The Danube Ain't Blue | Lewis Black's Rantcast #269

Ajouté : 2026-05-27

[00:00:02]This could it could all go horribly wrong at any minute. Hello there and welcome to the 269th edition of Lewis Black's Randcast entitled The Danube Ain't Blue. And uh and it's not uh it's it's just not it's uh turns out it's just been based on the the the Walts that Strauss wrote. And uh I guess be should have seen the Daniel, but it's not blue. But I guess you can't title the song the murky dark Danube. And it was a little murky and a little dark, but it was quite serene. Um, it was not.

[00:00:44]It really was. And uh, uh, beautiful to float down the Danube. [ __ ] beautiful. Um and uh something I'd always wanted to do as I told you and I am lucky enough to have been able to do it and um it was quite something and it was quite wonderful as I said it is always a joy uh to get away from the sound of his voice and from the daily uh what do you do today? What do you do today? What do you do today? What do you do today? Is anybody going to stop this?

[00:01:16]Why does the legal system take this long? uh what does it take for the Republicans to react? Why uh do we have to go through this? What did we do to deserve this punishment? Um how did the Democrats lose? Why did they lose?

[00:01:28]Because well, they're inept and nuts. Of course, we know that already. And it just is constant to to to really be able to get you can actually breathe um uh when you're traveling. You can actually when you're traveling outside the country or you know, you really can.

[00:01:46]Oh, yeah. That's what it was like.

[00:01:47]That's what silence is like. It's just extraordinary.

[00:01:52]Um and uh there wasn't a lot of people weren't, you know, there was not a lot of discussion. There was moments when people would talk about it. They a lot of people were angry. Um and uh I guess only one time did someone seem to want to kind of make a little defense, but not a major one because I wasn't going to put up with it.

[00:02:17]you know, I go, "Well, what about this, this, and this?" And then they quiet down and it was But it was quite nice um to be away. And uh I I I mean that it was if you you're thinking of going down a river, the Dan was is well worth it. I I you know, I I don't know. It's just a matter of what you really want to see.

[00:02:39]And uh you know uh I would look again to see which way to go but uh I it was quite nice to see Vienna. I'd always wanted to see Vienna and mainly for its you know just the blue and you belone was written there Mozart's home Freud was there. It's a you know it's a cultural uh uh center. Um the lipidens honor is dancing through the streets.

[00:03:09]I don't know if they were home. I don't even know if they do them anymore. I have no idea. I don't know if they think that maybe they're trained in a way.

[00:03:16]Maybe PETA got a hold of them, but I didn't hear anything about them. But I did have a It was quite a lovely city to wander through. For years and years and years, I have uh wa wondered uh why they've always said that and and I've been told this over and over again that uh uh you know, Austria is really uh the most anti-Semitic country on earth. and and and I I will never I I just don't understand anti-semitism. Okay? I I I it's it's really there there only a few of us. There's not much, you know, I don't care what I don't give a [ __ ] It's intolerable.

[00:03:53]Um there shouldn't no group should be, you know, centered and focused on and hated. It's ludicrous. I mean, it really is [ __ ] Oh, they're the problem.

[00:04:04]Really? No, you're the problem. And that's the reason you create the problem that you see as the problem. Do I need to go over? This is [ __ ] second grade psychology.

[00:04:15]God damn it. Um and but there it was just unbelievable uh to discover that yeah I it may win. If there was an anti-semitic Olympics uh Austria would walk away with the title. Um I'm I'm not going to sit here. You could just look at the history of Austria.

[00:04:37]It I think it starts in the 13th century. They're already they kick the Jews out. And then um and then again I think in the the 14th I I I it was just continuous.

[00:04:51]And the Jews would help and then they kick him out. The Jews would help and then they kick him out and then the Jews would help and they kick him out. Uh, and they would, you know, it was really like uh just a a very bad marriage is what it was like. I don't know what brought the Jews back. I don't know what they thought they would they would be getting from the Austrians. Um but by the by 1842 there was uh the ship was hitting the fan there and they needed help and the um they really kind of um Jewish the wealthy Jews kind of pitched in and did everything that they could and they but and Austria wouldn't have survived without uh the financing of the Jews and uh especially these wealthy wealthy Jews. That's why they said that's that's they had the money. Just stop it. Just stop. Just don't go there.

[00:05:43]So they because they used the money to to help and then after they helped and they and the Austrians said one they threw the Jews out, the people who had helped them, the people specifically who had helped them and all the others who practice the same religion. Um really quite something. Really quite something.

[00:06:07]Um there was a really unbelievable just un [ __ ] believable and it went on and then it went on again and of course uh during the rise and fall of uh the Third Reich again. Uh some of that of course came out of that kind of impetus came out of Austria. But it wasn't until the early 90s that the Austrian government said, you know, maybe we've uh overlooked this. There's certainly seem to be a little problem here, but we're past it.

[00:06:43]Whenever you we kind of brought it up on the tour, and I I never do, but just in terms of trying to find out, well, you know, but we're past it. They really just blew it the [ __ ] off. Um, and if you get to Austria, well worth going to the Jewish Museum where I was really brought up to speed on on the Jewish problem.

[00:07:05]Wow. They just It is I read and read and read and read. Just you go down these walls and up these walls and um the the Germans had come in and actually uh there was an original uh Jewish museum.

[00:07:21]And the Germans of course closed it, took took a bunch of stuff away and then gave back only some of the stuff. So why and but what was written on those walls will kind of stick in what's with the the few fragments left in my brain forever. Um I was uh overwhelmed by it.

[00:07:38]Yeah, I was. And uh really the queen of the queen of the queen of the queen of anti-semitism was uh Maria Teresa who was you know considered to be uh you know she did a great deal for the country and was quite remarkable and you know her her quote is uh uh in a notorious letter regarding a Jewish presence a presence just all seven of them in Vienna she wrote I know of no greater plague than this race which on account of its deceit usury usery userie and avarice is driving my subjects to beggory beggory Jesus and so that was Vienna but it was still uh um also uh it is the um the home of the uh climpmped the the bayer who really did these did the the famous one he did was the kiss. I did not really know a great deal about him. I kind of knew his paintings. If I had been, you know, asked whose paintings that I I would have been hardpressed, but I certainly knew a lot of them. And I was struck by the fact that in a sense it was the the first kind of uh uh it was really these kind of uh incredible Facebook photographs. Uh, and not that he did, you know, kind of photographic art, but it was really these stunning um women that he painted uh and that he or these women that he painted stunningly.

[00:09:18]I mean, it's a combo. And it was uh really quite something like uh the original Instagram maybe, who knows? But it was uh what was it was what was there before uh the phone took it all away.

[00:09:34]instead here. We can just uh take some photos and that'll be fine. Um and we'll we won't look for that inner light.

[00:09:42]Um and I'm still jetlagged as you can probably tell. Uhhuh. Yes, Siri. And it was because it's a slept back and uh I'm uh and I I had a bunch of stuff to do when I got back here. So, I'm still not recovered. However, um we the other uh we went on to Hungary and uh mainly Budapest, which I will be going back to because it is also really just a [ __ ] stunning city. Uh really remarkable split into two, Buddha and Pesh and uh both worth a visit.

[00:10:20]That city is truly worth a visit and I did not get to spend enough time there and I will be going back. And then we rolled on down all the way to Bgrade and uh which I thought would be kind of really fascinating. Uh and I've really learned the history of um I've never truly understood the Serban the Serb the Serb Croat Croatian Serbian Serb and Croatian war. Um and uh so and and uh it was uh so I learned enough about that to go holy [ __ ] Um that was really something I did not know and I you know read about it if you want want to find out. I'm not going to uh you know god knows I stumble over. You know, there's only so much once I go through a trip like that that I can remember and I'll only give you the high points and then go, but you know what really happened is so let's just skip it. So I I get back and boom, he uh it just, you know, starts up again. And I'm gonna f I'm going to drop my suit against the Department of Justice.

[00:11:30]And in return for dropping that suit, I just need 1.7 billion billion billion billion dollars to pay off um those who have been uh unduly uh you know uh politicized and uh gone after by the department that the Department of Justice went after people.

[00:11:55]And so we're going to, you know, he's got he's going to have a slush fund to to pay them off. So these are like who's he who do you think he's paying off?

[00:12:06]Huh? He's going to pay off the guys who went in on uh January 7th, the 8th, 9th, 10th, 11th. [ __ ] my brain. Those who went in to the uh to Congress. Huh?

[00:12:22]That's what some people say. I'm sure.

[00:12:25]And I'm sure that's what he's going to do. That'll be a chunk of it and then a chunk to the people that are friends that uh you know have been uh that he's probably already pardoned. Like Jesus Christ, beyond belief. And then they'll kick back whatever they do to him. Is anybody home? But finally, that's what got the Republicans moving. Epstein and that. And they can't really figure out what to do with Epstein. But they pounced on this. Boy, we can't have this, can we? Well, no, they can't. Even though they uh know that uh he pardoned them all and didn't they did not censor him for that. Just even tell him no, you can't do that. All right. He pardoned them. He pardoned them. He pardoned them. But this, you know, you can pardon them, but I you don't give money. The [ __ ] idiots. Okay. And then uh he had a you know he uh filed suit against the um uh the uh um you know they you know tax you know they think about they they uh you know his tax forms were released so people could look at his tax forms which should be done anyway by by anyone who's ever run for the presidency. they've done it. And so, uh, the, uh, the IRS to make amends, I I read, this is when I come home. This is when I come home. The IRS to make amends says, "Well, you know what we're going to do?

[00:13:59]We're going to uh, we're going to be sure you get uh, you don't have to.

[00:14:03]We're never going to audit you again or your family or your children or your children's children or your children's children's children's children. I'm a [ __ ] levable. Are you kidding me?"

[00:14:13]Right? Look, I don't give a [ __ ] No, you don't want to audit him for about two years. Fine. Audit him. You're never going to audit him? Him? Him him? Him him again? The [ __ ] is the matter with you? Son of a [ __ ] And then, so where's the court here? Where's the court? Well, we're going to have to do some talking about this and then, you know, by the time we, you know, he wasn't able to do that, he's not that judge is has to go because we, you know, and then it's five years down the road.

[00:14:52]I the the look, I don't know a lot about the law, but I do know that's got to be against the law, and I don't give a [ __ ] Okay? It's that simple. All right?

[00:15:05]They they [ __ ] up. You you you uh but you don't get you don't uh get get out of audits. I mean, come on. Where's the law in any of this? Huh? When the law just dropped out of [ __ ] sight, huh?

[00:15:24]We just don't go somebody just a judge, one judge put on the robe, go out in front of his uh house in the suburbs, go, you know, I think I got something to say on this. Uh, no, just it's appalling and we shouldn't have to live through it. I mean it. I can't tell you what it's like to be in the middle of of of a place I've never been and not have to listen to this. And then now we're going to have peace today. That's what we were told. Peace in in Iran. It's coming.

[00:15:58]It's coming. Even though we're not going to get anything that we he set out he but we don't even know what we set out to get what he set out to get in our name, you know. Son of a [ __ ] We don't even know.

[00:16:18]And uh really now so he's jerked us around for the 400th time and it and some of these people still think this was a good boy. What do you the the uh that's the senator from uh Pennsylvania?

[00:16:33]No, I think this is a Democrat. This was a really good war. you got to No, he had taken out of place what had been put in there to make sure um that they wouldn't have a nuclear weapon in order for him to remove and he's and now he's going to what? Put it back based on what? Right.

[00:16:53]And he said he destroyed all their all of their material.

[00:16:59]Please, but what point DON'T YOU GET? HE'S LYING.

[00:17:05]And as you can tell, I have a it's it was too much yelling on the Daily Show this week. Um, and I'm the voice of the Stanley Cup, which I'm excited about. Yep. You'll be seeing that. But I digress because I'm sick of talking about him. And so, we're going to move on. And we will move on to uh my f my my friend uh colleague Steven Cobear, you know, leaves the air for no apparent reason other than the fact that um you know made jokes made jokes made jokes about someone who thinks he's funny and people have said that uh our president is funny and he's not funny. He's got a He's got a mild sense of humor. And if he had a real sense of humor, he would know what funny is. And he's the same as people I have in my audience at times.

[00:17:58]Well, you're not funny. What are the other people laughing at, Schmuck? What do you think the people are laughing at?

[00:18:05]Okay. Are there people running around every audience? Uh, tickling everyone who came into coarsen.

[00:18:13]They just ran. They had these little gremlins that were tickling them. And the people left there and were like, "Wow, I can't believe I've been I was tickled. I was tickled. I I couldn't find the person tickling me. I don't think that stuff's funny, but they tickled me. I Jesus Christ.

[00:18:30]You take him off the air, huh?

[00:18:33]I think you took away, you already took away uh what was from what I think I think uh in many ways Stephen wanted to do which was uh to really not be in this position. He wanted to entertain. That's what I think and uh and he uh and he was basically kind of uh you know put in this position. the Cobear report, as far as I'm concerned, I I really wish in many ways that had continued now.

[00:19:07]Um, but how long can you keep that up?

[00:19:09]It's got to be exhausting. I thought that was a uh a piece of satire that was way ahead of its time and will not be matched by many. It was really extraordinary. My hat is off to him. Um, and I dedicate uh for whatever it's worth this this randcast to him and the work that he's done. And I'm sure that we'll be seeing uh you know he did he's done you know great work and I'm sure we'll see more great work from Stephen.

[00:19:40]Um, so, uh, bomb boyage and, uh, all the best and, uh, to you and to your family.

[00:19:51]Take care of yourself. And, uh, that's what I got from here, folks. That's it.

[00:19:57]Um, I've got more to say about probably nothing. So, that's why I'm done. And, uh, but I'll be back. And uh I want to thank uh all the folks who've continued to send in uh rants and continue to have something to get off their chest and allow me the privilege and the pleasure to read them. And I I deeply appreciate that. And the fact that uh those of you who do listen, I have no idea how many of you there are. I don't think there are a lot, but those of you who do, it means the world to me. So, as always, thank you. Thanks to all of you for listening to my rantcast. If you have a rant you want to get off your chest, send it into me at lewisblack.com/live.

[00:20:46]You can think of it as therapy or whatever you want to think of it as.

[00:20:50]Just let it rip. And I want to thank the true stars of our show, the ranters and the splendid rants they gave us. Lewis Black's Rant Cast was created and hosted by me. Haha, Louis Black. Our live rant audio was produced by James Salt. Our theme song by Chris Lane. Executive producer Ben Room. Executive producers Matt Klein Schmidt and Robert