It is eery and fascinating what this says about Tommy Smothers, a man America whom has showered with every good thing; Moreso than what it says about Penn, God bless him.

Tommy is trapped in the petrified forest of 1968 liberalism. I too, like Penn grew up on the Smothers Brothers Comedy hour. I was angry when CBS cancelled it because of their Vietnam protests.

But the world turns.

Nowadays the reactionary crust over American Pie is liberal lefty crust. When I was 14 in 1969 it was fun to rattle my friends' conservative parents with sideburns, bell bottoms, pot and love beads. Now the true radicals rattle the liberals' world talking about the free play of ideas and freedom and the possibility that some conservative ideas are valid. How the world turns!

Penn, you're OK!

Funny about who's 'the Establishment' now, isn't it?

Gerard, I get a message from You Tube when I click into the video that tells me it is not available in the UK for reasons of copyright. Are the Internet Stasi up and running already? I thought it was still in the planning stages. Anybody know how I can frig it?

Penn is direct in his atheism, but atheism is an opinion to him and not a religion. A year or two ago, after a show, a religious fan who is an admirer of Penn approached him after the show, and Penn listened to his pitch with interest and respect. Penn sought to connect with the man as he was, and saw his essential decency as more important than his argument.
That means he will also see indecency whatever your argument. He's going to lose a lot more friends than Tommy Struthers.

I think there is a brief moment when Penn actually gets to the nub of it, when he mentions that Tommy thinks it's "not just disagreement, but evil."
That's how they see Glen Beck, Rush Limbaugh, Fox News, whatever. Not just different, or a disagreement, but Evil. And that justifies everything.
Once you reduce your adversary to less than human and "just evil", it gets a lot easier to march them into gas chambers or put them up against the wall. "They asked for it!"
Sure they did. Just for existing and having a different opinion.
And after all, that could be a pretty funny bit on Saturday Night Live, "Up Late with Adolph! Achtung baby!" Somewhat like "what if Superman had landed on Earth in Germany instead of the United States?" Uberman!

Ahh, the life of a radical revolutionary.

I keep trying to convince my staid 'progressive' (Orwellian isn't it?) friends to tune out, turn in, and step up...No dice.

They're too busy saving polar bears by PayPal, and doing huge lines of hopium whilst consuming entire flocks of organic free-range tofurky to notice that they're 'the man' now; The very ones who're harshing on America's ecosystem of liberty as they blindly go about conforming to every pronouncement of the Gaea-deindustrialization complex's agenda pimps spewing their extremist anti-first world hate-speech on NPR crock radio in complete consensus with the corporate stooges over at PBS and Serve.gov.

Oh well...Someone's gotta man the barricades against the green shirts and the purple phalange Sturm-tropers...And I do love the smell of burning Gleichschaltung in the morning.

What an amazing story from Penn Jillette. I couldn't quite catch what show it was, that Smothers and Jillette were on. Was it The Green Show? Can someone elaborate?

Wow--that was damned interesting. Thanks for posting this. I've always loved Penn n Teller. He's got a first rate mind and heart.

Again Wow: Penn's on a journey now. His big, smart, open mind is going to take him on a ride. I love watching and talking to people starting that journey; he's been cranked up the first hill of the rollercoaster and is poised for the plunge. It's a vicarious thrill.

God will pour an extra helping of talent and discernment even into an atheist--perhaps especially into an atheist--He doesn't even care if you believe in Him. Neither should anyone else.

(For myself: there comes an odd point where God becomes unavoidable and it takes a twisted act of Will to deny Him. Belief is not an act of Will, it is an act of abject surrender. God blesses those most who resist the longest.)

Bog bless you, Penn.

I fled Him down the nights and down the days
I fled Him down the arches of the years
I fled Him down the labyrinthine ways
Of my own mind, and in the midst of tears
I hid from him, and under running laughter.
Up vistaed hopes I sped and shot precipitated
Adown titanic glooms of chasme d hears
From those strong feet that followed, followed after
But with unhurrying chase and unperturbe d pace,
Deliberate speed, majestic instancy,
They beat, and a Voice beat,
More instant than the feet:
All things betray thee who betrayest me.

"The Hound of Heaven"
Francis Thompson

Why would anyone put someone else up so high that when that person disapproves of what you think and do that you shrink in horror questioning your own existence?

This is a twisted sort of relationship - when you question your own self because someone else browbeats you. I respect Penn intellectually, although I disagree with some of his views, but this emotional attachment, the search for approval, is a sign of emotional immaturity that he will have to work through.

And Smothers. Ask yourself - what sort of person would punish someone who is emotionally close for not holding his exact views? That is the act of a truly screwed up individual.

Why would anyone put someone else up so high that when that person disapproves of what you think and do that you shrink in horror questioning your own existence?

'Cuz Smothers was a stand-in just then for a voice in his own head--the prog-liberal he thinks he "should" be as an atheist and artist. He's not wrestling with what Tommy Smothers said, he's wrestling with something in himself.

That'll make you question your own existence: when your own existence is questioning you.

Perhaps Mr. Gillette will join Juan Williams on the porch with a nice cold slice of watermelon and ponder just when did seed spitting contests become a crime?
When they "outlawed" watermelon seeds my boy. That's when.

You can see the disbelief and hurt all through out the video. The long pauses as a man, who doesn't ever lack le mot juste is fighting back his emotions. The decency of this man speaks loudly from within the long pauses.

That Gillette is one of the deeper thinkers among celebrities is a surprise. Not only does he share his beliefs, he shares his questioning of his beliefs. More of us would do well to do the same.

That said, the magic show he and Teller are part of is highly entertaining and worth your time if you're in Las Vegas. For me, the best part was the end of their act....They run to the back of the room, and then stay there for as long as it takes to shake hands, take pictures, and give autographs to all who are interested. They seem to genuinely appreciate their audience.

Director Mitch wrote: "And Smothers. Ask yourself-what sort of person would punish someone who is emotionally close for not holding his exact views? That is the act of a truly screwed up individual."

And that is precisely why mother always liked Dick Smothers best.

Watching Gillette's painful wake up to the spew spat at him by one to whom he admired brought to mind Saul on the road to Damascus. It is Gillette's open mind , heart and sincere desire for truth that will set him free.
Grey's comment above is worth repeating: "...Penn's on a journey now. His big, smart, open mind is going to take him on a ride. I love watching and talking to people starting that journey; he's been cranked up the first hill of the roller coaster and is poised for the plunge...
God will pour an extra helping of talent and discernment even into an atheist--perhaps especially into an atheist--He doesn't even care if you believe in Him. Neither should anyone else.
... God blesses those most who resist the longest.)..." Thanks Gerard for posting this.

"I think Tommy was right."

Hmmm. Not in the tribe any more... but not ready to accept it's time to push the canoe off the beach and look for another one.

I'd join a wagon train with him in the party. Wouldn't think twice about it, either.

Leftists are stalinists.

Penn Jillette is cursed in a way that most of us aren't: he actually gets to meet his childhood heroes, and discovers that they're really just assholes. Poor guy. Keep in mind, Penn, that the Smothers Brothers virtually invented left-wing bias on TV. Why would Smothers behave in any other way? He's shit on your shoes.

Sidebar to main thrust of the video,
Prediction: Penn will die a God fearing man.