Question: Why are you speaking out against this war in Iraq?
Janeane Garofalo: I'm so public about this because I've been asked to do so and because I painfully felt that the anti-war movement was being ignored.
And so, like my three-year old, "I'm gonna keep screaming until I get some attention!"
But as it became abundantly clear that no one was getting on TV talking about this, and when I was specifically approached by the founders of Win Without War and some people at MoveOn.org, I said yes. And I wasn't reluctant about it. I can't stand watching history roll right over us. It's like they're asking you to bend over, put your head in the sand, and put a flag in your ass.
And given your girth, it could accomadate a mighty big flag.

Q: Have you felt a backlash from speaking out?
Garofalo: Ohmigod. It's ridic. I'm not saying that it's just me, it's everybody who's spoken out. The press has wasted America's time, an inordinate amount of time, with celebrity bashing.
But, boy oh boy, has it been fun.
First of all, why are you wasting time celebrity bashing? Don't book me. Don't put me on your show. You have a choice. You can book a guest you can respect or you can respect the guest you book.
Or, we can book you and abuse you.

It's really kind of fun, mocking you and making fun of you...

They love to pretend that if you are in entertainment, that's what defines you and you can't possibly have any knowledge of what's going on in the news. So you have grown adult anchors and media people who are literally acting like twelve year olds, saying, "You shut up. You don't know anything." Literally treating you with the contempt of a schoolyard bully.

"Whereas, really, somebody like me knows all sorts of things. Not substantive things, mind you, but things that are firmly grounded in opinion..."

Q: Have you gotten a lot of hate mail?
Garofalo: Oh shit, yeah. I had to change my home phone number. A lot of the hate mail I get is clearly misogynist. I am a proud liberal, feminist woman, and the hate mail I get for those three things is not about me. It's about those signifiers, and about what the right in this country has managed to do to perpetuate anger over what they mean. Then there is a lot of the hate mail that says actors are too wealthy to understand what's going on. The actors live in Hollywood, all this kind of nonsense. Do they realize how wealthy the Bush family is or the Cheney family? The Ashcrofts? Bill O'Reilly? Tom Brokaw?
Yes, that raging hard-right Brokaw dude.
Do they realize that if you are talking about the Administration now, Bush and Cheney in particular, the life of privilege, wealth, and elitism they have lived? If you are going to talk about somebody not understanding the common man, then look no further than the Beltway. It is shocking that some people's lives are enriched by this nonsense—these boycotts and e-mails. They are proving themselves to be fundamentally anti-American and anti-democratic. They are against the First Amendment, so what are they defending? Unless they are trying to build a fascist Administration, unless they are trying to bring the American people to a point that we exist under a totalitarian regime. That brings us to some of the rightwing pundits who dominate the radio, like Mike Savage, or some of the commentators at Fox--the Ann Coulters, what have you. I think what they do is they turn their own personal issues--whether they be racist, homophobic, sexist, xenophobic, or imperialistic--and they wrap them in the flag and hide them behind Jesus.
Isn't Savage and Coulter Jewish?

Q: Do you think it's possible to have a liberal media network?
Garofalo: It is possible.
Possible? That answer leaves me incredulous. How about NPR, Pacifica Radio, ABC, CBS, NBC, BBC, Reuters, Associated Press and Public Television (Bill Moyers, specifically)?
What's not possible is to penetrate the wall of opposition. The myth is it can't work. Phil Donahue was working, but MSNBC took it off for their own rightwing agenda. A liberal radio network can easily work. What will accompany it, unfortunately, will be an overwhelming opposition to it in the mainstream media and by the punditocrity. Again, a lot of these pundits just sit around on these chat shows and repeat each other. They repeat phrases and words, and the news cannibalizes itself.

Q: What about the rumor that you might be involved in a new liberal radio talk show?
Garofalo: I don't know. I've been talking to Jon Sinton, who is trying to get this going. I am certainly willing to hear him out and go forward if it looks like something with integrity.

"I mean, I don't just want something where people call in and call me names until I start to cry or something. I'd like something more substantial than that. But I can't think of any other format that would make any money..."

Q: Are there any sit-coms in your future?
Garofalo: I don't know. I'm working on one for ABC.
Please, everyone let's kill this before it gets started.
It's going to be shot in Vancouver.

"It's got Gary Coleman in it, and John Ritter, and one of Suzanne Sommers' breasts, I think..."

But it's not a done deal; we're just shooting the pilot.

"They've already shot the writers, but the producer got away. He's the guy who stole Sean Penn's car..."

But with all this anti-war stuff, you never know. I never imagined that I would never care about dumb things anymore. I never imagined I'd be a person who could transcend that kind of nonsense.

"And I'm not, really. Everything I do care about, care deeply about, turns out to be dumb."

But beyond that, I never imagined I would be penalized for speaking out in favor of social justice.

"With my looks, I never even imagined anyone would pay attention to me. I'd just kinda slide, in the background, y'know..."

I never thought that anyone who spoke out for peace, and diplomacy, and social justice would be pilloried. I'm frequently depressed, just have a general malaise.

"I mean, look at me. I'm a young woman who wears birth-control glasses by choice. I have no noticeable bosom. My social skills stink. And every time I try to say something meaningful it comes out sounding like I'm regurgitating something Ed Asner ate. Wouldn't you be depressed?"

And I don't mean a malaise of indifference, I mean a malaise of sadness and fear.

"We're talking Jimmy Carter-style malaise here, folks! Where's my sweater? Oh. I have it on."

I've always been alarmed by some of the things that the mainstream media does and by what the government does, no matter who's in office, but the broken heart is new.