Via Reuters: Edgy comic George Carlin dies at 71
Carlin, who had a history of heart and drug-dependency problems, died at Saint John’s Health Center in Santa Monica about 6 p.m. PDT (9 p.m. EDT) after being admitted earlier in the afternoon for chest pains, spokesman Jeff Abraham told Reuters.
Carlin will, no doubt, be known primarily for his “seven words” routine and the subsequent legal conflicts that following in its wake:
Carlin achieved status as an anti-Establishment icon in the 1970s with stand-up bits full of drug references and a routine called “Seven Words You Can Never Say On Television.” A regulatory battle over a radio broadcast of the routine ultimately reached the U.S. Supreme Court.
In the 1978 case, Federal Communications Commission vs. Pacifica Foundation, the top U.S. court ruled that the words cited in Carlin’s routine were indecent, and that the government’s broadcast regulator could ban them from being aired at times when children might be listening.
Beyond all of that, he was a brilliant comedian and was scheduled to be honored by the John F. Kennedy Center with Mark Twain Prize for American Humor later this year.
While perhaps not the most well known or edgy of routines, Carlin’s “Ice Box Man” is one of my favorites, and I was always fond of “A Place for my Stuff.”
At the end of the day I suppose we still don’t know the answer to the question: “What wine goes with Cap’n Crunch?”
James Joyner has far more on Carlin here.
June 23rd, 2024 at 9:27 am
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