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Stewart and Colbert Plan Competing D.C. Rallies
Lev13than writes "In a direct retort to Glenn Beck's Restoring Honor rally, Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert have announced competing rallies on October 30th. Stewart plans to host a 'Rally To Restore Sanity' on Oct. 30 on the National Mall in D.C. for the Americans he says are too busy living normal, rational lives to attend other political demonstrations. Colbert, meantime, will shepherd his fans in a 'March To Keep Fear Alive.' 'Damn your reasonableness!' Colbert said. 'Now is not the time to take it down a notch. Now is the time for all good men to freak out for freedom!' Stewart, meanwhile, has promised to provide attendees with signs featuring slogans such as 'I Disagree With You But I'm Pretty Sure You're Not Hitler' and 'I'm Afraid of Spiders.'"
No, they're not. John Stewart and Steven Colbert are satirizing Glen Beck. Glen Beck is serious. That's the difference. The point of this type of satire is to draw attention to the absurdity of the thing/person/event being made fun of by imitating its form and taking the ridiculous characteristics ad absurdam.
Also, Rally to Restore Sanity
Also, Keep Fear Alive
Also, I love you, Jon (with one H).
As I understand it, the permits aren't normally granted until just before the event anyway, no matter how far in advance you start setting it up. By the time you've jumped through the other hoops, the actual permit is more of a formality. It was the same way for Beck's rally.
In 2009 the PEW research study asked individuals where they got their news then 23 factual questions about US politics and wold affairs. Below is the list of news sources, correlated with percentage of correct answers:
From this can we pretty definitively site that the fans of The Daily Show and the Colbert Report are more likely to be knowledgeable about what's going on in the world than Glen Beck;s rally attendees?
My point is, the audiences of these shows are mostly young liberal and uninformed
Yes, yes, and demonstrably false. When polls were done a couple years ago, people that watched The Daily Show were more politically informed than people that got their news primarily from other cable channels. People who don't understand what Stewart and Colbert are making fun of probably won't find them funny and won't watch their shows.
Where are those people who oppose the war now? We're still at war in Afghanistan, and yet those people have all but disappeared. Oh because it is THEIR guy running the war it must be okay.
Obama lied, and people died!
We're still at war, where are the war protesters?
They weren't protesting the war, they were protesting the president under the guise of protesting the war. Now that their guy is in office, code pink is all but gone and where is Cyndi Sheehan? How come she isn't camping out in front of Obama's vacation houses?
There's enough hypocrisy to go around, quit pretending it is only one sided.
People were opposed to the Iraq war (a war without a reason), not against the war in Afghanistan (a war justified by the events of 9/11.) People were opposed to the Iraq war because it prevented the US from completing the mission in Afghanistan. Had the Iraq war never started, chances are we would have been out of Afghanistan quite a while ago.
For someone who complain about the war opponents, you don't seem to have much of a grasp of the events they were opposing, do you?
They weren't protesting the war, they were protesting the president under the guise of protesting the war. Now that their guy is in office, code pink is all but gone and where is Cyndi Sheehan? How come she isn't camping out in front of Obama's vacation houses?
Are you referring to the Cindy Sheehan who protested at Martha's Vineyard when Obama was staying there in August of 2009? The same Cindy Sheehan who was arrested last October while protesting Obama's continuation of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan outside the White House? The very same person who went to Norway to protest Obama's receipt of the Nobel Peace Prize, and who was arrested again this past March outside the White House?
Yeah, you're right. It's all about Bush, and has nothing to do with the war.
"You cannot simultaneously prevent and prepare for war." -- Albert Einstein
They know their relevance is ending when the 20 somethings that used to watch them while eating cheetos are now turning 30 and are bored with their childish humor.
Got a source for that? My Googling turned up this:
Vs. last summer, ratings for “The Daily Show” were up +10% among Adults 18-49, +22% among Adults 18-34, up +20% among Men 18-34 and up +15% among Men 18-24. Viewership grew +9% to 2.2 million Total Viewers (P2+)
Vs. last summer, ratings for “The Colbert Report” were up +9% among Adults 18-49, +18% among Adults 18-34, up +13% among Men 18-34 and up +12% among Men 18-24. Viewership grew +9% to 1.5 million Total Viewers (P2+)
Unless that's factually incorrect, it would appear that they're relevance is increasing rather than decreasing and these rallies may be an attempt to publicly show their relevance to a country that's gotten the impression that the tea party groups are much more relevant than they actually are.
"Don't blame me, I voted for Kodos!"
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