Malachai

I am not sure whether or not I watched the correct Colbert Report, because I did not get linked strait to it, but the one I watched was called Guitarmagideon. I thought it was hilarious, although I am not too sure as to why it was satiralcle. I think for the most part that the entire show was concentrated on exposing just what present day music consists of. By this I mean that it was showing that present day music has become rather wild. Despite, the true satire of the show was mainly in the judges. It poked fun at the government as well as music journalists. The music journalists pretended to favor only one type of music. One only chose bands with a certain guy in it and the other simply chose any type of music that teens listen to in order to help his own approval ratings. The governor  meanwhile, decided to take himself out of the preceedings ant the end in order to avoid being linked with possible corruption at the very end of the show, and I believe that this makes fun of the government by trying to show that the government will stay involved as long as it is not questioned. I thought Colbert was hilarious in this show and I especially appriciated the guitar solos in it. This was one of the best shows I have seen him do if simply because he ripped off his sleeves and pretended to play a 5 neck guitar. I thought the piece was simply great and an excellent though unclear piece of satire.

Also. The fact that they added Henry Kissinger was just brilliant.

Despite the argument that racial issues in today’s society have been effectively removing themselves, there is still a strong undertone of racial importance in our nation. While it is true that present day clashes concerning race are less frequent, that has not effectively eliminated the problem. Even though many people keep their racial views quieted, there have still been events that have revealed a much more aggravated situation. For example, crises in our nation have unleashed strong displays of racism in many people. In the aftermath of the World Trade Center Bombing, there was a strong movement that categorized people from the
Middle East as terrorists. Our nation became prejudice and that air developed into racism. Our government has even embraced this mentality. Another example was Hurricane Katrina. 

“Some 71% of blacks say the disaster shows that racial inequality remains a major problem in
America, according to a survey by the

Pew
Research
Center for the People & the Press, conducted Sept. 6-7 among 1,000 Americans; 56% of whites feel this was not a particularly important lesson.And while 66% of blacks think the government’s response would have been faster if most of the victims had been white, 77% of whites disagreed.”-USA Today, (tomorrow the world) 

This passage from usatoday.com just helps to show how many people lie in ignorance of racism. This survey helps to show how people of all ethnicities can find something to fault in another race, just as they can act out against a race all the while ignorant or in denial of these same actions. All of these things simply help to prove that despite the belief of some, racism remains a strong factor among today’s social problems. If we are to amend this rift caused by race, then we must first come to terms with the racism that exists in ourselves. Only then can this problem of race be mended. It is quite possible that this rift will never fully mend, but hopefully time will fix that which others have destroyed: racial unity.

This article actually did relate to Huck Finn. Racism was a strong theme in the book just as it is in this article. For example, almost everyone that Huck meets along the way believes themselves to be superior to a slave. At that time, blacks were accepted as an inferior race. Thus the people of that time were extremely racist. Even Mark Twain himself while he did write of the liberty and integrity, he also factored in the superiority of the white man in his books. All blacks were considered inferior in some way. There is even a section where Jim discusses how he is going to get an abolitionist to steal his children for him. This article fits in with this because it is discussing how the social rift created by the slave system is still with us today- in the form of racism.  

Even Before the War on Iraq, there were already deals being made with major oil corperations in the United States. One such company was Haliburton.

“Halliburton’s stock price responded swiftly, plummeting to $12.62 in October 2002, from a high of $22 the year beforee, and rumors began to swirl that the company would be forced to file for bankruptcy.

But news of a pending war in Iraq meant that Halliburton’s financial troubles would, like Saddam Hussein’s regime, be history. Classified documents from November 2002 show that the Department of Defense recommended that The Army Corps of Engineers award a contract to Brown & Root to extinguish Iraqi oil well fires in addition to ‘assessing the condition of oil-related infrastructure; cleaning up oil spills or other environmental damage at oil facilities; engineering design and repair or reconstruction of damaged infrastructure; assisting in making facilities operational; distribution of petroleum products; and assisting the Iraqis in resuming Iraqi oil company operations.”‘       -By Jason Leopold from

There are many people that believe that Racism has been extremely diminished and is almost nonexistant in todays society. However there seem to be cases concerning racism that have been frequently coming up in the news as well as in pop culture. The movie Crash, which came out last year brought many racial issues to the surface. Another movie would be Borat, which showed white Americans doing racist acts under the premise that the movie would only be shown in the far off nation of Khazakstan. In truth, racism seems to be an extremely important issue in today’s society and here is one recent instance:On November 24, a group of men leaving a club in
New York City was shot at 50 times by NYPD.

Interestingly enough, there is no mention of race in the article. It does not mention the race of anyone involved. I find this pointed avoidance just as interesting as the case itself. The writer of this article cleanly left out all race. Sean Bell is known to be black from his picture, but the police are not mentioned. One source says that there were both white and black police officers involved. This only makes the situation more interesting. These two quotes from the New York times help to show how there was no good explanation for the act:

“But one after another, in conversations with Sergeant Kipp or Sergeant Wheeler, the men said they could not say how many shots they had fired. Two said they were unsure whether they had even fired at all, including a detective who investigators later learned had fired 31 shots, emptying his 9-millimeter Sig Sauer pistol, reloading and emptying it again during the frenzied barrage.”- The New York Times 

“Mr. Bell, mortally wounded and not speaking, and Joseph Guzman, despite wounds from his head to his feet, were put in handcuffs after the gunfire ceased.”- The New York Times

These acts show how horrible things can happen to innocent people when race gets in the way. Witnesses say that Sean Bell had crashed and upon doing so, the driver of the Minivan got out of the car and started firing without even approaching the car. There is no accident when 50 bullets are fired.

This just goes to show that hundreds of years after the abolition of slavery, there is still lingering conflict over the matter. I do not think that this instance has a strong relation to Huck Finn because the book does not deal with the lingering effects of slavery but rather the conditions of it. And I found the entire ordeal of this case to be rather sick.

I believe that the wild success of satire is a result of its manner concerning problems.  Satire makes fun of serious issues in a constructive manner so that it will help to make people aware of the seriousness of situations. For example, when one of the most prestigious philosophers in
Ireland suggests that eating babies will help to solve a hunger problem, people are shocked. Satire can often utilize a sickening sense of humor, but it still draws attention to major problems. A movie like Borat or the essay “A modest proposal” are satire because they poke fun at serious world problems. In Borat, it is racism that is confronted and in “A modest proposal” it is the living conditions of the Irish nation. These examples look to change society and they aim to better it as well. A movie such as Scary Movie however is not one that does this. While it does make fun of some larger problems, it does not take a stand on them and the purpose is humor rather than change. To me, satire is something I enjoy because it brings out the darker look on many problems and helps to reveal many things. Thus satire is amusing as well as constructive. Some of my favorite examples include Farside comics and Saturday Night Live.