Born 383 years ago today, the French mathematician and philosopher Blaise Pascal once wrote, “I have discovered that all human evil comes from this, man's being unable to sit still in a room.” Well, good news: tonight a combination of TV's greatest patriot, Stephen Colbert, and the unstoppable cultural phenom that is our own Gustavo Arellano should keep you sitting still in a room long enough to avoid at least 5 minutes of evil-doing. (Salvation available only to those with basic cable– the rest of you may continue on your path to damnation.)
As first noted by our favorite Tivo-friendly time piece, Gustavo, who just won an AltWeekly Award for his Ask a Mexican! column, will be the guest tonight on The Colbert Report. I predict the subject of Mexicans will come up during the interview, since today is, after all, the 139th anniversary of the execution of Emperor Maximilian (the hapless Austrian inbred the French appointed Emperor of Mexico, during their bloody and futile effort to rule the country) by a Mexican firing squad.