Unlike Jon Steward and Stephen Colbert, John Oliver isnt most concerned with getting the audience to laugh, but to understand. He did more than 15 minutes on how payday loans rapaciously exploit our most economically vulnerable citizens. Another illustration : The quintessential example was Oliver’s exploration of the glorious con known as net neutrality, a term I had read and/or heard a hundred times but never (for the life of me) understood. Oliver spent more than 13 minutes explaining why net neutrality would allow huge cable companies to jack up prices. What people remember about this segment isn’t the cheap laugh he got slagging Sting, or his awkward effort to imitate a mobster. What they remember is the piercing insight he delivered about why the public has yet to raise any hue and cry about net neutrality. The cable companies have figured out the great truth of America, he noted. “If you want to do something evil, put it inside something boring. Apple could put the entire text of ‘Mein Kampf’ inside the iTunes user agreement and you’d just go ‘Agree.’”
Posted on: Thu, 14 Aug 2014 23:23:28 +0000
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