The Rise of the Comedian-Politician
1,361 words

The greatest religious and societal luminaries seem to repeat each other’s message time and again throughout history. Be kind to each other. Try to empathize with your enemy; see how you are like them, rather than how you are different. And why do we need these people to constantly repeat what their predecessors have already said? It is because the world constantly changes, and we must be aware of the context with which to apply ancient wisdom. Recently, there has been a new breed of professional that carries on this struggle for contextualized thinking: The comedian-politician. In the confusing and vitriolic era of today’s politics, comedian-politicians such as John Oliver and Jon Stewart are essential because they are the foremost providers of political context and moderation. Since the 1980s, American political debate has seen an unprecedented reduction in context. Lee Atwater, a Republican political operative, openly recognized that stripping the context from an issue and playing to baser emotions such as fear, prejudice, and anger was an amazingly effective way to mobilize a base of voters. Rather than appeal to both sides through examination-backed rationality, he instead opted to inflame his core constituency to the point where they came out to vote in droves. Atwater’s legacy lives on in Karl Rove, a fellow accomplice dating back to their college days. Atwater’s tactics were simple yet effective. Lee was the brainchild behind the ingenious use of racially charged media. His ads associated Presidential candidate Michael Dukakis-who had a huge lead before Lee’s attacks-with negligence concerning violent crime. The resulting public response destroyed Dukakis’ 17-point lead. His opponent, George H.W. Bush, won by a landslide. Before Atwater deliberately turned the debate into a fear-based conversation about being raped by black criminals, the focus had been on a broad range of more pertinent issues. In another instance of dirty politicking, Lee attacked his opposition, Tom Turnipseed, via malicious implication and rumor. Specifically, he let it be known that Turnipseed was of unsound mental health. To further pander to his racist constituency, Lee distributed fake surveys that associated Turnipseed with the NAACP. Other Machiavellian tools weren’t above Lee; he once planted a fake reporter in his press conference to bring up concerns about Turnipseed’s sanity. This “impartial third-party” bringing up the issue independently gave Lee the appearance of moderation and neutrality, as well as the impression that the issue was more talked about than it actually was. Lee took inflammatory rhetoric and reduction of context to a new level. It did not stop with Lee’s death in 1991. Karl Rove carried on Lee’s legacy with similarly vile tactics. He implied Hillary Clinton had brain damage, phrasing his words so that he could exercise deniability: “Thirty days in the hospital? And when she reappears she’s wearing glasses that are only for people who have traumatic brain injury? We need to know what’s up with that.” Rumors of other underhanded tactics follow Rove like a cloud of foul cigarette smoke. He performed character assassination on incumbent Texan governor Ann Richards by implying she was gay. He destroyed a Supreme Court candidate’s viability by implying that he was a pedophile. Most famously, he ran a slanderous campaign against John McCain during the 2000 Republican Primaries, spreading rumors that McCain had fathered a black “love-child,” when in fact he had adopted a girl from Bangladesh. The political left’s response has been predictably reactionary; MSNBC and CNN are not quite as misleading as watching Fox News, but they are still pretty bad. Wolf Blitzer has been known for his penchant to sum up interviews by asking his interviewee “Good or bad?” In a way, it is understandable: When an opponent uses slander and reductive simplification to attack you, you do the same thing right back. The sad consequence is that we cannot rely on examining two opposing ends of the media to present an informed opinion anymore, because they both have gone too far in either direction. Hope is still present. Among this venomous storm of polarization, there has been a rise in the demand for moderation. There has been demand for sane voices that examines each circumstance by itself, recognizing that blindly fiery conservative ideals and indignantly weak-chinned liberal viewpoints are not the answer. This voice recognizes that humanity must honor context, as all the great sages and leaders of times past have implored us to do. Daily Show comedian Jon Stewart has led the charge, transforming from a scoffed-at comedy host to a recognized political force. This was evidenced when he led the Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear, gathering hundreds of thousands who had grown sick of the trench warfare of modern politics. Jon Stewart has been known to attack liberal and conservative media alike, pointing out the flaws of each ones’ logic. He is known to generally lean liberal. It is not his leanings that matter, however, but his willingness to examine arguments and propositions on their own merit, rather than serving a premise that he has obstinately decided should never change. He is not the only one that the Daily Show has spring boarded into the call for political common sense. John Oliver is another. Oliver is credited with having recently had a huge influence on net neutrality. Net neutrality is the idea that the internet should remain equally accessible to all users despite the nature of their traffic. Before Oliver’s intervention, the FCC was leaning heavily towards destroying net neutrality, allowing businesses to charge differing rates based on the differences between users’ web traffic. Oliver’s outcry turned the issue of net neutrality from one of shadowy, obscure business legislation to one that sparked a dramatic public backlash, inciting a flood comments that crashed the FCC website. The FCC chairman responded by keeping net neutrality in place. If not for John Oliver’s activism as a public comedian, the doors would have likely been opened to a blitz of businesses seeking to take advantage of our ignorance with teams of lawyers and corporate-speak, similar to how loan companies preyed on many in the latest Recession. But why use comedy? Comedy and the recognition of absurdity can be used to humanize. Orson Scott Card’s masterpiece Ender’s Game implies exactly that, and who hasn’t been in a tense situation diffused by well-timed humor? When broadcast journalist Edward Murrow took on McCarthyism he triumphed in the end, using sound rhetoric to restore sanity and dispel the witch-hunt mentality created by Senator McCarthy. Murrow has been lauded for his dignified stand against the Senator. He was later portrayed in the 2005 film Good Night and Good Luck that showed the tenacity of fear-mongering that has plagued America, and indeed civilization itself, from time immemorial. The tragedy of Murrow lies in his downfall. His desire for dignified objectivity conflicted with CBS’s desire for commercial entertainment value. In the end he was sidelined. Years of his life were spent entangled in conflict with his employer. But Murrow’s spirit lives on in modern day comedians, specifically those from the Daily Show. Honoring the teachings of spiritual and societal sages of times past, comedian-politicians have realized that it is not the outer aesthetic of the message that is important, it is the use of whatever aesthetic that’s most effective in order to raise awareness. Through comedy, these entertainers remind us we are all human, that we can all share a laugh, and that it is okay to have a differing opinion. May Edward Murrow rest in peace. I think he would be glad to see his legacy taken up by the likes of John Oliver and Jon Stewart. I think that great minds throughout history, most of them rebels in their time, would think the same. No one else is doing it; everyone else is just ranting and pounding their gavels as hard as possible to reinforce their opinions and worship their chosen viewpoints. The new breed of comedian-politicians is the most currently relevant force in the age-old battle to get people to recognize context. To recognize we are not that different from each other, and that our goal should not be Pyrrhic victory, but unanimous prosperity.