Late night television comedy, mid-afternoon congressional testimony: attacks on Stephen Colbert’s house judiciary committee appearance

Abstract

This analysis examines criticism of Stephen Colbert’s congressional testimony on farm labour issues in September 2010 to better understand accusations of offensiveness and appropriateness. A nuanced look at this unprecedented version of performed Congressional testimony expands our understanding of the increasingly complicated relationship of politics and late-night television humour, and it also sketches out parameters for standards of acceptability in political discourse and political humour. Implications on the co-mingling of political humour and political attacks are considered.