Behind the scenes with Jason Alexander, Samantha Bee, David Javerbaum & Randy Cohen

Photo courtesy of Nick Caito, Fox 61 News

Can't get enough of our It's Satire! panelists? Neither can we! Check our their answers to our backstage questionnaire, and stay tuned for more photos and videos from behind the scenes coming soon!


What is your favorite place in the world? Why?

David Javerbaum: My mother's womb...because I was happy there.

Samantha Bee: My cottage in the Catskills is my favorite place. When I go there with my family we instantly transform into out best, most relaxed, pink cheeked selves.

Jason Alexander: To hard to choose a favorite, but one of the most beautiful places is Bondi Beach in Sydney, Australia.

Randy Cohen: Central Park-that urban jewel. It's the finest municipal park in America.



What is something you can't live without?

David Javerbaum: My lymphatic system.

Samantha Bee: My children and my husband.

Jason Alexander: My family, including the dog. Things are not something I get overly attached to as my entire childhood home was robbed by 8 men in a moving van when I was little.

Randy Cohen: A feeling of remorse.



What book are you currently reading?

David Javerbaum: Hop on Pop. (I have a two year old)

Samantha Bee: The Sheriff of Yrnameer by Mike Rubens (friend, ex-Daily Show producer)

Jason Alexander: Giants by Jonathan Stauffer a comparative study of the life and times of Frederick Douglas and Abe Lincoln.

Randy Cohen: Wolf Hall, Hilary Mantel's Booker winner.


What is always in your fridge?

David Javerbaum: Cold air.

Samantha Bee: Whole milk, eggs, Perrier, broccoli, onions, and yogurt. I am boring.

Jason Alexander: Deodorant.

Randy Cohen: Hummus.


What surprises people about you?

David Javerbaum: When I jump out of a giant birthday cake.

Samantha Bee: That I am short, and nice.

Jason Alexander: Any discernible intelligence.

Randy Cohen: My having a refrigerator full of hummus.

Fans & Teammates Remember UConn Football Player Jasper Howard

Rentschler Field was awash with the number 6 on Saturday afternoon, as teammates, fans and students remembered Jasper Howard, the University of Connecticut football player who was killed on campus two weeks ago.

Our YOUTH Forum Associate, Danielle Joseph, was there for the pre-game ceremonies and shared her thoughts about the tribute to Howard.

"At the UConn game on Saturday, everyone felt a sense of loss. Not because of the final score but because of the missing player, Jazz. For the few moments of silence the whole stadium seemed united. Even those of us who had never met him were overwhelmed by the unity the team, the fans, the band and the cheerleaders, showed by their proud display of the #6. Even though I had never met him I think Jazz would have been proud to see how many people he touched.”

Photo courtesy of NBCConnecticut.com

Facebook="Highclass"

Check out this recent article on NPR. Interesting commentary from Tech Revolution panelist danah boyd.

It seems, in the mind of many kids:

Facebook is "highclass"
Myspace is "trashy"
and
Twitter is for "old people."


Perhaps I can ad from my own anecdotal experience you could rewrite this as:

Facebook is for white people.
Myspace is for brown people.
and
Twitter is for(sorry) old people.

Zero-Tolerence for zero-tolerence

It seems the zero-tolerance monster is rearing its ugly head and the boy scouts are falling like dominoes.

Things are rough in Delaware's Christina School District.

Evidently, there is a gang of rampant, first-grade, ankle biters running around. And, their weapon of choice is a camping, knife-spoon-fork combination thingy. Cherubic, Zachary Christie was evidently so excited about joining the cub scouts that he brought his fork-spoon-knife thingy to school and that is where the iron fist of the law came slamming down.

For this egregious offence, suspension and the possibility (I’m not kidding) for reform school time.

Now, maybe darling Zachary is a holy terror and can’t be trusted with a down pillow, never mind a spoon-knife-fork thingy in school. Fair enough. Having worked many years with holy-terrors myself, I’ll give the school the benefit of the doubt. If that is the case, then the issue here is behavior of a particular child, not weapons in school. Somebody needs to have the cajones to deal with said child and parents as such and not hide behind a policy.

Next on the docket: Lansingburgh Senior High School student Matthew Whalen.

Now, where I might expect a kid like Zachary (above) to be a trouble maker, Matthew seems to be downright, goodie-two-shoes. Not only is he an Eagle Scout, Junior ROTC and has an award for saving a life, but he keeps an emergency kit in the trunk of his car. (The only emergency kit I ever had in my car was the spare change I kept in the ash tray in case I wanted a Slurpie on the road…until I lost the ash tray.) The problem? Matthew had the audacity to keep a two inch pocket knife in the kit. That, according to school officials is a weapon and for that he must be punished: 20 days suspension. Dare I state the obvious that this “weapon” was locked securely in the trunk of the kid’s car and next to it was probably a tire iron which is way more dangerous. Or perhaps, that anyone on the baseball team is likely to have a bat in their car which would inflict far more damage than the knife. Or maybe, even that Matthew was statistically an absolute menace to life and property when he got behind the wheel of the car and drove it and was much more likely to hurt or kill someone out of inexperience than intent with that knife.

Nope, none of that matters.

Here are the facts. Zero-tolerance policies don’t work. According to a study by the American Psychological Association, they do not reduce and even increase violent behavior in schools. They do not promote consistency in discipline in schools. They even seem to encourage drop-outs. All they seem to do is relieve school administrators from the responsibility of, oh I don’t know, being school administrators. I’ve always figured the reason adults teach the children is that the adults have better judgment. It doesn’t seem that way in these two cases.

In the interest of full disclosure, I've been carrying a pocket knife since I was 12. I've only ever stabbed myself, and that was an accident.

An addendum from my friend Becky!

Girls are trouble makers too! No knives here, but clearly a danger to herself and others...

Racism is Alive and Well (In case you were wondering)

It seems Keith Bardwell, justice of the peace for Tangipahoa Parish's 8th Ward, is not the hopeless romantic we all thought he was. Keith has a standing policy when it comes to justice-of-the-peaceing, no interracial marriages. According to him, they just don't work out and, in the interest of "the children" he figures that mixed race kids are neither accepted by whites or blacks.

"I'm not a racist. I just don't believe in mixing the races that way." — Keith Bardwell, justice of the peace in Louisiana's Tangipahoa Parish, explaining why he refused to issue a marriage license to an interracial couple.




So Keith:
A+ for standing up for your convictions.
F for having the convictions of a Southern racist caricature.


CNN
Dailykos...
LSU's Daily Reveille


(I can't wait for all this National News coverage when a gay couple is denied a marriage license.)

When Cakes go Bad...

Here's a recent world-wide-web find that I just had to share...It's Cake Wrecks!
It seems all who work in the Cake Decorating Craft are not up to the same level as our Forum Panelist Duff Goldman. Some are...well, you should check out the site.

Congratulations Heidi "(in Spanish!)" (now all "together")
Glad your "Here" (Are you really?)
Way to go Bob (Yeah Bob, way to go...)

David Javerbaum Joins Panel for It's Satire! (Who's He?)

Who is David Javerbaum, you ask?

Well, he's the guy Jon Stewart called as a "lifeline" while participating on the TV game show, Celebrity Millionaire.

He's won a few (11!) Emmy awards producing and writing for The Daily Show.

He's also written for The Onion, Colbert Report, The Late Show & Harvard Lampoon.

And perhaps most importantly, he was a finalist on the Jeopardy! 1988 Teen Tournament and its 1998 Teen Reunion Tournament. ("Yes, Alex. I'll take Clearasil for 500, please.")

Then, of course, there's his latest book (released today!), What to Expect When You're Expected: A Fetus's Guide to the First Three Trimesters. Here's a quick "get to know you" video of Javerbaum discussing his book.



We're really looking forward to laughing along with David Javerbaum and fellow Forum panelists Jason Alexander and Samantha Bee at It's Satire! on Saturday, November 14th.

You can read more about David Javerbaum here.