I’m Miguel Centellas, a political science professor at Mount St. Mary’s University. Because of academic interests, I post frequently on Bolivian politics. I also occasionally discuss interesting books, pop culture, and daily life in Baltimore.
If you haven’t already heard, Jon Stewart announced that Evo Morales will be on Comedy Central’s The Daily Show tonight (11pm EST). This is quite a coup for the show, which is fast becoming more of a “serious” news show than mainstream news (but does anyone think CNN, FOX, etc. are “serious” news networks anymore?). Needless to say, I’ll be tuning in.
---- PS. Both The Daily Show & The Colbert Report have recently become the subject of a number of political science conference papers & journal articles.
Oops, it was Chavez that was "too busy", not Morales. But maybe he wants to get home in time to see Morales on TV. :)
Posted by
Frank IBC
September 25, 2007 1:25 PM
Thanks, Eduardo.
Posted by
Frank IBC
September 25, 2007 1:26 PM
Does Evo speak English?
Posted by
John
September 25, 2007 1:47 PM
Reuters (according to freepeltiernow blog)says The Daily Show is going to use a translator, the first time they've done that. I hope the translator has a good sense of humor.
Posted by
John
September 25, 2007 1:55 PM
Miguel,
Okay, I'll bite....what's up with the conference papers and journal articles? Why are the Daily Show and Colbert Report an issue? What did the papers/articles say about the shows? Enquiring minds...G.
Posted by
GS
September 25, 2007 7:50 PM
GS:
I linked to some reports in the post above. Basically, there have been a number of studies on the influence of the two shows on American politics. Some studies have shown that a significant number of young people get most of their TV news/commentary from TDS (The Daily Show) than other sources. Studies have also shown that TDS viewers are more knowledgeable about political issues than those who got their news primarily from "hard" news sources. One study also did content analysis of TDS & other shows (on CNN, FOX, MSNBC, etc) and found that the informational content was nearly the same (that is, CNN shows didn't provide any more information or content on "hard" news stories than TDS did) and even found that TDS spent less of its time on "fluff" stories (like Paris Hilton) than other networks did.
I watched Evo’s appearance in the Daily Show (link provided in the post above). I must say that I was a little disappointed. Evo doesn’t lack charisma, but he didn’t seem to understand the nature of the show and some of the answers he gave were far too serious and beside the point. For instance, when asked about his friendship with Chávez and Castro, he stated some philosophical platitudes urging humankind to be united to save lives and things like that.
I think his last sentence (“please don’t consider me part of the axis of evil”) was his best and somewhat made up for the dullness of the previous part.
