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"Wait, what, did news happen?"
May. 3rd, 2006 03:59 amThe sluggish press reaction to Stephen Colbert's Saturday night performance reminds me of that Simpsons bit, when the reporters rush up to interview Mr. Burns as he leaves the courthouse:
Reporter: "Who are you, and where are you going?"
Kent Brockman: "Oh, do your research, Shutton!"
But I'm pleased to report that the moisture of blog-news is seeping into the lithographic strata of the mainstream media, forming cracks of truthiness under the inclement weather of public opinion. The New York Times has taken notice, a day or so after Salon did. I saw Tucker Carlson—who was soundly spanked by Colbert's old boss Mr. Jon Stewart just before he got his show yanked from under him—debating whether Colbert was funny on MSNBC tonight. (Carlson opined, "No.") The NYT article pointed us to the Gawker poll, which asks that same question: "Was Stephen Colbert’s White House Correspondent’s Dinner performance a) one of the most patriotic acts I’ve witnessed of any individual, or b) not really that funny?" (To spare you the suspense, "patriotic act" is winning, 7838 to 1213. The comments are funnier than the poll: "Shouldn't it be, 'Stephen Colbert: great keynote speaker or greatest keynote speaker?'" and "Uh. I touched the screen, and my vote came up 'Bush'. How is that possible?")
But the debate shouldn't be about whether Colbert was funny or not. I thought he was, but I think he's been funnier elsewhere, and anyway I'm pretty sure it's impossible to judge comedic success in an atmosphere of such frostiness; the comedy was almost moot. The grassroots swell of support is the story here; it exists, it is measurable with real numbers, and it is impressive. Colbert said what many many of us wanted to say to Bush, and to the media, and he said it in the best possible way: by posing as one of Bush's own. The response tells us that a big chunk of our country had a yawning need for someone to spit in the President's eye, to make him fume; it tells us we were frustrated with the fourth estate's endless willingness to accept pat responses and ignore important facts. Stephen Colbert was a visible avatar of the frustrated American liberal gestalt on Saturday, wielding a flaming sword in the den oflions bears. The Left is finally learning what the Right has known for years: if enough people latch onto a thing, if they refuse to stop talking about it, they can make it the story. The mainstream media's surprise, apparently genuine, at our response is almost shocking; couldn't they hear the rumbling before this? By failing to notice Colbert or the breach he stepped into, they proved his point.
Meaningless numbers: thankyoustephencolbert.org is up to 33522 thank yous, and in helpless thrall to my obviously unhealthy obsession with this event I did a little graph this evening to see how many thank-yous-per-minute he's been getting over the last few days. (It wavers between 10 and 20 typm, with today's peak a bit narrower than yesterday's, as you'd expect.) The three parts of Colbert's speech are the top three downloads at YouTube, far ahead of the #4 spot (and some five to ten times more popular than Bush's twin routine, which a blonde CNN talking head claimed "stole the show").
Reporter: "Who are you, and where are you going?"
Kent Brockman: "Oh, do your research, Shutton!"
But I'm pleased to report that the moisture of blog-news is seeping into the lithographic strata of the mainstream media, forming cracks of truthiness under the inclement weather of public opinion. The New York Times has taken notice, a day or so after Salon did. I saw Tucker Carlson—who was soundly spanked by Colbert's old boss Mr. Jon Stewart just before he got his show yanked from under him—debating whether Colbert was funny on MSNBC tonight. (Carlson opined, "No.") The NYT article pointed us to the Gawker poll, which asks that same question: "Was Stephen Colbert’s White House Correspondent’s Dinner performance a) one of the most patriotic acts I’ve witnessed of any individual, or b) not really that funny?" (To spare you the suspense, "patriotic act" is winning, 7838 to 1213. The comments are funnier than the poll: "Shouldn't it be, 'Stephen Colbert: great keynote speaker or greatest keynote speaker?'" and "Uh. I touched the screen, and my vote came up 'Bush'. How is that possible?")
But the debate shouldn't be about whether Colbert was funny or not. I thought he was, but I think he's been funnier elsewhere, and anyway I'm pretty sure it's impossible to judge comedic success in an atmosphere of such frostiness; the comedy was almost moot. The grassroots swell of support is the story here; it exists, it is measurable with real numbers, and it is impressive. Colbert said what many many of us wanted to say to Bush, and to the media, and he said it in the best possible way: by posing as one of Bush's own. The response tells us that a big chunk of our country had a yawning need for someone to spit in the President's eye, to make him fume; it tells us we were frustrated with the fourth estate's endless willingness to accept pat responses and ignore important facts. Stephen Colbert was a visible avatar of the frustrated American liberal gestalt on Saturday, wielding a flaming sword in the den of
Meaningless numbers: thankyoustephencolbert.org is up to 33522 thank yous, and in helpless thrall to my obviously unhealthy obsession with this event I did a little graph this evening to see how many thank-yous-per-minute he's been getting over the last few days. (It wavers between 10 and 20 typm, with today's peak a bit narrower than yesterday's, as you'd expect.) The three parts of Colbert's speech are the top three downloads at YouTube, far ahead of the #4 spot (and some five to ten times more popular than Bush's twin routine, which a blonde CNN talking head claimed "stole the show").
