England for Obama

(Thanks to Daily Kos for the round-up)

“Attention passengers: The Straight Talk Express is no longer in service. … Barack Obama is our new president. I think I speak for everybody when I say, ‘Anybody mind if he starts a little early?’ … At the end of the night, the electoral vote count was 349 for Obama, 148 for McCain. Or as Fox News says: ‘too close to call.’”
—David Letterman

“People were worried about the Bradley effect. Apparently, it was not nearly as strong as the Bush effect.”
—Jay Leno

“You know who I blame? The Large Hadron Collider. It is the world’s largest and highest particle accelerator. You may remember we were warned that it could create a black hole and destroy the Earth. Consider this: it launched in mid-September, when John McCain was leading in the polls. I believe it jolted us into a parallel universe that was exactly like our own, only Barack Obama is president and the Phillies are world champions.”
—Stephen Colbert

“Yesterday, first lady Laura Bush called Michelle Obama and invited her and her young daughters to the White House. Laura Bush told Mrs. Obama, ‘While I give you a tour, the girls can watch SpongeBob with the president.’”
—Conan O’Brien

“We’re all very happy except Sean Hannity, who is too busy in the bathroom crying.”
—Fox News’s Chris Wallace on The Daily Show

“People all over the world are celebrating Obama’s victory. Sarah Palin watched the Russians celebrating from her house. … Sen. John McCain’s concession speech was beautiful. It was dignified, and it was classy. And I think the reason for that is he didn’t let Palin say anything.”
—Craig Ferguson

“President Bush called Barack Obama to congratulate him. … Obama thanked Bush for his call and for all he did to help Obama get elected.”
—Jimmy Kimmel

“But right about now Joe the plumber is meeting with his transition team. They’re going to help ease him from obscurity back to oblivion.”
—David Letterman

And I’d like to add these from Stephen Colbert:

“Last night we elected a man called Barack Hussein Obama. What part of that doesn’t scare you?”

“It’s no secret that I have been upset since the election. I’ve tried taking my aggression out on a punching bag - but all the stuffing fell out after the first shotgun blast.”

“Obama’s victory: the international community weighs in. But it’s in metric, so who cares.”

“Obviously, American voters must not watch TV or movies - or they would know that every time a black man is President, something terrible happens. Either terrorists set off a nuclear bomb or an asteroid strikes the Earth… If these movies are any indication, it is only a matter of time before a terrorist teams up with an asteroid to invade the US. Though I am sure President Obama would be willing to sit down with the asteroid without pre-conditions.”

An aside: it appears that UK viewers can no longer watch video clips from The Colbert Report on its site. Which is, of course, gutting. You can still watch Daily Show clips, though - so I have no idea what, as they say, gives.

The election night coverage in one minute. Brilliant:

(Hat-tip: Bob Cesca.)

So, in fact, there’s nothing major to report this morning following yesterday’s bombshell from John McCain. Except that - as I wrote in my comment to P Grecco last night - it’s come out that the Republican camp want to push the presidential debate back to October 2, which is, surprise surprise!, the date that the vice presidential debate is due to take place. ie. they want to push that back too, to an unspecified date. Ideally, presumably, ‘never’.

Could this possibly be because they fear that Sarah Palin is at best unprepared for, or at worst unable to cope with, her debate with Joe Biden? Could this entire ‘rushing to Washington’ thing have been purposely constructed in order to push back - or even eliminate - as many debates as possible? I wouldn’t put it past the GOP.

For what it’s worth - and it actually is worth quite a lot - polls of American people on various news sites seem to show that the overwhelming majority think the debate this Friday should still go on (looks like McCain got the public opinion wrong on this one - oops); and the debate commission is also insisting, along with Obama, that it goes ahead.

In the meantime, both Barack Obama and John McCain are going to be in Washington today, at the invitation of George Bush - although apparently this invite was extended months ago - and there were some big TV moments yesterday.

Firstly, George Bush addressed the nation about the economic crisis and the proposed bailout plan. Here’s the MSNBC Nightly News team analysing what was, essentially, a sales pitch:

Secondly, The Late Show With David Letterman saw its host rip into John McCain, who was supposed to be appearing on it but pulled out at the last minute due to his rush to Washington (only it turns out he was in the studio next door):

And thirdly, video of Katie Couric’s Monday night interview with Sarah Palin appeared on YouTube (my jaw, which had been slowly moving towards the floor, actually hit it on Palin’s last line):

So, Bill Clinton was on the David Letterman show on Monday night. And so was Chris Rock. And the latter couldn’t help but notice the former’s reluctance to actually talk about Barack Obama. Although he seemed perfectly happy to mention Hillary Clinton, Joe Biden and John McCain. A lot. Is Bubba consumed with jealousy, or something?

Someone has compiled both Bill and Chris moments for a YouTube video, below. Enjoy. Well, enjoy the Chris Rock part, at least:

Adda boy!

Yes, it was a biggie, folks! Here’s the rest of Obama’s interview on The Late Show With David Letterman - in which he talks about 9/11, Bin Laden and Afghanistan (until Dave’s head starts hurting), his first trip to the American mainland,  how the world views America, the hurricanes, Bill Clinton and his family.

To quote Dave: “He’s just smart”. Compare and contrast Sarah Palin’s not-so-smart, deer-in-headlights, arrogant, uninformed, sabre-wrattling performance in her first TV interview, with Charlie Gibson on ABC (see here and also here). This woman could easily become the most powerful person on the planet. One word: scaaaary.

(In case you missed it, here’s part one of Obama on Letterman - which includes the Lipstickonapiggate discussion)

Our man was on the David Letterman show last night - and handled the whole lipstick/pig thing rather nicely. As well as other matters, of course:

(Part Two will be posted as soon as someone puts it up on YouTube).