Given all the gaffes John Boehner has made this week, Stephen Colbert came to Boehner's defense on his show last night. From his "ant" comment, to the new tanning tax that just took effect, to Joe Scarborough accusing Boehner of being lazy and going out to drink every night, it's not been a good week for Boehner.
Stephen "defends" Boehner as only Stephen can. Video below the fold.
Here's the transcript.
This has been a very trying week for a true American hero, House Minority Leader John Boehner. Yesterday, Barack Obama accused Boehner of being "out of touch with the struggles of American families", just because Boehner made this innocent observation about the Democrats' new financial reform bill.
BOEHNER (6/29/2010): This is killing an ant with a nuclear weapon.
Republicans prefer to kill ants with magnifying glasses, or as they call it, "sunboarding". And, there is a good reason not to nuke ants. Remember what happened the last time we tried it?
Welcome to Obama's America! Get used to picnicking in body armor.
Then today, folks, there was another senseless personal attack on Boehner.
MATT LAUER (7/1/2010): The so-called "tanning tax", one of the provisions in the new federal health care law, goes into effect today...
A tanning tax! Booooooooooooo!!!!!!!!!! No taxation with our radiation! And clearly John Boehner is going to be particularly hard hit, because I believe his tanning bed... is also his bed. I have not seen legislation so specifically targeting one Republican since they passed a tax on turtle wax.
And Boehner has been the subject of vicious hate speech, from one Mr. Joe Scarborough.
JOE SCARBOROUGH (6/30/2010): I hear it on the Hill, I'm sure you hear it on the Hill all the time, it's not reported, but so many Republicans tell me this is a guy that is not the hardest worker in the world ... every Republican I talk to says that John Boehner, by 5 or 6 o'clock at night, you can see him at bars. He is not a hard worker.
JIM VANDEHEI, POLITICO: What I would say is that is not the knock that I hear most frequently...
SCARBOROUGH: Do you hear the knock that he has a bad work ethic?
VANDEHEI: I definitely hear that people feel like he's not committed to the party.
SCARBOROUGH: That he's lazy.
Oh sure, Joe. Boehner's lazy, just because his skin is darker than yours. You are clearly racist against Tangelo-Americans. Oh, we've all heard it:
"Orange people don't like to work."
"Orange people just drink all day."
"Oh, orange people hate Mondays and love lasagna."
"Orange people just sit around on the front steps all day with candles in their mouths."
"And if you're bad, orange people roll you away to the juicing room."
Now, I'm not saying orange people are perfect. This guy is clearly a tweaker.
But there's a limit. So Representative Boehner, let me apologize on behalf of all pundits. I hope that next week is better for you, and your son Chester Cheetah.
BTW, after all this, Scarborough tweeted:
How sad that Republicans get upset when I simply repeat what GOP members say about DC leaders every day.
Let the Boehner pile-on continue. He's handing Democrats a golden opportunity, and Rachel Maddow pointed out the Democrats are actually taking advantage of it. His words need to be a campaign issue. If the midterm elections are just a referendum on Obama and the Democrats, we're going to lose quite a few seats. But if they become a referendum on what the GOP wants to do to this country, then we have a better chance at staving off some losses.
Also last night, Jon Stewart covered the Kagan hearings and the Russian spy story. Some guys will be happy to learn Olivia Munn is now a correspondent for the Daily Show. Stephen also looked at al-Qaeda's new magazine and how the Texas GOP wants to criminalize sodomy. Stephen thinks they should, so that gays can be sent to prison... where obviously no sodomy occurs. Though Stephen does proclaim he wants sodomy between a man and a woman to be kept legal.
