The Evolution of American Political Humor
KANFER, STEFAN
Culture Watching The Evolution of American Political Humor By Stefan Kanfer THE OTHER DAY I came across a collection of one-liners written by the greatest standup comedian of them...
...There’s another view of political comedy, though, and I think it is a more robust one...
...Ford also had a penchant for endorsing ineffective programs, like buttons that read, “WIN— Whip Inflation Now...
...Jonathan Winters free-associated impersonating an old lady named Granny Frickett, and speaking rhapsodically of the Arctic, where they threw mixed fruit at the northern lights...
...Rarely did performers kid elected officials, and then they did it with kid gloves...
...Following the JFK assassination, political humorists went into voluntary exile—but only until the next election...
...Lenny Bruce used shticker shock—four-letter words and wit-free jokes about rape and amputees...
...Lou Costello was confused by his partner Bud Abbott, with disastrous results: “Should I back up...
...That would have been a great ticket, Reagan and Ford—an actor and a stuntman...
...Dressed in his trademark slacks and sweater, he carried only one prop, a rolled-up newspaper...
...The whites impersonating blacks in Amos ’n’ Andy were notorious for distorting language: “I denies de allegation and I resents de alligator...
...You don’t know what to worry about these days—whether the country will be overthrown or overdrawn...
...It listed Obama’s key strengths: “Will have American soldiers tell the Iraqi soldiers that they’re just going out for some smokes, and then sneak back home to America...
...Hillary Clinton: “Just because it would be amazing to see the look on everyone’s faces when they say ‘No way!’ followed by ‘Well, it kind of makes sense.’” Mike Huckabee: “Bass player needed...
...moved into the neighborhood and had bodyguards as inept as he was...
...He loved to make sport of what he called haute politique: “the ribald combats of demagogues, the exquisitely ingenious operations of master rogues, the pursuit of witches and heretics, the desperate struggles of inferior men to claw their way into Heaven...
...At the time he appeared in the ’50s, comedy had become innerdirected harsh or surreal...
...A quipster found that Carter had more positions than the Kama Sutra...
...Enter Mort Sahl, stage left...
...And: “Is against any kind of change at all...
...No new taxes,” proved his undoing...
...As the 19th century moved on so did democracy, and soon everybody wanted to get into the act...
...Fred Allen gently derided Southern attitudes with his fictive character, Senator Claghorn, a loud-mouthed know-nothing who refused to drive through the Lincoln Tunnel, drank only from Dixie Cups and sported Kentucky derbies...
...But Hope’s immense personal wealth and Right-wing leanings rendered him unfit to deliver truly barbed satire...
...I have left orders to be awakened at any time in case of a national emergency, even if I’m in a Cabinet meeting...
...In 1964 comedians enthusiastically returned to work at the same old stands, with the same old goal—to get laughs and keep the government on the straight and narrow...
...Impressionist David Frye imagined Nixon petitioning the Godfather for a favor: “You want justice...
...After the resignation, late night talk shows continued to make fun of the President’s replacement...
...REAGAN’S ABILITY to deflect the barbs was not bequeathed to the men who followed him...
...Guard: “Okay, is he expecting you...
...Jay Leno: President Bush’s “approval rating has dropped so low the only thing he’s above now is the law...
...Larry is still in...
...Jimmy Durante battled with polysyllabic words: “What a catastrostroke...
...The cornucopia, however, was yet to come...
...When Hillary is out of town...
...they were uttered by the President himself: “I know how hard it is to put food on your family...
...The impeachment was followed by a blizzard of gags...
...Mencken had already shown them the way...
...I admit his chances look pretty good, but what about ours...
...Despite a successful engagement in Iraq, the imposition of higher tax rates guaranteed that his would be a oneterm Presidency...
...Our enemies are innovative and resourceful, and so are we...
...As Gerald Nachman points out in his twinkling history Raised on Radio, the early comedies “were heavily dependent on puns, malapropisms, double-talk, mangled syntax...
...Suppose you were an idiot...
...comedians played it safe, going after Adolf Hitler, Benito Mussolini, Hideki Tojo, etc...
...Born in a log cabin in Whittier, California,” ran Sahl’s Nixon biography, “in a blue suit...
...Still, the mainstays of vaude, as the showfolk called it, were comedians...
...Or, as Democrats call it, Barack Obama...
...The Depression and World War II removed the sting from domestic political humor...
...If every official makes a meal for mockingbirds, why bother to vote...
...Artemus Ward took aim at armchair generals: “I have given two cousins to war and I stand ready to sacrifice my wife’s brother...
...things might have turned out to be even worse if the comedians had not been sniping away night after night in clubs, in movies and on TV Are audiences growing tired of their activities...
...The choice is between the lesser of two evils...
...I am a Democrat...
...In a changing world, we want more people to have control over your own life...
...One never knows...
...When a feline yowled down an aisle, Allen cracked “I do a monologue, not a catalogue,” and he was on his way...
...Justice ought to be fair...
...Accordingly, performances (and performers) were sanitized...
...Bill Maher: The President is “on a five-nation tour of Latin America...
...Backstage, signs were nailed to dressing-room walls...
...Originally the humor centered on his stiff appearance...
...Don’t say ‘slob’ or ‘son-of-a-gun’ or ‘hully gee’ on this stage,” warned one, “unless you want to be canceled peremptorily...
...They never stop thinking about new ways to harm our country and our people, and neither do we...
...We make them.’” If Jimmy Carter thought the comic establishment was going to let him off with a few peanut farmer yocks, he was sadly mistaken...
...That’s easy to say if you are not involved” explained the comedian...
...Family entertainment was the thing now...
...Reagan doesn’t dye his hair, he bleaches his face...
...Etc., ad nauseum...
...W.C...
...Ronald Reagan’s large mandate did not impress the comedians...
...New rules of behavior and material were imposed...
...twirling his lariat, he brought politics back onstage...
...Let me put it to you bluntly...
...But I repeat myself...
...Kennedy had to have Lyndon Johnson on the ticket with him because he can’t get into Washington without an adult...
...In time, impresarios came to a conclusion that should have occurred to them a decade earlier—scandalous “adult” shows drew a strictly stag audience...
...In Huckleberry Finn the two con men, the King and the Duke, offered a typical act, “The Royal Nonesuch...
...Get down here...
...Radio stars followed suit...
...It furnished all the material he needed...
...Everything is changing...
...George H.W...
...Then again, was the boyish John F. Kennedy mature enough to be a leader...
...Also: “Voted to require 15 minutes’ extra diplomacy before launching airstrikes...
...and when he was painted all over, ring-streaked-andstriped all sorts of colors, as splendid as a rainbow...
...He opened the envelope...
...It said, “Describe Jimmy Carter’s position on three major issues...
...Nixon is trying to sell the country, and Kennedy is trying to buy it...
...Since legitimate actors like Edwin Booth had trouble finding accommodations then, it is not surprising that vaudevillians were considered beyond the pale...
...Lady Hope, who showed off the enormous Hope diamond...
...Beltway satirist and pianist Mark Russell played a number entitled “Bail to the Chief,” and sang about “impeachment with honor...
...Mike Nichols and Elaine May performed a skit about a British dentist smitten with his patient: “I knew it when I looked into your mouth and saw you were English clear through...
...Almost immediately, they began lobbing grenades in his direction: “There’s a power struggle going on between President Reagan’s advisors...
...Perhaps the comics would have gone easier on Bill Clinton—he began well enough—but then there was Ms...
...Added Bill Maher: “In New York, Catholic groups have forced an art gallery to shut down an exhibition of a six-foot image of Jesus in chocolate...
...Culture Watching The Evolution of American Political Humor By Stefan Kanfer THE OTHER DAY I came across a collection of one-liners written by the greatest standup comedian of them all, Mark Twain...
...An improvisational group called The Premise predicted that if Barry Goldwater won the Presidency his first major address would begin, “Ten . . . nine . . . eight . . . seven . . . six . . . five . . .” An audience member who asked what life would be like under President Goldwater received a one-word answer: “Brief...
...Polar explorer Captain Cook...
...Among Hillary Clinton’s strengths: “I am the only candidate who can claim experience on the issue of health care: an experience of glaring, humiliating failure dating back more than a decade...
...He spent a few quick hours visiting with the troops, and then he left...
...Bumper stickers sprouted everywhere: FOUR MORE YEARS----AND TWO OFF FOR Good Behavior...
...David Letterman: “Traffic was so bad I had to squeeze through spaces that were narrower than President Clinton’s definition of sex...
...The new vaudeville presented the opera singer Nellie Melba...
...Twain was not the only humorist to make acerbic comments from a dais...
...But if you are in the Administration, you have a lot of problems of policy, like whether or not to use an overlapping grip...
...Jay Leno: “What’s Clinton’s definition of safe sex...
...He mentioned the Presidential salary: “Politics aside, is Richard Nixon worth $100,000...
...Bush at War (with the English Language...
...Hoping to catch up with the latest political amusements, I sought out the Onion, America’s hippest satiric newspaper and online site...
...And suppose you were a member of Congress...
...BUT THE LAME DUCK is getting ready to wing his way to Texas, and the comedians have already shifted focus...
...Letterman was more pointed: “Hillary Clinton is the junior Senator from the great state of New York...
...lesser souls also worked the lecture circuit, honing and polishing as they went along...
...Oklahoma cowboy Will Rogers did something more significant...
...Conan O’Brien: “A group of Republican Congressmen asked President Bush what his ‘Plan B’ is if the current Iraq plan doesn’t work...
...Many of his wisecracks are astonishingly durable: “Politics has got so expensive that it takes lots of money to even get beat with...
...Although the country’s future was shadowed with doubt and concern, humor propped up the system...
...It’s so cold here in Washington this winter,” he cracked “that the politicians had their hands in their own pockets...
...Dana Carvey started mimicking him on Saturday Night Live, and later Bush was featured in a Simpsons episode...
...The difference between the gags of the 19th century and the 21st is less a matter of substance (the criminal class is still very much with us) than of media...
...Suddenly they could afford that greatest luxury—writers...
...Most of the entries in these books were not composed by gagwriters...
...government and its employees...
...During the next election Sahl sniped at the rich candidate and the scruffy one...
...Go ahead,” Abbott told him...
...Because McCain has already locked up the GOP nomination, some possible running mates were considered...
...Unlike so many of his predecessors, Reagan knew it was useless to protest, and came up with a few selfdeprecating gags of his own: “It’s true hard work never killed anybody, but I figured, why take the chance...
...Letterman: “How about that President Bush—he makes a surprise trip to Iraq...
...Would refuse to allow Kenyans to come to America, father children, abandon children, attend Harvard PhD programs, and return to Kenya...
...Their routine, according to Huck, featured the King “a-prancing out on all fours, naked...
...One holds that political satire increases national cynicism about the U.S...
...Condoleezza Rice: “Petulant-terrier look always plays well at foreign state funerals...
...Kin Hubbard sagely commented on political grudges: “Nobody ever forgets where he buried the hatchet...
...He had to retract a claim that he had been under cannon fire from the Confederates...
...When Hillary Rodham Clinton falsely claimed to have landed in Bosnia under sniper fire in 1996, Leno offered a nonpartisan critique: “Do you think this is a big deal...
...I am not a member of any organized political party...
...Once upon another epoch a film comedian made fun of a politician, aping his wardrobe, his features and mannerisms...
...When they swore her in, she used the Clinton family Bible—the one with only seven commandments...
...The turban photo should help Obama with a key group of voters, the New York taxi drivers...
...and heavyweight champion John L. Sullivan in a miniversion of Uncle Tom’s Cabin...
...The name, derived from the French vau de Vire, refers to the Valley of the Vire in Normandy, where itinerant singers amused crowds with suggestive songs...
...In well-honed monologues, Johnny Carson went after the chief executive night after night: “Did you know Richard Nixon is the only President whose formal portrait was painted by a police sketch artist...
...Free nations don’t develop weapons of mass destruction...
...You know, it was just like his days in the National Guard...
...That gave Chevy Chase a license to kill the Saturday Night Live audience with imitations of the President falling off chairs and caroming off floors...
...Will japes and lampoonery alter politics...
...with women and children in attendance, profits soared exponentially...
...Moe and Curly are out...
...In the 1950s his critiques got a little harsher: “Eisenhower admitted that the budget can’t be balanced and McCarthy said the Communists are taking over...
...See, all candidates exaggerate...
...Twain’s oneliners were the progenitor of American political humor, from Will Rogers to Johnny Carson to Jon Stewart and the Daily Show...
...As Carnac the Magnificent, Johnny Carson held a sealed envelope to his forehead and spoke an answer to the question that lay inside: “Yes and no, pro and con, for and against...
...Sahl was having none of it...
...When President Dwight D. Eisenhower chose to play golf rather than journey to segregated Little Rock, Arkansas, one columnist wrote that Ike ought to take a black girl by the hand and walk her into an all-white school...
...Allen was an equal-opportunity caricaturist...
...And Hirohito said, ‘I know...
...Next, he zeroed in on the Arkansas governor: “I like Orval Faubus, but I wouldn’t want him to marry my sister...
...A lot of people are saying while he’s below the border, what a great time to build that wall...
...Pretty impressive, don’t you think...
...Homer: “I’m going to punch George Bush in the face...
...Replies Nixon, “Not necessarily...
...Bookstore shelves began to brim with volumes like Bushisms: Adventures in George W. Bushspeak...
...Lewinsky...
...Her rival for the Democratic nomination was not exempt from comic critiques...
...In vaudeville days comedians changed cities more often than they changed shirts, so a single routine could last a year...
...They misunderestimated me...
...George Bush Sr.’s pre-election promise, “Read my lips...
...The funnyman was set upon by members of the Establishment for his cynicism and impudence...
...Jon Stewart: “As it does ev ery year, this State of the Union matches up two bitter rivals: the President of the United States and words...
...Will they hit the mute button on their remotes when a new man—or woman— occupies the Oval Office on January 4,2009...
...To keep elected officials honest, he took incessant potshots at Washington D.C...
...Carson also predicted that this President would never make it to Mount Rushmore because there was only room for one more visage—the Tonight Show’s way of saying that Carter was two-faced...
...Millions of Americans are wearing these,’ Ford told him...
...In turn, the President gave him a WIN button...
...As for McCain’s strengths: “The United States should no longer act as the world’s police but instead as the world’s stripper, dressed as the police...
...and The Wit and (Anti) Wisdom of George W. Bush...
...The clown was Charlie Chaplin...
...Conan O’Brien said that a picture of the Illinois Senator in African garb was circulating on the Internet...
...asks Marlon Brando...
...Bob Hope took a more direct route...
...George W. Bush’s adventures with the English language, and the 43rd President’s private inter pretation of facts, gave rise to a cottage industry of political farce...
...Homer Simpson: “Hey, Bush...
...Moral of the story: There can never be enough humor about the people who strive for power, in and out of the U.S...
...Those gimmicks palled after a while, and the smartest writers turned to character comedy (Jack Benny’s parsimony, Gracie Allen’s idiocies) or, more often, to the surefire source of laughter: politics...
...Enter vaudeville, stage right...
...Remember John McCain in 2000...
...Guard: “’Scuse me sir, where are you going...
...Once upon an epoch, all performances were live...
...Fred Allen also juggled at first, adlibbing as he performed...
...Initially the funnymen and ladies used verbal devices...
...And then came Watergate...
...People are taking their comedians seriously and the politicians as a joke...
...They were forced to seek shelter and victuals at rundown rooming houses and cafeterias...
...Claimed one comedian: “In Japan, Hirohito gave the President a jeweled sword with the crest of the Order of the Setting Sun...
...Costello asked...
...When the clowns went on microphone once a week there was an insatiable demand for material...
...In the late 1920s, radio beckoned and the entertainers fled to the bigger salary, the gaudier dressing room, the grander reputation...
...It was Richard M. Nixon, though who provided the richest source of gags...
...American vaudeville became raunchier as the subject of politics was temporarily displaced by single-entendre comedy...
...he spoke of a town in Republican Maine that was “so dull the tide went out and never came back...
...Fields began as an eccentric juggler and switched to droning wisecracks that brought down the house...
...The ‘Plan B’ discussion was difficult for Bush, because it involves two areas where he’s extremely vulnerable—Iraq and the alphabet...
...the movie was The Great Dictator, and the politician, of course, was Adolf Hitler...
...Samples: “It could probably be shown, by facts and figures, that there is no distinctly native American criminal class except Congress...
...Gerald R. Ford tended to bump into inanimate objects...
...It is to laugh...
...Since Twain’s day there have been two schools of thought about such humor...
...A Borscht Belter forecast the President’s epitaph: “Here lies Richard Nixon—so what else is new...
...Well, it would a made a cow laugh to see the shines that old idiot cut...
...These joke machines were to become as vital as food...
...Even the First Lady had her detractors: “Nancy Reagan fell down and broke her hair...
Vol. 91 • March 2008 • No. 2
