I know that this isn't a satisfying response, but what you're saying really just indicates that it's all a matter of taste. Some people don't find it corny; others see that element and don't care (that's basically my take). Maybe it helps that my first reaction to the concept was thinking of something like "General…

Well, that's getting a bit more abstract, as it didn't strictly have to be about a Founding Father or, indeed, anything else. The immediate answer is simply that Miranda read a biography about Hamilton and something about it caught his imagination. Whether or not that approach is of interest is up to the individual…

It worked! An Order of Canada to you, hero of our people.

I think it has to do with Hamilton's story being a rich source for drama. A Founding Father who started out as a poor kid from the West Indies and travelled to New York on the strength of a local collection? The guy who served directly under Washington in the Revolutionary War and became the first Secretary of the…

I think it depends on one's personal diet. I can take quite a lot of corn if the rest of something justifies it. Hamilton is big and earnest and often quite blunt; it's also something that grabbed me pretty much instantly once I listened to it. Maybe it's not so much that people don't see it as corny as it is that…

I think a further element is that you just can't make jokes about things like email as easily as you can make jokes about everything Trump says or does. Really, what are you going to do for the former? Do a bit where Clinton is really clueless with her IT staff? Have her receiving her classified email at an AOL…

No, unfortunately. Thanks for thinking of us, though.

I think this run has had the highest batting average. Between this and the stoned furries, the Comics Page is alright by me.

There's a lesson for the left in the creation of the Conservative party, I think. When the Progressive Conservatives and the Reform party combined, the former seemed (at least to me) to have been completely subsumed by the latter, even though it was the smaller party. After the switch, it would be politicians of the…

I think I managed a decent Branch Davidian joke once, but only one other person got it. Lost in time, tears in rain, etc.

That was the first thing that came to mind. Really, we're a pretty foul-mouthed nation. So long as we follow up any English-language swearing with some French profanity, is there really a problem? Tabernac!

I need candy / Bubblegum and taffy / Get in my way, punk, ya gonna get ya ass beat nasty

I've been thinking about this lately. I've lived in a parliamentary democracy my whole life. During that time, there have always been at least four parties with substantial representation. One of them is purely regional (the Bloc Quebecois) and has no chance nor ambition to become the majority party. This works,…

It arguably worked for Trudeau. I warmed up to him a little bit when he was caught in Parliament yelling "bullshit!" at some bullshit.

It wasn't all that much whiplash, I don't think. I had one of their albums when I was younger and it ended with a song about heaven. It also had this song named "Hellalujah" (which has held up rather well, in my opinion) that fairly viciously satirizes televangelists. Christianity was certainly part of the ur-text…

No one ever means London ON. Googling for things in my city is sometimes a trial.

I can proudly say that I am about as much a pile of cryptic semi-gibberish as my handle.

I met someone a little while ago for whom clowning was a passion and a career. It didn't always pay the bills, so she worked other stuff, but she told me about all sorts of clowning she'd done, including what I'm going to call medical clowning for lack of a better term. She'd even been to a conference in Israel…

Children of Men was such a surprise at the time that I think it left theatregoers blown through the back of the wall of a long time. I say this because I was one. I had zero foreknowledge or expectations (which is my favourite way to see movies) and stuff like the first action sequence suckerpunched me. By the time…

The only thing I remember about The Reader was Outlaw Vern's review wherein he renamed it I Was A Teenage Nazi-Fucker.