What's even more obvious is how you can't see his satire is directed at the superficial way liberals address conservative principles. His parody is of a conservative but as seen from the limited perspective of one predisposed to liberal "thought." You take all this in thinking you're getting the joke when it's really on you. I think he's brilliant. Liberals are so linear in their thinking, always coming back to the same lazy logical progression. Your appreciation of sublety is infantile. It's too funny that they just don't get it.

I listened to this story once, and was so confused I had to go back again and listen again more carefully. Guess what? It still made no sense....and I had been primed by the appearance of this tidbit on the Huffington Post. If this researcher landed a fancy academic job based on her study, it's only evidence that one should steer clear of that institution. He premise made no sense, she didn't cite cogent examples. She only threw something provocative out and talked such a knot of jibberish that you wonder if it was calculated to provoke (and in our culture, therefore, gain attention and favor) all along. Yes, and now for the third time, this is like saying Rush Limbaugh is cleverly a liberal, making all our points.

Sigh. I guess I should be pleased; to the extent that students who want to believe what the principal had to say would flock to her side and sing in the silly choir. But I sure was disappointed Bob Garfield didn't ask her for better, deeper examples to back up her claims.

I was surprised that Ms. LeMarre could express any doubt that Colbert is satirizing conservatives. That is so obvious to those who watch him regularly. He will, on occasion, satirize liberals. I think the difference is that conservatives just don't get that they're being mocked (based on Ms. LeMarre's comments) while liberals don't mind an occasional jab (and we appreciate and recognize it).

Colbert's brilliance was clearly demonstrated at the Correspondents' dinner, a benchmark of satire, aimed not only at the sitting conservative administration, but also the media, both conservative and liberal.

I also think that Bob's 'determined effort ... to use the adjectives "obtuse" and "stupid"' is why the show is "edited by Brooke", and I chuckled to myself that she must have been on vacation.

I have to admit I did not hear the entire piece. That being said it did hear enough to notice the determined effort the host made to use the adjectives "obtuse" and "stupid" when referring to conservative viewers of Colbert. Also, since a very high percentage of liberals readily report that they actually "rely" on the Daily Show for most of their news information how can you do research on this topic and not include this either in the research or at least mention it in the reporting even in passing? Or am I just being obtuse.

I'm stunned that OTM did not dispute LeMarre's "research". If you watch Colbert, even for a single episode, you'll see he steps out of character regularly. No, he doesn't become his genuine self but switches from being an ignorant conservative blowhard to an ignorant liberal blowhard mid-sentence. Sometimes several times in a sentence.

The apparent phenomenon of conservatives admiring Colbert is probably more due to the fact that Colbert regularly slams liberal myopia, too. Conservatives and liberals merely have to find the parts of Colbert that they identify with and ignore the rest. Many psychology studies have been done showing that people pay attention to what they want to hear and tune out the rest. This is nothing new. So it is with Colbert.

So if you don't think he comes out of character frequently on his own show, you're either not listening closely and or you're just exposing your own bias.

Whoops! Believe it or not, I did actually hear that Terry Gross interview back when it aired. (I must have been commenting too early in the morning)

But the reason I included that 60 minutes quote was not to say he's a conservative, rather just to show that he wants to *appear* politically ambiguous - so that both conservatives and liberals can like him and his show.

Is that an unfair interpretation? (not a rhetorical question)

Mark
On the Media

Dear OTM Producer,

Do a bit more research. Listen to the numerous interviews of SC by Terry Gross and you get an honest give and take about the man. He is an entertainer first, and an ideologue afterwards.

There is no doubt that SC is skewering conservatives. But by quoting a snippet of doggeral saying he is 'conservative' misses the point that he's equally as willing to take real (justifiable) jabs at 'latte-drinking' liberals. He skwers anyone who's unwilling to reflect on their ideology.

As a 'liberal' who also also teachs Catholic religious instruction (as does SC), I am anti-abortion (but not anti-choice); against war, but willing to accept real politic. I absolutely understand where SC is coming from ---- mocking Bush and the blowhard conservartive elites doesn't mean we accept equally bloviating liberal POV.

Watch/listen to Ed Schultz and get a clue on being a true left-leaning moderate, as surely SC is. Forget about the mouthy auto-reponse to anti-corporate, Hollywood, pro-teacher union, public service union, white wine whinning liberals who alienate working class liberals.

If liberals are to suvive the suicide of the conservatism, we have to offer the middle-class, middle of the road, middle of the country something other than smugness and our own brand of elitism.

The reason there is no 'conservative' satire is that such humor takes:

1) depth of intelligence

2) a willinness to accept reality

3) more than insulting people for not being the same as the issuer of the 'joke'

So in addtion to the 'comedians' Limbaugh and Hannity, the conservatives have the comic strip 'Mallard Fillmore' and I guess Stephen Colbert

I'm surprised that the producer of OTM was unable find the following Fresh Air interview with Colbert, (not in character) from November 2008: http://tinyurl.com/5wzcbt.

This is the only interview of Colbert I've found where he's not in character. It's from 6 months after the show started:

http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=4835796n%3fsource=search_video

At one point (2:35), he's asked if he thinks anyone takes him seriously. He says:

"Yes, it makes me so happy. Because.. Listen, for a comedian I'm a fairly conservative guy. I'm not a bomb-thrower, I don't have a particular political ax to grind and I'm terribly disappointed in the democrats. But I would love people to not know necessarily when I mean what I'm saying. First I want them to laugh, but if they don't know which side of an issue I'm on at times, that's fantastic because I don't want people just like me to watch the show. I'd like O'Reilly's audience to watch the show and enjoy it."

Mark Phillips
On the Media

As I read the comments scrolling down, Colbert's performance at the White House Corresondents' Dinner was in my mind as it was in Josh Burnett's. I agree with JB.

I wonder how the conservatives who think Colbert is one of them explain his savaging of Bush at the White House Correspondents' Dinner.

I'm a liberal, and I consider the Colbert Report to be a good source of valid information. The information is embedded in a joke, but it can be quite substantive.

Take this segment about oil futures as an example:
http://www.colbertnation.com/video/tag/Formidable+Opponent-|-oil

Now, instead of calling conservatives idiots for liking Colbert, let's take a look at the following idea. If there was a show that was as smart as Colbert, and it lampooned liberals, you wouldn't think the liberals were stupid for enjoying that show, or finding interesting information in it.

I have to admit that I avoided Mr Colbert for quite some time because anyone living in the UK in the 80s will bitterly remember how Harry Enfield's satirical character "Loadsa'Money" was subverted by the right wing. However, anyone who saw how swiftly and ruthlessly Mr Cobert dismissed Tom Delay's putrid attempt to do the same need not fear any similar outcome. Mr Colbert is just too damn good. To say that Mr Colbert is somehow ambiguous in his targets only displays the utter credulity of this person LeMarre who apparently has never strayed too far from the old Ivory Tower. I wouldn't be as cynical to suggest she may have another agenda. As for Mr Colbert never coming out of character, I suggest she listen to his interview on Fresh Air: when asked was he talking "Truth to Power" I believe he replied "I'm saying "f@$# you" to Power". 'Nuff said, as it were.

The Conservatives are once again showing they don't get it.
Before he was doing the Colbert report he was on the Daily show with the same character before that he was a member of the cast for the Comedy central show " Strangers with candy" where he played a gay school teacher.A conservative might..might play a gay person once as a joke.But not as a career which is what it would have been if it had not been canceled.As it is, it was on for a few seasons.They also did a movie.
Now the Liberals might be fooling themselves a tad bit if they think he never makes fun of them( I am Independent)
but no way is he a Conservative.

Norman, you are splitting hairs on a bald man when you argue that the research wasn't determining the target of Colbert's satire. The aim of satire has everything to do with its perception; if a car is gunning for me, shouldn't I perceive myself as a target? Conservatives, especially those who watch and support O'Reilly, Hannity, Beck, Limbaugh, etc. are clearly the targets of Colbert's ironic-persona-delivered satire. And if those people aren't right, just like if I'm not figuring out a car's trying to kill me, guess what happens? They get run over in their obtuseness. Guess what your time-travelling "valid research" re: people's failure to recognize the irony of "A Modest Proposal" would show? That they were not capable of critical thinking about the political cause of that famine in Ireland and so either implicitly or explicitly supported the English landlord system that was impoverishing and killing the Irish. But hey, let's spend lots of time talking about "research" into satire rather than recognizing it for what it is trying to do--foster critical thinking and inspire crucial action against the powerful.

Robin, the research wasn't determining the target of Colbert's satire. The research was investigating how that satire is perceived by different people. (And not whether those people are "right".) If people read Swift's Modest Proposal and concluded that he was advocating baby-eating, then it would be valid research to find out why they think so.

When the Colbert Show started, I told my wife that SC was probably too subtle for many conservatives to understand, and that many of the "obtuse" would probably take Colbert seriously as being anti-liberal.

SC is often genius in his subtlety, sometimes to the obvious consternation of his guests who occasionally seem flustered regarding how to react.

Still, I don't know how anyone can watch the show over an extended period of time and be moronic enough not to understand that Steven is clearly making fun of conservative stupidity, or even stupidity in general (but especially conservative stupidity... a much more fertile field).

Thanks Steven, for all you do! You're truly amazing!

I can't believe someone is actually offering Heather LeMarre a job for this research. Colbert is/was clearly satirizing the Bush administration and all pompous and narcissistic politicians and types. It's a good thing LeMarre wasn't around to "study" Jonathan Swift or she'd be arguing that his audience for "A Modest Proposal" were right to assume that he was advocating eating babies for lunch.

The people who think Colbert is making fun of liberals equally with conservatives ARE WRONG. The show is modeled on mocking Bill O'Reilly! Hence, the press is right to report the study as showing that conservatives don't understand satire. She is demonstrating they don't.

And her study is lame; by stating that Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh also use satire, she shows she doesn't know what it is or understand its power to undercut the powerful.