Why Late Night Comics Are No Longer Laughing At The Donald (WITH VIDEOS)

Donald Trump and Mike Pence at the Republican National Convention (image courtesy Voice of America, part of public domain)
Donald Trump and Mike Pence at the Republican National Convention (image courtesy Voice of America, part of public domain)

It should come as no surprise that the nation’s late night comedians are having a field day with Donald Trump. But it’s not for the reason you might expect. The consensus among the men and women who put America to bed is that Trump is no longer a laughing matter.

During campaign season, late night TV is usually open season on both parties, with Democrats and Republicans alike being targets for mockery. But with Trump having proven time and again that he is manifestly unfit for the presidency, a number of late night hosts have decided not to mock him anymore, but openly call for their viewers to defeat him in November.

Take Samantha Bee of TBS’ “Full Frontal,” for instance. You may recall that Trump rolled out a comically bad logo after naming Mike Pence to the ticket, only to be forced to change it in part due to Bee’s epic send-up of it.

Contrast this with Monday’s edition of “Full Frontal,” in which she laid into Trump for his outrageous smearing of Gold Star parents Khizr and Ghazala Khan. Watch here.

Bee spoke for all of us when she let Trump have it for daring to suggest that Ghazala wasn’t allowed to speak for herself when her husband tore into Trump.

“She was too choked up from seeing her son’s picture. Why are you allowed to have anything to say?”

Less than 24 hours earlier, John Oliver was even less restrained on HBO’s “Last Week Tonight.” Watch here.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ggoofYZiqVk

Again speaking for all of us, Oliver let the Donald have it after playing the now-infamous clip of Trump suggesting Khizr didn’t allow Ghazala to speak.

“Okay. For starters, his wife has explained that she chose not to speak because she gets too upset when she sees images of her son’s face, you f***ing a**hole!”

When he played Trump saying he’d made a lot of “sacrifices” by creating jobs, a visibly disgusted Oliver claimed those “sacrifices” where actually “self-serving half-truths from a self-serving half man.” He then made his view of the post-convention environment loud and clear.

“The main takeaway from these two weeks is that, incredibly, we may be on the brink of electing such a damaged, sociopathic narcissist that the simple presidential duty of comforting the families of fallen soldiers may actually be beyond his capabilities. And I genuinely did not think that was a part of the job that someone could be bad at.”

The over-the-air comedians have been slightly more restrained. A notable exception is NBC’s Seth Meyers. Back in June, he denounced Trump as a stone-cold racist for his claim that the judge presiding over the Trump University case can’t be fair to him because he’s Mexican. Watch here.

And after Trump banned The Washington Post from his campaign events, Meyers replied by banning Trump from appearing on “Late Night with Seth Meyers” until Trump allowed the Post to return. Watch here.

Stand-up comedienne Elise Valderrama has a hunch why Bee, Oliver, Meyers, and others have turned so hard on Trump. She believes that comedians look at Trump and see a part of them that is “completely narcissistic and sociopathic almost.” She believes that most comedians have dealt with this kind of person before, “and it’s easy for us to see through it.”

She also thinks that her colleagues fear Trump has reached “this critical mass where we can’t afford to joke anymore.” That’s a conclusion most of us reached a long time ago. The thought that a man who is manifestly unfit for office even has a chance at the White House is nothing to laugh at.

Darrell is a 30-something graduate of the University of North Carolina who considers himself a journalist of the old school. An attempt to turn him into a member of the religious right in college only succeeded in turning him into the religious right's worst nightmare--a charismatic Christian who is an unapologetic liberal. His desire to stand up for those who have been scared into silence only increased when he survived an abusive three-year marriage. You may know him on Daily Kos as Christian Dem in NC. Follow him on Twitter @DarrellLucus or connect with him on Facebook. Click here to buy Darrell a Mello Yello.