A few days ago I posted an article in response to a moronic ratings analysis by Breitbart’s editor-in-chief John Nolte. I noted that Nolte’s glee over the Daily Show having lower ratings than some other cable programs was a vacant and desperate stab at relevance, particularly considering that the ratings of his right-wing darlings at Fox News were even lower.
What I hadn’t noticed at the time was that Nolte is virtually fixated on what any coherent observer would agree is the unparalleled success of Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert. The late night Comedy Central pair have created a Renaissance of political satire and much of their humorous insight has entered the popular culture. In addition to their broad-based popularity, they have both been the recipients of numerous broadcasting awards – and not just Emmys, but journalism honors. The Colbert Report just won its second Peabody this month.
That must be why the Breitbrats are so feverishly hammering away at these stars of satire. Nolte is either consumed with jealousy or merely suffering from a paranoid psychosis triggered by his Olympian lameness. In the past month Nolte has published four articles all making the same insipid and easily rebutted claim that Stewart and Colbert are failures. Four articles restating the same misinformation. But worse, Nolte imagines some Grand Design being orchestrated by Comedy Central and the White House to subvert – oh, I don’t know – motherhood? The NRA? Democracy? God’s will? In his dementia Nolte describes Stewart and Colbert as…
“…elite millionaire, speech-policing leftists,” and…
“…the dynamic duo of left-wing free speech oppressors…” and…
“…left-wing, speech policing, Obama Palace Guards…”
Talk about delusional. And he hasn’t even gotten warmed up. He also declared that…
“It’s all a mainstream media scam used to protect Obama and to get leftist talking points out there using a Trojan horse marked ‘satire.’ and…
“The corrupt entertainment media creates a phony reality around television shows they like.”
Nolte takes particular offense at Colbert about whom he rants…
“There’s a HUGE left-wing agenda behind what Comedy Central’s Stephen Colbert is doing, and it’s a serious agenda that has nothing to do with satire.” And that Colbert is…
“…attacking constitutional free speech by attempting to make a mockery of a new Supreme Court ruling that finally allows private citizens and corporations to have as much say in the political process as Stephen Colbert and corporations like, say, Comedy Central.” [Editor’s note: Comedy Central is not a corporation]
Who knew? The Stewart/Colbert cabal to undermine America’s foundations, in concert with a Marxist Manchurian in the White House, is conspiring to silence “private citizens and corporations” like the Koch brothers, and China’s biggest trading partner, Wal-Mart. Indeed, Colbert’s mockery of the Citizen’s United decision is brutal in that it exposes the blatant excess of corporate billions corrupting the democratic process. Thank goodness for the Breitbrats who single-handedly come to the defense of otherwise defenseless waifs like ExxonMobil, Goldman Sachs, and AstroTurf Tea Party sugar-daddies at Americans for Prosperity.
I’m not sure why Nolte is so obsessed that he feels it’s necessary to repeatedly pound on a couple of comedy programs, especially when those programs are often as tough on liberals as they are on conservatives as I documented here. Perhaps he doesn’t like the abundance of dick jokes. Or maybe it’s just a part of his moral character that compels him to speak out when he sees injustice, such as this recent outpouring of outrage over an HBO program that crossed the lines of decency.
Apparently the outrageousness of the program was not enough to keep Nolte from republishing the object of his disgust. And he further demonstrated his moral fiber and family values by advocating the murder of the child-actress’ mother (Nolte later scrubbed that remark and replaced it with one saying that the mother should lose custody of her children). And somewhere in the process Nolte hallucinates that the left is supportive of this sort of televised gross-out.
I can’t say that I was ever a fan of Andrew Breitbart. In fact, I considered him to be a deliberately dishonest purveyor of propaganda who reveled in rancor and divisiveness. But still, I have to wonder if he would be proud of his successors who are driving his media empire into ever more juvenile territory. I would imagine that he would at least be dismayed at what a hopelessly ineffective operation they have turned his web site into by slathering it up with such puerile trash. On the other hand, Breitbart’s biggest claim to fame was posting a TwitPic of a congressman’s wiener. So respectability was never really a part of his mission, but the wiener obsession survives.
By ridiculing Stewart and Colbert, Nolte, is policing their free speech. Right? I mean satire and pointed criticism are infringements on free speech. At least that seems to be the criteria that infuses the fringes.
Nolte never explains what he means by that, nor provides any example of an imposition of free speech. It’s just an insult he likes to throw down the same way these wingers throw down the word Nazi.
Fox not News makes the satire of them coming from Stewart and Colbert so easy and funny. You see, Stewart and Colbert have something the Breitbrats and the right wing have demonstrated they don’t have and never will-a sense of humor!!! I know they make fun of Fox more than the other networks but that is because Fox is, well, being Fox. I see them making fun of CNN and the other networks if they say something stupid or ridiculous. It’s just that Fox does it all day every day so they give them so much more material. It’s only in our nature to pick the low hanging fruit first. The fact that the Breitbrats go after S & C is because they point out how ridiculous the right is through their comedy and satire. Eventhough the information you get from S & C is presented through the prism of comedy, you will be better informed on what is going on in the world then if you got all your information from Fox not News. At least the Breitbrats have finally figured out Colbert is a parody of the right wing noise machine and that in itself is some sort of progress. What really makes no sense is how they are so obsessed with something they claim has little audience and therefore makes it almost irrelevant, yet they have to pound away on it over and over. Their own obsession shows how weak their argument is.
Aargh. Your last point was one I intended to make in the article, but I forgot. Why are these people so obsessed about a couple of comics they regard as failures who wield no influence? Indeed, they are invalidating their own argument.
And you’re also correct about right-wing humor (or lack thereof). When was the last time anyone laughed at something Dennis Miller or Victoria Jackson said? (Actually, I laugh all the time AT Victoria Jackson, not with her).
Dennis Miller is just an angry bitter old man.
I didn’t realize he was on TV anymore…