“The Daily Show” executive producer/writer Rory Albanese tried mightily to deny his program’s liberal biases this week during a symposium on political humor.
But Albanese merely reinforced what conservatives already know about the current humor industry – Obama jokes aren’t welcome.
Albanese, joined on stage at the South by Southwest festival in Austin by The Huffington Post’s Comedy Editor, Carol Hartsell, and comedian/author Sara Benincasa, attempted to rationalize why the vast majority of political comedy attacked the right.
Suffice to say they stumbled and bumbled their way through some dishonest answers.
Albanese admitted that after eight years of making jokes about President George W. Bush, it was difficult at first for “The Daily Show” to take aim at Obama. He said Obama’s measured statements aren’t easy targets for parody.
“There’s funny stuff on the left, but sometimes you have to dig a little deeper. I can’t say all the lies in politics come from the right. I think a lot of them come from the left,” he said during the event Friday. “I do think it’s important to try and come at things from all sides. What we do is poke fun at the [political] system, poke fun at the process….”
Albanese said the 2011-2012 Republican primary campaign, with such colorful candidates as Rick Perry and Hermain Cain, has been comic gold for “The Daily Show” and other jokesters.
“With all due respect to the candidates, there is the view that all of them are insane. A guy like Santorum, who’s taking an anti-college stance? That’s funny. I mean, who the f— is against college?
Should political comedians want to find the funny from the left they can just tune in to Rush Limbaugh on any given afternoon. Or, listen to President Obama offer his latest silly defense for the wilting economy or how algae will help power the nation.
“The Daily Show’s” Jon Stewart would have teed off on a GOP candidate who talked about algae in such a fashion. When it comes from Obama’s lips, you can hear the crickets.
The sooner comedy writers like Albanese admit that they have little interest in mocking the left, the sooner we’ll see comedy programs like “Saturday Night Live” and “The Daily Show” tackle politics in an unbiased fashion.
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