Last night, Stephen Colbert utterly exposed how Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) has nothing when it comes to the so-called IRS "scandal", and the pathetic media that won't report the truth about it, which made Stephen coin a new term called truthinews, about how the news media is using truthiness as the truth.
Lately, my job has been kind of fun. You see, Barack Obama is engulfed in so many scandals, you almost forget he's black. Now, for my money, his most serious scandal is the IRS's targeting of the Tea Party. Well last week, those Tea Party patriots roared back!
6/19/2013:
GRETA VAN SUSTEREN: Tea Party protesters storming Capitol Hill, thousands of angry taxpayers railing against the IRS and the Obama administration.
DANA PERINO: Thousands of supporters gathered outside the Capitol today to stand up against the targeting from the IRS, and to push back against big government.
REP. MICHELE BACHMANN, R-MN: Now it's time for the politicians to listen to all of you! You're here, and you're clear with your message!
(audience laughter)
That's right. You're here, you're clear, and if you happen to be queer, my husband runs a camp that can cure you with Jesus. (wild audience cheering and applause)
Luckily, folks, one man is getting to the bottom of this scandal, California representative and Mafia tribute face Darrell Issa, who interrogated top officials from the IRS's Cincinnati office in closed door hearings, as he explained on CNN's State of the Crowley.
REP. DARRELL ISSA, R-CA (6/2/2013): What we have is people coming in to transcribed interviews. They're saying under penalty of crimes that certain things are true.
Did you hear that? Certain things are true! And remember, that's under penalty of crimes, which means, I believe, if they're lying, they have to go commit a crime! And that's against the law! And Issa presented the hard evidence of what he found.
REP. DARRELL ISSA, R-CA (6/2/2013): The administration's still trying to say there's a few rogue agents in Cincinnati, when in fact the indication is they were directly being ordered from Washington. ... My gut tells me that too many people knew that this wrongdoing was going on.
Yeah, my gut tells me the same thing. I mean, this can't just be Cincinnati. Remember the old saying: What happens in Cincinnati... nothing happens in Cincinnati. (audience applause)
I mean, that's what Issa said. But he refused to release the full transcripts for a very good reason which he also refused to release. But on Tuesday, Congressman Elijah Cummings (D-MD) released the full transcript to the press. And it proved conclusively that Issa was right to not want the transcript released. Jim?
NEWS REPORT (6/18/2013): A Cincinnati-based IRS manager who describes himself as a conservative Republican told Congressional investigators there was no evidence that the White House was involved in targeting conservative groups.
Goddammit! So this scandal is not connected to Obama. I don't want to hear that! I want to hear tonight's Wørd: Truthinews. (wild audience cheering and applause)
Nation, listen up. I don't know about you, but I do not watch the news to see what I don't want to hear. And I shouldn't have to. These days, there's a news channel for everyone. Conservatives have Fox, liberals have MSNBC, and the elderly who lost the remote in 1998 have Headline News.
Now cable networks have one cardinal rule. (Fire Paula Deen) That rule is to tell their viewers what they want to hear. Speaking of which, tune in tomorrow for my special report, have you lost weight? (Tonight's Forecast: You Look Hot!)
And folks, television news isn't only saying what you want to hear. They're letting you hear you say it.
FOX BUSINESS CHANNEL (6/20/2013): We want to hear from you.
ALYSON CAMEROTA (6/23/2013): We'd love to hear from you via Twitter.
ED SCHULTZ (6/23/2013): We want to know what you think.
FOX NEWS (6/9/2013): Don't forget to vote in our Insta-poll.
CNN (2/23/2013): Our iReport is here, here's your chance to help us create a food lover's map of the world.
BILL O'REILLY (4/12/2012): We did a BillOReilly.com poll, which is not scientific, but it is indica... it does indicate what my viewers believe, and they said 75% of them said Factor was fair in its coverage.
CNBC (6/4/2013): We'll do a Twitter online poll, and then we'll figure it out for tomorrow.
Yep, just like anchorman Walter Cronkite used to say, "And that's the way I think it was, I don't know, we'll figure it out tomorrow."
The point is, cable news is increasingly putting the "me" in "media". (And The "Ew" in "News") Especially the good folks over at CNN. On the same day that the full IRS deposition transcript clearing Obama was released, CNN's headline read: Shifting IRS Polls Contradict Key Deposition. Take that, key deposition! CNN has a poll. A poll that says half of Americans think that Obama did it anyway.
Now folks, years ago I gave you something called truthiness — ignoring what the facts say, and instead going with what feels right in your gut. (Factivia?) (audience laughter and applause) Well, you know what happens when you put a bunch of those guts together? (The Human Centipede?) (shocked audience laughter) I'll tell you what happens. What happens is you turn truthiness into truthinews. (Truthinews)
With truthinews, cable news networks have only one obligation. (Pretend Kanye West Is News?) Their obligation is to report whatever the American people already think. ("We Report What You Decided") If only truthinews were around the last century, we could've seen great headlines like...
And...
Luckily, now truthinews is here to usher in a new standard of broadcasting. First, we ask you what you think the news is, then report that news you told us back to you, then take an insta-Twitter poll to see if you feel informed by yourself, which we will read on the air until we reach that golden day when we are so responsive to our viewers, that cable news is nothing but a mirror, a logo, and a news crawl.
And that's the Wørd. We'll be right back.
Video below the fold.
Stephen then covered the story of
two KKK members charged with trying to build a death ray.
Meanwhile, John Oliver riled up the audience with some more Wall Street
malfeasance by the credit agencies, and then Jason Jones looked at how the
Canadian banking system dealt with all these things.
Both
John and
Stephen asked just where Edward Snowden is now.
Stephen talked with author
Andrew Solomon, and John talked with actress
Maggie Gyllenhaal.
And last week, which I didn't get to because I was at Netroots Nation, Stephen returned to the air and opened his Wednesday show talking about the life and death of his mother, Lorna Colbert.
He then looked at the recent "scandal" that
Cap'n Crunch may be lying about his naval rank, before turning to how Wall Street is creating yet another
massive housing bubble.
Meanwhile, John Oliver looked at Obama's
declining approval in Europe, and his
awkward meeting with Russian president Vladimir Putin.
John then talked with
John Hodgman about the recent Supreme Court ruling against a company patenting genes.
On Thursday, Stephen looked at the results of
Iran's presidential election.
He then looked at the
latest batshittery coming from Rep. Steve King (R-IA).
He then looked at how Nestle doesn't want people
drinking tap water.
Meanwhile, John covered the
shocking racism coming from Paula Deen with
Jessica Williams.
He then looked at the
trial of mobster Whitey Bulger.
On Wednesday, Stephen interviewed
The Postal Service, which performed
"Such Great Heights" and
"A Tattered Line of String", and then director
Joss Whedon on Thursday.
And on Wednesday, John interviewed documentary filmmaker Dawn Porter, which went long. Here's the unedited interview in three parts.
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Then on Thursday, John had on Tom Brokaw, which also went long. Here's the unedited interview in three parts.
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3