Tooshay

Stephen Colbert's speech at the White House Press Corps dinner two nights ago, with its surprising, savage, and immensely clever attack on the president, could potentially have been ten times more effective than any previous indictment of Bush and his regime, because it employed sarcasm rather than a frontal assault. What Helen Thomas did at the White House press conference a couple weeks ago was courageous, but Bush was able to counter her "Why did you invade Iraq?" one-woman inquisition with his usual lame talking points. Anti-Bush rants (and I've done my share of them) don't really accomplish anything and are easily neutralized by noise pollution and smokescreens.

But what Colbert did wasn't ten times more effective than a rant, it was a thousand times more effective, because it was oblique flank attack rather than a frontal assault, and because Bush was there and he had to listen.

Speaking to Bush but using the third person, Colbert started with 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 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.

Brilliant. Bush, the anti-intellectual, has always said in so many words that he's proud of his own ignorance. He thinks it's cool. Colbert's message? No, it ain't cool. It's just stupid.

Or how about Now, I know there are some polls out there saying this man has a 32% 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.

Uh-huh. The short version of that is, "You're delusional." And another part of the speech, the "Rocky" metaphor delivered that part of the message even more emphatically. It said in effect that Bush is constantly getting bitch-slapped by reality.

Bush was not the only victim impaled on Colbert's pitchfork. Judge Scalia was there, and was treated to Colbert's flinging his honor's favorite obscene Sicilian hand gesture back at him numerous times. However, He saved his most severe condemnation for the assembled members of the establishment press.

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. Just put 'em 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!

With a little sarcasm and irony, Colbert came closer to overturning the Bush regime in fifteen minutes than all the anti-Bush columnists and bloggers put together have done in the last four years. If the little dictator didn't leave the event shaken, humiliated, and knowing that anybody who knows more than he does (which is about three-quarters of us now) has his number, I'll move to Cleveland.

If you have not yet read Colbert's entire masterpiece, the link to which I posted here yesterday, you really should.