I hate when fairly clear-cut issues become dividing points here

[Dreamer Tatum]

This is what I think is reasonable about the Letterman issue:


1. Letterman told a joke that, at best, was sort of feeble.

2. Most reasonable people would assume that the daughter in the joke was meant to be the daughter at the ballgame, and the joke
really only makes sense if it was Bristol at the game.

3. No one at Late Night verified that the daughter at the ballgame was Bristol.

4. Letterman's joke seemed nastier than it was meant to be as people realized that the younger daughter (and not Bristol) was at the game.

5. Even if the joke was perfectly executed and made sense, it wasn't funny anyway, because it has no comedic basis. Bristol
Palin, hate her though everyone seems to, got pregnant once, and by some white trash kid. If ARod got some girl pregnant before,
or if Bristol has a history of pregnancies by pro athletes, at least the joke would've made SOME sense.

6. Letterman was probably a little disturbed to learn that the daughter who was the effective object of the joke was
14, because he's an entertainer, and entertainers want attention for being entertainers. He meant to joke about Bristol, who
is now fair game for satire.

7. Letterman didn't think the issue was big enough to throw his staff under the bus by making a grandiose apology, but he did
express clear, sober regret.

8. Letterman clearly has a great disregard for Palin, so he is probably not going to expand on his apology as Sarah Palin
beats this issue into the dirt with the help of the rest of the right wing. Moreover, the "but I was making a joke about an
18-year-old" defense is not really a winner for Letterman, since if the issue lingers, it will simply look like a 60-year-old
man beating up on a teenaged woman.

9. Palin's politics and/or intelligence have nothing to do with the correct stance on the matter, which is that jokes about 14-year-old girls being statutorily raped are not appropriate coming from anyone. Jokes about an 18-year-old woman are fine, of course, but it would help if they were somehow funny.

10. "But Palin puts her kids on display," is a puerile, illogical, and feeble attempt to justify a joke that Letterman certainly would not have made had he known that the daughter in attendance was not Bristol.



That's my take. Flame away.

[Midlodemocrat]

1. If Palin had an ounce of class, she would have let it go.

She has paraded those kids around since she was picked. It certainly is reasonable to expect that a comedian makes a joke against the 'wrong kid'.

[Dreamer Tatum]

6. Agreed. It's just too bad that Letterman can't say

"sorry, wrng kid! I was after the other one!"

Works well on the net, but if he splits hairs over this, he looks calculating, and that's not a winner for him.

We all knew what he meant, so she should have accepted the apology and moved along.

[ColbertWatcher]

20. Without caring who was at the game, I assumed from the beginning it was directed ...

... at the daughter who was having sex.

[madmax]

2. Great analysis

:thumbsup:

[Beetwasher]

3. Who Cares? Bottom Line= BIG Ratings For Letterman And Now

Palin looks like even more of a lightweight moron than ever.

[konnichi wa]

4. If Palin hadn't gone nuts over it, the whole thing would be long forgotten by now.

I didn't even know she had another daughter besides the one with the bastard kid until the thing erupted into a media circus.

Shakespeare wrote a play with an appropriate title.

[Hissyspit]

5. Palin trashed people with hateful unfunny jokes on radio. She is a manipulative, ignorant,

hypocritical narcissist who has no business running the country or a state or being a representative. Letterman wants to keep the pressure on for people to see her for what she really is and he should do that, but he didn't do it very well this time around.

[hfojvt]

11. you think Letterman has some noble objective?

He said himself, he makes dumb jokes for cheap laughs. It's not like he's David Corn with a late night show, or an Al Franken, a funny guy who also does politics. Letterman only does celebrity.

[Hissyspit]

18. Of course he said that. It's his defense. Jon Stewart says the same too. But Letterman is a liberal.

He hated Bush, he didn't like McCain. He clearly got sick of the Republicans over the past decade and mocked the stupidity as much as he could.

I don't know whether it's 'noble' or not, but Letterman clearly understands his power/ability to affect this people he obviously can't stand and he gets a kick out of doing it.

[Captain Hilts]

17. Fine. But let's not go aftyer her kids. nt

[Hissyspit]

19. I said that he did not do it very well.

Although Bristol is 18.

[mitchum]

21. What's this "us" bullshit? Fine, if you don't care to do so...

but you're not telling me what I can or can not do

[WeDidIt]

7. If you have to write a ten point explanation of an issue from how you see it

I wouldn't call that issue "fairly clear-cut".

:eyes:

[Dreamer Tatum]

9. It's absolutely clear cut to me, but nothing is EVER clear cut here.

You have to lay out every assumption and nuance to your opinion, lest you get replies, like, oh...yours.


:eyes:

[kiva]

8. K&R

"Palin's politics and/or intelligence have nothing to do with the correct stance on the matter" Thank you, that's it exactly--I don't care what Palin thinks, I'm just opposed to sexist jokes that target girls and young women.

[Bucky]

10. I'm sorta on Palin's side in this controversy, but I also disagree a bit with you

I don't think it's a big deal which daughter Letterman was saying "got knocked up". It's not an acceptable joke. But that doesn't mean some people can't find it funny. I don't, but people laugh at mean jokes all the time. My joke about the Greek ship wreck and the cargo of sheep on the desert island is unbelieveably offensive, but I still happen to think it's funny. Humor is complex, not "fairly clear-cut" as you assert. For instance you think a joke becomes acceptable once the target hits her 18th birthday. Having taught plenty of 18 year olds in my life, I can assure you that a good number of them are still young and deserving of protection from this "fair game" standard of ridicule we hold for adults.

[Dreamer Tatum]

12. I kind of see your point

...and of course anything that's funny to you is funny to you. No harm there.

The difference is that Letterman can't be on the airwaves knowingly making crude jokes about 14-year-old kids, so
which daughter he was talking about matters.

I didn't say that HUMOR is clear cut, but the appropriateness of the joke in light of the facts is pretty clear cut to me.

And yes, not all 18-year-olds are created equally.

[Captain Hilts]

16. I think 'knocked up' is crude. nt

[Blue_In_AK]

13. Just one other thing about this.

There seems to be no photographic proof that Willow was even at the ballgame. Bloggers here have scrutinized all the footage of the Palins and Guilianis at that game and Willow is nowhere to be seen. In her usual way, Sarah is making a big huge deal about this because playing the victim is her chief MO. We've seen it over and over and over again here. She never accepts responsibility for her mistakes, she never apologizes, and any time there's a dispute about anything it's because her critics are "haters," "ankle-biters," "bogus," "asinine," or "pathetic," to use just a few of her favorite expressions. She is no victim. She is loving this.

[RaleighNCDUer]

14. Actually, if you read the joke, it would work just as well if there was NO

daughter at the game - it was aimed at Sarah, not at either of the daughters (though it did, obviously, reference Bristol).

In context, remember that it was part of the Top Ten - and ALL the jokes were about Sarah. This one was "Sarah Palin is clueless about what is happening in her own family".

[Captain Hilts]

15. Agree. Don't penalize the kids because their dumbass parent has exploited them. Letterman did well

in expressing regret.

It's over now.

[mitchum]

22. Palin has an agenda and some scolds on this site also have an agenda

they may not be the same agenda, but yet...

[ColbertWatcher]

23. My only flame with your post is this ...

... can a "woman" be "teenaged"?

Or, would that be a "girl"?