abcnews.go.com — Running for president is hard work. But for comedian Stephen Colbert, who announced his plans to "explore" a presidential bid in South Carolina earlier this week, it's not the long hours of campaigning or the intense public scrutiny that weighed against his decision to run, it was giving up control of his Super PAC.
Jan 15, 2012 View in Crawl 4
Moses76Jan 15, 2012
The irony is if he showed up on a ballot in my state i would vote for him to express my frustration for the current political system.
Hell, if i am going to be forced to continually watch this political theater at least he can entertain me.
It sure beats the gut wrenching disgust that the current political climate causes :)
johnnysoftwareJan 15, 2012
Yeah, gee, "as long as they do not directly coordinate with a candidate" [FTA] would be a pretty hard standard to follow since all the Super PAC has to do is listen to their candidate's speeches and do what he says he wants!!
o.0
craigstellmacheJan 15, 2012
"I'm in no way coordinating with, how do you say his name, Jon Stewart?"
letsgetreal50Jan 15, 2012
Colbert will be an educational experience this summer, in reference to Super Pacs.
That's a good thing. Perhaps he will expose them well enough that the public will do something about it.
I certainly hope so. There's nothing like enlightenment. Especially when it comes from a good comedian.
NeosopheusJan 15, 2012
He is a brilliant satirist who reveals the absurdity of their positions. What is even funnier is when people take him seriously. Oh, the irony.
sooperskipJan 16, 2012
My father is a staunch 'fox-news' conservative but a good guy other than that. We have vast ideological differences. He's retired and works part time as a security guard at a concert hall/theater venue to pay for fishing trips to South America. He lets me in through the sidedoor whenever he can so I can catch a free stand up act or concert. Louis Black was playing and I asked my dad if he could get a quick autograph as I wasn't able to be there. He in turn asked me who Louis Black was. I informed him of his history, most notably with the Daily Show to which he replied "I can't stand that liberal bull-s**t! They're all socialist assh**es, all of them. EXCEPT FOR THAT STEPHEN COLBERT GUY. He just speaks his mind and tells it like it is. He's got some really good views, I'm surprised.they let him on the same channel as those other a-holes." Though as much as I wanted to, I simply didn't have the heart to explain it to him. I have a feeling that he's not the only one.
NeosopheusJan 16, 2012
Now that is funny. Thanks for sharing.
msbpodcastJan 15, 2012
I'd sooner vote for Colbert that the corrupt bunch of millionaires we have running now.
We've become a government
• OF the thousandaires (the 99%, that would be me and thee,)
• BY the millionaires (the 1%, that would be the extremely insular privileged overlords and bosses,)
• FOR the billionaires (the 12,400 individuals identified by the IRS as the people who count (though they don't really count as they hire some thousandaires to run machines to do that.)
The first thing we do is change from an ELECTED to a SELECTED form of government.
Pick names at random out an eligible citizen pool and they’re stuck with doing the job for one, and only one, four year term.
There could/should/would be no such thing as a career in politics. (The only thing worse than getting stuck with somebody who didn’t want the job is getting stuck with some idiot who did, figuring it was going to lift him a few rungs up the social/economic ladder.)
salbatrossJan 16, 2012
That's an interesting and tempting idea, but it only takes to the extreme the current anti-intellectual strain in politics. As bad as it is now that some choose people based on whether they'd like to have a beer with them, imagine how bad it would be if every Average Joe had an equal chance to run things.
dauntless1Jan 16, 2012
I'd like to do something like that, but with provisions. For example, you can't be in a position like finance adviser, or economic cabinet member, without at least a Master's in said area. So everyone who graduates with a Masters in Economics or Accounting have their names in the pool.
Or, have the candidate randomly selected from the populace, but he has to take an advisory board of random Master's degree picks for each post.
salbatrossJan 16, 2012
I'd love to see that occur, just to see how it worked out. Sounds promising, though obviously I'm sure there are downsides neither of us has thought of yet.
johnnysoftwareJan 15, 2012
He is giving up his baby to join political affairs.
He is his party's son!
They have members who can give him pointers on how to dump offspring and manage political funds.
swift2Jan 16, 2012
digg bar is a huge annoyance, just like it was last time.
sooperskipJan 16, 2012
What they (Colbert and Stewart) are doing right now is a comedic coup of the election process. While they've always been leaps ahead of the pack in political satire, there seems to be something exceptional in what they're currently doing. After watching the interview with George Stephanopoulos, I posted this as my facebook status.
"If you're not paying attention to what's going on with John Stewart and Stephen Colbert in the news right now, you should be. You might be missing out on the comedic master-class they're demonstrating which extends well beyond their own respective shows and has infiltrated the National Political Talk shows. It involves Colbert's 'exploratory committee' to run for President (after having found that he was out-polling Jon Huntsman in SC.) Nothing against Larry the Cable Guy or fart jokes in generally (which admittedly have their own charms), but what they're doing right now is unparalleled in the frightening brilliance of its ability to scathingly lampoon the current political system all the while making intelligent and thought provoking humor. Think of it as brain candy for the intelligent and informed. As a comic, I always admire greatness. You watch guys like Carlin and Pryor on stage and their genius seems effortless. The same exists with Colbert. If ever there were a 'Comedians Hall of Fame' I think that this would be his full court press for an induction"
StonnaJan 15, 2012
Stephen Colbert is a genius and I am hungry for a campaign