Stewart, Colbert rally: Comedy or politics?
Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert
As I prepare to cover Jon Stewart’s “Rally to Restore Sanity” and Stephen Colbert’s “March to Keep Fear Alive” on Saturday in Washington, I have so many questions.
Is this a comedy show on steroids — or is there some serious underlying politics here? As an objective journalist, am I allowed to laugh at jokes told by a left-leaning comedian and another who mocks conservatives? And after learning that free buses provided by The Huffington Post board at 5:30 a.m., why did I volunteer for this assignment again? At the very least, it appears some Democrats, in a last-ditch effort to retain power in the House and Senate, are taking the event seriously. The Democratic National Committee, for example, will attempt to convert rally goers into phone-bank volunteers. (Someone really should text the Dems to tell them this generation doesn’t talk on phones.) And here I thought this was just a tongue-and-cheek attempt to one-up Glenn Beck. The permit application for the event on the National Mall, which runs from noon to 3 p.m., lists an expected crowd of 65,000, but 225,000 have RSVPed on Facebook. I’ll be tweeting all day at www.twitter.com/amnewyork.Tags: news , Jon Stewart , Stephen Colbert , politics