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Old May 7th, 2006 #1
lawrence dennis
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Default 'No matter what happens, America will rebound with powerfully staged photo ops'

The transcript below is just a partial transcript.

Link to video for full performance: Colbert's smart bomb

Transcript: 'I'm a simple man with a simple mind'
May 7, 2006

In his keynote speech at the media dinner, Stephen Colbert played the earnest but clueless newsman of his Comedy Central TV show, 'The Colbert Report.' Here's an edited transcript:
Quote:
Wow, wow, what an honor. The White House Correspondents' Dinner. To just sit here, at the same table with my hero, George W. Bush, to be this close to the man. I feel like I'm dreaming. Somebody pinch me. You know what, I'm a pretty sound sleeper, that may not be enough. Somebody shoot me in the face.

Is he really not here tonight? The one guy who could have helped.

By the way, before I get started, if anybody needs anything at their tables, speak slowly and clearly into your table numbers and somebody from the NSA will be right over with a cocktail.

Ladies and gentlemen of the press corps, Mr. President and first lady, my name is Stephen Colbert and it's my privilege tonight to celebrate our president. He's not so different, he and I. We get it. We're not brainiacs on the nerd patrol. We're not members of the "fact-inista." We go straight from the gut, right sir? That's where the truth lies, right down here in the gut. Do you know you have more nerve endings in your gut than you have in your head? You can look it up. I know some of you are going to say "I did look it up," and that's not true. That's because you looked it up in a book. Next time look it up in your gut. I did. My gut tells me that's how our nervous system works.

Every night on my show, "The Colbert Report," I speak straight from the gut, OK? I give people the truth, unfiltered by rational argument. I call it the no-fact zone. Fox News, I own the copyright on that term.

I'm a simple man with a simple mind, with a simple set of beliefs that I live by.

Number one, I believe in America. I believe it exists. My gut tells me I live there. I feel that it extends from the Atlantic to the Pacific, and I strongly believe it has 50 states. And I cannot wait to see how the Washington Post spins that one tomorrow.

I believe the government that governs best is the government that governs least. And by these standards, we have set up a fabulous government in Iraq.

I believe in pulling yourself up by your own bootstraps. I believe it is possible -- I saw this guy do it once in Cirque du Soleil. It was magical.

And though I am a committed Christian, I believe everyone has the right to their own religion, be it Hindu, Jewish or Muslim. I believe there are infinite paths to accepting Jesus Christ as your personal savior.

Ladies and gentlemen, I believe it's yogurt. But I refuse to believe it's not butter. Most of all I believe in this president. Now, I know there are some polls out there saying this man has a 32 percent approval rating. But guys like us, we don't pay attention to the polls. We know that polls are just a collection of statistics that reflect what people are thinking in "reality." And reality has a well-known liberal bias.

So, Mr. President, pay no attention to the people that say the glass is half full. Pay no attention to the people who say the glass is half empty, because 32 percent means it's 2/3 empty. There's still some liquid in that glass is my point, but I wouldn't drink it. The last third is usually backwash.

Folks, my point is that I don't believe this is a low point in this presidency. I believe it is just a lull, before a comeback. I mean, it's like the movie "Rocky." The president is Rocky and Apollo Creed is everything else in the world. It's the 10th round. He's bloodied, his corner man [is] Mick, who in this case would be the vice president, and he's yelling "Cut me, Dick, cut me," and every time he falls she says stay down! Does he stay down? No. Like Rocky, he gets back up and in the end he -- actually loses in the first movie. OK. It doesn't matter. The point is the heart-warming story of a man who was repeatedly punched in the face.

So don't pay attention to the approval ratings that say 68 percent of Americans disapprove of the job this man is doing. I ask you this, does that not also logically mean that 68 percent approve of the job he's not doing? Think about it. I haven't.


I stand by this man. I stand by this man because he stands for things. Not only for things, he stands on things. Things like aircraft carriers and rubble and recently flooded city squares. And that sends a strong message that no matter what happens to America, she will always rebound with the most powerfully staged photo ops in the world.

Now, there may be an energy crisis. This president has a very forward-thinking energy policy. Why do you think he's down on the ranch cutting that brush all the time? He's trying to create an alternative energy source. By 2008 we will have a mesquite-powered car.

And I just like the guy. He's a good joe. Obviously loves his wife, calls her his better half. And polls show America agrees. She's a true lady and a wonderful woman. But I just have one beef, ma'am. I'm sorry, but this reading initiative. I've never been a fan of books. I don't trust them. They're all fact, no heart. I mean, they're elitists telling us what is or isn't true, what did or didn't happen. What's Britannica to tell me the Panama Canal was built in 1914. If I want to say it was built in 1941, that's my right as an American. I'm with the president, let history decide what did or did not happen.

The greatest thing about this man is he's steady. You know where he stands. He believes the same thing Wednesday that he believed on Monday, no matter what happened Tuesday. Events can change, this man's beliefs never will.

And as excited as I am to be here with the president, I am appalled to be surrounded by the liberal media that is destroying America, with the exception of Fox News. Fox News gives you both sides of every story -- the President's side and the vice president's side. But the rest of you, what are you thinking, reporting on NSA wiretapping or secret prisons in Eastern Europe? Those things are secret for a very important reason -- they're super depressing. And if that's your goal, well, misery accomplished.

Over the last five years you people were so good over tax cuts, WMD intelligence, the effect of global warming. We Americans didn't want to know, and you had the courtesy not to try to find out. Those were good times, as far as we knew.

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. Put them 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.
Press responds by turning Colbert's performance into a non-story:

Bush, US media respond to Stephen Colbert’s comic assault: “We are not amused”
Quote:
At the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner April 29, satirist Stephen Colbert (of “The Colbert Report” on the Comedy Channel) delivered a biting, ironic monologue directed at President George W. Bush and the media establishment.

With Bush seated only a few feet away, Colbert, as is his wont, impersonated a right-wing blowhard, calling on the president to ignore the polls (“Guys like us, we don’t pay attention to the polls. We know that polls are just a collection of statistics that reflect what people are thinking in ‘reality.’ And reality has a well-known liberal bias”) and praising the press for its subservience to the administration (“Over the last five years you people were so good—over tax cuts, WMD intelligence, the effect of global warming. We Americans didn’t want to know, and you had the courtesy not to try to find out. Those were good times, as far as we knew”).

He skewered Bush: “I stand by this man. I stand by this man because he stands for things. Not only for things, he stands on things. Things like aircraft carriers and rubble and recently flooded city squares. And that sends a strong message: that no matter what happens to America, she will always rebound—with the most powerfully staged photo ops in the world.

He zeroed in on “Fox News,” which “gives you both sides of every story: the president’s side, and the vice president’s side.” He suggested the way to handle “these retired generals causing all this trouble” was not to let them retire. Noting that he had seen retired Gen. Anthony “Zinni and that crowd” on television talk shows, Colbert continued, “If you’re strong enough to go on one of those pundit shows, you can stand on a bank of computers and order men into battle.”

Colbert deftly punctured Republican Sen. John McCain’s ‘maverick’ reputation: “Somebody find out what fork he used on his salad, because I guarantee you it wasn’t a salad fork. This guy could have used a spoon! There’s no predicting him.” He also urged his audience to enjoy a metaphor he employed about “boxing a glacier...because your grandchildren will have no idea what a glacier is.”

The comic implored the media not to report on “NSA wiretapping or secret prisons in eastern Europe.” Instead, “Get to know your family again. Make love to your wife. Write that novel you’ve 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!” This stung particularly sharply.

Colbert concluded with a video in which he imagines himself the new White House press secretary, lying, evading, double talking, and, finally, pursued by Helen Thomas, the veteran UPI and now Hearst Newspapers correspondent, who insists on knowing why the US invaded Iraq.

The audience at the dinner, composed of politicians, journalists and entertainment figures, responded for the most part in a distinctly muted manner to Colbert’s monologue. Bush was clearly furious. According to US News & World Report, Colbert “won a rare silent protest from Bush aides and supporters Saturday when several independently left before he finished. ‘Colbert crossed the line,’ said one top Bush aide, who rushed out of the hotel as soon as Colbert finished. Another said that the president was visibly angered by the sharp lines that kept coming. ‘I’ve been there before, and I can see that he is [angry],’ said a former top aide. ‘He’s got that look that he’s ready to blow.’ “

The leading media outlets were apparently “not amused” either by Colbert’s performance. Remarkably, Elizabeth Bumiller of the New York Times, in her account of the dinner, failed to mention Colbert’s name! She recounts in some detail the appearance of Steve Bridges, a Bush impersonator, who collaborated with Bush in a skit. Bumiller diligently reports about the preparations for the Bridges-Bush act (“Last Friday was the dress rehearsal with Mr. Bridges in the White House family theater. Mr. Bartlett and Joshua B. Bolten, the new White House chief of staff, attended, but many other senior aides were kept out to keep it secret. Mr. Bush and Mr. Bridges did two straight run-throughs”), but never makes a single reference to Colbert’s 20-minute monologue, in which the White House Press corps, of which Bumiller is a member, came under attack for its cowardice.

The Washington Post, the Associated Press and Reuters all provided scant coverage of Colbert’s appearance. The television networks largely ignored his comments. As news of Colbert’s monologue spread, thanks to the Internet, certain in the media felt obliged to account for the initial silence. The New York Times assigned Jacques Steinberg the task of attempting to cover its particular posterior. Noting that Colbert’s comments were creating a great stir (Comedy Central had received 2,000 email messages by May 1), Steinberg wrote, “Others chided the so-called mainstream media, including The New York Times, which ignored Mr. Colbert’s remarks while writing about the opening act, a self-deprecating bit Mr. Bush did with a Bush impersonator. Some, though, saw nothing more sinister in the silence of news organizations than a decision to ignore a routine that, to them, just was not funny.

This became the second line of defense. Colbert was simply not amusing. As if that were the issue! Colbert’s angry irony was certainly likely to go over the head not only of Bush, but of most members of the political and media establishment. He ridiculed American philistinism, in its own voice. Speaking of Bush, for example, Colbert explained, “We’re not so different, he and I. We get it. We’re not brainiacs on the nerd patrol. We’re not members of the factinista. We go straight from the gut—right, sir? That’s where the truth lies, right down here in the gut. Do you know you have more nerve endings in your gut than you have in your head? You can look it up. I know some of you are going to say ‘I did look it up, and that’s not true.’ That’s ‘cause you looked it up in a book.

“Next time, look it up in your gut. I did. My gut tells me that’s how our nervous system works. Every night on my show, the Colbert Report, I speak straight from the gut, OK? I give people the truth, unfiltered by rational argument. I call it the ‘No Fact Zone.’ Fox News, I hold a copyright on that term.

“I’m a simple man with a simple mind. I hold a simple set of beliefs that I live by. Number one, I believe in America. I believe it exists. My gut tells me I live there. I feel that it extends from the Atlantic to the Pacific, and I strongly believe it has 50 states. And I cannot wait to see how the Washington Post spins that one tomorrow. I believe in democracy. I believe democracy is our greatest export. At least until China figures out a way to stamp it out of plastic for three cents a unit.”

At a large public gathering, attended by the president, top officials and “celebrities” from various fields, a well-known comic personality lights into the administration and the media, accusing the one of malfeasance and the other of toadyism, and this, according to Steinberg and the Times, is not newsworthy. Is anyone expected to believe this?

The media buried Colbert’s routine because his comments, rather courageous considering the circumstances, spoke directly to their own role as accomplices of the administration. These are things that simply cannot be said in America.

One of the most dishonest and self-serving attacks on Colbert came from Richard Cohen of the Washington Post.
Cohen, in his May 4 column, first returns to the theme: Colbert’s comments were not funny. But why should Colbert have confined himself to amiable, good-natured “ribbing,” as Cohen and others would have preferred? He was sharing the dais with a criminal. He must have realized that he had the opportunity to speak for millions, to tell Bush what he should be told for once.

Cohen further attacks Colbert as “rude” and “insulting.” [Yes, folks, jews decide what is or is not 'rude' and 'insulting.' Jews! --L.D.] “Rudeness,” writes Cohen, “means taking advantage of the other person’s sense of decorum or tradition or civility that keeps that other person from striking back or, worse, rising in a huff and leaving. The other night, that person was George W. Bush.”

He continues, “Self-mockery can be funny. Mockery that is insulting is not. The sort of stuff that would get you punched in a bar can be said on a dais with impunity. This is why Colbert was more than rude. He was a bully.”

This is a remark worth considering. It is so preposterous that one has to consider the social and intellectual process by which it could have made its way into print.

Bush, along with his associates, is guilty of launching an unprovoked war, illegal under international law, responsible for the death and mutilation of tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of Iraqis and Americans. He has helped pitch the world forward toward potential conflagrations of horrifying dimensions. As a personality, he is a weakling and a sadist. No one should forget his presiding over 152 executions in Texas, and his mockery of the plea of death-row inmate Karla Faye Tucker for clemency. “ ‘Please,’ Bush whimpered, imitating Tucker, his lips pursed in mock desperation, ‘don’t kill me.’“

Standing reality on its head, Cohen, however, accuses Colbert, who merely hints at the methods of this administration, of being a “bully.” In making this comment, Cohen speaks for the privileged, profoundly self-satisfied media elite. The Post columnist responds with venom to any signs of political or cultural life going beyond the bounds of the official consensus; hence, his bitter attacks on Michael Moore’s Fahrenheit 9/11, Stephen Gaghan’s Syriana and now Colbert.

Cohen and his ilk are not journalists, they are courtiers, part of the administration’s entourage. This insulated media world, where intermarriage is common, where reporters “cover” the activities of their drinking buddies.... Cohen personifies this ignorant, cowardly milieu. He is the type that has made “pundit” into a dirty word.

Cohen is also covering up for his own complicity in the invasion and occupation of Iraq. After initial hesitations, he signed on enthusiastically to the war drive in February 2003, following Secretary of State Colin Powell’s appearance at the UN, during which Powell made entirely false allegations about the Iraqi regime. Cohen claimed at the time that the “evidence he [Powell] presented to the United Nations—some of it circumstantial, some of it absolutely bone-chilling in its detail—had to prove to anyone that Iraq not only hasn’t accounted for its weapons of mass destruction but without a doubt still retains them. Only a fool—or possibly a Frenchman—could conclude otherwise.”

The columnist concluded, “If anyone had any doubt, Powell proved that it [Iraq] has defied international law—not to mention international norms concerning human rights—and virtually dared the United Nations to put up or shut up. There is no other hand. There is no choice.”

Many of the journalists in attendance at the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner have similar track records. If they weren’t laughing at Colbert’s remarks, it’s no wonder.
__________________

How is the faithful city become an harlot! It was full of judgment: righteousness lodged in it, but now murderers. Thy silver is become dross, thy wine mixed with water. Thy princes are rebellious, and companions of thieves: every one loveth gifts, and followeth after rewards.

Xian WN!

"The Jew can only be understood if it is known what he strives for: ... the destruction of the world.... [it is] the tragedy of Lucifer."

Holy-Hoax Exposed, Hollow-Cost Examined, How Low Cost? (toons)
 
Old May 7th, 2006 #2
lawrence dennis
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Default 'An "Emperor's New Clothes" moment played out with Bush & his court forced to watch'

Why Colbert matters
by Tim Grieve

Quote:
09:58 EDT, May 1, 2006 -- We seldom start a week by sending readers away, but we'll have to make an exception today: If you haven't seen Stephen Colbert's appearance at the White House Correspondents' Association dinner, go watch it now.

We shouldn't have to say that. What Colbert did to the president and the press corps is news: He didn't shoot anybody Saturday night at the Hinckley Hilton, but he laid them out in just about every other way imaginable. It was as an "Emperor's New Clothes" moment played out with George W. Bush and his court forced to watch, and you ought to have seen it and talked about it and read reporting and analysis on it by now.

It's not your fault if you haven't. The Washington Post had a few not-quite-getting-the-point mentions of Colbert's act, but Colbert didn't get half the ink the paper spilled on appearances by George Clooney and Morgan Fairchild and other celebrities at Bloomberg's after-party. The New York Times' Elisabeth Bumiller wrote almost 1,000 words on the annual dinner this year, but not one of them was "Colbert."

The correspondents' dinner, Bumiller, wrote, is "supposed" to be a time for the president "to make fun of himself in an effort to establish his regular-guy credentials and ingratiate himself with the press." That's apparently what Bumiller's reporting on the dinner was supposed to be, too: one more chance to show what a swell guest Bush would be at our next backyard barbecue. Colbert didn't play along -- he didn't stick to the story line -- so he didn't get the laughs in the room, and he didn't get the attention his message deserved in the press.

Why did Colbert matter?

In trying to describe what Colbert did Saturday night, we have a little sympathy for the reporters who didn't do it themselves. In the core of his performance, standing just feet away from the president, Colbert adopted Bush's phony or just feckless "from the gut" style of talking and thinking, then revealed it for the international embarrassment that it is. You can't say something like that without sounding strident and heavy-handed; if you're a reporter for a major American newspaper, you can't really say it at all. But over the course of 10 minutes or so -- for the president, it must have seemed much longer -- that's what Colbert did. He put the lie to the Bush presidency: Iraq, domestic spying, the outing of Valerie Plame and all the folksy, consistency-and-character crap that's so often used to legitimize it all.

It's hard to explain that in a way that would satisfy a desk editor's balance meter. But that's assuming that anyone wanted to try. As Colbert made clear in a videotaped sketch, the White House press corps -- while showing some signs of life of late -- has, over time, been more than complicit in the Imagineering that surrounds this president. It helped sell his case on Iraq. It covered up for him on Plame's outing. It laughs at his jokes when it should be shining a light on an administration that went to war on a lie, turned a massive surplus into a massive dedicit, and stood by idly as a great American city faced death.

In the video, Colbert fantasized that he was the new White House press secretary, forced again and again to confront the question of why the administration invaded Iraq. Bush used to think that was a pretty funny one; at the 2004 Radio and Television Correspondents' Association dinner, Bush narrated a slide show of himself searching for those wascally WMD all around the Oval Office and under the cushions of a White House sofa. Some 2,400 dead Americans later, it's not really har-de-har-har humor anymore.

What it is is tragedy, and Colbert's video was painful to watch in a what-might-have-been sort of way. There's a moment where Colbert mashes together tapes of old press briefings to make it sound like all of the White House reporters are asking questions at once -- as if the press corps is rising up, as if the administration is being called to answer for all that it has done.

It hasn't happened that way in real life. The Elisabeth Bumillers of the world can't even let it happen in fantasy.
__________________

How is the faithful city become an harlot! It was full of judgment: righteousness lodged in it, but now murderers. Thy silver is become dross, thy wine mixed with water. Thy princes are rebellious, and companions of thieves: every one loveth gifts, and followeth after rewards.

Xian WN!

"The Jew can only be understood if it is known what he strives for: ... the destruction of the world.... [it is] the tragedy of Lucifer."

Holy-Hoax Exposed, Hollow-Cost Examined, How Low Cost? (toons)
 
Old May 7th, 2006 #3
Mike
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Nice item LD.

Salon's a pay site, but I found Colbert's speech on google video.
http://video.google.com/videoplay?do...83917758574879

I've watched about a third of it. Colbert is pretty ballsy, standing at the podium about three seats down from Bush and basically calling him an idiot and throwing everything but the kitchen sink at him. I am pretty surprised they let him give this speech.


Quote:
Originally Posted by lawrence dennis
The transcript below is just a partial transcript.

Link to video for full performance: Colbert's smart bomb

Transcript: 'I'm a simple man with a simple mind'
May 7, 2006

In his keynote speech at the media dinner, Stephen Colbert played the earnest but clueless newsman of his Comedy Central TV show, 'The Colbert Report.' Here's an edited transcript:
Press responds by turning Colbert's performance into a non-story:

Bush, US media respond to Stephen Colbert’s comic assault: “We are not amused”
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Old May 8th, 2006 #4
Mike
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Now that I have watched this, I'd say it's pretty understandable that the media didn't have much to say about Colbert. By the end, he scathed them more than he scathed Bush. Who would want to report being ridiculed for a longstanding practice of lax reporting?

Colbert has carried on with his "truthiness" satire for a while. One problem: The question "What is the real reason for the war" was properly raised by Colbert and Helen Thomas, but not properly answered. Just raising that question is a good start but obviously does not go far enough.
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Old May 8th, 2006 #5
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This tells me that the jew is getting ready to change gears and put a democrat into the White house. They are done with the idiot and they just gave him his going away slap to the face, probably because he proudly proclaimed that he’s was a Christian too many times for their liking. Those at Fox News also just got their wake-up call. For those too stupid or too slow to get the message, they will find themselves out of a job. Let’s see if Hannity and O’Reilly can hang on. My guess is that Hannity will be shown the door. O’Reilly is bending over for the mexicans and he’s a sex pervert, so that means he has a a fighting chance to hold onto his job longer then a year and a half.

Colbert (is he a jew?) was allowed to get away with that only because big jew has allowed him to get away with it. The jew doesn’t change policy or support for a White politician behind closed doors in a smoked-filled room.........the jew does it in broad daylight, on stage, right in front of the stupid goyem. The rest of the tribe picks up on the cue. Remember, the jew invented chutzpah.
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