UPDATED: Stewart, Colbert to rally...for irony we can't believe in
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UPDATED: Stewart, Colbert to rally...for irony we can't believe in
As you were warned last week, I've written a story for today's Daily News about the Jon Stewart/Stephen Colbert rally in D.C. this Saturday, the people from Philly who are attending, and what it all means. Here's an excerpt:
But - in perhaps a commentary on the absurdness of the American political moment - there remains little agreement over what the rally is actually about, even among those who've plunked down hundreds of dollars for train tickets and motel rooms.
Is it, indeed, an in-your-face rejoinder to conservatives Beck and Sarah Palin, who drew a large throng to the Lincoln Memorial on the other end of the Mall for their Restoring Honor rally in late August?
Is it nothing more than a big outdoor comedy show with rock bands on a glorious October day - with no grander purpose than biting satire, and perhaps moving a few copies of Stewart's new book?
Or, is it what Stewart himself has said, "a rally for the people who've been too busy to go to rallies, who actually have lives and families and jobs (or are looking for jobs) - not so much the Silent Majority as the Busy Majority"?
As they say on Facebook - where as of yesterday some 221,543 people claimed they would be attending - it's complicated.
I have my own thoughts about the Rally to Restore Sanity -- in fact, I wrote an op-ed that's scheduled to run in the Los Angeles Times on Friday -- but I'm a little tied up with a midday event, so this is a chance for you to weigh in. I'll update the post with my commentary later today.
UPDATE: The headline for the post refers to "irony," which Stewart and Colbert are the masters of -- the arched eyebrow and what not. They are also, as I've argued here several times over the last couple of years, arguably two of the best journalists working in America right now -- because they're not afraid to ask tough questions from time to time (that's mainly a reference to Stewart) and because they've done so much to expose hypocrisy, from politicians (an easy target!) and in the media (also an easy target, but one that rarely gets its proper due because the media doesn't like to report on itself). Last night was a good example, tracing all the times over the last 21 (yes, 21 years) that Sen. John McCain has proclaimed that "Washington is broken!" You think maybe with all this time he would have fixed it by now.
That's what the Comedy Central duo do. They function not just as comedians but as ace journalists from the comfort zone of their studios in Manhattan -- but journalists generally don't stage large outdoor rallies, not even for a cause as vague as "sanity," and with good reason. Rallies are typically for something -- and not for irony.
Like most members of my Generation Jones coming in the wake of the tragically sincere Baby Boomers (maybe peace love and understanding is funny, afterall!), Stewart and Colbert revel in irony, the constant hypocrisy of our pop-culture that now permeates political culture. Irony is "hipsters" who go out on the town and have a grand time wearing a trucker hat and drinking Pabst Blue Ribbon, the joke being that they are not the kind of person who would really wear a trucker hat and drink PBR...except that here they are doing exactly that. Ironic, huh? Now here come thousands of liberally leaning folks but not the kind who would ever attend a real political rally for a controversial cause. Yet now they're enjoying the comaradarie and good times of a rally, without commiting to anything -- except the irony that they are attending a rally of their own.
I guess I'm predicting that the Rally to Restore Sanity will be the trucker hat and PBR of political rallies -- but Stewart and Colbert still have three days to prove me wrong.
If 221,543 people show up, I'll show you 221,543 people who aren't very serious about the issues facing this country, and just want to participate in a comedy bit. Naturally, the leftist media will do all it can to portray this the most important rally in Washington since MLK. I guess the winner of Stewart/Colbert vs. Beck/Palin will be decided on Tuesday.— jmc
We'll see how funny their audience finds the show on November 3rd...(googlie eyes...mug for camera).
It really is amazing how some "conservatives" are always stuck in whine mode. Nate (above) whines that Will doesn't post on the topics he'd prefer. The "stomper" whined about (1) the camera angle, (2) how his bad back affected his stomping technique, (3) how the police didn't prevent him from stomping on someone. Now, a Tea Party Senatorial candidate whines how unfair it is that he's been exposed as a serial liar and for violating workplace rules: --snip--JUNEAU, Alaska — Alaska Republican Senate hopeful Joe Miller admitted to improperly using three co-workers' government computers over a lunch break to access his personal website to participate in a political poll, then cleaning the caches to try to cover up the activities...In a March 2008 statement to Fairbanks North Star Borough Attorney Rene Broker, Miller said he'd lied about accessing all the computers initially when asked and about the reasons why he used them. Clearing the caches also removed passwords and website IDs used by co-workers.... --snip-- Oh, those wacky, wacky "conservatives" and their concept of accountability and "personal responsibility:" --snip-- "I appear to be the only candidate in this Senate race whose entire life history matters to the media," --snip-- Miller also wrote that he first lied about accessing the computers, then admitted accessing them but lied about what he was doing and then, "Finally, I admitted what I did." --snip-- "It's so unfaaaaaaaaaaaiiiirrrrr, mommy, I violated my employment rules, and I lied about it, and then I lied about it again -- but "the media" won't just ignore it. It's sooooo unfaaaaaaiiirrrrr, mommy."— Talking point sleuth- Why do people give Colbert and Stewart, both punks, any stage at all to speak on. If it were not for their liberal views, they would both starve to death. I have not objection to the rally; I just object to the organizers who never let a person that did not agree with them speak. They are products of the 60's punks— frankfj
- I'm interested in the interaction between Stewart's "Sanity Keepers" and Colbert's "Fear Keepers".— SteveMG
- Dear God...I don't ask for much...but may the wild storm whipping through the midwest arrive in Washington D.C. in time for the restoring sanity rally on Saturday....Your faithful servant bagocheese, xi jah, xi jah back from reeducation, zach sawer cool guy, etc.)...Oh. PS.....may the tsunami about to hit next Tuesday be even larger than predicted...Thank you. (googlie eyes...mug for camera).
Comment removed.
- Can they restore sanity by pointing out that Democrats are actually outspending Republicans, despite all the cries about the evil corporations? http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1010/44216.html#ixzz13XffUM2Q— RG
The rally should be a lot of fun - I wish I had time to attend. My only concern is that it is robbing the true recognition we should all be giving on October 30th to the 1938 Orson Welles' "The War of the Worlds" airing on CBS radio. The belief that the realistic radio dramatization was a live news event about a Martian invasion caused panic among listeners.— bird11- The rally should be a lot of fun - I wish I had time to attend. My only concern is that it is robbing the true recognition we should all be giving on October 30th to General George C. Marshall being awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1953.— bird11
- It is amusing to see the vitriol from "conservatives" about the rally - but no matter how many attend, the rally is really an indication of just how far to the right the country has been leaning. Notice that Stewart and Colbert - who hilariously ridicule freakish rightwingers nightly on their shows - need to claim that this is a march of "moderates." You have to give credit to "the right." They (well, at least the wacko kinds of "conservatives" who show up at Attytood ) may be laughably illogical and completely lacking in any sense of accountability or "personal responsibility - but they are extremely good at attacking and demonizing "the left" and playing the game of politics.— Talking point sleuth
- The rally should be a lot of fun - I wish I had time to attend. My only concern is that it is robbing the true recognition we should all be giving on October 30th to President Richard Nixon approving legislation to increase Social Security spending by $5.3 billion.
— bird11 - The rally should be a lot of fun - I wish I had time to attend. My only concern is that it is robbing the true recognition we should all be giving on October 30th to police finding the body of kidnapped pro-Solidarity priest Father Jerry Popieluszko in Poland in 1984. His death was blamed on four security officers.
— bird11 - The rally should be a lot of fun - I wish I had time to attend. My only concern is that it is robbing the true recognition we should all be giving on October 30th to Martin Fettman, America's first veterinarian in space, performing the world's first animal dissections in space, while aboard the space shuttle Columbia in 1993— bird11
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