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Big Brassy Balls: The Colbert Blog Victory Mainstream Media Missed
Labels: Big brassy balls, blog, Colbert, Colbert Report
The media trend of truthiness continues to dig in deeper.
It's been quite a week for the father of truthiness Stephen Colbert. First, he was the final speaker at the annual White House Correspondent's Dinner, where he skewered George Bush and his Cabinet with verbal smart bombs using his "Colbert Report" persona and even enlisted pressroom Grand Madame Helen Thomas in his spoof "audition tape" for the White House Press Secretary job he was never offered.
In case you missed it, here's the transcript of his performance.
And here is the actual video -- part 1 and part 2.
Then he was named as one of Time magazine's 100 Most Influential. This week's blog explosition mostly in favor of Colbert shows exactly how influential he's become.
The blogs all got the story: Boing Boing, Instapundit, Drudge, DailyKos, Huffington Report, and thousand more (including the Jointblog). Even the official press release version from the White House Correspondent's Office applauded it.
However, the most important part of the story is that mainstream media seemed to overlook the fact that someone - FINALLY - had the courage to directly deliver to President Bush the frustration felt by the 68% of the population disapproving Bush. The "underground" blogs clearly got it. And mainstream News missed once again.
Most core conservatives didn't get the style of humor (what? they don't watch the show?) and the White House itself said Colbert's joking was misplaced or simply said it wasn't funny. It was reported Bush even frowned during the performance. The mainstream media mainly printed pictures of Bush's stunt double pretending to be Bush, hardly mentioning a thing about Colbert's bravura performance.
Some -- like Time -- did ask if Colbert was funny or not. But most seemed to think mainstream media missed the story, including venerable news institutions like the Washington Post. Sure, the office of the President deserves respect and a degree of demurement. Last I checked, though, this was a Republic for the People. There is a reason the media is called the Fourth Estate. Truth needs exposure, it needs the light. And News organizations are charged with that responsibility. But why is it they so often hestitate to confront?
Online, the Colbert story was one of the hottest search items of the week. According to the Yahoo Buzz Index, searches on Colbert were up 5,625% this week and picking up speed. Trajectories for "Colbert speech" and "colbert video" are racing off the chart. And "The Colbert Report," its fan site Colbert Nation, and the newly created ThankYouStephenColbert.org also launched upward in Buzz. Same thing over on both Google Video and YouTube, which both carry the C-Span video.
Colbert accomplished something millions of Americans have wanted to do -- give President Bush a piece of their mind. That he did in spades, in true truthiness style, using his infamous "big brassy balls". Even if it was done in double-speak. Perhaps that's the only language this White House understands.
posted by Unknown @ Sunday, May 07, 2006,
2 Comments:
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At 9:26 AM,
said...
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When Richard Cohen says (in the Washington Post) "anyone can insult the president of the United States. Colbert just did it, and he will not suffer any consequence at all.", he should have a talk with Joe and Valarie Wilson.
Stephen Nodvin -
At 11:45 AM,
said...
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Steven COlbert must be stopped. His attacks on bears are hurting america!
Join the fight.
http://www.americanbearalliance.com/
