Author: admin

This is an incredible true crime story with lots of unexpected twists and turns. It’s also an infuriating and disheartening story involving otherwise innocent people that were treated unfairly and with complete disregard by police and prosecutors, the very people tasked with uncovering the truth, not simply prosecuting the most convenient suspect.

Much has been written about this case, but usually, only in bits and pieces. I wanted to bring all of the information together in one spot, from the original murder, the unethical police behavior that led to a young woman’s death, the overzealous prosecutor who disregarded the weakness of her case, and the wrongly charged suspect who, if not for a bit of good fortunate, would likely be sitting on death row right now.

Without further ado, here’s “Search for the Truth, the Unsupported Prosecution of Juan Catalan:”

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Jose Ledesma is a bad man.

In November 2002, nineteen-year-old Ledesma, along with two other men—all members of the Vineland Boyz street gang—opened fire on an SUV containing members of a rival gang. They fired seven shots into the vehicle, killing twenty-six-year-old Enrique Acosta.

Four nights later, Ledesma approached eighteen-year-old Christian Vargas, as Vargas waited for his girlfriend near her home in North Hollywood. Without warning or conversation, Ledesma shot Vargas, killing him with one shot.

Los Angeles police detectives from the North Hollywood Division quickly solved the first murder. There were several witnesses that pinned the murder on Ledesma and Mario Catalan. Ledesma was arrested in North Hollywood, while Catalan was apprehended near the Mexican border after his girlfriend told police of his involvement in the Acosta murder.

The Vargas murder was not as easy to solve. Police couldn’t find any witnesses to the murder, although they recovered a shell casing that, through ballistics testing, matched the same 9mm semiautomatic pistol used in the Acosta murder.

Detectives Pinner and Rodriguez from the North Hollywood division were assigned to the case. Ledesma was already in custody from the Acosta murder, but when questioned by Pinner and Rodriguez, denied being involved in the Vargas murder. So, police hit the street looking for witnesses.

They spoke to sixteen-year-old Martha Puebla, an on-again, off-again girlfriend of Ledesma. On the night of the murder, Puebla and her friend Maribel were at Puebla’s house waiting for Ledesma. Vargas was waiting outside. They heard a gunshot, and when they went outside, they found Vargas slumped over the wheel of his car, dead. There are conflicting stories about what Puebla told police. Her family says that Puebla told them that she had not seen the murder of Vargas. Police contend Puebla saw the murder but refused to cooperate with them. In either case, Puebla did not name Ledesma as the shooter.

Even so, Detectives Pinner and Rodriguez returned to Ledesma and told him that Puebla had implicated him in the murder. They even produced a “six pack,” a group of six photographs of potential suspects, including Ledesma. Someone had circled Ledesma’s photograph, and at the bottom had written, “Those is the guy that shot my friends boyfriend.” The photograph was signed “MP,” supposedly for Martha Puebla.

The detectives told Ledesma that Puebla had identified him and, if he wanted a lighter sentence, he should confess. Ledesma claimed he didn’t know Puebla and refused to confess. He was returned to his cell.

The next night, Ledesma called his friend, Javier Covarrubias, known as “Cokester,” from jail and put out a hit on Puebla. “I need her to disappear,” Ledesma said. “She is dropping dimes.” Because Ledesma called from jail, the conversation was recorded. Sadly, at the time, no one bothered listening to the call.

Cokester was not very prompt. Five months later, Puebla was still alive. She was called to testify at Ledesma and Catalan’s preliminary hearing. Puebla testified that she did not know why she was there. She didn’t know anything about the Vargas murder. Los Angeles County prosecutor Beth Silverman had called Puebla to attend the preliminary hearing. She fired questions at Puebla, but the answer was always the same. Did Puebla see anyone? Did anyone say anything? Did anyone yell anything? “No. No. No.”

Also in the courtroom that day was Mario Catalan’s brother, Juan. He had once been in the Vineland Boyz street gang with his brother and Ledesma. He’d even confessed to drug possession to spare his brother jail time. But that had all changed years earlier with the birth of Juan’s daughter. After her birth, Juan left the gang, went to work at his father’s auto repair shop, and was living life as a law-abiding citizen.

Eleven days after the hearing, Cokester finally got around to doing what he had been directed to do five months earlier. According to Puebla’s father, he was sitting at home when he heard gunshots, He rushed outside to find his daughter dead. No one else was in the area, but there was a cell phone belonging to Juan Ibanez laying next to her body.

Ibanez told police that he and a group of friends were visiting Puebla outside her house when a car circled the block and parked at the end of the street. Ibanez’s friends left when they saw the car, but Ibanez stayed with Puebla. A man got out of the car and walked toward them. When he got to Puebla, he stopped. She asked the guy if he knew her. “No,” he replied, then shot her twice.

Ibanez claimed he fled, and that the killer shot at him as he ran. Police showed Ibanez a “six pack” of photos, and Ibanez picked out two photos. One of the people he picked out was already in prison. The other had an airtight alibi. Ibanez then helped police develop an artist’s sketch.

LA Magazine writes what happened next:

“Three days later the ex-girlfriend of a Vineland member went to the station and told Detective Pinner that the gang was responsible for Martha’s murder. It should’ve been obvious: Martha, a Vineland associate who had dated Vineland members, had testified in a preliminary hearing of a Vineland member, and had been falsely identified by Pinner and Rodriguez as a witness against a Vineland member, had died at the hands of a Vineland Boy.

“Despite this, detectives made no progress. The recording of Ledesma ordering Martha’s murder still sat in Pinner’s desk.”

A few nights later, police stopped a man riding a bicycle after the man gave them a suspicious look. The police frisked him but did not find anything incriminating. LAPD Officer Guiral asked the man if he was willing to talk to them, and he agreed, provided they could talk inside the squad car. The police agreed.

The man, Francisco Saldivar, admitted to being a member of the Vineland Boyz, and the police asked him about Puebla’s murder. Saldivar told the police that the shooter’s name was “Juan,” he had a girlfriend named “Alma,” he drove a white Ford F150 pickup, had a brother named “Mario,” and had just returned from hiding out in Mexico.

Police ran with the new information. They quickly arrested Juan Catalan, the brother of Mario Catalan, for the murder of Martha Puebla. Juan’s wife’s name was “Alma,” but It didn’t seem to matter to police that he had never owned a white Ford F150 and had never been to Mexico. The artist’s sketch Juan Ibanez helped the police develop looked nothing like Juan Catalan. It didn’t matter.

Juan had no idea why he had been arrested. He was stopped at gunpoint outside his father’s auto shop, his wife and four-year-old daughter in the car with him.

At the jail, Detective Pinner questioned him and accused him of the murder of Martha Puebla. Juan denied knowing Puebla or having anything to do with the murder.

“That’s you,” Detective Pinner said, pointing at a copy of the drawing the sketch artist prepared. It looked nothing like Juan.

Juan again denied being involved. “Please, that’s not me. That’s not me.”

Pinner told Juan several witnesses had identified him. This was a lie.

Juan was panicking. “Can I take a lie detector test or something?”

“No,” Pinner said.

It was then Juan realized that the detectives didn’t really care if he had committed the murder or not. If they could pin it on him, they would.

LA Magazine picks up the story again:

“Juan spent three days in the Van Nuys jail before he could see a judge, who transferred him to Los Angeles County. The cell was built for fifty men and must’ve held twice that number. Tensions behind bars run along racial lines, and whites, Latinos, and blacks managed an uneasy coexistence. Each group was led by a “shot caller.”

As soon as Juan arrived a trustee—an inmate with freedom to move around the jail—approached the bars to talk to the Latino shot caller.

“Hey man, we’ve got somebody that’s no good in here.’

“County jail, crowded as it was with killers and rapists, seemed an unlikely spot for moral judgments, but even the worst criminals feel entitled to punish certain offenders. It clicked for Juan: Martha was sixteen. He would be treated as a child murderer.

“I’ll get you the name after dinner,’ said the trustee.

“The shot caller salivated at the prospect of hurting or killing the man responsible.

“Juan stared at his food over dinner and couldn’t eat. Walking back to the cell he saw deputies wrestling with the trustee, whose face was pinned to the wall.  A deputy had caught the trustee searching inmate files to find the child killer’s name. He was taken to solitary confinement without being able to share what he’d learned.”

After the incident at LA County Jail, Juan was transferred to Wayside Maximum Security Prison, one of several, unannounced, unexplained transfers. It was at Wayside that his attorney, Todd Melnik finally caught up with him.

Melnik is a bit of a trope. He is a former assistant district attorney who saw firsthand some of the things prosecutors do to get convictions, and decided he’d rather be a defense attorney. After meeting with Juan, Melnik hit the street, tracking down the friends who had been with Puebla prior to her murder. After talking to them, he realized that things weren’t exactly as Ibanez had made them out to be. He found out that Puebla had taken a phone call shortly before they left, and after pulling the phone records, realized that she was still on the phone while the shooter was on-scene.

More importantly, he learned from Juan’s wife that the day of Puebla’s murder, Juan had attended a Dodgers baseball game with his friend, a cousin, and the cousin’s daughter. They all confirmed the story.

Melnik pulled video from Dodger Stadium’s “Dodger Vision” camera that sweeps the stands looking for fans to highlight. He searched a ton of VHS tapes, and finally found a tape that had scanned the section where Juan’s group was sitting. Unfortunately, the images were blurry and didn’t prove Juan was at the game.

When Melnik delivered the bad news, Juan was despondent. He swore he was at the game at the time of the murder. He even remembered a film crew at the game that night. “I saw “Super” Dave Osborn in my section.”

“Super” Dave Osborn was a character on Super Dave, an old HBO show. The main character, an overly-optimistic stuntman inspired by Evil Knievel, who often gets gravely injured while doing his stunts, was played by comedian Bob Einstein. But Super Dave hadn’t aired since 1991. Who had Juan really seen?

The Dodgers directed Melnik to HBO, but not because of Super Dave. Instead, Melnik learned that Curb Your Enthusiasm had been filming the night of Puebla’s murder. Melnik was unfamiliar with the show. He called, and was told they could not release pre-production footage until the show aired the following February. It was only May and Melnik needed that footage.

“My client is facing the death penalty for something he didn’t do,” Melnik said.

“Let me talk to Larry David. Hold on.” the voice on the other end of the phone said. Melnik had no idea who Larry David was. When the person returned to the phone, he said, “Larry says we can show you the footage. When do you want to come?”

Again, LA Magazine:

“The next morning Todd and the Curb Your Enthusiasm crew sat in an editing room. The episode featured Larry picking up a prostitute, so that he could use the carpool lane on the way to Dodger Stadium. A crew member fed tapes into a machine, one after another, each 5-7 minutes long. No sign of Juan.

“Then Todd jumped out of his chair and ran to the screen. ‘That’s him, that’s him, roll it back.’ Larry David and Juan Catalan walked right passed one another in the aisle in full view of the camera. The room went nuts.

“I’ll be damned,’ said Larry, putting his hand on his chin. ‘Maybe I should make an episode about this.’ The time code on the tape indicated it was filmed between 8:58pm and 9:10pm. Martha’s killer drove down Lull Street, fifteen miles away, shortly after 10:00pm. Todd would need something more to get the judge to dismiss.”

Meanwhile, Juan was wasting away in jail. He witnessed one man get beaten until he was unconscious. Another time, he found himself in the middle of a riot between Latino and black inmates. “That place is for animals,” Juan said, referring to LA County jail. “It’s not for human beings.”

Without Juan there to help his father, he almost lost his auto repair business. Even so, his dad found a way to financially support Alma and the kids while Juan was wrongly imprisoned.

Juan was in jail in part because Detectives Pinner and Rodriguez claimed that Juan Ibanez had identified him in a “six pack” lineup. However, there was no documentation to prove that Ibanez had actually picked out Juan. The judge ordered the prosecution to re-do the lineup and videotape the whole thing.

Melnik wanted to stop the prosecution at the preliminary hearing stage. He had promised Juan’s daughter that he would have her dad home before Christmas. The preliminary hearing was held December 17. California has one of the lowest thresholds to move past the preliminary hearing in a murder case, only having to find that there is a “strong suspicion” that the defendant is guilty  Melnick also knew that the prosecutor, Beth Silverman, who’s nickname is “Sniper,” had never lost a murder case. It wasn’t going to be easy.

Melnik ran into Detective Pinner the day before Juan’s preliminary hearing, and the detective told him that Juan Ibanez would not be testifying at trial. That didn’t make sense to Melnik. Ibanez was the prosecution’s only eye witness. California law allowed the police to give hearsay testimony in such cases, but if Ibanez was available, his testimony would be much more credible.

The next day in court, Ibanez was the prosecution’s very first witness. Melnik was ready. He threw his coat over Juan, hiding his face,  and proceeded to question Ibanez about the appearance of the shooter. Ibanez, who had never seen Juan in person before, described him as dark skinned and stocky, and said he was slightly taller than Ibanez himself, who was 5’5”.

Melnik revealed Juan, who was light-skinned, thin, and approximately 6’1”. Melnik even borrowed a tape measure from the court reporter and measured Juan for the court. Even so, Ibanez identified Juan as Martha Puebla’s killer.

The court then viewed the video that the police had recorded of Ibanez picking Juan out of a “six pack” lineup. It was obvious that Ibanez was not at all confident in which photo to point to. He sat quietly for a long time not making a choice while looking over the photos. Indecipherable whispering is heard in the background before Ibanez finally points to the photo of Juan.

Next, Detective Pinner testified. He admitted that he had been given Juan’s alibi of being at a Dodger’s game at the time of the shooting, but he never really checked it out. He claimed to have spoken to people familiar with the Dodger’s schedule and learned that the game ended before the shooting took place, so Pinner didn’t think Juan had much of an alibi.

Next, Melnik questioned the Detective about the car the shooter was driving. It was variously described as a dark blue or black Honda, Toyota, or Chevy, with all five windows tinted. Juan was driving a Chevy Tahoe SUV, not a car, and none of the windows were tinted.

Pinner dismissed Melnik’s contention that the car didn’t match the description given by saying that Juan had once received a traffic ticket while driving a relative’s black Nissan Maxima. Melnik asked if the detective had looked into whether or not the Maxima was available to Juan the night of the murder or if the car had tinted windows. Pinner admitted he had not checked.

When asked about Juan’s motive for killing Puebla, Pinner testified that Juan’s motive was that Puebla had testified against Juan’s brother, Mario, at his murder trial. However, Martha hadn’t testified against Mario or anyone else. She was called to testify against Ledesma for the murder of Christian Vargas, in which Mario Catalan was not charged, but said she hadn’t seen Ledesma or anyone else shoot Vargas. Puebla was no threat to Mario, had not testified against him, and posed him no harm. Pinner even admitted that at no time, either during the investigation or in testimony in court, did Martha Puebla say Mario Catalan’s name. In fact, Mario Catalan’s attorney stood behind Mario in court and asked Puebla if she had ever seen Mario before. She said she hadn’t. Even so, Pinner and DA Silverman clung to the belief that the killing of Martha Puebla was motivated by revenge.

Normally, the defense does not offer evidence at this stage of the proceeding. The preliminary hearing is designed for the court to have an opportunity to examine the prosecution’s evidence to see if the case should proceed. However, there are exceptions, and Melnik thought Juan’s case was one of them. They had evidence of Juan being at the game. They had cell photo records that tended to exonerate him. They had witness who were at the game with Juan. Melnik wanted to present the evidence to the court so he could get Juan home before Christmas.

DA Silverman objected to the defense offering evidence to the court, claiming that she had not been provided with the evidence. However, California law is clear that the prosecution is not entitled to see the defense’s evidence at this stage of the proceedings. The court was reluctant to allow the evidence in at the preliminary hearing but agreed when Juan waived his right to an uninterrupted hearing. Juan agreed, and the preliminary hearing was continued until January 9. Juan wouldn’t be home for Christmas, but he would get a chance to offer evidence to exonerate himself without having to wait for a full hearing.

At the next hearing, Melnik presented the video evidence from Curb Your Enthusiasm, he offered cell phone records indicating that Juan’s cell phone had pinged off a cell tower located at the police academy at 10:11 pm indicating he was within a mile of the tower at the time of the murder. Juan’s friend, cousin, and cousin’s daughter all testified that Juan was with them the entire night, that he never left the game, and that they rode home together.

In Melnik’s summation, he said, “I think it’s unconscionable the district attorney’s office has proceeded on this case with the evidence that they have presented. This man would be facing the death penalty if he hadn’t, by the grace of God, gotten Dodger tickets from someone the day before and invited these people, and got caught on video from that HBO show. He’s a lucky man.

“He sits here before this court innocent of the charges that have been placed before him. They are very serious charges, and somebody is still walking around the San Fernando Valley that’s responsible.”

Silverman was defiant. In her closing argument she stressed how credible Juan Ibanez had been on the stand, and returned to her contention that Juan Catalan had killed Martha Puebla as revenge for testifying against Juan’s brother, Mario.

At the end of closing arguments, the judge didn’t hesitate to issue his ruling. “I do not have any suspicion that the defendant committed this crime, and this case is dismissed.”

Melnik embraced his client, but Juan’s troubles weren’t over yet. Following the trial, Silverman went on TV promising to continue the investigation and ultimately convict Juan.

For a few days, Juan was a free man, but he had to return to jail to serve time on the drug charge he had confessed to previously. Melnik tried to cut a deal with Silverman, contending that Juan had already spent six months in jail for a crime he didn’t commit. That should be enough. Silverman was unmoved. She said Juan would have to serve two more weeks, or risk going to court and facing the possibility of five years in prison. Juan returned to jail.

On his first day back in jail, Juan was placed in a cell with three members of a black street gang that was feuding with the Latinos in jail. He was certain this was done on purpose and that he was going to end up dead. For his own protection, he stayed awake day and night. When a jail trustee delivered some blankets to his cellmates, he knew he was in trouble. His experience told him that knives were often delivered in blankets.

That night, a guard checked on him and asked if everything was alright. Juan knew that if he said “no” and the guard ignored him, his cellmates would surely kill him. So, he said “yes,” but the guard wasn’t buying it. He took Juan out of the cell and put him in with a group of Latino inmates for the duration of his stay.

Once he was out of jail, Juan sued the City of Los Angeles for violating his civil rights. Melnik thought they had a strong case, especially if Ibanez testified that he was pressured to lie about Juan being Martha Puebla’s murderer. Melnik was anxious to depose Ibanez, but he couldn’t get the city to tell him where Ibanez was located. Finally, a court intervened, ordering the city to reveal Ibanez’s location. As it turned out, Ibanez was in a federal immigration holding facility. Melnik made arrangements to depose Ibanez at the federal facility, but the day before the scheduled deposition, Ibanez was mysteriously deported to Mexico.

At the trial, Officer Guiral could not explain why he thought Francisco Salvidar’s tip was so credible or why they acted so quickly on the information when so much of it didn’t point to Juan Catalan as a suspect.

Detective Rodriguez was asked if he found Juan Ibanez’s testimony credible. “He was the only witness we had,” Rodriguez confessed.

Detective Pinner’s testimony was most surprising. He testified that he had never been trained as a homicide detective, and admitted that he had lost count of how many public complaints had been filed against him. At one point he flew into a rage because Todd Melnik was tapping his coffee cup on the table. He continued to contend that Juan Catalan was Martha Puebla’s killer.

Beth Silverman remained defiant in her deposition. She maintained that the court released a guilty man when they released Juan Catalan, showing no remorse for her questionable prosecution of him.

Despite the testimony from Silverman and the three officers, the case wasn’t nearly as strong without the testimony of Juan Ibanez. Juan’s civil rights attorney, Gary Casselman, feared that they were about to lose the case. When the city offered Juan $80,000, he took it.

In 2017, Netflix debuted a documentary called Long Shot that highlighted the Juan Catalan case. Because of the Larry David/Curb You Enthusiasm connection, the documentary is more lighthearted than it otherwise would have been, avoiding some of the more controversial aspects of the case. The truth is that the police and prosecution dropped the ball at several points throughout the case. They had a single-minded purpose to prosecute and convict Juan Catalan, with no regard for the truth or the rights of any of the people involved.

Even so, the documentary is very good and worth watching. It really is an incredible story that Juan Catalan’s alibi was discovered because of a crazy HBO comedy. Had they not been at the ballpark the night of the murder, and if Juan hadn’t shown up on the pre-production tapes, he’d likely be sitting in jail today, serving time for the murder of Martha Puebla.

Here’s a trailer for the Netflix documentary, Long Shot:

 

This post is much more political than most of the stuff I write. That’s a warning more than an apology, but it’s kind of an apology too. This story struck a nerve with me and I had to vent a bit to get it off my chest and out of my head. I’ll be back to writing about unimportant nonsense soon.

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In the days leading up to Christmas, President Joe Biden and First Lady Jill Biden answered calls from children calling into the NORAD Santa Tracking Center. One of those calls was from a child in Oregon, who was on a speaker phone with his dad, Jason Schmeck. At the end of the call, Schmeck said to the Bidens—with his young son listening in—”Merry Christmas and Let’s Go, Brandon.”

As you probably know, “Let’s Go, Brandon” has become a rallying cry for Trump-loving MAGA-heads because syllabically, it sounds like “F*ck Joe Biden.” To be certain, the “Let’s Go, Brandon” phenomenon is a juvenile approach to political speech, lacking as much in substance as it is in cleverness. When MAGA world says “Let’s go, Brandon” they might just as well announce themselves as politically illiterate, completely unoriginal, cult-following dolts who willingly hitch their wagons to the loudest, most hateful, most uninformed voices around them, desperate to be patriotic and to sound intelligent, but failing miserably on both counts.

After Schmeck showed his true colors on the phone call with the Bidens, he received quite a bit of backlash. Commenters on TV and across social media took him to task for being rude, crude, insensitive, and disrespectful. Schmeck was caught off guard by the backlash, and as a true member of the MAGA cult, assumed the position of victim. He claimed that he was being attacked for exercising “my God-given right to express my frustrations in a joking manner.” (Now, he’s talking about running for Congress.)

There are two problems with Schmeck’s sentiments. First, the right he is talking about is contained in the First Amendment to the United States Constitution. It prevents the government from “abridging the freedom of speech.” It doesn’t prohibit TV or social media commenters from reacting to that speech. That seems to be forgotten by a lot of freedom of speech hawks on the right.

The second problem with Schmeck’s complaint is something that is happening with increased frequency, particularly with right-leaning speakers. They seem to think that “freedom of speech” means they can say anything, no matter how vile, rude, or misinformed, and no one should be allowed to respond. They want freedom of speech as well as freedom from the consequences of that speech. To them, criticism is paramount to censorship.

Of course, that’s not how freedom of speech works. No one is censoring their speech. They are free to say whatever they would like. What they are not free to do is avoid reactions to their speech. The thing most of these people forget (or never realized) is that, if they have freedom of speech, so does everyone else. They want to have their say, but they want others to be prevented from having theirs. This is a hallmark of autocratic regimes where “the rules apply to thee, but not to me.”

This dumbing down of the First Amendment’s grant of freedom of speech is just one area where our Constitution and democratic institutions are being attacked by the far right. The Right’s move toward authoritarianism in recent years has been accompanied by attempts to alter long-recognized rights (such as those contained in the First Amendment) and sowing doubts in traditional democratic institutions, such as elections. Tweaking our rights and weakening our democratic institutions make it much easier for anyone with autocratic intentions to sweep into office, destroying our democracy in the process.

So, when you hear MAGA foot soldiers like Jason Schmeck complain that his rights are being violated because people reacted strongly to his idiotic comment, just remember that 1) the First Amendment only applies to the government abridging speech, not to you, and 2) just like Jason, you have freedom of speech too. Use it liberally. Our democracy depends on it.

For some time, I have been trying to understand people who support former President Donald Trump. To me, Trump is a lying, conniving, corrupt politician who leads a movement dedicated to destroying American democracy. Yet, I have friends and family members—people I like and respect—who not only supported Trump as president, but continue to support him even after the revelations of corruption and illegal activities came to light (and continue to come to light) following his defeat in the 2020 presidential election, a defeat that many of these people still don’t believe.

My attempt to understand these people has less to do with Trump than it does with the phenomenon of good people believing and spreading lies and misinformation. I see Trump for who he is. He is not a mystery to me. What is a mystery is how people I know—intelligent, successful, well-meaning people—can fall for his lies, excuse his bad behavior, and continue to support him no matter what he says or does. That’s the thing I have never been able to understand.

I recently came across a term from the field of psychology that helps to explain the confusing behavior of my friends and family members. The term is “motivated reasoning,” and it’s a real eye-opener.

Motivated reasoning is a phenomenon that uses emotionally biased reasoning to produce justifications and make decisions that are most desirable rather than those that accurately reflect the evidence.

Psychology Today says this about motivated reasoning:

“One of the most significant ways information processing and decision-making becomes warped is through motivated reasoning, when biased reasoning leads to a particular conclusion or decision, a process that often occurs outside of conscious awareness.”

In applying this concept to politics, Psychology Today goes on to say:

“Studies by political psychologists highlight denial of climate change or discrediting its science as important examples of motivated reasoning; people process scientific information about climate shifts to conform to pre-existing feelings and beliefs. After all, accepting that climate change is real portends unpleasant environmental consequences and would require most people to head them off by making significant changes in lifestyle. Changing one’s mind and changing one’s lifestyle are hard work; people prefer mental shortcuts—in this case, having the goal fit their ready-made conclusions…[Motivated reasoning] is seen as a mechanism people commonly use to preserve a favorable identity, particularly in Western cultures. To maintain positive self-regard, people (unwittingly) discount unflattering or troubling information that contradicts their self-image. Individuals engage in motivated reasoning as a way to avoid or lessen cognitive dissonance, the mental discomfort people experience when confronted by contradictory information, especially on matters that directly relate to their comfort, happiness, and mental health. Rather than re-examining a contradiction, it’s much easier to dismiss it.”

This is exactly the behavior I’ve witnessed with my friends and family members. They see the same things that I see when it comes to Trump and his anti-democratic, pro-authoritarian behavior, but they dismiss anything he does that goes against their values and beliefs. For them, Trump didn’t encourage and provoke the January 6 insurrection (despite loads of evidence to the contrary). He didn’t sexually assault any women (despite his own confession). He won the 2020 presidential election and had it stolen from him (despite not a shred of evidence to support this belief).

Julia Galef, co-founder of the Center for Applied Rationality, does a great job of explaining motivated reasoning in this Ted Talk (see below) from 2016. She uses the idea of soldiers and scouts to make her point. Soldiers accept their orders to kill the enemy and are motivated to carry out those orders without questioning the truth that led to the orders. Scouts are more concerned with gathering information. In order to do their jobs effectively, they have to question all of the data they are gathering in order to get to the truth. Their motivation is different than soldiers.

Here’s Julia Galef’s Ted Talk:

Many of these same people who dismiss Trump’s bad behavior also fall into the “anti-vaxx” category: those who dismiss and disbelieve the best scientific opinions on COVID-19. Recently, podcaster Joe Rogan interviewed Dr. Peter McCullough, MD about COVID. McCullough is a well-respected doctor who has consistently been opposed to vaccines as a way to immunize the country from COVID. The podcast gained a great deal of traction, primarily because McCullough parroted much of the misinformation the anti-vaxx community already believes.

Dr. Zubin Damania, MD, did an excellent job of breaking down McCullough’s biased, misinformed beliefs in the attached video (It’s long but very informative). One of the strongest parts of the video involved the tools Damania used to analyze McCullough’s arguments to determine if they were based on facts and evidence or bias and misinformation. These very same tools are useful when dealing with any argument or controversial position.

The first thing to look for is, is a conspiracy being alleged? If the argument is based on a conspiracy rather than hard facts or scientific evidence, it almost certainly is misinformation. It’s not that conspiracies don’t exist. But most claims of conspiracy, especially widespread conspiracies involving large groups of individuals, governments, and corporations, designed to nefariously hide the truth, are extremely, extremely unlikely. The larger the conspiracy, the less likely it is real.

A good example of this is the anti-vaxxers appeal to a “New World Order” being behind the push to force people to get vaccinated so this NWO government can control and enslave us. Anti-vaxxers portray themselves as a persecuted minority fighting to spread the truth to the rest of us, who they view as misinformed sheep, in an effort to save the world. This is an unfouded conspiracy.

The second tool or indication that someone is dealing in misinformation is if they set up impossible to meet expectations, and every time evidence is presented to debunk their claim, they move the goalposts. They refuse to consider any viewpoint other than their own, and they constantly make excuses when facts or evidence are presented that weaken or destroy their argument.

The next tool is cherry picking facts or data to support an argument. Anti-vaxxers consistently support groups like America’s Front Line Doctors even though the doctors involved are not experts when it comes to COVID, and are an outlier group, far outside the mainstream of the medical community.

Likewise, they often point to research studies that are badly flawed and often repudiated by other, more well run studies. They dismiss the more credentialed doctors or the more relevant studies in order to not have to abandon their arguments.

As Dr. Damania says, “You can always find something to confirm your bias.” However, if the argument requires cherry picking data and dismissing better, more relevant facts, you’re likely dealing with misinformation.

Appeals to fake experts (or false authority) is another indication that the person making the appeal is dealing in misinformation. What is a fake expert? It’s usually someone (or a group of people) who is not qualified to make the arguments they are making.

For instance, a few times during his interview with Joe Rogan, Dr. McCullough used Dr. Pam Popper and Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. as support for his arguments. What he didn’t say is that Popper is a naturopath, not a medical doctor, and Kennedy is a lawyer and a long-time anti-vaxxer who’s vaccine conspiracies were discredited by the medical community long before we ever heard of COVID. Popper and Kennedy are fake experts, and represent a fringe minority that is at odds with the vast majority of true experts.

Finally, people dealing in misinformation often set up logical fallacies involving internal contradictions. In a previous post, I wrote about a conversation I had with Adam Gaertner, an independent virology researcher. One of Adam’s arguments was that a conspiracy between world governments and “mega-corporations” was designed to enslave humankind, keeping us sick and replacing us in factories with automation, so the “mega-corporations” could maximize their profits. Of course, this argument falls apart the minute logic is applied. If humankind is too sick to work, and we are replaced by automation, who are the “mega corporations” going to sell their goods to? The claim falls apart due to it’s own internal logical contradictions.

Here’s Dr. Damania’s full video:

So, that brings us back to my Trump-loving friends and family members. I have to admit, I have a soft spot for these people. Other than their support for Trump, everything I know about them tells me that they are good, genuine, well-meaning people. So, I tend to be a bit defensive toward them.

Think about it this way: Every day, they are being lied to. During Trump’s term in the White House, he lied incessantly. According to the Washington Post, by the time Trump left office, he had told 30,573 documented lies.  That’s an average of 21 lies told by Trump each day during his presidency. That’s amazing! As Trump supporters, my friends and family members were prone to believe what he was saying.

Also, as Trump supporters, most of these people turn to Fox News or other right-wing media outlets to get their news. And every day, these outlets misinform their viewers, spinning news to favor Trump, and at times fabricating stories, telling outright lies designed to confuse and incense the very people who turn to them to be informed.

Adam Serwer, writing in The Atlantic, took Fox News to task for lying to their viewers. He wrote that, although Fox News hosts were blaming Antifa and BLM for the January 6 insurrection, claiming it was being overly dramatized by the media, and contending that those arrested  following the insurrection were “political prisoners,” behind the scenes,  those same hosts were texting Trump’s Chief of Staff, Mark Meadows, with language making it clear that they knew Trump encouraged the insurrection, and those that carried it out were not Antifa or BLM, but Trump supporters. In private, they reacted to what they knew to be the truth, but in public, on the air, they purposely lied to their viewers. According to Serwer, this type of two-faced behavior by Fox News is par for the course.

“The [text] messages also highlight Fox News’s unusual relationship with its audience, which involves the conservative media’s most trusted figures consciously lying to their viewers. The texts between Meadows and the Fox News hosts are hardly the only example of the network’s personalities deliberately misleading their audience: From downplaying the deadliness of COVID to making misleading assertions about the effectiveness of the vaccines, to advancing the false claims of voter fraud that helped motivate the riot in the first place, Fox and its satellites have shown little hesitation in exploiting the confidence of conservative viewers who are convinced that the network is one of the few trustworthy outlets in a media landscape they regard with fierce hostility.”

Of course, I can’t in good faith blame just Trump or the right-wing media cartel for these lies. My friends and family who supported Trump and tuned into Fox News and the other misinformation factories have to take some responsibility. After all, they have personal agency and possess critical thinking skills. If they want to know the truth, it’s out there, and it doesn’t take all that much effort to find it. Why don’t they? Motivated reasoning. It’s not a complete excuse for my friends’ and family members’ belief in the unbelievable, but it does help explain how they have been able to fool themselves.

I may be a cock-eyed optimist, but I still hold out hope that people will come to their senses and will turn their backs on Trumpism and the authoritarian future it is pushing us toward. Even so, I’m not holding my breath. Motivated reasoning is a powerful phenomenon, and many of these people simply don’t want to know the truth.

A while back, I wrote a post entitled “Don’t Sell Me A Car, Tell Me A Story.” If you haven’t read it yet, you can find it here. This post is a follow up to the first.

In that first post, I talked about how the most effective commercials don’t try to sell a product. Instead, they tell a story in which the product they are selling is the solution to whatever problem the character in the story is having. The example I pointed to was this Super Bowl ad from Audi.

The Astronaut commercial came out in 2016. Three years later, Audi went even bigger with this commercial for their RS4 Avant, a performance station wagon with great styling. This commercial is a little longer (six minutes and forty seconds), so it’s more than just a network commercial. It’s almost like a mini-documentary.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g8gw8B939Eo

This commercial from Dodge is another example of a car commercial using a story (or type of story) that features the vehicle they’re trying to sell, but isn’t specifically about the vehicle.

Finally, this is the best “story commercial” I’ve seen yet. It comes courtesy of Chevy and it doesn’t even contain a vehicle that they are currently selling. They’re just building their brand and wishing their customers (and prospective customers) a Merry Christmas. Take a look:

 

By Christmas Eve 77-years ago, American troops had advanced well into Europe, storming the beaches at Normandy six months earlier, and pushing German troops out of France, back toward the Fatherland.

At the time, my dad was an 18-year-old kid who had recently landed in England with the 2^nd Engineer Battalion of the 89^th Infantry Division, Company B. His unit was preparing to cross the English Channel the following month to push across France and ultimately engage Nazi troops near Trier, Germany. Little did any of them know that over the following four-plus months they would battle a desperate-but-not-yet-defeated German army, would witness some of the most disturbing sights of human cruelty the world has ever known, and they’d celebrate the liberation of Paris and the end of the war in Europe.

Like many of his fellow soldiers, Dad’s deployment to Europe was the first time he had ever been outside the United States. For the first Christmas in his young life, he was far away from his home and his loved ones.

President Franklin D. Roosevelt spoke to the emotions he knew U.S. troops were feeling during the holiday season, a season the President knew meant so much to so many Americans. As he did each year on Christmas Eve, Roosevelt addressed the American people at home and our troops stationed around the world. As people gathered around their radios, unsure of what the future held for themselves and their loved ones, this is what FDR had to say:

“It is not easy to say “Merry Christmas” to you, my fellow Americans, in this time of destructive war. Nor can I say “Merry Christmas” lightly tonight to our armed forces at their battle stations all over the world- or to our allies who fight by their side.

“Here, at home, we will celebrate this Christmas Day in our traditional American way- because of its deep spiritual meaning to us; because the teachings of Christ are fundamental in our lives; and because we want our youngest generation to grow up knowing the significance of this tradition and the story of the coming of the immortal Prince of Peace and Good Will. But, in perhaps every home in the United States, sad and anxious thoughts will be continually with the millions of our loved ones who are suffering hardships and misery, and who are risking their very lives to preserve for us and for all mankind the fruits of His teachings and the foundations of civilization itself.

“The Christmas spirit lives tonight in the bitter cold of the front lines in Europe and in the heat of the jungles and swamps of Burma and the Pacific islands. Even the roar of our bombers and fighters in the air and the guns of our ships at sea will not drown out the messages of Christmas which come to the hearts of our fighting men. The thoughts of these men tonight will turn to us here at home around our Christmas trees, surrounded by our children and grandchildren and their Christmas stockings and gifts—just as our own thoughts go out to them, tonight and every night, in their distant places.

“We all know how anxious they are to be home with us, and they know how anxious we are to have them- and how determined every one of us is to make their day of home-coming as early as possible. And- above all- they know the determination of all right-thinking people and Nations, that Christmases such as those that we have known in these years of world tragedy shall not come again to beset the souls of the children of God.

“This generation has passed through many recent years of deep darkness, watching the spread of the poison of Hitlerism and Fascism in Europe—the growth of imperialism and militarism in Japan- and the final clash of war all over the world. Then came the dark days of the fall of France, and the ruthless bombing of England, and the desperate battle of the Atlantic, and of Pearl Harbor and Corregidor and Singapore.

“Since then the prayers of good men and women and children the world over have been answered. The tide of battle has turned, slowly but inexorably, against those who sought to destroy civilization.

“On this Christmas day, we cannot yet say when our victory will come. Our enemies still fight fanatically. They still have reserves of men and military power. But, they themselves know that they and their evil works are doomed. We may hasten the day of their doom if we here at home continue to do our full share.

“And we pray that that day may come soon. We pray that until then, God will protect our gallant men and women in the uniforms of the United Nations- that He will receive into His infinite grace those who make their supreme sacrifice in the cause of righteousness, in the cause of love of Him and His teachings.

“We pray that with victory will come a new day of peace on earth in which all the Nations of the earth will join together for all time. That is the spirit of Christmas, the holy day. May that spirit live and grow throughout the world in all the years to come.”

Addendum: Winston Churchill, Prime Minister of Great Britain, was staying at the White House on Christmas Eve, 1944. That night, he also spoke to the American people. Here is the audio of his remarks.

I don’t have many Christmas traditions. Now that the kids are older, I don’t even put up a Christmas tree anymore. But one thing I still do every Christmas is watch my favorite movie, It’s a Wonderful Life, starring Jimmy Stewart and Donna Reed.

The iconic film came out in 1946 to very little fanfare. It underperformed at the box office and, although it was nominated for five Academy Awards, it didn’t win any.

By 1974, the film was all but forgotten. Liberty Films, the studio that owned the rights to the movie, didn’t even bother to renew the copyright, which it could have done for an additional 28 years. Oddly, this failure to renew the copyright was the start of the film gaining a loyal and adoring following.

With the copyright expired, TV networks could show the film without paying royalty fees. It was free content for an industry always looking for ways to make a profit. Suddenly, people were rediscovering the film and falling in love with the powerful story of friends, family, and faith.

Karolyn Grimes had no idea any of this was taking place. Grimes had been a child actor in Hollywood when she went to an audition for It’s A Wonderful Life. While she sat in the waiting room before the audition, the mother of another child “accidently” spilled a cup of coffee on Grimes new dress. It might have thrown some people, but not Grimes. When it was her turn, the coffee stain prompted a conversation between her and the film’s director, Frank Capra. The six-year-old Grimes was cast in the role of Zuzu, George and Mary Bailey’s youngest daughter.

The year after filming It’s A Wonderful Life, Grimes appeared in another Christmas movie, The Bishop’s Wife, and a few years later she landed a role in the John Wayne classic, Rio Grande. But all was not great in Karolyn Grimes’ life. At the age of fourteen, her mother died, and just a year later, she lost her father. Grimes gave up the movies and her life in California, and was sent to live with an uncle and his unstable wife in Missouri. The couple were religious zealots who preached against the dangers of movies, singing, and dancing.

Grimes survived her years with her aunt and uncle, but rarely spoke about her life in California. She made friends, finished high school, and went off to school at Central Missouri State College. After graduation, she became a medical technologist.

Life went on for Grimes, but didn’t get any easier. She married and had two daughters with her first husband, who was killed in a hunting accident. She re-married and had five more kids. Sadly, her second husband died of cancer. Throughout these tragedies, Grimes spent much of her time cooking, cleaning, and running kids to piano lessons and sports practices.

She lived what many would consider a normal life until 1980, when It’s A Wonderful Life once again entered her orbit. The film had gained an audience, due in large part to it’s copyright-free status, and reporters came calling, requesting interviews and asking questions about the film. Problem was, Grimes didn’t remember much about it. She had filmed the movie thirty-four years earlier and had never watched it all the way through. In fact, she had fallen asleep during the film’s premiere. Before she could answer any questions, she first had to watch the movie.

Since then, Grimes has been busy attending screenings, holiday gift shows, movie memorabilia conventions, and her personal favorite, the annual It’s A Wonderful Life Festival in Seneca Falls, NY, which bills itself as the real-life Bedford Falls, the town from the film. While in Seneca Falls, she is often joined by Jimmy Hawkins, the actor who played her older brother, Tommy.

For most of us that love It’s A Wonderful Life, we’ll always remember Karolyn Grimes in the role of Zuzu saying one of the most iconic lines in all of film. Take a look:

 

I have been watching Saturday Night Live since it debuted in 1975. When the show first began, there was absolutely no reason to think that it would become a TV staple, and that 46 years later, it would still be an ingrained part of the culture.

But after a rough start, the show found it’s legs. It helped that the original cast included some of the best cast members in the show’s history, including Dan Aykroyd, Jane Curtin, Gilda Radner, Lorraine Newman, Chevy Chase, and the great John Belushi.

Ranking the SNL cast members is a bit of a fool’s errand, but what the heck? I did it anyway. You may agree or disagree with my rankings. After all, this isn’t science. It’s all based on personal preference. What you can’t argue with is the fact that SNL muscled its way into the national conversation, and continues to be relevant today.

Without further ado, here are the top cast members to ever do time on Saturday Night Live:

50. Robert Downey Jr (1985-86) – Robert Downey Jr. in 1985-86 wasn’t the RDJ we came to know later. While on SNL, he was distracted and undisciplined. Yet, there was something about him. He obviously had talent, and we now know he is one of the best actors in Hollywood.

49. Chris Elliott (1994-95) – Chris Elliot was hilarious and had a thriving career before he joined SNL. Then when he got there, he kind of fell flat. Instead of raising the level of the show, the show brought him down to its level. Looking back, as much as I like Chris Elliot, I have to admit that his time on the show was a disappointment. Little known fact: Elliot’s daughter, Abby Elliott, was on the show from 2008-12.

48. Don Novello (1978-80, 1985-86) – Novello was a one trick pony, but what a great trick that was. Novello, as Father Guido Sarducci, the rock critic for the Vatican newspaper, had a great, hilarious run on SNL. He didn’t do much else, but he was really good at what he did.

47. Harry Shearer (1979-80, 1984-85) – Shearer’s heyday on SNL was during the 84-85 season when he was teamed with Billy Crystal, Christopher Guest, and Michael McKean. Shearer held his own with McKean, but paled in comparison to Crystal and Guest.

46. Anthony Michael Hall (1985-86) – I like Hall more than most people like Hall. I can’t tell you exactly why that is. I just found him very funny. He went on to great success after SNL, appearing in such films as Sixteen Candles, The Breakfast Club, and Weird Science. Little known fact: His real name is Michael Anthony Hall, not Anthony Michael Hall.

45. Laraine Newman (1975-80) – I’m not the fan of Newman that a lot of people are, but I recognize that she is widely respected for her time on SNL. I think she benefitted from the players around her,. But the fact is, she was there at the beginning of SNL and she was good while she was there.

44. Seth Meyers (2001-14) – Meyers was on SNL for a long time. He was mostly known for working the desk at Weekend Update. In that role, Meyers brought a decency and charm that hadn’t been seen previously, yet it worked.

43. Jimmy Fallon (1998-2004) – I have to admit, I sometimes get Jimmy Fallon and Seth Meyers confused. Maybe that’s why they are next to each other on this list. Fallon’s forte (as opposed to Will Forte) was imitating rockers. In that role, he was very good.

42. Chris Rock (1990-93) – Rock had a forgettable run on SNL. The show didn’t seem to know how to use him, so they often didn’t. Since then, he has shown that he is one of the funniest comedians in the world, but SNL failed to bring that out of him.

41. Kevin Nealon (1986-95) – I personally liked Nealon better in sketches than as a Weekend Update anchor. On Weekend Update, Nealon seemed lost, like he wasn’t sure what he was supposed to be doing. He was still funny, but as a Weekend Update anchor, he didn’t compare favorably to others on this list.

40. Rachel Dratch (1999-2006) – Every time I saw Rachel Dratch on SNL, I got the feeling that she was fearless. More so than many other players, Dratch put herself in uncomfortable, embarrassing situations, playing characters you wouldn’t expect her to play, and saying things you wouldn’t expect her to say. She was very good.

39. Tim Meadows (1991-2000) – Meadows was hilarious in “Ladies Man” sketches, playing a too-smooth-for-his-own-good Lothario who often falls flat in affairs of the heart. Too often, Meadows was an afterthought on the show. But when he got his shot, he hit it.

38. Ana Gasteyer (1996-2002) – Gasteyer was especially good at playing quiet characters in the most hilarious way. For instance, her NPR host of Delicious Dish where she discusses Schweddy Balls with Alec Baldwin is a classic. She also played a mean Martha Stewart.

37. Tim Kazurinsky (1981-84) – To me, Kazurinsky is underrated. Part of the reason is that he was part of weaker casts. Even so, he was fantastic on SNL, especially when playing awkward, angry characters. He could make me laugh with just a look.

36. Kenan Thompson (2003-Present) – Thompson holds the record for the longest serving cast member, currently sitting at 18 years. For the longest time, I had trouble thinking of Thompson as an SNL cast member. I first saw him on Nickelodeon’s Kenan & Kel, and for years associated him with that role. He has been very good on SNL. Even during some pretty thin periods, he shined.

35. Chris Parnell (1998-2006) – When I think of Parnell, I think of the word “solid.” He’s good at everything he does. He can be counted on. Even if he isn’t flashy or spectacular, he’ll do a competent job no matter what assignment he is given. It may not sound like it, but I mean that as high praise.

34. Tracy Morgan (1996-2003) – Morgan is one of those players that really hit his stride after leaving SNL. He was great on 30 Rock, and has had a good run on The OG. He was also very good while on SNL, and has gotten even better since leaving.

33. Darrell Hammond (1995-2009) – The second longest serving cast member in SNL history. He did great impersonations, my favorite of which was Sean Connery on the Jeopardy sketches. Truth is, his impersonation was nothing like Connery, yet was hysterical.

32. Molly Shannon (1995-2001) – Shannon will always be remembered primarily for her character Mary Catherine Gallagher, but the truth is, she was very good at everything she did. In that respect, she reminded me a bit of Jan Hooks.

31. Jan Hooks (1986-91) – Hooks could do it all, from redneck waitress at a truck stop to entitled elite. She always seemed to me like one of the players who would go on to bigger and better things. She didn’t, and that was sad. Even more sad, she died in 2014 at the age of 57.

30. Cecily Strong (2012 – Present) – Every time I see Cecily Strong, she is a breath of fresh air. She’s another cast member that reminds me of Jan Hooks. She can play any kind of character, from a beautiful heiress to a drunken tramp. Her two Emmy nominations bear that out. She was very good as an anchor on Weekend Update, and the sketch was weaker once she left.

29. Dan Aykroyd (1975-79) – I know it is a bit sacrilegious putting Aykroyd this far down the list. After all, he was a founding member and, in part because of his talents, SNL is still on the air. I’ll admit, Aykroyd is a very creative, talented guy, but he was never one of my favorites. I just didn’t find him all that funny. Interesting, yes. Funny, no.

28. Andy Samberg (2005-12) – To me, Samberg is the poor man’s Adam Sandler. Where as Sandler went on to great success in movies, Samberg did the same thing on TV with Brooklyn Nine-Nine. He was very good on SNL, especially in the Dick-in-a-Box skit with Justin Timberlake. His genius was in creating videos for the show. His live skits weren’t quite as good.

27. Joe Piscopo (1980-84) – I admit, I value Piscopo more highly that a lot of people. I get it. In a lot of ways, he was a blowhard who allowed his success to go to his head. Even so, I thought he brought the best out of Eddie Murphy, and I found his impression of Frank Sinatra hilarious.

26. Norm MacDonald (1993-98) – MacDonald had the rare ability of simultaneously being both the smartest and the dumbest guy in the room. He was great on Weekend Update (maybe my favorite Weekend Update anchor), and was hilarious as Burt Reynolds (Turd Ferguson) on the Jeopardy sketches.

25. Jane Curtin (1975-80) – I don’t know why Jane Curtin is so underrated, but she is. She’s underrated as a cast member on SNL, and she was underrated as a TV actress on such shows as Kate & Allie and 3^rd Rock from the Sun. On SNL, she was terrific as an anchor on Weekend Update, and in the Point-Counterpoint sketches with Dan Aykroyd (“Jane, you ignorant slut!”)

24. Kate McKinnon (2012 – Present) – McKinnon is the brightest star on the present iteration of SNL. She is a fantastic character actor, inhabiting the characters she creates and uncompromisingly portraying them. She’s simply very, very funny.

23. Christopher Guest (1984-85) – When Lorne Michaels left SNL for a few years, the show brought in some heavy hitters to jump start the show. Guest was one of those people. He was good, but truthfully, sketch comedy was not his strong suit. He was brilliant in longer-form pieces, like This is Spinal Tap and Best in Show.

22. Amy Poehler (2001-2008) – Poehler’s Weekend Update opposite Tina Fey was fantastic. They have great rapport and play off each other very well. Poehler was especially good playing quirky, off-center characters. She brought an edge to her character portrayals that is a real gift.

21. Jason Sudeikis (2005-13) – Sudeikis looks like a normal guy, but brings a freaky side to his characters. I don’t know why I find his dancing guy in the red tracksuit so funny, but I do. His work on SNL is currently being overshadowed by his portrayal of Ted Lasso, but we should never forget how good he was as an SNL cast member.

20. Dana Carvey (1986-93) – Carvey was primarily known for his impersonations, particularly of George Bush. His Church Lady character became part of the late 80s/early 90s culture. And who can forget Carvey’s sketch where he played a rock musician creating the “Chopping Broccoli” song. I’m laughing just thinking about it.

19. Fred Armisen – (2002-2013) – What a talented guy Fred Armisen is. Whether acting, writing, or creating music, Armisen can do it all. He wasn’t the best actor of the group. Every time I saw him play a character, I was seeing Fred play a character. It was Fred who shone through. But that wasn’t necessarily a bad thing.

18. David Spade (1990-96) – Spade may not have invented snark, but he certainly raised it to an art form. As an actor, he’s limited, but what he does, he does very well. He was very good on SNL, and did some good films, including Tommy Boy with Chris Farley, and the classic, Joe Dirt. He also had a good run on TV (“Just Kill Me”) after his run on SNL.

17. Jon Lovitz (1985-90) – There are two recurring sketches that define Lovitz run on SNL for me. The first is the Master Thespian sketch (“Acting!”), and my favorite, the pathological liar, Tommy Flanagan (“Yeah, that’s the ticket.”). His use of his eyebrows was second only to John Belushi. Lovitz is one of those guys that can make me laugh just by looking into the camera.

16. Adam Sandler (1990-1995) – Sandler is a polarizing character. He has a ton of detractors. I get it. At times, I have felt the same way about him since his SNL days. But while on SNL, I thought he was hilarious. I loved his “Opera Man” character, and thought his occasional songs (“Chanukah Song”) were very funny.

15. Chevy Chase (1975-77) – I sometimes think Chevy Chase is overrated. I wonder if he would have had as much success post-SNL if he had not been a part of the inaugural cast. Don’t get me wrong, he was good. His portrayal of a bumbling, stumbling Gerald Ford was hilarious, and he was in one of my all-time favorite sketches, Chase playing “Barely White,” a Caucasian take-off of the great Barry White. But to me, as a cast member, he paled (no pun intended) next to many of the original members.

14. Maya Rudolph (2000-2007) – Rudolph was (and is) ridiculously talented and versatile. She was always the coolest kid in the room, confident she could pull off whatever stunt the sketch called for. Rudolph sometimes took a backseat to Tina Fey and Amy Poehler, but she was every bit the performer they were, if not more so.

13. Tina Fey (2000-2006) – She was great as an anchor on Weekend Update, and was brilliant impersonating Sarah Palin. Fey is also credited as being one of the best writers ever on SNL. She could do it all. Since SNL, she has had nothing but success on shows such as 30 Rock, and several box office hits, including Date Night and Whiskey Tango Foxtrot.

12. Phil Hartman (1986-94) – Phil Hartmann was a genius. While on the show, he seemed to stand apart from the other players in talent and presence, yet melded with those same players to come up with some of the most memorable sketches in SNL history. He was great as Frankenstein, and his impersonation of Frank Sinatra was even better than Piscopo’s. His untimely death was a real tragedy.

11. Gilda Radner (1975-80) – When SNL first started, Gilda Radner was a revelation. We had not seen anyone like her on TV since Lucille Ball, a woman who was brainy and insanely funny. The characters she portrayed are timeless, whether Roseanne Roseannadanna (“It’s always something.”), Emily Litella (“Never mind.”), and Lisa Loopner, opposite Bill Murray’s Todd Dilamuca. Her life and her career were really just taking off when she died at the age of 42 of ovarian cancer.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xwaBJjoooOc

10. Chris Farley (1990-95) – What a huge talent Chris Farley was. His big body hid the fact that he was very athletic. His athleticism was on full display in his famous Chippendales sketch, where he danced alongside Patrick Swayze. But his most famous character is Matt Foley, the overbearing, low-rent motivational speaker who goes ridiculously overboard to help keep kids on the straight and narrow (“…when you’re living in a van down by the river.”).

9. Eddie Murphy (1980-84) – Eddie Murphy had one of the most brilliant runs of any cast member ever on SNL. His portrayal of characters such as Buckwheat and Mr. Robinson poked fun at society’s racial hang-ups, as did his character’s poem, “Kill My Landlord” (“Dark and lonely on a summer night/Kill my landlord/Kill my landlord/Watchdog barking/Do he bite?/Kill my landlord/C-I-L-L my landlord.”). Here’s Eddie as Gumby, one of my all-time favorite characters.

8. Kristen Wiig (2005-12) – Wiig was an incredibly talented writer and actor on SNL. She was beloved by the casts she was part of, and recognized as one of the true geniuses of the series. One of the funniest things I ever saw on SNL was a take-off on the Lawrence Welk Show, where Will Farrell sings to the Maherelle Sisters (“From the Finger Lakes region.”). Rather than tell you about it, take a look. And keep an eye on Kristen Wiig. She’s great.

7. Will Farrell (1995-2002) – Farrell was one of the few cast members from SNL that was at the top of his game while on the show, and somehow got even better when he left it. His “More Cowbell” skit with Christopher Walken is a classic, but was just one of many sketches Farrell made memorable. After SNL, his career went through the roof with movies like Anchorman, Talladega Nights, Step-Brother, and Old School.

6. Martin Short (1984-85) – I know a lot of people think I’m ranking Martin Short too high. He was only on the show for one year, and a lot of what he did during that year was knock-offs of things he had done previously on SCTV. Even so, he was hilarious. Whether he was playing Ed Grimly. Irving Cohen, Jackie Rogers, Jr. or Jiminy Glick (one of my favorites), Short was brilliant.

5. Billy Crystal (1984-85) – In just a year on SNL, Crystal created some of the show’s most memorable characters, including Fernando Lamos (“You look marvelous.”), Willie (alongside Christopher Guest’s, Frankie) (“I hate when that happens.”), and the blues singer, Buddy Young, Jr. (“Can you dig it? I knew that you could.”). Crystal had terrific success before he joined SNL, and he went on to even bigger success afterwards, but during the 1984-85 season, he was terrific.

4. Bill Murray (1977-80) – Although I don’t remember it this way, Murray didn’t join the show until season three. In my mind, he was there from the very beginning. Everything he did was good. He’s just one of those guys who makes you laugh no matter what he does. He created memorable characters like Nick the Lounge singer and Todd Dimuca (opposite Gilda Radner’s Lisa Loopner), and he went on to stardom after SNL in such films as Caddyshack, Stripes, and Ghostbusters.

3. Bill Hader (2005-2013) –Hader had a great run on SNL. He was a guy who is a bit understated and doesn’t necessarily draw attention to himself, yet he was one of the best things going on the casts he was a part of. My favorite character from Hader was definitely Stefon, the emo kid giving hilarious club updates during Weekend Update. The funniest part for me was when Hader couldn’t suppress a laugh. Take a look:

2. Mike Myers (1989-95) – Everything Mike Myers did made me laugh. During the time he was on SNL, he was the best thing on the show. He created memorable characters like local access TV hero Wayne Campbell (“Broadcasting live from Aurora, IL”), talk-show host Linda Richman (“Her legs were like buttah.”), and Dieter, the monkey-petting German talk-show host from Sprockets (“Pet my monkey. Touch my monkey. Love my monkey.”). After his SNL days, he went on to fame and fortune reprising his role as Wayne Campbell in Wayne’s World 1 & 2, as well as the popular Austin Powers movies. Unfortunately, in recent years, he has largely disappeared, instead choosing to enjoy his family and his money out of the public eye. Can you imagine?

1. John Belushi (1975-79) – Without Belushi, I don’t think the original cast of SNL would have been able to turn the show into a television staple. He was the glue that brought it all together for that cast. He was best known for characters like Samurai Hitman and the Chee-burger, Chee-burger skit, inspired by the Billy Goat Tavern in Chicago (“No Coke, Pepsi.”). But it was his bigger-than-life persona that really lit up the SNL stage. Watching him was like watching a comet streaking across the sky before it inevitably burns out.