Spoiled rotten America : outrages of everyday life

Larry Miller is one of the most enduring and stand-up US comics at work today. Hundreds of appearances on "Leno", "Letterman", "Conan O'Brien", and other TV shows, and his unforgettable roles in films as diverse as "Pretty Woman". Now, in "Spoiled Rotten America", he fixes his gaze on the outrages of contemporary life - from "pop stars thinking deeply and sharing their thoughts" to "pillow-soft Americans who stop by the Pizza Hut before collapsing into the Wide-O-Lounger just in time to watch 22 pimple-faced steroid-eaters slam into each other at 14 miles an hour". Among his targets: The Car Radio Beat Brigade: "Their parents buy them an Explorer, and suddenly they're out all day and night, the bass beat so loud that it fluffs the shirt off your body when they pull up next to you. Here's what should be said to them: 'Young man, you're too green and feckless to be annoying people like this. Go home and clean your room. Don't roll your eyes at me, just do it.' On second thought, perhaps they could be taken to a secluded glade and garroted, slowly, with Mozart in the background." Mixing the political with the personal as deftly as P. J. O'Rourke or George Carlin, Larry Miller is today's new voice of outrage for the little guy - for "anyone who walks into the backyard at night, lifts a proud chin, and screams, 'I am not wrong!' before going back inside to resume getting quietly hammered while his wife sits in the next room watching figure skating." Like Kofi Annan, Larry Miller is one of the most irresistible comic personalities working today. Known for years as an actor, writer, comedian, and sexual pioneer, he's gained a new following as a cultural commentator and frequent guest on political shows. Now, in Spoiled Rotten America, he fixes his gaze on what's funny about our daily liveswhich includes, roughly speaking, everything. From middle-aged drinking ("When you're in your twenties, you can drink all night and bungee-jump off a bridge the next day. If I drank all night, I'd want to go off that bridge without the cord") to the excesses of our eating habits ("This is why the world hates us: the size of the portions we order. Thank God they've never shown us eating on Al Jazeerathat would be the end of it"), Miller finds the silver lining of absurdity within every black cloud. Ultimately, though, Spoiled Rotten America is more than just the average yukfest. It's an insightful, and surprisingly heartfelt, plea for us to notice what's best and worst about ourselves. "The American pendulum only swings to extremes," he writes. "The news is on all day, but we know less and less; there's music in every mall, but we don't hear it; everyone has a phone but nothing to say. The chubbiest of us have the strictest diets, because we can't learn to modulate and moderate. It's all or nothing. One bite of a cookie, and suddenly you're on a plane to Vegas with a hooker. To the Cranky Nitpickers of Americaa club I'd join in a second if I weren't already its presidentit's long been understood that the world is going to Hell in a handbasket. "What better time for a collection of seventeen comic essays?" What better time indeed. In An Acerbic Commentary On The Follies And Foibles Of Everyday American Life, The Comedian Shares A Collection Of Essays On Everything From Contemporary Politics And Manners To Celebrity And Professional Wrestling. Title from eBook title screen (viewed on Nov. 6, 2006).