Here's a follow-up to yesterday's TVNewser item about Monday's 23/6 panel at the UCB Theater, "Pencils Down: America's Funniest Writers Talk Politics," moderated by MSNBC's Dan Abrams and featuring 23/6's Jason Reich (formerly of the Daily Show), Dennis DiClaudi of Indecision2008.com (and author of The Hypochondriac's Pocket Guide to Horrible Diseases You Probably Already Have, which the crowd seemed to love), Kevin Bleyer, Daily Show writer and — yes — Council of Foreign Relations member; and Baratunde Thurston of The Onion (and "vigilante pundit," according to his HuffPo bio. Rawr).
As Steve Krakauer from TVNewser (new nickname: "Stevie Newser") pointed out, it was a standing-room only crowd, but we were lucky enough to get a seat in the second row, with a direct view of the panel for the purposes of furtive videotaping, slightly shifting in accordance with how the guy in front of us moved his massive head. The videos below roughly represent the second-half of the show (the first half was used for camera-battery charging), so here are a few nuggets from the first half:
- Dan: Who of the four - Obama, McCain, Biden, Palin - has "utilized the comedic tool" in the very best way? Dennis said McCain is actually a funny guy, pointing out that he's "under the pressure of being the first white man to lose to a black guy."; Baratunde disagreed, noting that the campaign trail allows for humor to come out in spontaneous, unscripted moments, but McCain actually "makes really painful, awkward jokes about slaughtering millions of people or gorilla rape." Obama, on the other hand, got props from him for his shoulder-brush-off joke.
- Kevin noted that McCain often re-used jokes (like, "I haven't had this much fun since my last interrogation!"). On the other hand, he approved of so-called 'gaffe-prone' Biden's chattiness: "I respect that he would be willing to say things that might go over like big clunkers."
- Dan asked how concerned they all were with accuracy; all of them said, actually, yes, very. Even the Onion has a fact-checker. Said Kevin: "We may not have the responsibilty, be we do try to get it right." He said there's a person on the writing sfaff who functions as sort of an Obmudsman (and it would be a man because the Daily Show's one female writer, Rachel Axler, left the show in August!). Said Bleyer: "He'll be the first to say, 'no, we can't run that,'" - and they usually listen. Baratunde made the point that "you can be truthful without being factually accurate." (Insert Rove-esque joke here, which Dan sort of did though I didn't write it down.) But Baratunde said that they check "facts and spellings and locations and voting records and all that stuff."
- Great response to a question from Kevin: "I'm going to hear your question and invoke the Palin Doctrine — and answer a different one."
There's more but I'm getting on a plane. Enjoy the vids!