Comments on: Funny Guy http://firedoglake.com/2006/05/01/2220/ Firedoglake weblog Wed, 25 Nov 2009 15:14:14 -0600 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.6 hourly 1 By: Jon Swift http://firedoglake.com/2006/05/01/2220/#comment-90201 Jon Swift Fri, 05 May 2006 04:07:21 +0000 http://www.firedoglake.com/2006/05/01/2220/#comment-90201 <p>Although I am a conservative I don’t think of myself as humorless. And I have many liberal readers of my modest blog despite the fact that I sometimes skewer liberals, perhaps because my arguments are so reasonable. You might want to check out my piece on Stephen Colbert, for example, in which I chastize the <a href="http://jonswift.blogspot.com/2006/05/liberal-media-attacks-stephen-colbert.html">liberal media for attacking Colbert for his conservative views</a>, although I do so very politely.</p> Although I am a conservative I don’t think of myself as humorless. And I have many liberal readers of my modest blog despite the fact that I sometimes skewer liberals, perhaps because my arguments are so reasonable. You might want to check out my piece on Stephen Colbert, for example, in which I chastize the liberal media for attacking Colbert for his conservative views, although I do so very politely.

]]> By: John Pearley Huffman http://firedoglake.com/2006/05/01/2220/#comment-89037 John Pearley Huffman Thu, 04 May 2006 01:22:55 +0000 http://www.firedoglake.com/2006/05/01/2220/#comment-89037 <p>Smiff,</p> <p>Thanks for being so civil. I hope we’ll get a chance to discuss whatever else arises soon.</p> Smiff,

Thanks for being so civil. I hope we’ll get a chance to discuss whatever else arises soon.

]]> By: A Dickens Lover http://firedoglake.com/2006/05/01/2220/#comment-88249 A Dickens Lover Wed, 03 May 2006 07:24:09 +0000 http://www.firedoglake.com/2006/05/01/2220/#comment-88249 <p>Pecksniff isn’t an actual word. It is, as one of the other posters commented, the name of the villain in Martin Chuzzlewit. I bought the Oxford Illustrated Dickens a few years back during the Christmas sale. 21 volumes for something like nine bucks a volume. No finer investment anyone can make. Pecksniff is the moralizer of the novel who steals the architectural work of the title character and then does what he can to bury the boy. Smarmy, sanctimonious, smug… hypocrisy alone doesn’t really encapsulate Seth Pecksniff.</p> <p>The best Dickens villain is Alfred Jingle, who is something like a cross between Mozart’s Don Giovanni and Kramer from Seinfeld.</p> Pecksniff isn’t an actual word. It is, as one of the other posters commented, the name of the villain in Martin Chuzzlewit. I bought the Oxford Illustrated Dickens a few years back during the Christmas sale. 21 volumes for something like nine bucks a volume. No finer investment anyone can make. Pecksniff is the moralizer of the novel who steals the architectural work of the title character and then does what he can to bury the boy. Smarmy, sanctimonious, smug… hypocrisy alone doesn’t really encapsulate Seth Pecksniff.

The best Dickens villain is Alfred Jingle, who is something like a cross between Mozart’s Don Giovanni and Kramer from Seinfeld.

]]> By: Smiff http://firedoglake.com/2006/05/01/2220/#comment-88240 Smiff Wed, 03 May 2006 07:00:36 +0000 http://www.firedoglake.com/2006/05/01/2220/#comment-88240 <p>John Pearley Huffman, thanks, i respect your point of view, and apologise for calling what you wrote before dishonest; it seems a legitimate difference of opinion. really it’s remarkable that we can even discuss reasonably something this controversial. i will concede that Colbert probably won’t have very much political effect (though most of us here wish it would). so where it’s probably significant is as a piece of comedy/satire - as you and others have said, the content alone was not really new. taken as a whole though, it was, and i think many of us will always believe SC was something special there ;)</p> John Pearley Huffman, thanks, i respect your point of view, and apologise for calling what you wrote before dishonest; it seems a legitimate difference of opinion. really it’s remarkable that we can even discuss reasonably something this controversial. i will concede that Colbert probably won’t have very much political effect (though most of us here wish it would). so where it’s probably significant is as a piece of comedy/satire – as you and others have said, the content alone was not really new. taken as a whole though, it was, and i think many of us will always believe SC was something special there ;)

]]> By: Big Cat http://firedoglake.com/2006/05/01/2220/#comment-87947 Big Cat Wed, 03 May 2006 01:17:03 +0000 http://www.firedoglake.com/2006/05/01/2220/#comment-87947 <p>Any and all professional comedians and humorists I’ve seen weighing in on Colbert’s performance have lauded it for timing, material and - of course - balls.</p> <p>Those who slam it seem to invariably do so from a standpoint of not knowing word one about how humor is constructed or performed.</p> <p>‘Nuff said.</p> Any and all professional comedians and humorists I’ve seen weighing in on Colbert’s performance have lauded it for timing, material and – of course – balls.

Those who slam it seem to invariably do so from a standpoint of not knowing word one about how humor is constructed or performed.

‘Nuff said.

]]> By: George Orwell http://firedoglake.com/2006/05/01/2220/#comment-87924 George Orwell Wed, 03 May 2006 00:37:49 +0000 http://www.firedoglake.com/2006/05/01/2220/#comment-87924 <p>Oh, the devastating “real name” bullshite! How about if I use the handle “Publius”? You know who that was? Look it up under “Federalist Papers”.</p> <p>Anybody that knows a single thing about the profession of comedy knows that Colbert hit the ball out of the park with his intended audience, the 65%+ of us living in the reality of this nightmare. Only shamed and cowed media whores and their GOP masters refuse to see that.</p> <p>If you won’t believe me, read professional screenwriter and former touring comedian John Rogers at <a href="http://kfmonkey.blogspot.com/">Kung Fu Monkey</a>. He brilliantly deconstructs what Colbert accomplished.</p> Oh, the devastating “real name” bullshite! How about if I use the handle “Publius”? You know who that was? Look it up under “Federalist Papers”.

Anybody that knows a single thing about the profession of comedy knows that Colbert hit the ball out of the park with his intended audience, the 65%+ of us living in the reality of this nightmare. Only shamed and cowed media whores and their GOP masters refuse to see that.

If you won’t believe me, read professional screenwriter and former touring comedian John Rogers at Kung Fu Monkey. He brilliantly deconstructs what Colbert accomplished.

]]> By: John Pearley Huffman http://firedoglake.com/2006/05/01/2220/#comment-87799 John Pearley Huffman Tue, 02 May 2006 22:05:19 +0000 http://www.firedoglake.com/2006/05/01/2220/#comment-87799 <p>Being called a liar is an interesting experience when it comes from someone unwilling to sign their own name to it. But so be it. If we’re at the point where disagreeing with the assessment of a comedy routine becomes an ideological litmus test, it’s no longer a discussion worth continuing.</p> Being called a liar is an interesting experience when it comes from someone unwilling to sign their own name to it. But so be it. If we’re at the point where disagreeing with the assessment of a comedy routine becomes an ideological litmus test, it’s no longer a discussion worth continuing.

]]> By: Big Cat http://firedoglake.com/2006/05/01/2220/#comment-87749 Big Cat Tue, 02 May 2006 21:35:28 +0000 http://www.firedoglake.com/2006/05/01/2220/#comment-87749 <blockquote><p>All I wrote was that liberals adopting Colbert are working on an assumption. They may be right or they may be wrong, but the evidence either way is scant.</p></blockquote> <p>About as scant as the evidence that Charlie McCarthy was a ventriloquist’s dummy. Anyone who doesn’t understand what Colbert is doing and what he’s lampooning has some kind of serious cognitive impairment.</p>

All I wrote was that liberals adopting Colbert are working on an assumption. They may be right or they may be wrong, but the evidence either way is scant.

About as scant as the evidence that Charlie McCarthy was a ventriloquist’s dummy. Anyone who doesn’t understand what Colbert is doing and what he’s lampooning has some kind of serious cognitive impairment.

]]> By: Jim Hudson http://firedoglake.com/2006/05/01/2220/#comment-87729 Jim Hudson Tue, 02 May 2006 21:22:16 +0000 http://www.firedoglake.com/2006/05/01/2220/#comment-87729 <p>Nothing Colbert said could be considered nearly as offensive to our soldiers as Bush was at a previous dinner when he cracked jokes to a tape of himself searching the White House for WMDs.</p> Nothing Colbert said could be considered nearly as offensive to our soldiers as Bush was at a previous dinner when he cracked jokes to a tape of himself searching the White House for WMDs.

]]> By: pietyjake http://firedoglake.com/2006/05/01/2220/#comment-87629 pietyjake Tue, 02 May 2006 20:17:35 +0000 http://www.firedoglake.com/2006/05/01/2220/#comment-87629 <p>Having a sense of humor requires that one have a sense of irony. Literalists always view irony with suspicion, fearing as they do that they may be the butt of what is being said. Since so large a chunk of the right wing consists of religious literalists–with the rest of them being political literalist–we should not be surprised that Colbert left them uneasy. By the way, Freud noted in passing that sociopaths were invariably literalists, but as far as I know no one has ever investigated whether the reverse is true, that literalists are sociopaths.</p> Having a sense of humor requires that one have a sense of irony. Literalists always view irony with suspicion, fearing as they do that they may be the butt of what is being said. Since so large a chunk of the right wing consists of religious literalists–with the rest of them being political literalist–we should not be surprised that Colbert left them uneasy. By the way, Freud noted in passing that sociopaths were invariably literalists, but as far as I know no one has ever investigated whether the reverse is true, that literalists are sociopaths.

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