UPDATE (By Bob). “I was a corn-packer. And I know that term is offensive. To some people. Because corn-packer is a derogatory term for a gay Iowan.” — Colbert responds to Iowa Republican Steve King.
This is hilarious for many reasons, not the least of which is watching the faces of the people who are either totally unamused or desperately trying not to laugh.
Please share widely!
Colbert’s appearance compels me to imagine Jonathan Swift reading his “modest proposal” to British officials in 1729….
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p>If nothing else, the squirming discomfort contemporary readers/listeners experience in the presence of biting satire is writ prettly large here. Brava, Mr. Colbert. I’m sure Steve King will be singing your praises in private today.
I’m a huge fan of Colbert, and I thought this was an alright idea when I first read about it, but I found myself constantly cringing and looking away from the screen. The whole thing just seemed inappropriate and awkward. What’s funny on Comedy Central isn’t necessarily funny at a congressional hearing.
See how fast migrant workers get the job done? See how there is no shade? See how much they do in a day?
Conservatives tell us that union workers are lazy, but these farm workers do more in a day than Bill O’Reilly does in a week.
http://www.colbertnation.com/f…
The workers are at the 5:00 mark.
And here’s the catch: If you don’t have Colbert do this stunt, then nobody pays attention to the Congressional hearing and nobody sees just how hard migrants work. And nobody sees that the union is right to stand up for the workers.
Exactly right. Did you see how many cameras were in there? How many do you think would have been there if Colbert hadn’t shown up? For that matter, how many members of the committee would have bothered to show up? (Obviously they had to show up for the cameras.)
I’m reminded of two things…time and place. Less than 6 weeks from election day, this was neither. I’m sure the Republicans are going to roll this and Aunt Ziteuni out for months to come.
Do you really think Americans find it amusing to see our elected officials sitting and wasting their time while a comic does a bit on national airwaves.
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p>Colbert is a funny guy no doubt but Congressmen who didn’t have the time to do so many things (like extending the tax cuts) should not be wasting time with a comic at a Congressional hearing.
Huh, funny. I always thought that Republicans wanted part-time legislators, etc., because they didn’t want legislators to do as much as they do.
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p>Poor John. The Colbert thing is fabulous both because he actually makes a serious proposal about visas, and because by satirizing the idiotic line that Republicans have taken on immigration, he shows the true poverty of their “ideas.” It must hurt to have that revealed with such clarity. Are you OK, John?
Maybe it would be the start of a new reality TV show, Dancing with the Stars… and now Congressional Jokers (professional ones, not the ones who work there).
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p>However, I don’t think it will work. Do you think it is bringing to light the plight of migrant workers? Do you think most Americans don’t know that these migrant workers are treated like crap and paid very little. We do.
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p>I think the only thing that happened yesterday was a comedian made a mockery of Congress.
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p>As for part-time legislators… I have no idea WTF you’re talking about. I’ve never heard anyone saying this at a Federal level. I do believe this is completely true at a state level where other states enjoy part time legs and MA is stuck with full time bozos who have second and third jobs which they fit into their schedules somehow.
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p>PS In case you’ve had your head someplace shady, more enforcement of existing laws and new laws will be coming very soon to clamp down in illegals supported by Republicans and many Democrats. Count on it. WIll you be ok with that David?
Oh John. Try to keep up, will you? This idea has been around for a very long time. Here’s one example, from your bestest friends at the Heritage Foundation. http://bmg.ma/aPEJF5 Here’s another. http://bmg.ma/dofxaz
I think you’re stretching things to almost an inelastic state to say me and my brethren are pushing for a part time legislators at the Federal level. You can point to Heritage Foundation all you want, but they don’t represent me.
That’s fine, but that’s not what you said. Let’s go to the tape.
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p>You said you’d “never heard anyone” suggesting a part-time federal legislature. I pointed out that at least one well-known conservative thinktank has been suggesting exactly that for many years. QED.
You wrote:
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p>I watched Mr. Colbert use satire to slay row upon row of REPUBLICAN bogey-men.
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p>In the corn-packer exchange in particular, I watched several members of Congress do a fine job of the difficult task of playing straight-man (or woman) to Mr. Colbert. I didn’t see any “mockery”.
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p>In fact, the only “mockery” I see is when today’s Republican lock-step members of Limbaugh’s Army make a mockery of American ideals like freedom, patriotism, responsibility, and morality (both personal and public) by their relentless attempts to twist those ideals around their own pervasive greed, viciousness, bigotry, and lust for both power and blood.
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p>Limbaugh’s army is about to take over, watch out Tom!
I’d like to see Steny Hoyer direct rather more criticism towards Limbaugh’s army and rather less towards Mr. Colbert.
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p>Perhaps you forget that I grew up in Maryland. I’m sure there are places in this great land that are more backward than Maryland’s 5th congressional district. I can’t think of any at the moment, however.
According to his website, he represents “Maryland’s 5th District“.
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p>I believe that Maryland’s 6th District is represented by Republican Roscoe Bartlett.
Who’s testifying today… Kathy Griffin, Kelsey Grammer… maybe it can become a regular stop on the tour of gigs.
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p>One thing which got lost in his murky inappropriate message… there is a big difference in this country on how people feel about legal immigration and illegal immigration. Many liberals try to paint people (like me) who are against “illegals” as being against “legal” immigration and it is pure bullshit hyperbole.
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p>I fully support legal immigration. I support migrant worker programs. I think our immigration system needs to be reformed/expanded. I would fully support reforms in the migrant worker programs which result in them being treated more like human beings than indentured slaves. I have no problem paying higher prices for lettuce, apples and beans. I don’t want illegals here no matter where they come from.
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p>I agree with your remarks a few days ago that there are many jobs in America which Americans will not do… no argument. You should agree with me though and proclaim that there are many jobs in America which Americans do want and illegals are stealing with rock bottom wages. Ask any guy in the trades (roofer, mason, landscaper…) if they are getting competition from cheap illegal labor and they’ll give you 20 real life stories of lost opportunities. I have said it befoer that illegals aren’t stealing my job, but they are stealing millions of lower income jobs from low income Americans.
The one nearly substantive observation he offered was to fix our incredibly broken visa system.
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p>Funny how murky your party’s immigration message is if the real intent is, in fact, to reform/expand our immigration system. That’s certainly not the message that the circus in Arizona sends, and it’s certainly not the message that Scott Brown sends when he applauds that Arizona travesty.
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p>A mockery is being made, and it isn’t being perpetrated by Stephen Colbert.
I’ll bet I’ve even said a few things that “you” agree with!
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p>Sorry but it is your party that wants to paint Republicans as anti-immigrant when almost every Republican I know is PRO-immigration, but just LEGAL immigration.
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p>Think of how it would take the sting out of Democrat’s charges if they couldn’t engage in this kind of lying. Republicans are only too happy to see a new class of immigrants being sworn in as American citizens. It would be great to get the opinions of a bunch of these new American’s on illegals.
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p>My question for people like you Tom is why are you so over the top supportive of illegal immigration? Do you think anyone born in the world has a right to come to the US with no limitations or rules. Are you an “open border” type of person? Did you see the Pats game yesterday with 50,000 people in the stands? Should every American have the right to simply walk through the gates of Foxboro Stadium and demand a seat. Maybe there are reasons only 50,000 are allowed in? Maybe there are safety considerations? Maybe the stadium cannot safely hold more than 50,000? Order, safety, security, communication… It’s not perfect analogy si please don’t rip it apart but think about it (although I have a feeling you are never going to change your mind).
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p>We will be moving towards Arizona style laws very soon and the public will be behind them. We will figure out how to write them within the confines of the law and get what we finally want… security and order.
I have no clue what you’re talking about. None. Your last comment is so filled with distortions, non sequiturs, and plain old lies that it isn’t worth responding to.
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p>This is a thread about a satirical appearance of a comedian before Congress. I liked it, you didn’t. Let’s leave it there, shall we?
and Congress will get back to its serious business of sending billions of taxpayer dollars to the few billionaires and corporations who have donated millions to the Tea Party.
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p>Shame on Steven Colbert! He brought more TV cameras to hearings about people who sweat all day for minimum wage (which the true Conservatives would like to lower to zero dollars an hour).
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p>It is an affront to the Tea Party to remind America that migrant workers with Spanish names work much, much harder jobs than JohnD does, for very little pay. To have these images on television so close to the election is grave risk to the conservative propaganda about illegal aliens having it too good in America.
I can’t come close to their labor output. So what? I would guess that’s true for everyone reading posts on BMG. Do you work harder than a migrant worker picking lettuce? So what? When did we start paying people based on the labor-intensiveness of their jobs? Should incredibly innovative software developers get paid $8/hour… after all they’re only moving their fingers a few inches (no sweating involved)? Work smart not work hard. Of course some people I think use the term work “hard” to encompass working physically, intellectually, strategically, tenaciously with all your skill sets. These are the successful people. Working hard meaning just physically working hard is a waste of time and means little to me without the other facets.
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p>I really don’t think your demagoguery is here is working. I know the talking points being distributed to Democrats drones is to keep preaching that Republicans coming back to power will mean billionaires becoming trillionaires… blah blah blah. The only part of that message which I’d give any credence is I think we’ll have many “regular middle class people” becoming millionaires.
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p>You cannot hurt rich people and I wish you’d stop trying. They can take their money and buy things in other countries (like John Kerry), they kind use legal loopholes and if they don’t spend their money it hurts us.
You are CONSTANTLY suggesting that certain people are less deserving because they don’t work hard enough, via physical labor or otherwise. This is one of the more disingenuous comments from you, and you have quite the collection to choose from!
You wrote:
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p>We already reviewed the facts about this, and you wrote that you prefer to hang on to your own fantasy rather than admit what actually happened when your ideology was put into practice. Here are your precise words (emphasis mine):
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p>When the Republicans were in power, the millionaires became billionaires and they took their wealth from the middle class, working class, and poor. That’s what happened, John, whether you admit it or not and whether you like it or not. The effect of the policies you advocate was, in fact, just the opposite of what you now claim. I showed you the facts, and you willfully chose to ignore them.
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p>The Republican talking point that your comment attempts to evade is the lie that illegal immigrants take jobs from American workers. The issue isn’t how hard anybody works. The fact is, instead, that American workers can have these jobs anytime they want to.
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p>The trouble is (for the Republican belief-system) that the reality doesn’t have nearly the power to fire up the right-wing mobs that the chosen lie has. Not even Rush Limbaugh can rouse the masses to go work in those fields. “Taking jobs from Americans” plays better than “Doing work American’s won’t do.
Obviously Stephen Colbert is even better at becoming the center of attention than a Certain Person.
as one of those pivotal moments of Stanley Milgram type media propaganda failures or rather symptoms of a dying empire when the Orwellian doublespeak paradigms get obviously profane. I don’t know which is worse the Bush fake patriotisms or the PC social engineering global techno fascism of the snot nosed left.
He is one of my least least liked Congresspeople
People like JohnD deserve representation, too.
If there are enough tendentious bores in the country, they deserve representation. Deciding who does and doesn’t deserve to be counted as “American” is a game the other side plays.
and he doesn’t live in King’s district. If he did, then King would be representing him. Since he theoretically lives in Mass, somebody else is representing him – someone who is (also theoretically) not a tendentious bore. If he needs one to represent him, perhaps he should relocate.
There has been a trend on BMG and from the liberal left to silence the voices they don’t like to hear.
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p>Did you guys forget what another famous Democrat once said…
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Talk about tendentious bores, and John D comes running.
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and I had to go find a dictionary.
…when we took the Congress as serious business. For good or evil the hearings meant something. Valachi, Watergate, Army-McCarthy, Iran-Contra. Now a comedy routine. Last year’s SEC hearings into that agency’s corruption or incompetence was telling in that those testifying were claiming “executive immunity” and were not held in contempt. Congress deserves to be a comedy routine. With We-The-People as the producers.
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p>They have made themselves little more than lightweight buffoons. Voting on bills unread, target of scandal after scandal, showing little respect for the basic laws of the country. Little wonder they garner low levels of public respect.
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p>Far easier to line up at the trough for corporate masters than work to heal the nation.
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p>“If I studied all my life, I couldn’t think up half the number of funny things passed in one session of congress.” –Will Rogers
Of course, many people will die of old age before they finally come before the people. My guess is the Democratic Congress will start the hearings after the elections to spare them all that embarrassment, but before the Republicans take back the House (and the Speaker seat) and take a real skewering.
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p>Lame Duck Congressional hearing is my prediction.
Colbert was a complete ass. who the heck allowed him in the building/ And the D’s wonder why their toast on 11/2.