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Edited on Fri Jul-18-08 08:09 PM by NanceGreggs
It’s no surprise to anyone that our faltering economy is leading to massive cutbacks and job losses in every sector of employment.
However, few realize the impact that is now being felt by satirists, comedy writers, and pundits with a penchant for skewering our beloved politicians with their rapier wit.
These jobs – once thought to be among the most secure, regardless of fluctuations in the economy – are not being outsourced nor deemed unnecessary. They are instead being rendered redundant by the very political system that was all too often the target of their barbs, witty observations, and punchlines.
Sadly, they should have seen it coming.
Early on in the Bush misadministration, it became obvious to the staff writers of late-night talk-shows that simply running a tape of Bush’s own remarks was more knee-slappingly funny than anything they could come up with – no clever retort needed.
It was the dawn of the four-hour workweek for many a comedy writer, who hadn’t had it this easy since the halcyon days when Dan Quayle was in office.
Even though the graffiti was on the wall, few realized that their livelihoods were in jeopardy as the politicians and their spokespeople started dazzling the audience with one-liners that would soon have all America rolling in the aisles.
Take John McCain – please! Every time he opens his mouth, another stand-up comic throws his last batch of 8 by 10 glossies into the shredder, calls his agent, and acknowledges professional defeat.
Who can top the ramblings of a guy who believes he should be inaugurated as president in the year 2009, but still thinks Czechoslovakia is a country? What Catskills comic with his eye on the big-time can out-do a candidate who, running for the highest office in the land in the midst of economic disaster, can deliver the dead-panned statement that he doesn’t understand this economy thing that everyone’s on about – and why should it matter?
A perfect case in point is a recent statement from McCain national security adviser, Randy Scheunemann, that Barack Obama’s stubbornness in wanting to end the war in Iraq was comparable to Bush’s inflexible stay-the-course strategy – thereby rendering the two philosophies too similar to appeal to voters.
Within minutes of suggesting that McCain was the obvious alternative because “the American people have had enough of stubbornness and inflexibility in national security policy”, two dozen employees at “The Onion” cleared out their desks and headed for the unemployment office.
“You know, you can make this shit up,” said one stunned ex-writer. “I mean, that was our job, making this shit up. Now they’re making this shit up themselves – and some of it is damned funny.”
And it’s not just the McCain “Straight Talk Express” – and if that isn’t satire, I don’t know what is – sucking all of the comedic oxygen out of the room.
In addition, the mainstream TV “news” media – inadvertently comical at the best of times – is now offering “comedic stylings” of their own.
CNN recently spoofed its own legendary lack of substance in a piece featuring a body language “expert” opining on the candidates’ movements. ”Watch how Hillary wraps herself in her own arms on-stage, demonstrating vulnerability and a need for self-protection …” Funny, funny, funny stuff.
Not to be outdone, MSNBC “news” commentators later waxed philosophical over Hill’s new hair-do, with special attention paid to the political implications of having moved her part from one side of her head to the other.
Phone lines across the nation were overloaded as friends called each other, too convoluted in laughter to speak coherently, yelling, “Put on the TV, right now!!! No, I can’t describe the – just do it! You’re gonna laugh your ass off!!!”
Personally, I have always been a fan of the straight man, the guy who can look into the camera, completely dead-pan, and deliver outrageously hysterical lines without a hint of mirth.
And this is where the talking heads are garnering the guffaws that stand-ups used to dream about, with riffs like “The incredible success in Iraq,” “the strong economy”, or the oft-relied upon zinger that’s bound to keep ‘em in stitches, “President Bush’s intelligent and well-thought-out plans for …,” one of those mad-lib type of jokes that can end in virtually anything and still leave ‘em laughing.
“This is the kind of stuff that’s putting guys like me on the street,” said a former satirist I know. Reduced to panhandling, he camps outside an electronics store where he can watch the news on a TV in the window.
“Did you catch Lou Dobbs tonight,” he asked as I walked by just moments ago, sadly shaking his head. “Dobbs just said it’s official, ‘The media is in the tank for Barack Obama.’ On my best day, I couldn’t have come up with a gem like that.”
As I dropped some change in his tin cup, situated under a crudely-made handwritten sign that says ”Will crack wise for food”, I wondered how many more will join his ranks in the days to come.
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