{"id":326,"date":"2007-01-19T23:25:44","date_gmt":"2007-01-20T06:25:44","guid":{"rendered":"\/?p=326"},"modified":"2007-04-10T23:10:44","modified_gmt":"2007-04-11T06:10:44","slug":"the-white-house-press-and-the-colbert-curse","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=326","title":{"rendered":"The White House Press And The Colbert Curse"},"content":{"rendered":"

Last year Stephen Colbert delivered what will probably be the most memorable comic presentation that the White House Correspondent’s Association will ever see. He showed up in character as the bombastic pundit that presides over his Colbert Report. And throughout the routine he pounded the media just as much as he did the president. Here’s an excerpt:<\/p>\n

“But, listen, let’s review the rules. Here’s how it works: the president makes decisions. He’s the decider. The press secretary announces those decisions, and you people of the press type those decisions down. Make, announce, type. Just put ’em through a spell check and go home. Get to know your family again. Make love to your wife. Write that novel you got kicking around in your head. You know, the one about the intrepid Washington reporter with the courage to stand up to the administration. You know – fiction!”<\/span> [Transcript<\/a>] [Video<\/a>]<\/p>\n

Apparently the Colbert experience was too much for the WHCA. This year they have elected to go with the comfort food of comedy, Rich Little. The lasting legacy of Colbert’s performance may be that the WHCA may never have another poignant and provocative guest speaker. But not only did they book Little this year, they have also instructed him to layoff of the President. Says Little<\/a>:<\/p>\n

“They don’t want anyone knocking the president. He’s really over the coals right now, and he’s worried about his legacy.”<\/span><\/p>\n

The latest salvo<\/a> in this feud has Steve Scully. president of the WHCA, denying that any conditions were imposed on Little. If true, that would make Little a liar. But Scully’s statements have there own inconsistencies. After explaining to Little that the dinner is attended by, “people who live and eat politics,”<\/em> he later critiques Colbert as being, “very sophisticated and if you’ve not seen his show you may not get it.”<\/em> With Little, Scully added, “you don’t have to explain his humor.”<\/em><\/p>\n

So Scully’s opinion of his White House press colleagues is that they are immersed in politics but incapable of understanding sophisticated political humor without an explanation. His opinion suggests that, despite going to all of the right congressional hearings and cocktail parties, they still don’t have a clue as to what’s going on.<\/p>\n

Come to think of it, that’s my opinion of them too.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Last year Stephen Colbert delivered what will probably be the most memorable comic presentation that the White House Correspondent’s Association will ever see. He showed up in character as the bombastic pundit that presides over his Colbert Report. And throughout the routine he pounded the media just as much as he did the president. Here’s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[9,1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-326","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-art-culture","category-general"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4Ijg-5g","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":23926,"url":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=23926","url_meta":{"origin":326,"position":0},"title":"A Tip Of The Hat To The Now Immortal Stephen Colbert","author":"Mark NC","date":"12\/19\/2014","format":false,"excerpt":"The moment that America was dreading has come. 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In the first poll to be released since his announcement he shows both strength\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "General"","block_context":{"text":"General","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?cat=1"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":67700,"url":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=67700","url_meta":{"origin":326,"position":2},"title":"Stephen Colbert Honored with Robert F. Kennedy ‘Ripple of Hope’ Award for Social Justice Efforts","author":"Mark NC","date":"9\/25\/2025","format":false,"excerpt":"The eternal vigilance required to maintain America's promise as a haven for free speech and a free press has been staggered by recent assaults delivered by Donald Trump and his censorious MAGA movement. 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That’s What His FCC Chair Implied to Fox News","author":"Mark NC","date":"7\/24\/2025","format":false,"excerpt":"The history of broken democracies that descend into totalitarianism almost always begins with an aspiring dictator who lashes out at the media and seeks to muzzle any criticism from a free press that resists being censored. The honest journalists and others with the courage to speak truth to power are\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Censorship"","block_context":{"text":"Censorship","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?cat=56"},"img":{"alt_text":"Stephen Colbert & Trump Baby","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/..\/Pix\/Trump\/colbert-trump-baby.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/..\/Pix\/Trump\/colbert-trump-baby.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/..\/Pix\/Trump\/colbert-trump-baby.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":35003,"url":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=35003","url_meta":{"origin":326,"position":4},"title":"Stephen Colbert Makes a Mind-Blowing Announcement While Guesting on Russian TV","author":"Mark NC","date":"6\/24\/2017","format":false,"excerpt":"Fans of Stephen Colbert may have noticed his mysterious disappearance this week. His Thursday and Friday broadcasts of Late Night were replaced with repeats without explanation. The scheduling change was peculiar considering all of the current events that would be ripe for Colbert's brand of satire. 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And within that council of cretins one man stood out for his shameless flow of flagrant falsehoods: Trump's chief\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "General"","block_context":{"text":"General","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?cat=1"},"img":{"alt_text":"Stephen Colbert, Mick Mulvaney, CBS","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/..\/Pix\/Trump\/colbert-mulvaney-cbs.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/..\/Pix\/Trump\/colbert-mulvaney-cbs.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/..\/Pix\/Trump\/colbert-mulvaney-cbs.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x"},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/326","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=326"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/326\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=326"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=326"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=326"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}