Two years ago, Noel Sheppard reported that Bill Maher joked on his HBO show that the NCAA basketball tournament is “the only place where you’ll ever hear the phrase 'Kansas is advancing.'” That’s clearly not a joke from this weekend, since Kansas and Wichita State were defeated in upsets.
On his Twitter page, Maher cracked “wise” on Saturday, comparing unpaid college basketball players to slaves in the American colonies:
March Madness really is a stirring reminder of what America was founded on: making tons of money off the labor of unpaid black people
— Bill Maher (@billmaher) March 22, 2014
Often, the standouts from "March Madness" quickly make millions as NBA players, so perhaps the slavery analogies are more than a little strained.