve Bannon. Focusing on the underway actions by Trump and unelected billionaire adviser Elon Musk (“one of the worst white guys South Africa ever produced, which is really saying something”) to dismantle the government and all its pesky regulations, humanitarian aid, and oversight of rich guys looking to loot the country, Oliver dug in and got back to work.
With Musk (called variously “a scrotum dressed for a funeral,” a “parasitic freak,” and “a witch from Dutch folklore,” just to get back in the creative insult swing of things) in his sights for gutting everything from USAID (thus guaranteeing hundreds of African babies have now contracted AIDS without retroviral drugs), to disease tracking and prevention (just in time for bird flu season), and to the many government agencies coincidentally investigating him for multiple instances of fraud and conflict of interest, Oliver was back in mid-season form.
Citing the shockingly young and perhaps unshockingly douchey minions from Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), Oliver revealed how longstanding and well-intentioned civil servants are now being ordered to essentially justify their employment to barely legal lads like one Edward Coristine, aka “Big Balls,” a 20-something tech bro fired from his last job for leaking secrets and now a state department adviser with full access to sensitive government and personal information. And Marko Elez, another whippersnapper who was forced to resign after posts resurfaced in which the 25-year-old attacked interracial marriages and called for a “eugenics based immigration policy.” (Elez has since been rehired because of course he has.)
As Oliver noted, Musk and Trump’s assault on reported waste in government is propped up by incessant misinformation. Comparing a poll where a majority of Americans think foreign aid accounts for a quarter of the U.S. budget (it’s less than one percent) to a recent poll where a large percentage of men say they could hang on the tennis court with Serena Williams, Oliver noted with full confidence, “If I played tennis against Serena Williams, I would die.”
Debunking also the Musk-Trump camp’s widely repeated lie about USAID paying for condoms for either Hamas or the Taliban (depending on how far down the “game of telephone” your right-wing talking head has gone) and various other DEI and trans-related programs that turn out not to have been funded by USAID, Oliver noted how misinformation is instrumental to the administration’s game plan—and exposing those lies is is one way to defuse it.
Still, Oliver wasn’t impressed by the Democrats’ unfocused and underwhelming response to all this democracy-threatening chicanery. Mocking House minority leader Hakeem Jeffries’ comparison to Yankees slugger Aaron Judge “not swinging at every pitch,” Oliver noted how Dems are choosing not to take a stand for a lot of marginalized and vulnerable communities. (And how Judge batted .184 this postseason and his team lost the World Series because of his terrible defense, just to nail down the metaphor.)
“Please, just let us know who you think is worth swinging for,” stated Oliver icily while accusing Democrats of throwing trans people, immigrants, and civil servants under the bus “because it looks to me like you’re striking out looking right now.”
Knowing that his audience was coming to him for some hope amidst all of this, Oliver pointed to those few Democrats like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, whose messaging hits the right notes of alarm and calls to action. Oliver also tossed a compliment to Oregon Rep. Maxine Dexter, even if the swearing-averse congresswoman’s attempt at trash talk came out as, “We have to f*ck Trump.” “We most certainly do not have to do that,” responded Oliver, although he gets the esteemed rep’s meaning.
Oliver also spent a good chunk of time praising one TikTok user’s widely remixed song explaining just how corrupt and cruel things are right now, suggesting that this should be the new national anthem and promising that Canadians would never boo something as catchy as it is on-point.
Beyond those Democratic elected officials actually taking the bat off their shoulders, Oliver also pointed to Trump’s many losses in state and federal courts in this first month, mounting lawsuits from state attorneys general halting or slowing his and Musk’s “buzzsaw” through the government, and the bracing number of New York prosecutors who have resigned rather than follow Trump’s DOJ orders to drop corruption charges against NYC Mayor Eric Adams, a new Trump convert transparently being offered leniency in exchange for carrying out Trump’s anti-immigrant raids in that city.
Applauding Assistant U.S. Attorney Hagan Scotten for signing off his resignation letter with the scathing rebuke, “I expect you will eventually find someone who is enough of a fool, or enough of a coward, to file your motion. But it was never going to be me,” Oliver noted, that “while he didn’t quite write the word ‘bitch’ at the end of that letter,” it’s pretty much implied.
In parting, and girding himself for another long season of dealing with all of this, Oliver could only offer up some stark warnings along with his usual practical advice. Saying that the coming moths and years are “going to be bonkers, terrifying, and darkly absurd,” Oliver noted that things are indeed “worse than we thought—and we thought about them a lot.”
As for what to do about it, Oliver pointed to the often deceptive effectiveness of protest and pressuring elected representatives, explaining how incremental pressures from outside forces can and do nudge things inside the halls of power. (He also fought back against those sneering at activism’s sometimes tone-deaf missteps, gamely pointing to his own once-triumphant “Drumpf” zinger as one example.)
“It’s going to be exhausting,” Oliver counseled with tough love, and urging “we have to find a balance” between “the hell of what’s going on” and “finding the joy that can sustain us.” Speaking of…
And Now This…
It’s funny dog names! Picking up on last week’s Westminster Dog Show (congrats, Monty the Giant Schnauzer), Oliver presented some alternate names for some very good dogs. Names like Roadhouse, Shrimps, The Perv, Chilaquiles, Berp, The Dreamer Who Lives Inside the Dream, Bong Connery, Paul Rudd, and—renaming this year’s winner with a more rousing moniker for troubled times—Luigi Mangione.
Cardus Endus
Speaking of bird flu (also measles, which is having a big comeback amongst Texas’ unvaccinated community), Robert F. Kennedy Jr was confirmed by the Republicans in the Senate (apart from Mitch McConnell, who’s still sore about his childhood polio) to head up the Department of Health and Human Services. Tonight’s final title card is labeled “Sickus Quickus,” which about sums up what’s in store for a country whose entire healthcare infrastructure is in the hands of a noted anti-vaxxer who doesn’t believe in medical science. Maybe “Sickus Quackus” was on the whiteboard as well.
Last Lines Tonight
“I think the only thing more quintessentially Canadian than booing the U.S. National anthem at a hockey game is the fact they waited politely for the right time to do it.”
On Canadian hockey fans booing the American anthem after trump threatened to take over their country
“And I’m glad they took it down . Not because of that, but because the question ‘What do you get when you combine Britain, accessible descriptions of dense government policy and animal mascots?’ has already been answered, and you’re watching its Season 12 premiere right now. Get off my f*cking corner.”
On the Labour Party scrubbing their unfortunate A.I. animal video
“‘Yeah, Kaitlan! Yeah, what aren’t you getting about this? Trump got Canada to agree to what they already agreed to, and it didn’t cost us anything except for any goodwill between our countries whatsoever. He pissed off an entire country of the most difficult to piss off people in the world, and in exchange, we got them to resend an email! It’s called leadership, Kaitlan!'”
on GOP congressman warren davidson’s limp excuse for trump’s canadian tariff blunder
“No, I actually can’t. And that’s frankly a wild thing to say in front of a portrait of your dad who you inherited a real estate empire from.”
on Trump asking, “Can you believe it?” while claiming america would be run exclusively on merit
“And I never thought I’d say this, but … I expected better of Big Balls, or as he’s now known, senior advisor at the State Department and Department of Homeland Security.”
on Doge boy Edward Coristine’s website steering users to sites touting child porn and the kkk
“Are we absolutely sure Kristi Noem shot her dog, or did she just talk to it and its head exploded?”
on homeland security director noem’s nonsensical explanation of why elon musk has your personal data
“I fully get why people are not letting you in particular into their home.You’re a bald weirdo with terrible vibes. You look and sound like J.K Simmons choking on a marble, and I’m rooting for the marble.”
On Trump’s “Border Czar” Tom homan complaining that people knowing their rights is hampering ICE’s anti-immigrant crackdowns
