After some time off from blogging TBS’s Full Frontal and an acknowledgement from the show that yours truly lives rent free inside their heads, I checked back in on Samantha Bee’s unfunny program as she opined that the vice presidential debate featured “Hillary Clinton’s care bear” Tim Kaine facing “homophobic Race Bannon” known as Republican Mike Pence.
“It was an epic showdown between Trump's conservative beard, Mike Pence, a man who tried as hard as he could to turn Indiana into a Handmaid's Tale theme park and Hillary Clinton’s care bear Tim Kaine,” Bee explained in the show’s first minute.
As Bee has previously done in the short-lived history of her show, she took a number of pathetic shots at Pence’s social conservatism with this instance mocking him as someone who wouldn’t be okay with women wearing tank tops:
When Kaine gets mad, he starts sputtering like Pence is his daughter's teacher who sent her home for wearing a tank top, which to be fair, Pence did right before the debate. It was his big night. He can't be distracted with sinful woman shoulders[.]
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A few moments later, Bee knocked Pence for “[lying] all night, but did it in such a soothing, FM radio voice” as “[h]e never lost his cool which is weird because in one has ever accused homophobic Race Bannon of being cool.”
Bee’s abbreviated segment on the VP debate wouldn’t have been complete without commenting on moderator and CBSN host Elaine Quijano, who the former Daily Show correspondent appeared to throw a jab at (along with Kaine) for not informing viewers “what we ought to know about Pence.”
Following an incomplete soundbite from Quijano in which she said “I do have one final question for you,” Bee expressed disappointment that it didn’t involve hounding Pence for not being radically pro-abortion and pro-LGBT:
Is it, Governor Pence, what about your push for anti-gay religious freedom laws and your disgust for the pathological condition of gaydom and your support for gay conversion therapy and your attacks on women’s health and your unconstitutional anti-abortion initiatives and oh, I'm sorry, we're out of time. [LAUGHTER] I'll put you down for, my faith is important to me.
Bee conceded that Pence won the debate and concluded by dropping a Godfather reference as to how Donald Trump reacted to Pence’s performance (compared to how many think he did in his first debate):
Now look, Pence is a year younger than Kaine and he had a good night. So why is Pence the one who looks like he drank from the wrong grail in Trump's penthouse? My guess is that Tim got a post-debate phone call from his boss saying, that's ok, little amigo, get up off the mat and go charm some Miami Cubans, while Pence, who committed the unpardonable sin of winning too good probably woke up to a congratulatory horsehead in his bed, which is the second most horrifying thing the governor has gotten into be with.
The relevant portions of the transcript from TBS’s Full Frontal with Samantha Bee on October 5 can be found below.
TBS’s Full Frontal with Samantha Bee
October 5, 2016
10:31 p.m. Eastern
SAMANTHA BEE: It was an epic showdown between Trump's conservative beard, Mike Pence, a man who tried as hard as he could to turn Indiana into a Handmaid's Tale theme park and Hillary Clinton’s care bear Tim Kaine who, I don’t know, looks like he has his own line of frozen breakfast sausages. [LAUGHTER]
(....)
BEE: When Kaine gets mad, he starts sputtering like Pence is his daughter's teacher who sent her home for wearing a tank top, which to be fair, Pence did right before the debate. It was his big night. He can't be distracted with sinful woman shoulders, but Pence showed himself to be an able running mate in the sense of running away from everything Trump has ever said.
(....)
BEE: Pence lied all night but did it in such a soothing, FM radio voice. He never lost his cool which is weird because in one has ever accused homophobic Race Bannon of being cool. [LAUGHTER] Of course, caring about the vice president's calm temperament when an erratic rage quasar is at the top of the ticket is kind of like asking a car salesman about the air bags on a car that's currently on fire. [LAUGHTER] A little real assuring but kind of beside the point. Kaine's losing strategy was to spend the night telling us what we already knew about Trump instead of what we ought to know about Pence.
ELAINE QUIJANO: I do have one final question for you.
BEE: Oh! Is it, Governor Pence, what about your push for anti-gay religious freedom laws and your disgust for the pathological condition of gaydom and your support for gay conversion therapy and your attacks on women’s health and your unconstitutional anti-abortion initiatives and oh, I'm sorry, we're out of time. [LAUGHTER] I'll put you down for, my faith is important to me.
(....)
BEE: Now look, Pence is a year younger than Kaine and he had a good night. So why is Pence the one who looks like he drank from the wrong grail in Trump's penthouse? My guess is that Tim got a post-debate phone call from his boss saying, that's ok, little amigo, get up off the mat and go charm some Miami Cubans, while Pence, who committed the unpardonable sin of winning too good probably woke up to a congratulatory horsehead in his bed, which is the second most horrifying thing the governor has gotten into be with.
