Episode 4023 (02/13/2008)

Potomassacre: “Barack Obama wins with a message of hope. I hope I can get through this script.”

• Stephen Did It! He survived the writers strike.
• WOW – welcoming the writers are back.
• The missing issue in this campaign season.

Special Guest: David Gracer – Entomological Gastronomist (Eats Bugs).

Magnificent Recession: “Then, our struggling economy. If I had a Dollar for every time someone mentioned a recession, I’d convert them to Euros.

• Stephen Colbert’s Fallback Position: Astrophysicist. With Neil deGrasse Tyson.

Have You Nailed A Ford Lately?: “Plus my guest Richard Thompson Ford thinks people are accused of racism too often. I know I am.”

• Richard Thompson Ford – author, ‘The Race Card’

In closing: Good night, everybody.

Guest Plug:

NOTABLE MOMENTS

• You know something that I have learned, that I did not know, is that reading is a muscle. And it can go soft on you.
• The writer’s strike is over! I did it! Wooo! Yes, I survived the writers’ strike. And finally, this morning, I was able to shave my strike beard – downtown. Oh yea. Oh, it was unruly. The guys in the steam room are going to be so happy this strike is over.
• Let’s all welcome back The Colbert Report writers! [God Bless America plays as the writers come on stage to shake Stephen's hand and receive a pen - including some "new" writers: Tiki Barber, Mikhail Baryshnikov, Judy Miller, Kevin Bacon and Mr. Met.]
• Ladies and Gentlemen – The Colbert Report Writers! [Group Photo in front of the stain glass window with Stephen kneeling in front of the group.]
• This is great! I’ve got my prompter back. Wow!
  [shot of prompter while Stephen reads it]
  WOW
  WOW WOW
  WOW WOW
  WOW WOW
  I mean
  
  
  
  
  WOW
• I guess I’ve got to get on with the news… I’m so excited.
• Barack Obama won so big yesterday that MSNBC was able to declare him the winner with zero percent of the vote counted. That is, literally, running on hope.
• Many issues have been debated back and forth throughout this campaign, but one issue remains suspiciously undiscussed. Namely, should we eat bugs?
• My guest tonight thinks this is one issue with legs.
• There are a whole lot of reasons not to do it. I just want you to know.
• • Stephen: What is the impact to the planet of all those people vomiting when they watch you eat bugs?
  • David: The vomit can feed the insects.
  • Stephen: Oh, that’s the… ok. They call that the circle of life, I believe.
• • Stephen: Do you believe that we should be eating each other? That would solve the overpopulation problem.
  • David: That would be a magnificent solution, but there are laws that protect us from each other. So the fact is that bugs are the next best substitute.
  • Stephen: This isn’t that new. I mean, this isn’t groundbreaking. If you eat hot-dogs, you eat bugs already.
  • *May I mention how happy I am right now that I’m a vegetarian?*
  • David: That’s right. In fact, we all eat bugs everyday. The fact is, there’s only a tiny bit of bugs in our food so we’re getting only a tiny bit of value from the bugs. If we increase the amount of bugs in our food we get more value from them. So, let’s go to just 50% bug and get more protein and more…
  • Stephen: That’s a lot of bug.
• • David: This bug we are going to fillet because there is meat inside the bug.
  • Stephen: I’m not entirely sure we are.
• *I would personally like to thank Stephen for turning down the opportunity to dine here*
• I might ask one of my writers to eat a bug. Let me check their contract first. Hold on one second, I’ve got to make sure… “You may not make a writer eat a bug.” G@#d@#n it! That is a good contract.
• So, eat bugs, save the planet.
• We are in a recession and frankly, I’m worried because I could loose this gig anytime. In the old days, Pundit was a recession proof job. You could be wrong about everything, all the time, and you’d still never get fired. I mean, take Bill Kristol.
• You thought Superman 4 was bad.
• As a precaution, I will be exploring backup careers in my new segment “Stephen Colbert’s Fallback Position”.
• If you have never tried the fallback position, it’s quite lovely.
• My first was an obvious choice – astrophysicist.
• I met with Dr. Neil deGrasse Tyson, director of the Hayden Planetarium and all around smarty-pants.
• • Stephen: What I need to be an astrophysicist?
  • Neil: You need a lot.
  • Stephen: So, give me the basics.
  • Neil: So, the basics. Number 1: you’ve got to know how to ask questions. Questioning.
  • Stephen: What kind of questions, Neil?
  • Neil: Two: You’ve got to be openminded.
  • Stephen: I’m interested in what you’re saying next.
  • Neil: Good. Three: You’ve got to have tools of the trade. You’ve got to knooooow things.
  • Stephen: That. Sounds. Good. What’s the fourth one?
  • Neil: In the end, you should teach it to others.
  • Stephen: Astrophysicist – you’ve got to question, you’ve got to be openminded, you have to know things, and you have to then teach those things.
• So, this used to be an Apple Store?
• • Neil: This is the universe, however.
  • Stephen: A lot of people feel that way about Mac products.
• • Stephen: Dr. Tyson, may I lick your meteor?
  • Neil [watching Stephen lick the meteor]: That’s nasty!
  • Stephen: So, that’s what space taste likes.
  • Neil: This is surely the oldest thing your tongue has ever touched.
  • Stephen: You’d be surprised. I had Jane Fonda on.
• • Stephen: I thought there was no air…
  • Neil: There is no air in space.
  • Stephen: Then why is it called the ‘Air In Space Museum’?
  • Neil: Air And Space.
  • Stephen: So there’s both up there.
  • Neil: No – it’s the Air and Space Museum
  • Stephen: I don’t understand. BUT – I’m openminded.
• • Neil: The man who discovered that atoms are mostly empty space… the next morning he woke up and was afraid to step on the floor of his room out of fear that he would fall through the empty space of the atoms that comprised the floor.
  • Stephen: So he was mentally retarded.
• *Stephen reacting and hyperventilating watching ‘The Big Bang’.*
• Tom Hanks really sounded like Maya Angelou!
• Where along this timeline did Luke Skywalker come in? Because that was a long, long time ago in a galaxy far, far away.
• That looks like somebody hocked up a globular cluster.
• • Neil: All of human history fits within the width of that hair.
  • Stephen: You are blowing my mind.
• What’s not to get?
• [adressing his audience of preschoolers] First there was a big bang. And then it just goes space space space space space space space space for like hundreds of years, ok? And then BOOM! All the dinasaurs died and all that was left was a single human hair and this is the part that will completely freak your trip – all of human history is in one little hair. And they have that hair right up there and I don’t know how it happens, but even what we are doing right now is in that hair. Who’s feeling freaked out?
• I like planes that go fast, but here’s the thing. I’m usually in First Class, so I kind of like it when they go slow ’cause it’s like I can stay in the cockpit longer and they have cocktails and they warm up the nuts.
• My guest tonight thinks the race card is played too often. Maybe so, but it’s not played as often as Hotel California.
• By calling your book ‘The Race Card’, aren’t you playing the race card? Because, if I don’t buy this book, I seem like a racist. Or that I don’t care about racism.
• • Ford: Hurricane Katrina. It’s a terrible tragedy; disproportional number of the people affected were black. People huddled in the Superdome….
  • Stephen: Not disproportionate. They lived there. It was completely proportionate. [Ford: ok] Exact right number of black people were affected. The one’s who lived there.
• Not our fault, baby!
• • Ford: No one denies that racism was the norm…
  • Stephen: I do…
  • Ford: Well, few people deny that racism was the norm…
• Is this what you’re saying? And if it’s not what you’re saying, I’m just going to say it’s what you’re saying.
• It’s like, let’s say, you’re having a sexual problem with your partner. You just don’t talk about it and it will go away.
• That’s what I’m suggesting you’re suggesting and I think we’re going to have to go with that.
• I think you’re a racist! Go ahead. Try to deny it. It just makes it worse.

Videos courtesy of Comedy Central MotherLoad

• Coffee Strike: The Toss.
• Potomassacre : Table of Contents.
• Writers Strike Over: Stephen personally welcomes back each of his writers.
• David Gracer: David Gracer cooks up a delicious plate of insects and invites Stephen join in the feast.
• Stephen Colbert’s Fallback Position – Astrophysicist: Stephen visits Neil deGrasse Tyson to learn how to be an Astrophysicist.




• Richard Thompson Ford: Richard Thompson Ford believes the Clintons are playing the race card against Obama

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