{"id":1710168,"date":"2022-10-25T07:54:31","date_gmt":"2022-10-25T11:54:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1710168"},"modified":"2022-10-25T10:18:54","modified_gmt":"2022-10-25T14:18:54","slug":"political-satirists-dereliction-of-duty-is-no-laughing-matter","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/political-satirists-dereliction-of-duty-is-no-laughing-matter\/","title":{"rendered":"Political Satirists\u2019 Dereliction of Duty Is No Laughing Matter"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">18<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fpolitical-satirists-dereliction-of-duty-is-no-laughing-matter%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1710168&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><div><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/10\/e6712be64eac44379507bcb448ab6690.jpg\" class=\"ff-og-image-inserted\" alt=\"image\" \/><\/div>\n<p>We endured four-plus years of Trump jokes across the comedy landscape, and that\u2019s exactly how it should be. As president, Donald Trump\u2019s bluster proved to be catnip for satirists, and presidents should always stand atop the comedy world\u2019s hit list.<\/p>\n<p>A killer punchline can make a politician\u2019s knees buckle.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"ad-unit ad-unit--mr1_ab\">\n<\/aside>\n<p>Yet a not-so-funny thing happened after Trump left office. Neither late-night comedians nor \u201cSaturday Night Live\u201d would let him exit, stage right. You could forgive comics for lamenting his absence from the Beltway stage, and President Joe Biden seemed far less gag-worthy than his predecessor. Besides, we\u2019d already had eight years of Vice President Biden.<\/p>\n<p>And then President Biden opened his mouth.<\/p>\n<p>We\u2019ve spent the past year watching the 79-year-old leave a trail of gaffes around the world. The miscues happen almost daily now, but the humdingers deserve special attention:<\/p>\n<p>\u00b7 Biden says his son Beau\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.newsweek.com\/video-joe-biden-son-beau-lost-life-iraq-viral-1751433\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">died in Iraq<\/a>. (Beau Biden actually died after a battle with brain cancer.)\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u00b7 Biden calls upon Rep. Jackie Walorski (R-Ind.) at a White House conference honoring her work fighting hunger,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.npr.org\/2022\/09\/28\/1125591160\/biden-jackie-walorski\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">forgetting she died weeks earlier<\/a>\u00a0following a car accident. \u201cJackie, are you here?\u201d he asked. \u201cWhere\u2019s Jackie \u2026 she was going to be here.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u00b7 Biden\u2019s\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.yahoo.com\/now\/biden-cheat-sheet-shows-instruction-074352962.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">public-appearance cheat-sheet<\/a>\u00a0goes viral, showing how he needs child-like commands to get through an event.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"ad-unit ad-unit--mr2_ab\">\n<\/aside>\n<p>\u00b7 Biden\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/news\/biden-gaffe-two-words-made-in-america\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">tells a Maryland crowd<\/a>, \u201cLet me start off with two words: Made in America.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>That\u2019s a veritable Whitman\u2019s Sampler of gaffes, suggesting to some \u2014 perhaps even a growing number \u2014that he isn\u2019t mentally fit to serve as commander in chief. And let\u2019s not forget how often the White House walks back Biden\u2019s on-the-record riffs.<\/p>\n<p>President Gerald Ford\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/nypost.com\/2021\/03\/19\/gerald-ford-stumbled-like-biden-in-1975-and-got-roasted\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">stumbled a time or two<\/a>\u00a0despite his athletic past, and \u201cSNL\u201d star Chevy Chase made it his signature look back in 1975.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"ad-unit ad-unit--mr3_ab\">\n<\/aside>\n<p>Such presidential\u00a0<em>faux pas<\/em>\u00a0are all prime fodder for comedians, of course. The jokes write themselves, as do the comic memes. That\u2019s the lifeblood of late-night TV, political shorthand that makes the arduous writing process easier: Bush is dumb, Clinton is horny, Trump is an egomaniac. It\u2019s neither kind nor sophisticated, but it\u2019s how the satire game goes.<\/p>\n<p>Similarly, President Biden\u2019s gaffes should be front-and-center via Stephen Colbert, Jimmy Kimmel, and the rest of Team Late Night. The first sketches on \u201cSaturday Night Live,\u201d the now-legendary \u201ccold open,\u201d should feature Biden impersonators on a regular basis.<\/p>\n<p>Instead, late-night monologues pound away at Trump, still, along with Georgia Republican Senate hopeful Herschel Walker, Fox News superstar Tucker Carlson and, of course, the Trump family. The first \u201ccold open\u201d of the new \u201cSNL\u201d season recreated the Mar-a-Lago raid on Chez Trump.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"ad-unit ad-unit--mr4_ab\">\n<\/aside>\n<p>How could comedians ignore the current president, a figure cartoonishly ripe for ridicule? Sure, \u201cSNL\u201d will mention Biden\u2019s mental fog now and then, but it\u2019s usually in passing and never the focus of a sketch.<\/p>\n<p>A few months ago, late-night comics began noticing Biden\u2019s failings around the same time some unflattering media profiles went live, but they quickly reverted to form as the midterms drew near.<\/p>\n<p>It gets worse.<\/p>\n<p>Vice President Kamala Harris gives ol\u2019 Joe a run for his money on the gaffe game. Harris\u2019 word-salad musings are the stuff of social-media lore in less than two years.\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.foxnews.com\/media\/kamala-harris-mocked-word-salad-community-banks-community\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Here\u2019s an example<\/a>, from a Harris speech at Claflin University in South Carolina in September:<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe invested an additional $12 billion into community banks, because we know community banks are in the community, and understand the needs and desires of that community as well as the talent and capacity of community.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>There\u2019s plenty more where that came from. Plus, Harris\u2019\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.foxnews.com\/politics\/kamala-harris-loses-2-more-aides-vps-office-continues-high-turnover-rate\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">staff turnover is legendary<\/a>, and she has little to show for the assignments Team Biden put on her lap, like overseeing the U.S.-Mexico border.<\/p>\n<p>Again, late-night comedians are standing down rather than poking fun at the vice president. They comedically pummeled past Republican VPs like Mike Pence and Dan Quayle. Satirist Adam McKay made an entire film \u2014\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.vox.com\/2018\/12\/21\/18144605\/vice-review-dick-cheney-adam-mckay-christian-bale-sam-rockwell-bush-steve-carell-rumsfeld\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">2018\u2019s \u201cVice\u201d<\/a>\u00a0\u2014 skewering another Republican vice president, Dick Cheney.<\/p>\n<p>And think of all the politicians who demanded we stay locked down for our safety during the pandemic but lived it up when the cameras clicked off, like\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.politico.com\/states\/california\/story\/2020\/11\/13\/newsom-faces-backlash-after-attending-french-laundry-dinner-party-1336419\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Gov. Gavin Newsom<\/a>\u00a0(D-Calif.) and San Francisco Mayor London Breed (D), whose\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/news.yahoo.com\/san-francisco-mayor-london-breed-220103296.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">excuse was that she was \u201cfeeling the spirit.\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Stand-alone gaffes also deserve attention. Consider election-denier Stacey Abrams, the Georgia Democratic gubernatorial candidate, who has been\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/nypost.com\/2022\/10\/19\/stacey-abrams-suggests-abortion-can-help-voters-wallet-amid-inflation\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">skewered for appearing to suggest<\/a>\u00a0an ingenious plan to battle inflation: Abort more babies. (Abrams\u2019 campaign insists her comment was\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.newsweek.com\/fact-check-did-georgia-governor-election-candidate-stacey-abrams-suggest-abortions-ease-inflation-1753318\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">taken out of context<\/a>.)<\/p>\n<aside class=\"ad-unit ad-unit--mr5_ab\">\n<\/aside>\n<p>The pattern here is obvious.<\/p>\n<p>Biden, Harris, Abrams, Newsom and Breed are all Democrats. And today\u2019s political satirists lean monumentally to the political left, leaving late-night upstart Greg Gutfeld to speak to the half of the country ignored in that process \u2014 but he can\u2019t do it all from his Fox News perch.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"thehill-promo-link\">\n\t\t<a href=\"https:\/\/thehill.com\/opinion\/finance\/3702110-tax-changes-mean-brighter-future-for-retirement-savings\/\" class=\"thehill-promo-link__link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><br \/>\n\t\tTax changes mean brighter future for retirement savings\t<\/a><br \/>\n\t\t<a href=\"https:\/\/thehill.com\/opinion\/international\/3702529-is-germany-ready-to-lead\/\" class=\"thehill-promo-link__link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><br \/>\n\t\tIs Germany ready to lead?\t<\/a><br \/>\n\t<\/aside>\n<p>The Johnny Carson model of tweaking the Left and the Right is but a memory. We\u2019re left with something far worse, a comedy landscape that refuses to hold the powerful in check with laughter, a perfect way to keep politicians honest.<\/p>\n<p>This dereliction of duty, however, is no laughing matter.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"ad-unit ad-unit--mr6_ab\">\n<\/aside>\n<p><em>Christian Toto is the editor of the conservative entertainment site \u201c<\/em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.hollywoodintoto.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\"><em>HollywoodInToto.com, the Right Take on Entertainment<\/em><\/a><em>.\u201d He is the author of\u00a0<\/em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Virtue-Bombs-Hollywood-Woke-Lost\/dp\/1637580991\/ref=sr_1_3?crid=1OYLDWYEPEUCI&#038;keywords=virtue+bombs+christian+toto&#038;qid=1637081298&#038;qsid=146-8322887-8639658&#038;s=books&#038;sprefix=virtue+bombs+toto%2Caps%2C198&#038;sr=1-3&#038;sres=1637580991\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\"><em>\u201cVirtue Bombs: How Hollywood Got Woke and Lost Its Soul.\u201d<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>We endured four-plus years of Trump jokes across the comedy landscape, and that\u2019s exactly how it should be. As president, Donald Trump\u2019s bluster proved to be catnip for satirists, and<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1710171,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cndimages.nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/IMG_2758-scaled-1.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[547],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1710168","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-the-bongino-report"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cndimages.nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/IMG_2758-scaled-1.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1710168","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1710168"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1710168\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1710171"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1710168"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1710168"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1710168"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}