Jolie and Madonna cuddling babies from impoverished countries bothers us because it is SENTIMENTALITY that drives them. They are not protesting their own nation’s policies that lead to African, Asian, and Latin American poverty and war. (Sentimentality is the same ersatz emotion engaged in by right-wingers, moaning a swan song about a bygone America that never existed. Sentimentality is, in essence, a substitute for genuine emotions.)

I would never compare Colbert’s satirical efforts to the self-indulgent googoo-gaga of someone like Jolie. He uses his talk-show persona to make excellent points, and his short speech at the end, out of his TV character, sums it all up.

No, gerard, I cannot imagine these things. I don’t think relatively healthy people can even imagine the things that some actual people do, and that’s the problem. Psychopathology can became so pervasive in human society (not just ours) that we walk around acting like it’s normal to torture, murder, maim, and displace people. Those of us who object too strenuously to insanity will undoubtedly be visited by the FBI.

Tobysgirl:
  Can you imagine the Marx Brothers lined up with machine guns, mowing down Palestinians?
  Or Mark Twain dropping bombs on villages in Afghanistan?
  Or Stephen Colbert fastening wires on the body of a 16-year-old Arab kid at Guantanamo?
  Grotesque, what?  But shows you how far we have sunk—that is, so long as we continue to permit it.

call me Roy, September 26 at 2:34 pm

After a pompous and arrogant post like yours I would love to call you something other than “Roy”. But in the interest of good taste and manners I will simply prick your pompous balloon and note that it isn’t Colbert’s vocation that upsets you as much as it is the crystal clear truths he spoke.

rico, it’s good to find out you have a sense of humor!

gerard, I’ve said this many times. People take the wrong things seriously and make fun of serious things. It is not funny to make fun of women being raped (powerless) and it IS funny to make fun of pompous greedy idiots (powerful). But for a certain group of people, making fun of the powerless provides endless guffaws and making fun of the powerful is ... simply outrageous!

Did anyone get a chance to hear Colbert’s roast at the National Press Club several years ago? We were screaming with laughter as he made fun of politicans and so-called journalists, and from the audience you could hear three people going “heh ... heh ... heh.”

A country fighting multiple foreign wars against terrorists, suffering depression era unemployment, with a $13.4 Trillion National Debt and with 1 out of 7 living in poverty, naturally (under a Congress controlled by Democrats), invites Comedy Central’s, Stephen Colbert to testify on immigration reform. 

Stephen Colbert performing as comedian Stephen Colbert in front of a Congressional Sub-Committee, while under oath, is a mark of shame and embarrassment.  Mocking the system inside the very governmental institution that is suppose to represent our country’s shared ideals of freedom, liberty and justice is inexcusable.

Those who lead congress – have they forgotten about their honor and Constitutional oaths?

Millions have given the ultimate sacrifice in fighting for the liberties enshrined within our founding documents.  And in present time, well over 2 million of our fellow citizens voluntarily serve within our Armed Forces, ready to defend our Nation and Constitution.

What took place in Congress today is an outrage, a moral outrage and one that is a disgusting display of contempt encouraged by both Speaker Nancy Pelosi and the Obama administration.

The democratic leadership that allowed this travesty to take place today are nothing short of bastards and should be immediately reprimanded and relieved from leadership.  Are these strong words?  You bet they are.  And when the November mid-terms come, we will see just how disgusted the American electorate has become with Speaker Pelosi and her congress. 

After the Republicans take control of the House, the investigations into the stench of Speaker Pelosi’s Congress will begin ~ We’ll see who’s laughing then.

Where Colbert was a comedian of note who’s show
brought some levity to serious issues - he was just
a performer. Arrogant & self absorbed to an extreme,
which was part of his performance, he mocked us and
our system and helped us laugh at ourselves.
To believe this would be a good thing for an
investigative process by Congress is, perhaps, one
of the most brain-dead ideas yet. It only
perpetuates the loss of respect for Congress, almost
to a point of no return.
The difference between conservatives & liberals on
this issue is that conservatives understand the
seriousness of this nonsense (hence Colbert told to
get out) and liberals are just out for a good laugh.
If we could only find some politicians who AREN’T
in the back pocket of big business, and believe in
the rule of law as applied by The Constitution,
there would be none of this, but that idea is as
perverted as Colbert’s reputation now.

It is very refresshing to see a Congressional Committee and its audience faced with the demand for a sense of humor—which they plainly don’t have.
From the irked expressions on faces among listeners it is obvious that they are feeling somehow demeaned, as though their dignity is being threatened.
  Many people who take themselves too seriously show the same signs of distress when confronted with criticism, especially if it comes in the form of humor or sarcasm. They don’t “get it,” and their discomfiture is a sure sign of lack of intelligence and of broad experience among people with different attitudes toward life than their own rather puritanical over-seriousness. 
  Broadly speaking, one of the huge differences between “liberals” and “conservatives” seems to be that for the latter everything is so frequently and relentlessly serious. It is also one of the main reasonss that “liberals” have trouble toleratig
“conservatives”, for experience seems to prove it a fact that unrelenting serious greed, for example, is leading to human suffering on a massive scale and there’s nothing funny about it!  World capitalism has slipped on a banana peel and both feet are in the air, yet who can laugh?
  Hamlet found Yorick’s skull still smiling—but his body had definitely been detached from his head by some irksome conservative lacking a sense of humor!

Politically powerful and wealthy American “farmers” are fighting efforts to curb illegal immigration. I put farmers in quotes because few farm anymore, they are wealthy owners who hire managers. An average “farmer” inherited a multi-million dollar farm and earns a million dollars a year. They fear an end to their post-slavery system of using desperate, poor Mexican immigrants to harvest crops. Second generation Mexican-Americans are “uppity” and refuse to slave away in tough conditions for low pay, so farm owners rely on the continual influx of new, desperate foreign workers. If this is stopped, they would have to raise wages from $7 an hour to $12 an hour to attract enough American workers, thus cutting their annual profit down to $800,000 a year.

As a result, farm owners have begun a media campaign to show that Americans can’t do farm labor. The corporate media plays along, and reporters never ask the legal farm workers if illegal immigration pushes down their wages. They’ve enlisted the support of corrupt officials from weak farm workers unions. I say corrupt because: What union official would advocate illegal immigration that increases the labor pool of unskilled workers, thus driving down wages for their union members?

I described the racket of importing legal foreign workers in my Sep. 17 blog. Here is a recent case of a multi-millionaire Beverly Hills farm owner who doesn’t even want to pay Mexican migrants $7 an hour, so he imported slaves from Thailand (probably starving Burmese).  http://scpr.org/news/2010/09/08/thai-farm-workers/

You’ll never see that story on CNN. Now our federal government will have to pay to fly them home, but will probably grant them visas instead so they can apply for unemployment and welfare since they can’t find jobs with California’s massive unemployment. The only reason this scam was possible is because the federal government issued these slaves H-2 visas, and continues to issue thousands of new H-2 work visas each day!.

Why is it nearly impossible to land a job as an autoworker in the USA? These guys work standing up all day performing menial tasks. No one really wants that work, so why aren’t auto factories filled with illegal aliens? The answer is that workers formed strong unions to earn impressive wages (I think too much) so even college graduates are turned away if they seek this tiring, back-breaking work. If our farm workers also averaged $25 a hour plus $40 an hour in benefits, it would be hard to find a farm worker job too.

Most American farm owners are just like most Americans—greedy! They don’t pay their farm workers enough. Greedy owners claim that if they had to pay Americans to do that work based on supply and demand free market principles, the price of things like strawberries might rise 30%. So what? Taxpayers would come out ahead since unemployment would be reduced, as well as crime and welfare. This common sense is not permitted on America’s corporate TV. Even the PBS Newshour is mostly corporate sponsored and controlled, and their highly-paid teleprompter readers know that objecting to content is grounds for termination. It’s just a matter of time before our TV news shows move to India or China where then can staff their studios with very cheap workers, or maybe they will use H-2 visas and import foreign workers.

credit G2mil blog

Good for Colbert! Those pompous asses in Congress and the “MSM” need someone in front of them with the nuts to laugh in their faces. Every citizen of every political persuasion should congratulate him for his performance.

Good to read a positive comment after the extremely silly bla-bla-bla on NBC this morning regarding his testimony. MSM idiots seem to think discomfort should be illegal or something rather than discomfort being something media and the politicians need to experience on a regular basis.

I do stoop labor on my own property while dealing with severe osteoarthritis, degenerative disk disease, and fibromyalgia. I personally think every single human being needs to be in touch with the earth, and in touch with that which provides for his/her own needs (such as cleaning the toilet, etc). We can see what happens in a world where large numbers of people do not prepare their own food, clean their own homes, wash their own clothes.

When I mentioned to a neighbor that without “illegals” (term she used for which I have nothing but contempt) there wouldn’t be much fresh food to eat in the market, she sniffed in disbelief. Americans’ sheer stupidity can be very depressing, and their denial of others’ suffering absolutely disgusting.

In my college summer vacation days in Oregon, I also did exactly one day of field
work—-picking strawberries. My revelations then matched S.C.‘s now, including
that the ground is too far down below waist level. That day motivated me to
pursue other dreams, and gave me a sympathy for migrant laborers. I really don’t
know how they do this work for years. I admire them, frankly. Plus most of them
are way shorter than I am.

Colbert really deserves a lot of credit for bringing his star power to this serious
issue. And being amusing doing it.