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It's official. Stephen Colbert has declared victory in the war in Iraq. But the top U.S. commander in the country says not so fast.

Colbert, wearing a camouflage suit and tie, brought "The Colbert Report" — Comedy Central's political satire in which he plays a conservative TV pundit — to hundreds of U.S. troops at Camp Victory, the U.S. military headquarters on the western edge of Baghdad.

He drew rousing applause from the uniformed audience when he poked fun at the fact that many of them have been deployed to Iraq multiple times and could end up in Afghanistan as soon as the U.S. effort there accelerates.

"It must be nice here in Iraq because I understand some of you keep coming back again and again," he said during the taping of the first show on Sunday. "You've earned so many frequent flyer miles, you've earned a free ticket to Afghanistan."

Well I guess I was naïve, but I hoped this day would never come.

.

Yeah, I was thinking if you do a broadcast from there as a USO event you've abandoned any pretense at critique. From that moment you're the empire's clown. Unless he's going to try to burlesque it, as he did with the Correspondents' Dinner speech, but to do that with soldiers is a recipe for a career lynching. Then again maybe no one will get it? People do seem to have trouble telling satire, in fact, a few of them even think wrestling is real, right?

.

Sadly, too damn right.

The court jester. Same as it ever was?

JackRiddler wrote:.People do seem to have trouble telling satire

I think, if it's successful, a lot of people just aren't going to get it. The unfortunate thing is when satirists themselves can no longer tell, or no longer care. Canadians have the example of Rick Mercer, who used to make sharp observations, and is now an honorary colonel.

As inclined as I am to being generous towards Colbert, just on the strength of the Correspondents' Dinner alone, I don't think there's any esoterically satiric dimension to joking about frequent flyer miles to Afghanistan for U.S. troops.

Looking at this far too deeply.

Entertaining the troops for USO-like events doesn't whore yourself out for "the empire". The troops are regular people. The agenda isn't theirs, although some may have since adopted it as a mindset.

Colbert is a sell-out. Playing for the corporate system that is against us, sure. Don't see how he's a whore for empire when an entertainer is entertaining troops.

Ha ha ha!

Not.

The troops are victims of all the bullshit.

If he's there to entertain the victims, well it's like Johnny Cash playing to the prisoners, no?

Did Johnny Cash get shit from people like us for playing prisons?

I don't think he did.

Let's not equate prisoners (especially U.S. prisoners) and U.S. troops, shall we? My subject line may be a smidgen provocative, and it is indeed true that I am for all intents and purposes a whore as well, taking as I am a salary from a major local media conglomerate.

However.

Even though the U.S. army is undoubtedly class-based and undergirded by massive propaganda starting from pre-school, or possibly the womb if HMW is to be believed, the soldiers do share in the guilt. One of the most poisonous things coursing through the American political discourse is the unquestioned, almost ritualized reverence for The Troops. Yes, they are mostly from poor backgrounds, yes, they profess lofty ideals and yes, they are merely fodder for the U.S. imperial system, being used in the most callous way. But the prisoner analogy just does not wash for me.

And for Colbert to go over there, have his head shaved by a U.S. general "on the orders of President Obama" and joke about present and future American imperial ventures is just indecent as far as I'm concerned. I guess power only needed the truth spoken to it when Dubya was Preznit.

Nordic wrote:Did Johnny Cash get shit from people like us for playing prisons?

I don't think he did.

No, but he would have if he'd gone to San Quentin and played for the warders alone.

RocketMan wrote:Even though the U.S. army is undoubtedly class-based and undergirded by massive propaganda starting from pre-school, or possibly the womb if HMW is to be believed, the soldiers do share in the guilt. One of the most poisonous things coursing through the American political discourse is the unquestioned, almost ritualized reverence for The Troops. Yes, they are mostly from poor backgrounds, yes, they profess lofty ideals and yes, they are merely fodder for the U.S. imperial system, being used in the most callous way. But the prisoner analogy just does not wash for me.

You can't be serious. 17 and 18 year old boys from poverty-stricken small towns, boys who have never travelled anywhere, who have had their heads filled with propaganda about what a great adventure the military is, and how evil the "terrorists" are, and how they can go prove themselves as "men"?

Those guys are suckers and victims. Now you can blame them for being suckers, but given the pathetic state of both the media and public education in this country, I can't blame them one bit for being swept up in the bullshit.

And once they're in, they're stuck. The prisoner analogy is actually more than apt, because these are guys who have done nothing wrong and are stuck in their situations and they WILL go to jail if they try to get out of it.

At least prisoners have, theoretically, done something WRONG to get in prison.

4,000 dead boys and girls, and you're blaming them for getting themselves killed in Rummy and Cheney's little project?

They're kids.

and it is indeed true that I am for all intents and purposes a whore as well, taking as I am a salary from a major local media conglomerate.

Enough said.

I just love it when whores get uppity about other whores.

chiggerbit wrote:

and it is indeed true that I am for all intents and purposes a whore as well, taking as I am a salary from a major local media conglomerate.

Enough said.

Chiggerbit, I take it you yourself are entirely decoupled from the capitalist-imperialist matrix. Maybe you'd care to explain to the rest of us how you managed that feat, or how the fact that Rocket Man hasn't yet managed it discredits any opinions he might hold about Colbert's tonic for the troops.