PoliTicS: More on Colbert's Sat Nite Massacre of BushPress

Executive Summary:
The White House correspondents dinner on 4/29 opened a can of worms.
Not because Steven Colbert made fun of Bush, but because the Mainstream
media did notcover his attacks on the president, but instead focused coverage
on the President's lampooning himself.

(and I am going to blog this message too,after I change the name!)

After FINALLY reading all six pages of Dan Froomkin's column about saturday night,
I found some interesting commentary.

Dan (Froomkin) writes: here:
(Emphasis Added by markbnj!)
"Was the biggest news of the night that Bush so effectively
and humorously poked fun at himself? Or that a captive president
-- and, to a lesser degree, the press corps -- had so sit and
watch as they were subjected to devastating, vitriolic satire?

Possibly because they themselves were targets, most reporters
chose to downplay the Colbert part of the evening.

He quotes (I'm summarizing here...)

Elisabeth Bumiller from the New York Times, gives her favorite
jokes from first part of the presentation (BUSH/dopplanger) but doesn't
even mention Colbert at all.

From the blogosphere he continues:
Blogger Peter Daou looks at the mainstream media coverage and finds:
"Colbert's performance is sidestepped and marginalized while
Bush is treated as light-hearted, humble, and funny. Expect
nothing less from the cowardly American media.

OUCH. This, believe it or not, is what I expect from the mainstream media, and why I don't watch TV "Happy" or "EyeWittless" News on TV.

And then:
Blogger Billmon writes: "Colbert used satire the way it's used
in more openly authoritarian societies: as a political weapon,
a device for raising issues that can't be addressed directly.

Did any of you see the movie "V is for Vengance"? It was fantastic.
I essentially say it's an updating of the stark authortarian society depicted in Orwell's 1984. (look HERE for my thoughts on it:).. And by the way, Natalie Portman WILL win an Oscar for her performance it, and she even looks sexy as her head is shaved when she's a political prisioner.

(Billmon continues)...He (Colbert) dragged out all the unmentionables --
the Iraq lies, the secret prisons, the illegal spying, the neutered
stupidity of the lapdog press -- and made it pretty clear that he
wasn't really laughing at them, much less with them.

It may have been comedy, but it also sounded like a
bill of indictment,
^^^^^^^^^^^^------
(my comment.. make that impeachment!)

and everybody understood the charges. . . .

Video Dog writes in Salon: "The real sign of Stephen Colbert's success
at the White House Correspondents' Dinner wasn't his jokes -- which, from
beginning to end, were spot-on (jokes deleted for brevity, available
elsewhere!)(..my snip...)And no, it wasn't the grim-looking handshake<>or the icy glare he received from Laura Bush
that let us know that he hit his targets...

"The proof of his accuracy lies in how badly the . . . Washington
press corps reacted. After all, this wasn't the usual
baby-soft slapstick they usually get at the correspondents'
dinner.

[F]or the most part the press sat on their hands -- while just
moments before, they were laughing uproariously at President
Bush's incredibly lame skit with a Bush impressionist.

MB: sez Interesting take, it's a COLLECTIVE dumbing down or ignoring reality, not just individuals doing it... hmm, their society (that of WHPC) makes it unimaginable for them to do that...

That was Colbert's real feat: Showing us the real Washington
media world, where everyone worries so much about offending someone,
anyone , that the least bit of frank talk turns them into obedient
little church mice."
"Colbert's real sin . . . was inserting a brief moment of honesty
into an event based upon a lie -- one considered socially
necessary by the political powers that be, but still, a lie."

IE, the concept of the WHPC dinner being a veneer for them to "relax" and enjoy each other.. (sez mitch)

He makes this point come home, quoting conservative Blogger Ed Morrissey

who writes: "There were two problems with Colbert's act. The first is
that it wasn't funny, and the second was that it didn't keep with
the spirit of the evening.
The Correspondents Dinner prides itself on making the evening a
safe venue for all, and the humor is supposed to stay self-deprecating.
Attacking one's opponents in this forum is considered bad manners.
Colbert has no grasp of his audience or the event, and he paid
the price for it. And that price was painful indeed."

Interesting observation. First off, I am going to respond to Mr. Morrissey,
and let him know that I DID consider the material funny. What's more, with a positive approval rating of around 30% now, I'd guess 70% of the population ALSO thought the material was extremely funny. How sad. The MINORITY that
still stands with the POTUS cannot see that all the errors he's made make
it a funny, yet extremely painful show to watch...

And Dan concludes his column by mentioning the SIGNING statements that Bush has attached to bills passed by Congress, effectively Gutting, or negating the bill that CONGRESS passed...(see HERE in my blog (sorry...)http://markbnj.blogspot.com/2006/05/politics-white-house-lies-again-and.html

OK. Nuff said for now...

Sigh... I like humor and Tech pieces... Oh well..

markbnj