On Monday night, Stephen Colbert had an excellent Wørd segment on the Colbert Report where he laid bare how the right-wing media would create a story, and then report it as "news". His focus was on Fox News, and how they created and heavily marketed the tea parties back in April, and then claimed that it was a "spontaneous" grassroots movement. Also included is how dumb Brian Kilmeade is when ripping the post office and not knowing basic math. (44 is double that of 29?? BWAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!)
Video below the fold.
And of course, Stephen takes it to the next level when it comes to health care reform. He eggs on Sean Hannity to not just say that health care reform will kill old people, but to actually go kill old people, and then report it as "news", just like that Brazilian crime show host Wallace Souza, who had people commit murder to boost his ratings. Yes, Stephen just compared Hannity to the murderous Brazilian show host. He closes by explaining what the creepy conclusion is to all of this:
"You have to be willing to do what's wrong... to prove you're right."
I think this video is very important in exposing what right-wing media does, and how it gins up right-wing fear and anger in this country. Jon Stewart touched upon this in a less ironic manner two weeks ago in this segment, where he called this repetition of right-wing talking points the "Crank Cycle" (a parody of the Krebs cycle in biology).
These videos, I think, are crucial in reaching out into the larger audience of Americans that don't watch Jon or Stephen, because they so brilliantly and effectively expose right-wing talking points for what they are. Send 'em to your friends and family who don't watch the shows. Make people understand what's really going on, because that's the only way we're going to win this thing.