RIP George Carlin

[badams]

RIP

LOS ANGELES, California (CNN) -- Comedian-actor George Carlin, known for his raunchy, but insightful humor, died Sunday in Los Angeles, his publicist said. He was 71.

Carlin performed as recently as last weekend at the Orleans Casino and Hotel in Las Vegas.

Carlin performed as recently as last weekend at the Orleans Casino and Hotel in Las Vegas.

Jeff Abraham says Carlin went into St. John's Health Center on Sunday afternoon, complaining of chest pain. Carlin died at 5:55 p.m. PDT, the Associated Press reported.

Carlin, who had a history of heart trouble, performed as recently as last weekend at the Orleans Casino and Hotel in Las Vegas.

"He was a genius and I will miss him dearly," Jack Burns, who was the other half of a comedy duo with Carlin in the early 1960s, told The Associated Press.

Carlin was best known for his routine "Seven Words You Can Never Say On Television," which appeared 1972's "Class Clown" album.

When Carlin uttered all seven at a show in Milwaukee in 1972, he was arrested for disturbing the peace, the AP reported. The comedy sketch prompted a landmark indecency case after WBAI-FM radio aired it in 1973.

The case was appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court where the justices ruled on a 5-to-4 vote that the sketch was "indecent but not obscene," giving the FCC broad leeway to determine what constituted indecency on the airwaves.

"So my name is a footnote in American legal history, which I'm perversely kind of proud of," Carlin said. "In the context of that era, it was daring."

"It just sounds like a very self-serving kind of word. I don't want to go around describing myself as a 'groundbreaker' or a 'difference-maker' because I'm not and I wasn't," he said. "But I contributed to people who were saying things that weren't supposed to be said." Video Watch Carlin's 7 dirty words routine »

Carlin, who was also an author, was slated to receive the 2008 Mark Twain Prize for American Humor in November.

"In his length career as a comedian, writer, and actor, George Carlin has not only made us laugh, but he makes us think," Stephen Schwarzman, Kennedy Center chairman, said in a statement. "His influence on the next generation of comics has been far-reaching."

In a typical wry response, Carlin said: "Thank you Mr. Twain. Have your people call my people."

Carlin hosted the first broadcast of "Saturday Night Live" in October 1975.

He played the character of Mr. Conductor on the PBS series "Shining Time Station" and starred in more than a dozen HBO specials. Carlin was also a regular on The Tonight Show.

He produced 23 comedy albums, 14 HBO specials, three books, a couple of TV shows and appeared in several movies, from his own comedy specials to "Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure" in 1989 -- a testament to his range from cerebral satire and cultural commentary to downright silliness (and sometimes hitting all points in one stroke), the AP reported.

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"Why do they lock gas station bathrooms?" he once mused. "Are they afraid someone will clean them?"

He won four Grammy Awards, each for best spoken comedy album, and was nominated for five Emmy awards, according to the Associated

[shainhouse]

RIP the one of the world's funniest men. Balls.

[NewRider]

R.I.P.

[bagochips]

Thanks for all the laughs, George.

[Tungsten Gruvsten]

ahh fack that's too bad. RIP George.

[Davey Boy 2.0]

ouch, sad one

Rest in peace George

[boiler]

RIP George Carlin, a true Comedian and my favorite. Thanks for all the laughs and social insight.

[Basher]

An absolute legend. I am very upset that I never got to see him perform.

[Kanada Kev]

Lost a legend So long George, your material is still damn funny and will be for decades to come.

[phishtaper]

a pioneer.

Shit, Piss, Fuck, Cunt, Cocksucker, Motherfucker and Tits

[hamilton]

R.I.P. to my absolute favourite comedian.

[scottieking]

"I think it's the duty of the comedian to find out where the line is drawn and cross it deliberately."

Amen. RIP.

[Big Wooly Mammoth]

Looks like he was a favourite to many of us here. He just really had a great way of looking at things and writing about them that were just so right on. ALways enjoyed his act - finally saw him at the NAC a few years ago. His books are also great.

[Davey Boy 2.0]

"...the baby boomers: whiny, narcissistic, self-indulgent people who's simple philosophy: 'GIMME THAT! IT'S MINE!'...these people were given everything, everything was handed to them, and they took it all, sold it all; sex, drugs, and rock and roll and they stayed loaded for 20 yrs and had free ride, but now they're staring down the barrel of the burnout, and they don't like it, they don't like it so they've become self-righteous, and they wanna make things hard for young people, they tell em abstain from sex, say no to drugs, as for Rock and Roll they sold that for television commercials a long time ago, so they an buy 'pasta machines', and 'stair masters', and 'soy bean futures'.

you know something, they're cold, bloodless people. It's in their slogan 'no pain, no gain', 'just do it', 'play it hard', 'shit happens, deal with it', 'get a life!'. These people went from 'do your own thing!' to 'just say no!', they went from 'love is all you need' to 'whoever has the most toys, wins!', and they went from 'cocaine' to 'rogaine' and you know something, they're still counting grams, only now it's fat grams! and the worst of it is we have to watch the commercials on tv for levis loose fitting jeans and fat ass docker pants because these degenerate, yuppie, boomer shit suckers couldn't keep their hands off the croissants and the 'Haägen Dasz' and their big fat asses have spread all over and they have to wear fat ass docker pants. fuck these yuppies, and fuck everybody now that I think of it"

[Dr. J]

Carlin was one of the first to realize that the role of the comedian was to do more than simply make you laugh and he accepted that role without reservation. A true original. A huge loss. RIP

[timouse]

a pioneer.

Shit, Piss, Fuck, Cunt, Cocksucker, Motherfucker and Tits

thanks for the laughs, george. you will be missed.

[Davey Boy 2.0]

nice little tribute here

[djmelbatoast]

My favorite comedian for sure.

R.I.P.

[ollie]

Well shit, we just lost one of the good ones. RIP.

[Kanada Kev]

*"Death is caused by swallowing small amounts of saliva over a long period of time."

R.I.P. George Carlin

Why we loved him:

"Just cause you got the monkey off your back doesn't mean the circus has left town."

"One can never know for sure what a deserted area looks like"

"If you can't beat them, arrange to have them beaten"

"If God had intended us not to masturbate he would've made our arms shorter"

"I have as much authority as the Pope, I just don't have as many people who believe it."

"You know the good part about all those executions in Texas? Fewer Texans"

"When cheese gets it's picture taken, what does it say?"

"When someone asks you, A penny for your thoughts, and you put your two cents in, what happens to the other penny?"

"If lawyers are disbarred and clergymen defrocked, doesn't it follow that electricians can be delighted, musicians denoted?"

"When someone is impatient and says, "I haven't got all day," I always wonder, How can that be? How can you not have all day?"

"I thought about how mothers feed their babies with tiny little spoons and forks so I wondered, what do Chinese mothers use? Toothpicks?"

"If a pig loses its voice, is it disgruntled?"

"Is a vegetarian permitted to eat animal crackers?"

"What if there were no hypothetical questions?"

"Frisbeetarianism is the belief that when you die, your soul goes up on the roof and gets stuck."

"Some national parks have long waiting lists for camping reservations. When you have to wait a year to sleep next to a tree, something is wrong."

"Give a man a fish and he will eat for a day. Teach him how to fish, and he will sit in a boat and drink beer all day."

"Before they invented drawing boards, what did they go back to?"

"Procrastination is the art of keeping up with yesterday."

"Why do croutons come in airtight packages? It's just stale bread to begin with."

"I have as much authority as the Pope, I just don't have as many people who believe it."

"Have you ever noticed that anybody driving slower than you is an idiot, and anyone going faster than you is a maniac?"

"If the #2 pencil is the most popular, why is it still #2?"

"Electricity is really just organized lightning."

"Women like silent men, they think they're listening."

""I am" is reportedly the shortest sentence in the English language. Could it be that "I do" is the longest sentence?"

"Men are from Earth, women are from Earth. Deal with it."

"If all the world is a stage, where is the audience sitting?"

"Well, if crime fighters fight crime and fire fighters fight fire, what do freedom fighters fight? They never mention that part to us, do they?"

"Honesty may be the best policy, but it's important to remember that apparently, by elimination, dishonesty is the second-best policy."

"I recently went to a new doctor and noticed he was located in something called the Professional Building. I felt better right away."

"Why is the man (or woman) who invests all your money called a broker?"

"I'm completely in favor of the separation of Church and State. My idea is that these two institutions screw us up enough on their own, so both of them together is certain death."

"There's no present. There's only the immediate future and the recent past."

"At a formal dinner party, the person nearest death should always be seated closest to the bathroom."

" As a matter of principle, I never attend the first annual anything."

"Think of how stupid the average person is, and realize half of them are stupider than that."

" I think it's the duty of the comedian to find out where the line is drawn and cross it deliberately."

"Inside every cynical person, there is a disappointed idealist"

"Some people see things that are and ask, Why? Some people dream of things that never were and ask, Why not? Some people have to go to work and don't have time for all that ..."

"The very existence of flame-throwers proves that some time, somewhere, someone said to themselves, You know, I want to set those people over there on fire, but I'm just not close enough to get the job done."

[dimafleck: the living legend.]

NOOOOOOO!

my favorite for sure.

[MarcO]

RIP George

[Ms.Huxtable]

Oh man that's really sad news. It's nice to think that he was making people laugh right up to the very end though.

[bouche]

George Carlin on the Tonight Show in 1966

[phorbesie]

RIP to such a funny dude.

He would say that he was worm food, because that is the extent of afterlife. You live 71 years, then you're worm food. If you're lucky, you get a memorial where all the assholes that you knew your whole life get together and talk about the great things you did... Bullshit, they remember all the times you got drunk and tried to have sex with the living room furniture. It's a pathetic sight really, bunch of old fucks talking about a dead fuck, fucking furniture. Sounds about right.