Stuff Journalists Like – #45 Stephen Colbert

For the most part, journalists live and think as a collective unit. They all prefer sans serif fonts, the Firefox browser and 100 percent voted for Barack Obama. But lately there is an issue that journalists can’t agree on: who they like more – Stephen Colbert or Jon Stewart.

When Jon Stewart took over Comedy Central’s The Daily Show in 1999, journalists finally had a legitimate excuse for not watching Nightline. Journalists got Stewart and Stewart got journalists. All was right with the world.

But then in 2005, an overzealous and ambitious Daily Show correspondent, Stephen Colbert,  introduced the world to The Colbert Report, forever dividing the newsroom in two teams: Team Stewart and Team Colbert.

Not since Dave Barry have journalists disagreed on something more.

Colbert fans have lost hours upon hours of their lives arguing how much better Colbert and The Colbert Report is than its lead-in show and anchor. Where Stewart opens his show with humbleness and self loathing, Colbert is the exact opposite with his grandiose pat-himself-on-the-back introductions.

And no matter how much Stewart fans love the Daily Show anchor, they concede the fact that Mr. Stewart’s interview skills are pale in comparison to the quick wit Colbert displays when sitting across the interview table from authors, actors, politicians and even Papa Bear himself. When Colbert announced he was running for president in 2007 (and perhaps a 2012 run?), journalists found themselves grinning of the thoughts of Colbert in the White House.

Though they all will admit they are in on the charade and know that the Colbert they watch each night in their nighties is just a character, it doesn’t stop them from daydreaming about Colbert during budget meetings and press conferences.

Any journalist who wasn’t swooning when Colbert first came onto the scene was won over when he hosted the 2006 White House Correspondent’s Dinner. There, he summed up the work of a journalist when he said, “The President makes decisions. He’s the decider. The press secretary announces those decisions, and you people of the press type those decisions down. Make, announce, type. Just put ‘em through a spell check and go home. Get to know your family again. Make love to your wife. Write that novel you got kicking around in your head. You know, the one about the intrepid Washington reporter with the courage to stand up to the administration? You know, fiction!”

Whether it’s his interviews with elected officials in the show’s “Better Know a . . . ” segment, his Peabody-winning “The WØRD” commentary, or his endless mission to get everything on earth, and in space, named after him, Colbert has amassed a legion of journalists who would sell their dwindling 401Ks for a spot on the Report. Or just to rub his head.

Every journalist wishes he or she could get their own Colbert bump.

More from @JournalistsLike

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