It’s Been a Busy Week
John Oliver is a master of the public service comic balancing act on Last Week Tonight. On a night where he knows the main story is going to make his audience break out in anxiety hives over something they knew was bad—but not that bad, he’ll ease them into the episode with poke and a prod at one of the world’s little absurdities. You know, like tonight, where he made a stop at the Silicon Valley Auto Show, where a guy who looked like he wanted to sell you molly (but not the good molly) promised that the long-promised day of the flying car is finally here.
Now, did that salesman once go by the name of DJ Wizard, with a song called “Sex Machine” that sounds like an A.I. trying to learn the ways of human procreation? Sure. And did the resulting demonstration look (to reporters who were required to stay 50 yards away) an awful lot like someone put a flimsy fiberglass shell around four to six hard-puffing drones with no visible driver? Also, sure. Still—when has anyone in Silicon Valley made lofty promises that crashed, burned, and stolen all your money?
After that bit of whimsical flim-flammery, Oliver then came in with the anxiety hammer, as is his way. Closing out the top of the show by showing just who’s now in charge of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Oliver called the situation “terrifying,” which is, coming from him, pretty terrifying.
Now, is that because our nation’s top internal law enforcement agency is being led by Kash Patel, the Trump sycophant who’s written a series of children’s propaganda books where a wizard named Kash protects his Trump-looking king from, among others “Queenary Clinton?,” and who has repeatedly appeared on the podcast of one Stew Peters, a Holocaust denier who Patel denied—under oath—he’d ever met? Yup.
And has Patel chosen election denier conspiracy meathead Dan Bongino, an “Alex Jones lite” as his deputy, even though Bongino has no FBI experience and has called for the abolishment of [checks notes] the FBI while promising to use his post to “own the libs?” Also yes.
Oh, and Donald Trump and the GOP are now firmly and publicly on the side of dictator Vladimir Putin’s Russia over U.S. ally Ukraine which Putin violently invaded three years ago. Showing clips of Trump and his wee, yapping lap dog henchman J.D. Vance berating Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy for not “saying thank you” enough while extorting Ukraine for its mineral rights, Oliver could only marvel at Trump boasting about the White House diplomacy debacle being “great television.”
“Well, that depends,” speculated Oliver, “Is ‘watching the president sh*t on a weaker ally for not wanting to be conquered while his goon V.P. tries to see if he can wrap his lips around his boss’s assh*le from a neighboring couch’ good television?”
Only you, the viewer, can decide.
And so that’s it for the fun, wacky portion of the show.
And Now This…
Unless you count the interlude where Oliver’s staff cut together a montage of irate callers to C-SPAN absolutely fuming that the unassuming government info network apparently has an “only one unhinged, ranting phone call per viewer per 30 days rule.” For the long-suffering call-in show hosts there, it honestly must be the best part of their day realizing they have the power to simply hang up on people once they realize this is that same Travis from Tulsa who called just that morning about the government stealing his mail. Call back in 30, Travis.
Our Main Story Tonight
So after all that back and forth with our fears and funny bones, Oliver tossed one of those Last Week Tonight curve balls and talked about… tips. You know, the simple gratuity for good service that really only the United States uses instead of simply paying its service workers a livable wage, thus leaving hard-working Americans’ ability to pay rent that month at the whims of an entitled, tetchy, unpredictable customer base while their bosses reap the benefits of their labor.
As ever when the topic seems less sexy/soul-wrenching than usual, Oliver went on to show how the issue of tipping is more complicated than, say Donald Trump would have you believe. That’s because then-candidate Trump bellowed his plan to end taxes on tips to his rallies, who ate up the concept, presumably without then tipping. As with anything coming out of Donald Trump’s mouth, Oliver stated that the reality behind the taxing tips issue was far more complex than “an easy applause line at rallies,” thus ensuring that a long, measured analysis of the subject will be listened to by about 1/100th the audience. Still, Oliver plowed ahead.
Oliver explained the history of tipping (slavery was in there somewhere, naturally), the fact that servers are traditionally allowed to be paid even less than the federal minimum wage (the term “sub-minimum wage” sounds ominously slavery-adjacent), and that white guys complaining about tipping online while claiming “I’m not the bad guy” are, in fact, the bad guy. (Seriously, even the gangsters in Reservoir Dogs shamed Mr. Pink into tipping their pre-heist server.)
Now is it annoying that tip screens for payment have cropped up in industries from mortgage companies to the people who tow your car? You bet—and Oliver noted that those people can screw right off. But for servers, bartenders, cab drivers, hotel workers, and others in the traditionally tipped workforce, Oliver showed how the current tipping economy is not only necessary but—wait for it—rife with fraud, abuse, and cheap bastards like Ralph Waldo Emerson who famously wrote of the practice, “I confess with shame that I sometimes succumb and give the dollar, yet it is a wicked dollar which by and by I shall have the manhood to withhold.” Thus cementing the legendary writer’s place in the cheap white guy hall of shame.
As for Trump’s sloganeering, Oliver noted that—again, wait for it—it’s not that simple, or stupid. As is the case with Trump and his boss/supposed underling Elon Musk’ chainsaw attacks on the federal workforce, glib, reckless solutions aren’t the answer, as Oliver explained how Trump’s plan would be unfairly applied, ineffective, and essentially worthless to people trying to make a living.
Instead, Oliver offered up ideas like abolishing that whole sub-minimum wage (where wait staff are paid $2.13 and hour assuming tips will make up the rest), especially since that means payroll taxes mean they get paychecks reading “this is not a check” and have to pay out tips to the rest of the support staff, often leaving them holding the bag. He showed how the seven states who’ve done so have paid workers better and more consistently while experiencing no downturn in restaurant business.
All it takes, according to Oliver, is a rational, thoughtful, and measured approach to an issue that politicians like to treat as a simpleminded applause line and… wait, he’s lost us already, hasn’t he? Well, he tried, Don’t forget to tip your late-night hosts.
Cardus Endus
That little blue poof of digital smoke represents the impending end of video-call service Skype, which announced this week will be shutting down on March 5 after 21 years worth of somewhat glitchy usefulness. Short for “sky peer to peer” (which sounds endearingly dreamy for a web application), the service gradually fell behind its sexier, more streamlined competition (see the picture caption for who), with the necessity of remote video calls during Covid really pointing out how old Skype had failed to keep up. Still, you let us call our parents for free from anywhere on Earth, you magnificent bastard—as soon as we walked them through a few hours of set-up on our cell phones.
Last Lines Tonight
“When I pictured what flying cars would look like, I imagined little rockets with leather seats and drink fridges. Not something that looks like lightning McQueen got canceled and rebounded by starting his own energy drink company.”
Sadly, it looks like no Blade Runner cars for us just yet
“Dan Bongino looks like a dad at a little league game who’s about to go to prison.”
Add in “Drunk dad,” unless that’s implied already
“Our main story tonight concerns restaurants, one of the dumbest things we’ve used HBO’s money to pay for, tied with Russell Crowe’s jockstrap, this giant cake, and the contractual day rate of Armie Hammer. Three days plus transportation, by the way. There’s not a lot to say.”
Some stunts age better than others
“Okay, first, no one should get that worked up about frozen yogurt. It is ice cream for people who hate themselves.”
just ask the good place
“William Howard Taft was once referred to as the ‘patron saint of the anti-tip crusaders,’ which is a fantastic spin on “cheap bastard.”
Take that, taft!
“Right. Someone’s ability to pay their rent can be dependent on a person who may be drunk, or partying on a Tuesday— or, if they happen to be the current Defense Secretary, very likely both.”
take that, fox news weekend host in charge of the largest military on earth
“Kid Rock, a man who constantly looks like he’s on trial for something called ‘moonshine fraud.'”
Trump’s adviser on the no tax on tips plan, everybody
