Name: George Carlin Thinks Football Players Should Be Able To Use Knives | Letterman
Uploaded: 2022-05-19T21:41:15.000Z
Description: Watch the stand-up comedy video 'George Carlin Thinks Football Players Should Be Able To Use Knives | Letterman' from Letterman on Comedy Buff. Published 2022-05-19. Transcript available.

Watch the stand-up comedy video 'George Carlin Thinks Football Players Should Be Able To Use Knives | Letterman' from Letterman on Comedy Buff. Published 2022-05-19. Transcript available.

- Well, it is truly a pleasure to welcome my next guest.
This gentleman is one of the most popular,
intelligent, and funny comedians of all time.
Please welcome to our show, Mr. George Carlin.
- George!
George, good to see you.
How are you, sir?
Thank you, I'm fine.
Thank you very much.
- Thank you.
- Thank you.
- Nice.
- Nice to see you.
- Thank you very much for being here.
You're actually, you're from this area, aren't you?
- Yeah, I'm a New York boy from Manhattan,
Upper West Side.
And this floor in this building
has a little to do with me, too.
I think it was about 24 years ago
when I did my first Jack Parr show.
- No kidding.
- Across the hall, yeah. - Yeah, that's right.
- In fact, Arlene Francis was the guest host.
I think that's one of the reasons I got on.
But, yeah, this has a lot of memories,
everything up and down at home.
- Do you remember other guests on the show that night,
aside from the guest host?
- Yes, Arthur Schlesinger Jr., the historian,
and Artie Shaw.
- Yeah.
- Those are the only two I remember.
I don't know who the singer was in the first 15 minutes,
remember?
- Oh, yeah, that's right.
It used to be an hour and 45 minutes.
- Right, and the singer would come on and leave
and never be seen again.
- And how did you do?
Did you, big laughs?
- Yeah, pretty well.
I don't know who the singer was in the first 15 minutes.
I don't know who the singer was in the first 15 minutes.
I don't know who the singer was in the first 15 minutes,
but I don't know who the singer was in the first 15 minutes.
I don't know who the singer was in the first 15 minutes.
I don't know who the singer was in the first 15 minutes.
I don't know who the singer was in the first 15 minutes.
I don't know who the singer was in the first 15 minutes.
I don't know who the singer was in New York.
- Oh, yeah.
- With the basketball teams doing so well.
Mets looking good.
Yeah, I'm a sports fan.
Of course, I only care about the three real sports.
Baseball, basketball, and football.
The rest of those things aren't really sports.
- No, wait a minute.
- They don't qualify as sports.
- Hockey?
- Hockey, not a sport.
Well, no, let me explain it to you.
Nothing personal.
It's an activity.
Actually, it's a combination of three things.
Ice skating, fighting, and the game of hockey.
My suggestion is that they should do these things one at a time.
Let them meet, play a game of hockey,
go to the bar, have a fight, and then go ice skating.
- All right, now, you're also excluding in here tennis and golf.
- Tennis is a form of ping pong.
It happens to be ping pong played on the table.
Soccer.
- Soccer?
- Can't use the arms.
How could it be a sport?
Any activity where you exclude the arms cannot be a sport.
No meaningful statistics in soccer.
Goals scored with your head is about the only thing I've seen.
Can't be a sport.
Golf.
Golf, you hit a ball with a crooked stick and walk after it and hit it again.
- Yeah.
- Doesn't sound like a sport to me.
- Doesn't qualify.
Golf is where businessmen get together to decide how to screw the rest of us
out of our money.
Can't be a sport.
- No.
Would you, any other rule changes or any new sports that you would be
interested in?
- Well, I'd change a couple of rules just for interest, for entertainment value.
In football, I think during the last quarter they should be able to use knives.
- Little thing, but it might pick up the ratings.
- Yeah.
- Yeah.
- In soccer, I have a suggestion of one guy should have a motorcycle and be
allowed to ride the
ball into the goal.
You'd still have a goalie, but it would be up to him to stop the motorcycle.
- Little thing, in baseball, I would have, in the outfield, 20 or 30 randomly
placed mine shafts.
Little excitement.
- Just really deep hole sunk in the outfield.
- Yes, and every now and then a guy would go, "Zoom!"
- And how would you score that?
- I think that would be an error.
- All right, I tell you, I know you have some more thoughts about this.
- I have some sports I'd like to suggest.
- I'll hold them.
- Okay, I'll hold those and we'll do a commercial.
And we'll be back with Mr. George Carlin.
Thank you, folks.
George Carlin is here.
I just wanted to mention this.
I saw your program on a cable outlet in this country, which I guess it was been
a while
ago now that it was actually...
- It's about a year.
It's been on about a year now, yeah.
- But it's terrific.
- Thank you.
- Very funny stuff.
All right, now, new sports.
- Yeah, this is on the order of the new rules, but it's a little, I guess...
Well, they're actually sports based on existing sports.
For instance, cross-country bowling is going to be a longer game.
You could spend more time at the alley.
How about full-contact chess?
- Sounds good.
- Kick golf.
We have kickboxing.
- That's right.
- Kick golf might be nice.
Figure-eight demolition wheelchair.
Would be voluntary, of course.
Off-water boating.
Gee, I never...
Now, how would that work?
- Well, you have off-road racing.
- Yeah.
- So you just...
You'd have to have a course, especially made, obviously.
- Oh, sure.
- I haven't given these a lot of thought, David.
These are...
- But the germ of the idea is what's important.
- Right.
And all of my job is just suggesting things.
- That's right.
- You know, thank God I don't have to implement these things.
- That's right.
You don't have to hire a committee or anything.
Just come up with the idea.
- You know, hang gliding is very popular.
I thought hang fencing would be very interesting.
But I'll try to work on some of the rules, if you like, for later.
I can come back and fill you in.
- Well, sure.
Yeah, if you can keep us posted on these.
- I hate to just leave you hanging like that.
- Yeah.
Now, do you ever...
Of course, with a guy that is as recognizable as you,
it must be tough for you to actually go see,
like a basketball game, a baseball game, or whatever.
- I get to them, you know, as much as I can.
I'm not a fierce fan in that respect.
I don't have to be there to enjoy it.
I did have my heart attack two years ago.
It came at a Mets-Dodgers game.
- Oh, boy.
- Yeah, and I'm really glad that it was a close game,
because, you know, those Dodgers fans leave early, usually.
And if they'd have been in that parking lot,
I'd have never gotten to the hospital again.
But I got out in time.
Yeah, I get out to the games.
I forget what that was going to lead me into, Dave.
I had a real good thought about that.
- Getting to the games?
- Yeah, being a real fan out there.
God, we'll just have to pass on that one or something, huh?
- Do you want to...
You can pass on it and go on to the next category,
or we can consult an expert.
- Well, I'd like to go on to the next category.
- Okay, let's go on to the next category.
- Because the next category is something that's dear to my heart.
- Now, this is for me also.
This is auto racing.
- Yeah, and you're an Indianapolis fellow.
- That's right.
- I have a Jackie Stewart impression that I do.
It's the only impression I do in my life.
And it's kind of special.
I'd like to do it from the seat here.
- You know, I would.
- Jackie Stewart, of course,
being the Scottish ABC announcer.
- Right.
- I have to work into this,
because the voice doesn't accommodate it automatically.
- This is Jackie Stewart.
Jackie Stewart here at Talladega Raceway.
We're at Talladega Raceway.
There's...
Hold on.
Wait a minute, no.
Wait a minute.
There's a car on fire in the Fartorn.
It's Mario André's car.
Mario André's car is on fire in the Fartorn.
Here comes A.J. Foyt.
Here comes Cagliabro.
They're all on fire in the Fartorn.
That's about it.
- That's about it.
You know, that more than makes up forgetting what that last category was.
- And I think I was...
I forgot the other because I was so anxious to do Jackie.
- Yeah.
Well, you did a fine job.
- I have something to finish with from the spot.
- All right.
- If you don't mind.
And it deals with sports.
I'll say goodbye to you now and see you another time.
- Please come back, George.
Thanks for being here.
- Let me try this from over on the monologue spot.
This is just a comparison of baseball and football.
It occurred to me that these two activities, baseball and football,
are very much...
We consider them very much a part of our lives.
In fact, we argue about which one is the number one sport.
And yet they're so different.
And you can tell from the terms that are related to them.
Baseball is 19th century.
It's pastoral.
19th century.
Football is 20th century.
It's technological.
Baseball is...
Baseball is played on a diamond in a park.
The baseball park.
Football is played on a gridiron in a stadium.
War Memorial Stadium.
In baseball, you wear a cap.
In football, you wear a helmet.
Baseball has a seventh-inning stretch.
Football has a two-minute warning.
Baseball has no time limit.
We don't know how long it's gonna last.
We may have extra innings.
Football is rigidly timed, and it will end
even if we have to go to sudden death.
Football is based on downs.
What down is it?
Baseball is based on ups.
Who's up?
Are you up?
I'm not up.
In football, you get a penalty.
In baseball, you make an error.
Whoops!
In baseball, in the stands, there's kind of a picnic feeling.
Emotions may run high, but there's not that much unpleasantness.
In football, in the stands, you can be sure that at least 27 times during the
game, you are capable of taking the life of a fellow human being.
Preferably a stranger.
Now, to sum it up, the object of the game is quite different.
In football, the object of the game is for the quarterback, known as the field
general, to be on target with his passes, riddling that defense with an
accurate aerial attack in spite of a blitz, even if he has to use the shotgun.
With short bullet passes and long bombs, he marches his troops into enemy
territory, balancing this aerial assault with a sustained ground attack, which
punches holes in the forward wall of the enemy's defensive line.
In baseball, the object is to go home.
I'm going home.
Thank you.