Jul 16, 2008

We've Become a Nation of Whino Comedians

Hard times are ahead: humorists and comedians are complaining that Obama is not buffoonish enough, so they can't come up with any funny jokes about him. Either that, or their audiences are too liberal:
When Mr. Stewart on “The Daily Show” recently tried to joke about Mr. Obama changing his position on campaign financing, for instance, he met with such obvious resistance from the audience, he said, “You know, you’re allowed to laugh at him.” Mr. Stewart said in a telephone interview on Monday, “People have a tendency to react as far as their ideology allows them.”
There is no doubt, several representatives of the late-night shows said, that so far their audiences (and at least some of the shows’ writers) seem to be favorably disposed toward Mr. Obama, to a degree that perhaps leaves them more resistant to jokes about him than those about most previous candidates.

Pathetic. Audiences are "resistant" to jokes. Translated to English: they don't laugh. Why would that be? In old times, before we knew better, we thought people didn't laugh when jokes weren't funny. But now we know it's because they are ideologically resistant. Somebody had better win the Nobel Prize for that discovery.

I've listened to the right-wing rants about "liberal media" for years, but this must be the first time the media complain that their audiences are too liberal. And those liberals just don't appreciate the hard work comedy writers have to do to chisel a joke out of such unfunny stone as Barack Hussein Obama. (Not even his name is funny...)

That's another way in which 8 years of GWB has weakened America: a whole generation of satirists has grown lazy, as the President has provided them with more-or-less finished products daily. And most other recent presidents were funny. Some were boring, but had idiot vice presidents; and in any case, humorists knew how to make jokes about someone being boring. Oh, right, but Obama is not boring, he is perfect, that's the problem...

Oh, really? I think the problem is that most comedians and comedy writers are so enthusiastic about Obama that they become inhibited when they try to joke about him. I can't blame them, I can't imagine how anybody in their right mind would vote for anyone else, but please! If you can't say something funny about the politician you like, find another career! And don't whine, for Phil Gramm's sake!

And what about that cover of theNew Yorker? People who made that are giving all morons a bad name. Of course, they'll say, "Ever heard of the table of contents? Look for it, and you'll find that the title of the ingenious and supremely funny cartoon is "The Politics of Fear". ROTFLMAO! You've got to read the words, son, not just look at the pictures!" To which I say, "Well, guess what. Your goddamn magazine is not sold in dark bags, so that only those who buy it (with proof of maturity) can look at the pictures and perhaps read the articles. If you didn't know, it's there, in plain view of shoppers looking for "People", who will never read your hidden caption."

As of this writing, the New Yorker editors seem convinced that those who don't get the joke or don't find it funny are stupid and irrelevant. I suppose those who didn't get Orson Welles' "War of the Worlds" joke were stupid and irrelevant as well.

No comments: