...are the last 10 minutes of the Daily Show and the whole thirty minutes of the Colbert Report. i stopped watching the Daily show after about sophomore year in college. John Stewart got a long ride on 4 years of Bushisms and it was gloriously funny. Then Bush won again in 2004 and John turned bitter. His only opening jokes were all about Bush. And he had clearly pulled them out of the trash from the previous 4 years. Nothing new. And this time, way less funny. Eight years of "Bush is stupid," just doesn't cut it. He kept up with great guests though on the show.Last night, John did something unusual. Two things that were completely out of character. One, he deffended a politician (without being sarcastic, although impuning another politician to do it). And two, he stepped into line with rest of the mainstream news world. GASP! What caused this? Obama. Anyone surprised? John's opening TEN MINUTE tirade began and ended as a defense of Obama by attacking McCain.
i'm concerned. One reason obviously is that there's so much good material in making fun of Obama. However, my other big reason is what will poor Johnny do come November if Obama wins? Retire? If he keeps pulling punches on Obama, he'll have no one to make fun of or his jokes will lose their bite in favor of gumming Obama around the edges.
Brian Williams was his guest last night and he was fantastic. The dude is funny. Seriously, funny. He looked John in the eye and told him he was from Jersey and he would open a can of whoop-ass on him if he had to. Didn't bat an eye.
Colbert had a great guest in the middle of the show. This guy who writes for the Green Lantern (click on the link to see an article comparing the envrionmental benefits of soy v. milk) on environmental issues came on to talk about things people try to decide on. Nothing i hadn't heard before, but most people may not have and it made me want to read his column. He discussed how there's so much more to being green than just surface level considerations. Paper or plastic? Well, on the surface, paper, right? Plastic never bio-degrades, strangles sea turtles, etc. Well, yes and no. First off, while paper can be recycled, it often isn't and depletes our forests. It also takes more energy in production to make a paper bag than a plastic one and more energy and fuel are expelled in transporting paper bags (which weigh more) to stores.
Now, he didn't discuss your own reusable bags like the one Ashley made and our canvas sacks, but he had about 3 minutes on the show. He also gave a good rule of thumb that i need to pass on to my misguided eco-cousin, Katie. i've told Ashley before that for gas mileage in the summer, she should put the windows down around town, but it improves it on the highway to put them up and use the A/C. This seems common sense to Ashley and i. The wind resistance on the highway is too high to leave the windows down and lower gas mileage means bad for the environment. The rule of thumb is 45mph. Anything over that and you save by rolling up the windows and turning on that A/C. Anything under and you might as well go for the windows.
He wrapped up by talking about CFL's, the cute little enrgy efficient bulbs my dad was hating on for so long. Everyone is screaming about mercury. He said your only real concern is if you break one and then lick it. But Steven put him in his place and said, "well it's hard not to want to! They look like soft-serve ice cream!"
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