Stephen Colbert

Hey, it's Friday night.  Time to kick back, relax, and have a few chuckles, courtesy Ed Schultz.  On his MSNBC show this evening, Schultz, somehow managing to keep a straight face, claimed that NPR is "as down the middle as you can get."

Schultz served up his side-splitter in condemning Jim DeMint and other Republicans for proposing the federal defunding of NPR.  In the world according to Ed, the Republican suggestion to withdraw NPR's taxpayer subsidies reflects a GOP plan to "shut down any dissenting voices in this country."  Ed, buddy: Dems control the White House and both houses of Congress.  NPR is the voice of pro-government flackery, not dissent.  The rebels are . . . the Republicans!

 

Liberal comedian Stephen Colbert's joke-testimony to Congress may have been a low moment for the House of Representatives, but apparently, to reporters, it makes him a symbol of holiness. Kimberly Winston of the Religion News Service hailed Colbert in an article that appeared in Saturday's Washington Post.

"And, you know, whatsoever you do for the least of my brothers, and these seem like the least of our brothers right now," Colbert said, quoting Jesus. "Migrant workers suffer and have no rights."

It was a different kind of religious message than Colbert typically delivers on Comedy Central's "The Colbert Report," where he often pokes fun at religion - even his own Catholic Church - in pursuit of a laugh. Yet it was the kind of serious faith that some of his fellow Catholics say makes him a serious, covert and potent evangelist for their faith.

"Anytime you talk about Jesus or Christianity respectfully the way he does, it is evangelization," said the Rev. Jim Martin, associate editor of the Jesuit magazine America, who has appeared on Colbert's show four times. "He is preaching the gospel, but I think he is doing it in a very postmodern way."

In case Arianna Huffington plotting to spend an estimated quarter-million dollars on buses to the liberal Jon Stewart/Stephen Colbert rally didn’t paint it as an Obama event, how about Oprah Winfrey? The Obama-endorsing, Obama-campaign-stumping Winfrey appeared via satellite on Thursday night’s episode of The Daily Show to announce that she was going to fly Stewart’s audience to Washington, D.C., for the so-called Stewart half, the “Rally to Restore Sanity."

"I know that you've got this huge event coming up, and I'm really excited about it, because I think that we need a bit more sanity in the world," she said. "I'm sorry, Stephen, I'm not for the fear part, I'm for the sanity part. And I wanted to show my support for you, Jon, and also for your audience...(applause) so here's what I did. I had my staff sneak into your studio early this morning with a little gift. Okay?" She told the Daily Show audience to look under their seats, where they found red envelopes, which they opened. A woman screamed at the top of her lungs: "We're going to the rally!" Oprah repeated "You're going to the rally" four times.  “Now get out there and restore some sanity!”

Colbert crowed: “I've gotta say, just for the record, Jon, your rally was supposed to be about sanity, and that was insane!”

Media reporter Michael Calderone at The Upshot reported on Thursday that National Public Radio officials were surprised the outpouring of attention they drew with a memo insisting reporters shouldn't attend the liberal Comedy Central rallies of Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert. When Calderone asked NPR senior vice president Dana Davis Rehm why there was no memo for the Glenn Beck Restoring Honor rally or the recent liberal One Nation event, she explained that NPR felt "it was obvious to everyone that these were overtly political events" and staff would surely know not to attend. "It's different with the Colbert and Stewart rallies; they are ambiguous," she continued. "But their rallies will be perceived as political by many, whatever we think. As such, they are off limits except for those covering the events."

Calderone asked other media outlets if they had a policy on the Stewart-Colbert event. ABC said it would follow a similar policy to NPR, to be present only as journalists and observers. An NBC News spokeswoman responded in a statement: "NBC News prohibits employees who function in an editorial role from participating at partisan events, however on a case by case basis we have permitted MSNBC hosts to participate in such events."

The Washington Post sent out a similar-sounding memo to staff about being observers, not participants:

The Poynter Institute's Romenesko website published a memo (sent today, and leaked today) from Ellen Weiss, senior vice president for news at National Public Radio insisting to the staff that they cannot attend the liberal Jon Stewart/Stephen Colbert rallies on October 30.

NPR journalists may not participate in marches and rallies involving causes or issues that NPR covers, nor should they sign petitions or otherwise lend their name to such causes, or contribute money to them. This restriction applies to the upcoming John [sic] Stewart and Stephen Colbert rallies.

Glynnis McNicol at Mediaite quipped: "No word on whether NPR issued a similar memo prior to Glenn Beck's rally in August…I’m going to hazard a guess it probably wasn’t needed." Uh, yes. It could be argued NPR already gave Stewart an extremely positive promotion on Fresh Air with Terry Gross on October 4. (It was a Gross-out.) Weiss also said it would be wrong to advocate for political issues -- that "you could not" advocate, ahem, in your day job at NPR:

Columnist Charles Krauthammer scoured congressional Democrats on Friday in The Washington Post for failing to pass any appropriations bills or even introduce a bill extending any of the Bush tax cuts. The title was "The Colbert Democrats." He concluded:

As if this display of unseriousness -- no budget, no appropriations bills, no tax bill -- were not enough, some genius on a House Judiciary subcommittee invites parodist Stephen Colbert to testify as an expert witness on immigration. He then pulls off a nervy mockery of the whole proceedings -- my favorite was his request to have his colonoscopy inserted in the Congressional Record -- while the chairwoman sits there clueless.

A fitting end for the 111th Congress. But not quite. Colbert will return to the scene of the crime on Oct. 30 as the leader of one of two mock rallies on the Mall. Comedian Jon Stewart leads the other. At a time of near-10 percent unemployment, a difficult and draining war abroad, and widespread disgust with government overreach and incompetence, they will light up the TV screens as the hip face of the new liberalism -- just three days before the election.

Fresh from mocking Americans concerned about illegal immigration (and from making a mockery of a congressional hearing), comic Stephen Colbert showed his disdain for another group of Americans: Tea Partiers.

In the introduction to the Oct. 4 "Colbert Report" on Comedy Central, the host said, "Then, the Tea Party reaches out to kids - I assume for help with spelling."

That's a harmless enough little joke, except that it comes from the man who once called Sara Palin "a f***ing retard."

In keeping with hi theme of contempt for conservative America, without pause, Colbert said, "And my guest Eugene Robinson has a new book about the four groups that make up black America."

Is it funny to suggest Christine O'Donnell is a murderer? Stephen Colbert thought so, in a skit last Wednesday. On Friday night's Real Time with Bill Maher, instead of playing a real clip from his old show Politically Incorrect, Maher created a fake one, so O'Donnell could be smeared as a killer. Alex Bornstein, the actress who performs the voice of Lois on Fox's Family Guy, put on a frumpy dress and curly wig to play O'Donnell, and said: "Like, you know, one time, during a game of Truth or Dare, me and my friend Becky killed a Mexican."

Edie McClurg (best known as the principal's secretary on Ferris Bueller's Day Off) then said, "Ohhhh, that's f---ed up." Earlier in the skit, the fake O'Donnell also reported she had repeated pregnancies to sell stem cells and thought anal sex was approved in the Bible:

FAKE O'DONNELL: We've all done things we regret. In college, you know, we used to get pregnant all the time on purpose, just so we could sell the stem cells. I'm not proud of that! It's just, it was the 80's, you know?

CHRISTOPHER "KID" REID: That's messed up, right there.

September 2010 might go down in history as the month America's comedians took over the Democrat Party.

From upcoming political rallies by Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert to the latter testifying before Congress and the media waiting breathlessly for Bill Maher to release another video of Delaware Republican senatorial candidate Christine O'Donnell, our world has surely taken a giant step towards the bizarre.

Jumping aboard the crazy train was David Gregory who on Sunday's "Meet the Press" actually played a clip from Comedy Central's the "Daily Show" to mock the Republican "Pledge to America" and House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Oh.) (video follows with transcript and commentary): 

What happens when the Left likes Stephen Colbert more than Jon Stewart? In a Tuesday interview on taxpayer-funded Pacifica Radio program Democracy Now, radical lefty Glenn Greenwald of Salon.com loved Colbert's "March to Keep Fear Alive," but did not like the centrist-against-extremists pose of Jon Stewart's "Rally to Restore Sanity," since all the extremism is on the Right, and there's only tiny fringes of that on the Left. First, Colbert:  

Well, that, I think, is actually something that I found incredibly encouraging, because the rally there is “to keep fear alive.” And, of course, the American right is dependent, more than anything else, on fear. And as we talked about earlier, Democrats use fear, as well, to motive their base. And so, the role that fear plays in our political culture and the way in which politicians exploit that, I think, is one of the most central issues. And to the extent this rally is designed to mock that, I think that’s a good thing.

It turns out that Colbert's fake-conservative bashing of "Fear" is a more authentic liberal pose than Stewart's phony centrism, but Greenwald resents Stewart's "Million Moderates March" pose precisely because of his "very influential voice" in the media and on the Left:

For general discussion and debate. Possible talking point: Stephen Colbert disgraces the Halls of Congress!

Was this a sad moment in American history, or a good way to publicize the immigration issue? How does this make Democrats look moving into the midterm elections? Any other thoughts? 

Comedian Stephen Colbert on Thursday ridiculed Rick Sanchez, the much-maligned CNN personality that deservedly is the butt of many jokes.

After telling his "Colbert Report" viewers that Jon Stewart's Washington rally next month has been endorsed by Oprah Winfrey, Colbert informed them that he too has gotten a "major media figure" in his corner.

Upon learning the endorsement is from Sanchez, Colbert said, "Wow. Rick Sanchez. The coveted Sanchez bump. That could get me tens of supporters."

After showing a clip of the CNNer making a fool of himself on the air, Colbert panicked, "Oh, my God. It's like I'm a freshman and I've just been befriended by a loser upper-classman" (video follows with transcript and commentary, h/t Right Scoop):

Personally, I completely agree with Glenn Reynolds that  having this idiot Colbert testify was nothing more than a Democrat stunt to take the media's eye off the very real and important testimony also taking place today regarding the Justice Department's racism scandals. So the more cringe-worthy and embarrassing Colbert's appearance is, the better. Naturally, the MSM will be all too willing to play along. They fully understand how damaging the DOJ Black Panther case is to the Obama Administration and have no desire to come anywhere near covering it.

And of course, there's Stephen Colbert, just as willing to play along - a narcissistic attention whore with no respect for the political process who thinks his schtick combined with a ten hour day he spent in the vegetable fields somehow makes him a compelling and important witness.

The one good thing that came out of this is Colbert's reaction to Conyers' request that he leave. It's not very often you see a smug, superior Hollywoodist caught off guard.

Comedy Central star Stephen Colbert will be testifying before Congress this Friday about, of all things, illegal immigration.

No, this apparently isn't a joke.

According to the Daily Caller, the comedian "is slated to testify at a congressional hearing Friday on immigration titled 'Protecting America's Harvest.'"

Jonathan Strong reported moments ago:

Comedy Central's Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert have announced dueling D.C. rallies on October 30 aimed at satirizing the August 28 "Restoring Honor" rally held by rival network Fox News Channel's Glenn Beck.

Newsweek's Daniel Stone is apparently stoked about it, predicting that the gimmick will "absolutely" be a success (emphasis mine):

You’ve got to hand it to Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert, social critics that they are, for keeping us attuned to the absurdity in our political discourse these days....

The liberal media just can't stand all the attention Glenn Beck got for his "Restoring Honor" rally in Washington, D.C., last month.

On Thursday, left-leaning comedians Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert announced dueling marches on our nation's capital to take place three days before Election Day.

Stewart is calling his the "Rally to Restore Sanity," and Colbert's is the "March to Keep Fear Alive."

The "Daily Show" host was first to announce his event (videos follow with commentary):

When Joe Scarborough wondered out loud "how many times can you set your hair on fire?" before viewers stop being shocked, you might have thought he was talking about Keith Olbermann, the man whose scenery-chewing soliloquies inspired an instant-classic Saturday Night Live skit.

But no, Joe was speaking of Glenn Beck.  Perhaps the shot Scarborough took at Ed Schultz a couple weeks ago exhausted his monthly quota of internecine MSNBC insults.

On today's Morning Joe, Mika Brzezinski and Joe took turns ripping Beck's promotion of the rally at the Lincoln Memorial he's staging Saturday on the anniversary of Martin Luther King, Jr.'s "I Have a Dream" speech.  Riffing off a Colbert Show segment showing clips of Beck, Mika claimed he sounded like a drama student "on crack."  Scarborough, suggesting Mika might have gone too far, surmised Beck might merely have taken "stupid pills."

Conservative talk-show host and The Obama Diaries author Laura Ingraham appeared to promote her book Wednesday night on The Colbert Report on Comedy Central. Fake-conservative Stephen Colbert suggested the Republicans didn’t have a visible agenda. But he really went after Ingraham in claiming it was somehow one of “the most hideous, hackneyed racial stereotypes” to joke that Michelle Obama ate baby back ribs.

What? All those Chili’s “I want my baby back, baby back, baby back” ads were only designed for black customers? Obviously, there are more hackneyed culinary stereotypes than that. Ingraham was clearly trying to mock how Eat Right Michelle (if you’re not lost in one of those “food deserts”) probably pigs out on less healthy food in private. Colbert ripped the author’s “diaries” as horribly written (Video below the cut):

COLBERT: What are the odds that Barack Obama’s private musings would completely and perfectly match up with the narrative the right is trying to push about him?

Comedy Central's Stephen Colbert on Wednesday defended Helen Thomas's anti-Semitic remarks by attacking conservative talk radio hosts Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, John Gibson, and Michael Savage.

Addressing the comments that led Thomas to resign her position with the Hearst News Service, Colbert said, "Jesus Christ on a matzo cracker, Helen. What were you thinking?"

He continued, "You don't just blurt out racially charged comments on camera."

As pictures of the four conservative talkers appeared on the screen, Colbert quipped, "You do it on your radio show" (video follows with commentary):

Appearing on Monday’s The Colbert Report on Comedy Central to promote his book, "The Promise," MSNBC political analyst Jonathan Alter – also of Newsweek – asserted that President Barack Obama had "prevented another Great Depression," and declared that Obama had it more difficult than Franklin Delano Roosevelt because he had to "sweep up" like a "shovel brigade" after President Bush, as he used a word that had to be bleeped out for airing. Alter: "He proceeded to make history almost right away, not only because he was the first African-American elected President ... we were all living history. This man prevented another Great Depression."

He soon added: "At the beginning, FDR only had to deal with domestic problems. Obama was left to run what you could call a shovel brigade, you know, the guys who sweep up after the elephants when the elephants leave their s- (BLEEP) all over the circus, right? ... Roosevelt didn't have to deal with foreign policy when he became President. Obama had to deal with a whole nother mess, one of Bush's messes, in Afghanistan."

Comedy Central's Stephen Colbert on Tuesday actually moderated a debate about global warming.

In fairness, it was less of a debate and more a vehicle for him to make fun of his guests Joe Bastardi of Accuweather and Brenda Ekwurzel of the Union of Concerned Scientists.

Regardless of the comedic intent on the part of the host, there were indeed some wonderful moments, in particular Bastardi pointing out that we're going to know in the next five to ten years whether there really is a connection between increasing levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and global temperatures (video follows with highlights and commentary):

Is it possible to be so wrapped up in a media culture that one could minimize a sacred religious holiday in a shoddy attempt to write a clever headline? Mediaite's Tommy Christopher and his editors seemed to have pulled this feat off.

Christopher, who has had a much-publicized run-in with Andrew Breitbart, has a new hero, former American Enterprise Institute scholar David Frum. Christopher elevated Frum to messianic status in a Good Friday April 2 post headlined "Did David Frum ‘Die' For GOP's Sins?" specifically praising the former AEI scholar for his appearance on Comedy Central's April 1 "The Colbert Report."

According to Christopher, Frum still wants to be a conservative and hasn't converted to the liberal ideology, like others have before him. He argued that lends credence to Frum, who is more known for levying criticisms about conservatives and Republicans, and not his conservative world view. (As if being popular with the liberal blogosphere was a badge of honor.)

Unsurprisingly, the Washington Post granted editorial-page space on Saturday to leftist Jim Wallis to vent against Glenn Beck for opposing "social justice." But here's the weirdest part:

Journalists, cable and radio talk shows, and even Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert have reported on or spoofed Beck's attempt to discredit this concept.

Even the left-wing comedians have spoofed Beck? And yet, I don't recall Wallis the Outraged Christian saying anything about Colbert's Christmas special, which joked that the Christians would like to murder the ACLU in their beds, and that Christians are just like Muslims in believing in a "dark and spiteful God."

Good Morning America co-host George Stephanopoulos appeared on Tuesday’s Colbert Report and had to deal with questions about his past as a Democratic operative. Comedian Stephen Colbert bluntly explained, “You’re a Democrat, okay? You worked for the Clintons.  I cannot imagine it must have been easy to sit there for the past year and watch Democrats get hammered so mercilessly by the Republicans.”

Colbert jokingly followed-up: “Did you ever want to just jump across the table to one of the Democrats and say, 'Fight back! Fight back, you fools! They’re eating you alive'”? (NewsBusters readers will know that Stephanopoulos has hardly hid his affection for Democrats since joining the show.)

Colbert even quizzed the ABC journalist as to whether taking the morning show job was simply a way for him to become anchor of World News. The comedian grilled, “Is it like, ‘Yeah, I’ll do GMA for a few years and flip the blueberry pancakes and then I get the chair?’ Is there a quid-pro-quo here with you and ABC News?” (Video below the fold - h/t Story Balloon)

The media's hate parade against the former governor of Alaska hit a disgraceful peak Monday night when comedian Stephen Colbert said on national television, "Sarah Palin is a f**king retard."

In a five minute segment bashing the former vice presidential candidate for her remarks at Saturday's National Tea Party convention, as well as her use of crib notes -- surprise! -- the Comedy Central star ended with the controversy surrounding White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel's "retard" comment.

After playing a clip of Palin telling Chris Wallace on "Fox News Sunday" that Rush Limbaugh's use of the word was acceptable because it was satire, Colbert concluded, "It is okay to call someone a retard if like Rush you clearly don't mean it" (video embedded below the fold with partial transcript, vulgarity alert):

CNN analyst Paul Begala sure likes creating what liberals call a "climate of violence." A week after insisting Barack Obama should deck Scott Brown on the basketball court – "throw him an elbow under the hoop" – he appeared on Comedy Central’s Colbert Report and joked about how Obama’s "going to clock John Boehner right in the face."

In addition to that Republican-punching vision, Begala strangely insisted that Taco Bell workers speak Spanish in talking about bipartisanship: "I say gracias to the guy at Taco Bell. That doesn't make me bilingual."

Even more strangely, Begala insisted Obama hasn’t been blaming the Republicans for the faltering economy: "The Republican economic philosophy ruined this country and this poor president inherited it and is trying to fix it."

When Colbert asked what the Democrats were going to do next, Begala offered his familiar formula of always offend, never defend:

On The Atlantic website, former Chicago Tribune Washington Bureau Chief James Warren recounted a recent liberal panel discussion at a celebration of the Second City comedy troupe in Chicago. Comedy Central host and mock-conservative Stephen Colbert insisted Glenn Beck was too impossibly stupid to satirize:

As for Glenn Beck, the panel discussed the challenge of maintaining a separation between reality and satire when so many TV pundits are simply, premeditatedly over-the-top.

"I said, 'Let's start doing some Glenn Beck stuff but in praise of Glenn Beck,'" said Colbert. "But every time we do one, he will have done something dumber. He raised the stupid bar and now it's nearly inapproachable."

"I worry that if we use that as a model....if somebody doesn't believe what they're saying, it's very hard to out-stupid them," said a decidedly analytical Colbert. "Because then there's no place to sink our hook into, there's no mountain to climb there. I can't climb Glenn Beck since there's nothing there."

Appearing as a guest on Comedy Central’s Colbert Report on Thursday, CBS News correspondent Lara Logan defended America’s continued war effort in Afghanistan, and argued that it is "crap" that some have made comparisons between Afghanistan and the Vietnam War. Logan: "You know, the ridiculous thing about all these comparisons – it’s the graveyard of empires, it’s Obama's Vietnam – it’s all that crap, right?"

Logan, who has spent years in the field covering the wars in both Afghanistan and Iraq, went on to make a strong case in favor of staying in Afghanistan and continuing the fight against Osama bin Laden’s al-Qaeda terror group because of the threat the group still poses, as she cited bin Laden's stated desire to attack America's homeland with weapons of mass destruction:

The truth is that when the Vietnam War ended, the Viet Cong didn't follow the U.S. back home. And that's the big difference. You don't have to listen to one President or another President. It's not political. Listen to bin Laden. Go and read what he has said: We will follow the United States, we will attack the homeland again, we will use nuclear weapons, we will use biological warfare. I mean, it's very simple. Everything al-Qaeda has ever said they were going to do before, they've done. There is no reason to doubt his intentions.