A Conservative Walks Into a Bar: The Politics of Political Humor

Shippensburg University political scientist Dagnes (Politics on Demand) interviewed a range of jokesters, from stand-up-comedian Lewis Black to writers for Saturday Night Live and The Daily Show, for this examination of the politics of political humor. Driven by claims of a liberal bias in the types of jokes on late night TV as well as the party affiliation of popular comics, these dialogues discuss the nature of antiestablishment humor, as well as entertainment television. Dagnes fares best when explaining how satire works, whether the satirist is Jonathan Swift or Jon Stewart, and reinforces the notion that the goal of late night TV and mock news is to entertain. Clinton, Bush, and Obama were well-represented as the butts of jokes during their tenure, and the comics concur that their material stems from popular stories and not political proselytizing. However, in explaining the dearth of conservative comedians, the book comes up short. While the targets of the jokes are declared to be equal opportunity, the examples provided illustrate a disparity between the quality of joke levied at the right versus the left, a point that is mentioned but not developed. (Sept.)