The Largesse Recommends that Jon Stewart be Very, Very Careful

Now that The Daily Show with Jon Stewart is back from its annual late-summer break, it seems like a good time to reflect on how it’s been doing in the ten months since the election.  You may remember that this period of time that was supposed to mark the end of humor for the comedians, Stewart very much included, who made their bones on the awe-inspiring hypocrisy of the Bush administration and ended up marking the point at which serious studies began concluding that Stewart was, as his commercials have always mockingly stated, “the most trusted name in news.”

The Largesse’s First Concert Series Rolls on

A. Friend Recommends Midwestern Hip-Hop Sensibility

Somewhere in the industrial Midwest, there is an arena.  To see it today is to see a metaphor for everything that went wrong with that neck of the woods:  the tired paint job reflecting a lack of imagination, the weeds poking up through the empty acres of parking lot reflecting neglect, the once-lit LCD marquee now covered by a gun show advertisement reflecting the changing priorities of the community.  Its website brags of having been “bestowed the honor” of a visit from George W. Bush, making it quite possibly the last place outside of Texas that would make that claim.

The Largesse Mostly Recommends Michael Jackson (1958-2009)

The following pieces were written completely independently of each other – in fact, the writers didn’t know the others were tackling the subject at all.  [Ed. Note: We should probably communicate better around here.]  In the interest of full disclosure, we present them all here for your edification.

First up, A. Friend:

I’ve never known exactly what true students of the craft think about the music of Michael Jackson.  Folks like the Notorious E.P.C., who has friends in high places in the world of music criticism, surely have a view of his catalog, but whether they love it or hate it, I don’t know.

Nor do I care, because my enjoyment of music owes its very existence to Michael Jackson and, more precisely, Thriller.  Everyone has certain pop culture markers that define eras of their life, and Thriller was the first, and remains one of the biggest, of mine.  I remember being on the school bus at the tender age of 7, when a classmate brought the album (as in, actual vinyl) to school one day for show-and-tell.  He was unquestionably the coolest kid in school that day, basking as he was in the reflected coolness of the coolest album, made by the coolest guy, in the universe.  I remember wanting his red leather jacket and his sequined glove, and there is a picture, famous in my family, of young A. Friend asleep on the couch one Christmas evening with the glove on one hand and a 1984 Michael Jackson wall calendar in the other.

The Largesse Sadly Denounces Scarlett Johansson

I wanted this to be different.  Really, I did.  “Scarlett fever” has been running wild for a few years now, and when I sat down to consider why, I hoped, and probably expected, that a quick look at its boobs roots would yield a satisfactory answer.  Instead, I’m left to consider whether I think Ms. Johansson is better described as “all sizzle, no steak,” or “all hat, no cattle.”

The Discerning Largesse Counter-Intuitively Recommends Phil Mickelson

People love to hate Phil Mickelson.  He’s cocky.  He’s a pretty boy.  He’s the whiney rich kid from grade school.  Some consider him a man possessed of great talent who, rather than maximize that talent, engages in destructive (on-course) behavior to ensure that he is never faced with the great expectations that following through on it would require.  Those of us without the burden of psychology training, on the other hand, see Mickelson as a fantastically talented, personable golfer who makes weekend sports-watching more enjoyable.  Here are some of the finer points you probably missed: