How Colbert Saved Me From Myself by Craig Crawford

[SCRUBDASHRUB]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/craig-crawford/how-colbert-saved-me-from_b_20488.html

<snip>

I am a bit late to the rodeo on this one, as I broke my arm after last Saturday's White House Correspondents Dinner (guess you could say President Bush disarmed this critic). But thank goodness Stephen Colbert was on hand to jolt me out of my swoon for the new Bush.

The fake one, that is. I really liked the inner Bush as played by impersonator Steve Bridges. It was reminiscent of John Wayne after his flawless all-American routine began to wear thin at the box office. He all but parodied his earlier he-man roles in the part of the boozy anti-hero Reuben J. "Rooster" Cogburn, a character far removed from the strait-laced heroes that made Wayne famous. And it finally won him an Oscar.

But enter Colbert just in time, before the president's comedy duo routine had me ready to put on an eye patch and march off to Iran with George "Rooster" Bush. Despite my Percocet-induced haze this week I gathered that there was quite the to-do about Colbert. All I know is that I was wiping away tears of laughter after the Comedy Central star's brilliant send-up (although I did notice that only a handful of folks at the tables around me were visibly amused).

Colbert spared no one, and Lord knows that none of us should be. In a hilarious passage that still makes me laugh at this writing, Colbert lampooned the entire country's jingoistic madness, from commerce to war-making, when he said, "Ladies and gentlemen, I believe it's yogurt. But I refuse to believe it's not butter." For all the high and mighty whiners out there, I'll relay what Colbert told me in the green room before I did his show a few months ago. "I hope you understand that I play a character on this show," he said. "I play a complete idiot." And a gloriously funny idiot he is, played to perfection at last week's dinner. At least he was the one just playing the fool. - crawfordslist.com

<snip>