Bill Burr occupies a unique place in modern comedy by appealing to an audience across party lines, but not in the usual mealy-mouthed, exhaustingly diplomatic and completely useless way.
Burr’s politics are a far cry from down-ballot progressive, but he’s never been somebody who you’ve had to couch your fandom of in open-minded spaces. This confuses some people, but I don’t think it’s that difficult to understand, because the key is that Burr is obviously thoughtful about what he says. He can get away with some takes that seem more controversial because he’s repeatedly proven that he’s constantly interested in learning and growing, not just broadcasting out hollow “hmm”s while some borderline fascist spouts off on a podcast.
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He also really, really hates billionaires, which would put him right at home in most Bushwick dive bars. You’d think they’d be frequently targeted, being the biggest upward punching bag in the country, but I guess a lot of comics still think they’ve got a spot in some future Marvel movie if they keep mum on angering studio heads. He recently combined his distaste for distasteful wealth with a take on the indiscriminate exile of occasionally-illegal immigrants from the country that’s happening right now, courtesy of ICE agents dressed up like a mannequin from some sort of Tom Clancy-themed clothing store.
Burr was a guest on Kareem Rahma’s wildly popular Subway Takes show, which finds its guests sharing their takes on all sorts of topics on the NYC subway. Burr’s take? That forcibly removing illegal immigrants is going to necessitate billionaires to “magically” start paying their workers a living wage. It’s not the most radical of takes, given that even confusion-soaked human grape Joe Rogan has come out against the extrajudicial, scattershot deportations across the country.
Of course, I share Rahma’s doubtful face-scrunch in response, because I think that’s affording billionaires entirely too much moral benefit of the doubt. The staircase to a billion dollars is missing a few steps that absolutely have to be replaced with the corpses of some poor sap, so I don’t think anyone reaches those hallowed halls without a body count.
Still, I’d much rather see shots fired their way by current comedians than the cadre of “fearless” dolts who use “cancel culture” as an excuse to try to make street jokes from the 1980s seem fresh and brave.
