| Topic: |
Politics > Politics-USA |
| User: |
"Harry Hope" |
| Date: |
29 Oct 2004 03:39:13 PM |
| Object: |
Introducing Sham Hannity, King of Comedy |
http://www.thenation.com/thebeat/index.mhtml?bid=1&pid=1933
Political Laughs? Try Fox
By John Nichols
Sorry, Jon Stewart, but Sean Hannity is the king of television comedy.
Yes, of course, "The Daily Show" is hilarious.
But the Emmy Award-winning Comedy Central program featuring Stewart's
cutting comments on the foibles of campaigners for president and
spot-on parodies of network election coverage by his crew of fake news
reporters is just too intellectually advanced.
If you want to see fall-down funny political humor on cable
television, click over to the Fox News Channel and watch Hannity
"interview" members of the Republican ticket.
No, Hannity does not fashion himself a comic.
He doesn't even know he's funny.
It is that unintended quality that makes Hannity's "interviews" so
remarkably ridiculous that it is impossible not to laugh.
When the men who run the country come on his show -- as they have been
for "energize-the-base" appearances in recent days -- Hannity greets
them with a demeanor reminiscent of the "Wayne's World" guys falling
to their knees before Alice Cooper and crying, "We are not worthy!"
There will be those who suggest that it is unfair to pick on Hannity
because, as a Fox host, he is not supposed to be concerned about his
credibility as a television interviewer.
But Hannity's "interviews" are not Fox bad, they are William Shatner
singing "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" bad.
Hannity's suck-up session with Vice President ***** Cheney last
Thursday was so syrupy that it made those Julia Roberts celebrity
interviews on "Entertainment Tonight" look like Prime Minister's
Question Time in the English House of Commons.
Hannity, the wide-eyed conservative who is paired up with in-his-place
"liberal" Alan Colmes on Fox's creepily amusing "Hannity & Colmes"
show, did not so much fawn over the vice president as desperately beg
the big guy for approval.
Hannity wasn't merely tossing softball questions; he was playing up to
Cheney like a half-wit intern trying to get on the good side of an
annoyed boss.
"Well, here you are in the all-important swing state of Ohio," Hannity
began.
"Right," Cheney replied.
"The president yesterday mentioned the shameless scare tactics that
are being used by the Democrats and more particularly John Kerry, who
is now on the stump regularly saying that there's a big January
surprise," Hannity said, referring to talk of privatization of Social
Security.
"Right," Cheney replied.
Seated on a hokey set where he was surrounded by bales of hay, the
vice president did his best to answer Hannity's questions seriously.
But it was simply impossible.
As the questions got sillier and sillier, the vice president grumbled
out the sort of several-word responses that are usually reserved for
the final uncomfortable minutes of sit-down sessions with the
editorial board of the Mason City Globe Gazette.
Holding up a booklet, Hannity breathlessly announced, "I brought
another prop with me."
"You brought a lot," Cheney observed, with all the enthusiasm of an
airline passenger being chatted up by a hyperactive seatmate.
What makes Hannity's performances all the more hilarious is the fact
that the Fox host does not appear to have the faintest inkling of how
of how much his "interviews" look like a local television station's
"remote" broadcast from the grand opening of a new car wash.
When the session was finished, an excited Hannity greeted the
Democratic guest on his "fair-and-balanced" program, U.S. Sen. Mary
Landrieu, D-La.
After Hannity referred to what had just finished as "the interview I
had with the vice president," Landrieu corrected him.
"I wouldn't call what just happened with the vice president an
interview. I think it was an infomercial for the Bush-Cheney
reelection campaign."
Hannity blew up, screaming, "Senator, senator, I think you're a lousy
senator, okay?"
Then he whined, "If you don't like it, I don't really care."
But, of course, he did care.
After the Fox host repeatedly interrupted Landrieu, the senator said,
"Sean, let me finish please. You did not interrupt the vice
president."
"Well, you're not the vice president," Hannity growled, "and I doubt
you ever will be."
The man is serious.
That's the genius of his humor.
Other shows hire writers to come up with funny lines.
Hannity is funny without even trying.
__________________________________________________________
Ya say ya don't believe Sham's funny? Check the kid out. He's really
funny.................in a sad sorta way.
Harry
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