When Late Night Attacks: Left Worries Obama Becoming Punchline

The Whitehouse is becoming touchy indeed...

Big Hollywood »

A few weeks ago, a funny thing happened — call it a late night political paradigm shift. Conan O’Brien put some extra bite to his bark by featuring a tape of Sesame Street characters who earlier in the day had visited with the First Lady to talk about healthy eating. Conan overdubbed the clip and, suddenly, instead of talking about food, the muppets questioned Obama’s ‘United States birth certificate’ and his ’socialist health care agenda.’ In the past, satire like this might have been automatically assumed to be an attack on the right, but the skit ended up taking some Obama fans aback. Perhaps it struck a nerve.

Then, Saturday Night Live rolled out a skit blatantly saying Obama had accomplished nothing, and followed it up by laughing at his Nobel Prize — relatively mild in execution, but they managed to cause a stir in the press. These comedic bits, once routine against President Bush, distressed many Democrat opinion leaders. Suddenly, more than a few talking heads were calling for the White House to start making their accomplishments clear — (so it looks like they have some). Others were killing the messenger — calling SNL’s Fred Armisen, who plays Obama, “no Tina Fey.”

Touchy.