Stephen Colbert

[Pepsi]

Anyone see this on CNBC? One of the funniest thing's I've ever witnessed. Bush looked like he was gonna jump out of his chair and kill him. :lmao:

"This administration is not sinking, they are soaring, if anything they're re-arranging the deckchairs on the Hindenberg."

[Guest Rygar Frost]

I've been looking for this. Is it on the web anywhere.

[Clawson]

Break.com has it in a couple of parts.

[St. Dubb]

I watched it yesterday on youtube but it has since been taken down because of copyright infringement.

However, here is the full transcript, including the audition tape of Stephen as Press Secretary (which did have a few parts cut out of what was shown last night on the Colbert Report).

Transcript here

[Plankton]

For your convenience.

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

[BlackFlagg]

Bloody brilliant.....I'm guessing whoever invited Stephen there is now working in the South Pole.

[Guest Bluesman]

A lot of the humor itself alone wasn't that great, but it was more the fact that he was saying all of that while all those assholes had to sit there and take it.

I do love how people are trying to say it wasn't funny because no one there was laughing...no shit, he was ripping on everyone there. Even if they laughed I think at some points they really wouldn't have been able to, just at the sheer shock of it.

[Skummy]

A lot of the humor itself alone wasn't that great, but it was more the fact that he was saying all of that while all those assholes had to sit there and take it.

I do love how people are trying to say it wasn't funny because no one there was laughing...no shit, he was ripping on everyone there. Even if they laughed I think at some points they really wouldn't have been able to, just at the sheer shock of it.

Ugh. I hate the logic that if no one's laughing, it's not funny. That's always the argument behind canned laughter, this misguided belief that if no one else is laughing, you don't know when you're supposed to laugh. You laugh when it's FUNNY, dipshit.

And this is excellent, for just the reason Bluesman said.

[Guest Professor Kou]

If only I had the testicular mass that Mr. Colbert has.

Then again my legs probably wouldn't be able to hold the weight of his mighty balls.

[SeanDMan]

...oh my god. Colbert is a hero.

[Toe]

I would have been dead by bear if I hadn't been warned by Stephen Colbert. He makes me want to become an American.

[Fanku Kaibutsu]

I wonder if whoever was in charge of inviting him, and whoever was in charge of approving those who were invited, have ever actually watched his show, or are they just incapable of grasping the concepts of sarcasm and mockery?

[Plankton]

A lot of the humor itself alone wasn't that great, but it was more the fact that he was saying all of that while all those assholes had to sit there and take it.

I do love how people are trying to say it wasn't funny because no one there was laughing...no shit, he was ripping on everyone there. Even if they laughed I think at some points they really wouldn't have been able to, just at the sheer shock of it.

[SeanDMan]

Stuff

Speaking of which...

Tucker Carlson being completely out of touch

...oh man. Talk about not getting the memo.

[Pepsi]

I think Tucker is still bitter about being verbally bitched slapped by Jon Stewart.

[Guest Bluesman]

Colbert has went after him quite a bit too, which no doubt plays a role.

All week I've been checking out Salon's War Room, and reading the shit that they post about people trashing Colbert's performance. It's amazing the lengths they will go to rationalize how bad Colbert's performance was, how it wasn't that important and news-worthy, etc. I favorite may be this one, for obvious reasons:

"While it may have shocked the President to hear someone talk so openly about his misdeeds in the setting of the correspondents dinner — joking about "the most powerful photo-ops in the world" and NSA wiretaps — I somehow doubt that Bush has never heard these criticisms before"

I almost wonder how much jealousy plays a role, with Colbert saying what they wouldn't and/or couldn't. Obviously it's incredibly questionable whether or not someone as sheltered as Bush is (maybe they should start doing the same when Rummy speaks) has been seriously confronted with something like this, and even more questionable whether it was done in such a belittling manner.

[Reflecto Is My Favorite Poster]

I think it's actually great as a form of self-fulfilling prophecy at work:

Throughout the Bush years, two of the major knocks about it are that they are, in layman's terms, "fucking clueless" and that, in addition, they have no sense of what the average American is like.

They hire Colbert, he does his thing, and they get pissed off at it. This proves that, since they're angry at his comedy, they logically must have hired him thinking that he was a legitimate right-wing pundit when anyone who's even seen a little bit of Colbert knows that his entire gimmick is that he's making fun of right wing pundits (in short, proving the Bush Administration is fucking clueless), and moreover, that there was also no one in the place who knew that this was Colbert's gimmick to tell them (in short, proving they're out of touch with the average American...)

[Plankton]

I think it's actually great as a form of self-fulfilling prophecy at work:

Throughout the Bush years, two of the major knocks about it are that they are, in layman's terms, "fucking clueless" and that, in addition, they have no sense of what the average American is like.

They hire Colbert, he does his thing, and they get pissed off at it. This proves that, since they're angry at his comedy, they logically must have hired him thinking that he was a legitimate right-wing pundit when anyone who's even seen a little bit of Colbert knows that his entire gimmick is that he's making fun of right wing pundits (in short, proving the Bush Administration is fucking clueless), and moreover, that there was also no one in the place who knew that this was Colbert's gimmick to tell them (in short, proving they're out of touch with the average American...)

[Ananas]

In fairness to Tucker Carlson (and I am anything but a fan), he's sort of right when he says that Colbert wasn't that funny. Ballsy, hells yes. But Colbert's opening monologue schtick drawn out over 25 minutes really gets old around halfway through. On The Colbert Report he's doing a sharp satire of Bill O'Reilly and FOX News. At the press correspondent's dinner he was just telling a really long one note joke.

[Guest Bluesman]

In fairness to Tucker Carlson (and I am anything but a fan), he's sort of right when he says that Colbert wasn't that funny. Ballsy, hells yes. But Colbert's opening monologue schtick drawn out over 25 minutes really gets old around halfway through. On The Colbert Report he's doing a sharp satire of Bill O'Reilly and FOX News. At the press correspondent's dinner he was just telling a really long one note joke.

[Ananas]

I'm not sure that this is exactly a great example of "how often" politicians are able to laugh at someone's satire of them. Canada has the equivalent to this every year, where the leaders essentially take the piss out of each other without any ill will (in fact, all parties involve generally find it funny). And there's a great tradition of presidents appearing on late night talk shows as well as cameos on shows that make fun of them on a weekly basis. I'm not sure I get what you're saying. Are you suggesting Colbert saw this reaction coming before he started, and was just trying to make a point? Or that Colbert was really average and got laughs not by his own virtue but the reaction of the administration? Because one way he's not doing what he was paid to do (basically, entertain these humorless bastards), and the other he just got lucky. Either way, it hardly qualifies as classic Colbert, especially for someone who is so funny in his own element.

[Guest Bluesman]

That's in Canada, not down here. Most people aren't overly accepeting of questions/criticisms of their beliefs (which is what they are, not ideas), particularly when made fun of in a satrical manner. You can take it one step further: people who don't agree on something aren't likely to laugh at it, even outside the realm of politics.

It wasn't what he said that was funny, but what he did. The Press Secretary skit was, stand alone, not very funny. However, when understood in the context of a scathing critique of the press corps and how weak and spineless they have been, their inability to chase after important/relavent facts about Iraq (think BBC finding out the truth about Jessica Lynch), etc. it becomes a hell of alot funnier. It's the same with the Colbert Report, without understanding what it is he really is doing/saying, it's not terribly funny. That's why I fail to understand how you can say something like 'he was outside his element' because this is what he always does, this was classic Colbert.

[Toe]

I don't know what crack you were smoking. I thought his whole routine was pretty funny. The Press Secretary Bit was the weakest, only because I had already seen it on Colbert's show.

[oldskool]

I think it's actually great as a form of self-fulfilling prophecy at work:

Throughout the Bush years, two of the major knocks about it are that they are, in layman's terms, "fucking clueless" and that, in addition, they have no sense of what the average American is like.

They hire Colbert, he does his thing, and they get pissed off at it. This proves that, since they're angry at his comedy, they logically must have hired him thinking that he was a legitimate right-wing pundit when anyone who's even seen a little bit of Colbert knows that his entire gimmick is that he's making fun of right wing pundits (in short, proving the Bush Administration is fucking clueless), and moreover, that there was also no one in the place who knew that this was Colbert's gimmick to tell them (in short, proving they're out of touch with the average American...)

I'm not following. Since a self-fulfilling prophecy is a prediction that, in being made, actually causes itself to become true, is that a knock on the critics? Or was that just a misinterpretation of a self-fulfilled prophecy?

[Ananas]

What oldskool said just made me click into your point, but if the laughs are a result of the GOP's fuck up, and not really anything Colbert did, I fail to see how it's "classic Colbert". It's not even really funny, it's just another pathetic mess up that is The Republican Party in 2006.