Oct. 17th, 2004
Bye Bye Miss American Pie
Oct. 17th, 2004 11:47 pmThe comedic tone of The Daily Show is all deadpan irony, but the mood behind the scenes is one of intense youthful passion, and even fury. Right now the team's indignation stems from the transparent fact that Allawi's address was a thinly veiled gloss on Bush's stump speech. "That speech was written by the United States," cries Ben Karlin, the show's thirty-three-year-old executive producer. "Yeah," Stewart says, "Allawi literally said, 'It's morning in Iraq.' "
"My favorite one was" -- Karlin adopts a Texas twang -- " 'Iraq is safer, the United States is safer, the world is safer.' They didn't even try to disguise the voice! And I guarantee you nobody is going to call that out!"
And no one does. The network news anchors, and the twenty-four-hour news channels -- CNN, MSNBC, Fox -- all fail to connect the dots on the telltale ghostwriting echoes, which, when you think about it, is a shame. Or a disgrace, given that this was the American public's first opportunity to hear Iraq's interim leader speak with the freedom we attacked his country to guarantee him. Instead, we got a rose-tinted campaign speech for Bush, clearly penned by the people who also put words in the president's mouth. For Stewart and the comedy activists at The Daily Show, this was too much. All morning the show's researchers trawled video of recent Bush speeches and located instances where the president used the precise words that Allawi did ("Iraq is safer," "The United States is safer"), and cut them into a rapid montage. At the 6:30 taping of the show, Stewart played the montage. Then, in a signature move, he shot a bemused look into the camera. "It's almost like the United States wrote the speech," he said, with puzzled disingenuousness. "But . . . that . . . couldn't be? . . ."
Rolling Stone Magazine >interview< with the most fabulous Jon Stewart (hands off Wendy)!
"My favorite one was" -- Karlin adopts a Texas twang -- " 'Iraq is safer, the United States is safer, the world is safer.' They didn't even try to disguise the voice! And I guarantee you nobody is going to call that out!"
And no one does. The network news anchors, and the twenty-four-hour news channels -- CNN, MSNBC, Fox -- all fail to connect the dots on the telltale ghostwriting echoes, which, when you think about it, is a shame. Or a disgrace, given that this was the American public's first opportunity to hear Iraq's interim leader speak with the freedom we attacked his country to guarantee him. Instead, we got a rose-tinted campaign speech for Bush, clearly penned by the people who also put words in the president's mouth. For Stewart and the comedy activists at The Daily Show, this was too much. All morning the show's researchers trawled video of recent Bush speeches and located instances where the president used the precise words that Allawi did ("Iraq is safer," "The United States is safer"), and cut them into a rapid montage. At the 6:30 taping of the show, Stewart played the montage. Then, in a signature move, he shot a bemused look into the camera. "It's almost like the United States wrote the speech," he said, with puzzled disingenuousness. "But . . . that . . . couldn't be? . . ."
Rolling Stone Magazine >interview< with the most fabulous Jon Stewart (hands off Wendy)!