Stephen Colbert on Glenn Beck: “He Raised the Stupid Bar and Now It’s Nearly Inapproachable.”

by Rachel Sklar | 12:09 pm, December 23rd, 2009

» 18 comments

stephen_colbert_x200 The Atlantic’s Jim Warren, former managing editor and Washington bureau chief for the Chicago Tribune, attended the Second City 50th anniversary event in Chicago, which featured alumni of the comedy institution — including a very forthcoming Stephen Colbert. Colbert, who sat for a panel discussion with writers of “The Colbert Report,” moderated by NPR’s Peter Sagal, talked about the jokes he held back at the 2006 White House Correspondent’s Dinner, what he thinks of Glenn Beck and why he couldn’t help himself from liking Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia.

First Glenn Beck. According to Warren’s report, Colbert talked about the paradoxical difficulty of mocking Glenn Beck’s outsize TV antics:

“I said, ‘Let’s start doing some Glenn Beck stuff but in praise of Glenn Beck,’” said Colbert. “But every time we do one, he will have done something dumber. He raised the stupid bar and now it’s nearly inapproachable.”

“I worry that if we use that as a model….if somebody doesn’t believe what they’re saying, it’s very hard to out-stupid them,” said a decidedly analytical Colbert. “Because then there’s no place to sink our hook into, there’s no mountain to climb there. I can’t climb Glenn Beck since there’s nothing there.”

Great, now I can’t get the image of Colbert climbing all over Glenn Beck out of my mind. Okay, this should help.

Colbert also talked about the chilly, chilly reception he got at the 2006 White House Correspondents Dinner (or, to many who clapped their hands in astonishment and delight when watching it on the Internet afterward, a day that shall live in awesomeness). From the Warren report:

When the dinner was over, “I don’t think I’m dying. I go to sit down and nobody’s meeting my eye. Only [the late journalist-turned-White House spokesman] Tony Snow comes over and says I’m doing a great job.” Then Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia came his way and told him he was brilliant.

“I said, oh, s-, don’t let me like Antonin Scalia!”

(Funnily, Colbert used Scalia as an example of someone who he thought might not get it when he discussed the event in the fall of 2008 at the New Yorker Festival. He also mentioned how no one would meet his eyes, saying: “I thought, ‘It’s gonna be hard to get out of this room.’ No, it was not.”)

Warren also talks about the jokes Colbert self-edited out of his speech while he was up there, assessing Bush’s reaction, and also assessed the comedic chops of Keith Olbermann and Rachel Maddow — but you should click through and read his report for that, and for the rest of his thoughts on it. He was there, after all.

Colbert Dishes On Bush, Glenn Beck, and MSNBC [The Atlantic]

http://www.karlspensen.blogspot.com Karl Spensen

This FAKE CONSERVATIVE has finally CROSSED THE LINE by trashing Glenn Beck!!1 MILLIONS of AMERICANS eat up every delicious morsel of ANGER and FEAR Glenn dishes out … is he calling THEM stupid as well??!!1 We will REMEMBER this insult when we TAKE BACK our Once Proud Republic and the SOCIOFASCISTS and LIBS are the first against the wall!!1
m

If Karl Spensen hadn’t capitalized the occasional word, I wouldn’t be able to tell if his writing is sarcastic or not.
Fidoohki

Well That isn’t exactly a good thing M.
rmbltmbl

Well, we all know how well Colbert can BS something, and he really shows it here.
Winghunter

Colbert’s sniveling attempts at humor are funny only to psychotics who share the same pre-failed idiotology….Baseless, inaccurate punch-lines are not funny, they’re just sick. Case in point, Jon Stewart raised the bar of stupidity to only the stilt wearers such as Colbert with his claiming America was criminal for bombing Japan…his mindless audience applauded with simpleton purpose and praise. How truly pathetic that each night these clowns stumble around in the same darkness leading the willing blind down the same path.

Other than Beck’s sometimes far too emotional pleading that we look at the questions he raises, based on what he has dug up which the MSM has refused to for three solid years, we see only personal attacks from these sniveling brats and not a hint of what they disagree with as they can’t with any truth.
http://www.karlspensen.blogspot.com Karl Spensen

“How truly pathetic that each night these clowns stumble around in the same darkness leading the willing blind down the same path.”

SO TRUE!!!11 BECK is like a GIANT FLASHLIGHT exposing the filthy SOCIOFASCISTS hiding in the darkness, while so-called “comedians” like Stewart and Colbert, who use the ELITIST LIB TACTICS of “irony” and “satire”, are the RATS who climb among the GARBAGE that is in the DARKNESS that is IGNORANCE!!1 (The GARBAGE in this metaphor is their FAILED IDEOLOGY!!1)!!1
Ted

Colbert just stating the obvious. Beck and the teabagging crowd are exemplary dumb asses – what’s the fuss all about, ask anyone.
Winghunter

Hey Teddy, sling your cussing insults in public and learn what the word accountability means as only cowards drool behind the safety of keyboards.

Go ahead, make an invitation.
Ted

Okay, your invited. Dumb ass.
tjl

I apologize to ImNot, Tft, etc. Winghunter has taken the cake as the nuttiest of them all. Ted, you are being too kind by calling him a “dumb ass.” Did he ask you to make an invitation? Wow.

I guess since he’s not in on the joke it causes his hysteria. We’re coming after you Winghunter — we’re taking your guns, your taxes, and you GED diploma and we don’t even have any birth certificates. BOO!!!

I too make the invitation. I suppose that would mean, though, you’d have to learn to tie your shoes, let alone read this post, before you leave your bunker… Happy holidays (whaaa?! not christmas???) Wingnutter!
http://www.uselessbeauty.com Vidiot

Winghunter, please post proof that you are NOT drooling from behind the safety of your keyboard. A webcam shot would suffice.
Winghunter

Sniveling Brats:

Look deep into your mirrors and know that one fine day you WILL be held fully accountable;

The Liberal Mind: Psychological Causes of Political Madness by Dr. Lyle Rossiter
Based on strikingly irrational beliefs and emotions, modern liberals relentlessly undermine the most important principles on which our freedoms were founded,”
“Like spoiled, angry children, they rebel against the normal responsibilities of adulthood and demand that a parental government meet their needs from cradle to grave.”
“A social scientist who understands human nature will not dismiss the vital roles of free choice, voluntary cooperation and moral integrity – as liberals do,”
“A political leader who understands human nature will not ignore individual differences in talent, drive, personal appeal and work ethic, and then try to impose economic and social equality on the population – as liberals do. And a legislator who understands human nature will not create an environment of rules which over-regulates and over-taxes the nation’s citizens, corrupts their character and reduces them to wards of the state – as liberals do.”
“The roots of liberalism – and its associated madness – can be clearly identified by understanding how children develop from infancy to adulthood and how distorted development produces the irrational beliefs of the liberal mind,” “When the modern liberal mind whines about imaginary victims, rages against imaginary villains and seeks above all else to run the lives of persons competent to run their own lives, the neurosis of the liberal mind becomes painfully obvious.”
Ted

Winghunter (aka dumb ass)

No on cares as you are a moron. Thanks for asking though.
RazorsEdge

So we’re left with dumb ass or smart ass…
Ted

I say we go with dumb ass. Seems appropriate.
LNSmithee

I think Ted’s getting worn out. Having long given up on substance, he’s recycling his insults.
ImNotBlue

m says:
December 23, 2009 at 1:21 pm

Karl Spensen is actually a character created by a college student, Christian Larson. “Karl” appears on blogs like this to be annoying, in an attempt to be funny. It’s kinda like a Colbert personality, but without the fame or popularity. You’d think after all the sites Christian has tried to be funny on, with NO positive reaction, he’d drop it… especially since he’s already graduated college. But, as I said previously, he once worked/interned for MSNBC and NBC… so the style of being condescending and self important, even when you’ve got no audience isn’t all that surprising.

Isn’t that right, Christian?

tjl says:
December 23, 2009 at 4:33 pm

So you like the fact that Ted can’t seem to make a post without swearing? You like that all he’s got is ad hominem against everyone else? You like that he’s never talked policy… and only name calls?

Really?

Why?
pyrope

Jim Warren? Stephen Colbert? Never heard of ‘em. They are, without doubt, trying desperately to be germane to the media.