U.S. Representative Robert Wexler’s Colbert Report Experience

Florida congressman Robert Wexler has a sense of humor, as was evident during his appearance on “The Colbert Report.” That was the underlying idea behind a story that broke almost every major news outlet recently.

“The Democrat who is unchallenged for re-election appeared on Colbert’s Comedy Central show and was asked to say a few things that would “really lose the election for you if you were contested.”
Colbert asked the congressman to complete this sentence: “I enjoy cocaine because … ”
A bemused Wexler looked into the camera and said, “I enjoy cocaine because it’s a fun thing to do.”” – – – CNN.com

Every single media outfit took this story and ran with it like a crazed O.J. Simpson during his amazing 1973 season for the Buffalo Bills. Everybody seemed to agree that this was a bad thing to say, but they didn’t know why. They mostly just shook their head at the faux-political antics of Comedy Central’s Stephen Colbert, the fake news disciple of Jon Stewart.

The main thing that the people who ran this “story” were neglecting, the aspect that the political and real-journalistic sects could have used to their advantage, was that this dude, Rep. Wexler, didn’t fall into the Comedy Central trap. He beat “their” system, he was the square congressman who failed to act the part. We are so used to our politicians as robotic, out of touch assholes you’d think we’d celebrate the fact that one of them acted like a normal human being.

So what did he say, “I enjoy cocaine because it’s a fun thing to do.” That means nothing. Taken out of context, there are a lot of things that can get twisted around. I’m not always high on The Colbert Report and The Daily Show. I’m more “liberal” than most liberals but sometimes I think they do more harm than good. Sure they’re funny most of the time, but the whole concept of what they do seems like a dog chasing his own tail.

The Wexler incident could have been just as big of a story if it was run in a different light: “Sly Congressman Gets the Better of Colbert.” That would have been more appropriate, if not much more accurate, than the coke scandal bent that it wound up getting. When the media smells potential drug outrage they certainly get a boner. If they could only get a hard-on for accurately covering the news I think we’d all be better off.