Posted on 09/24/2010 4:28:41 PM PDT by RobinMasters
WASHINGTON – Taking his blowhard comedy act to Congress, Stephen Colbert told lawmakers that a day picking beans alongside illegal immigrants convinced him that farm work is "really, really hard." "It turns out — and I did not know this — most soil is at ground level," Colbert testified Friday. Also, "It was hotter than I like to be."
Still, Colbert expressed befuddlement that more Americans aren't clamoring to "begin an exciting career" in the fields and instead are leaving the low-paid work to illegal immigrants.
Staying in character as a Comedy Central news commentator, Colbert offered a House hearing his "vast" knowledge, drawn from spending a single day on a New York farm as a guest of the United Farm Workers.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
I just sent a note to my congresswoman to register my disgust with this stunt. I encourage others to do the same.
***************
Send this same farcical group monopoly money in lieu of taxes and see how they laugh.
There is no way to tell where we will be a few years from now, but this existing order is clearly on its last legs. We are reaching the point where Caligula’s horse would in fact be better than most of our senators.
Colbert was brought before Congress in order to keep the media focus there instead of on the Coates testimony regarding the Black Panthers. It worked.
*************
Yes it did. Outside of the talk show, I have heard this ass three times today on the hourly news, the New Black Panther travesty only once.
I was the scrawny kid who got to climb up into the rafters of the barn and pack bales of hay into the hard to get areas.
Colbert is one of those fellows who, when he hears the words “manual labor”, thinks it’s a reference to a former President of Mexico.
Been there, done that!
It gets quite hot up there, doesn't it? Moving that open frame conveyor around while it was running would get a bunch of liberals all up in arms with charges of child endangerment these days.
Also, that old Holland hay baler sure had a few external moving parts that would make their heads explode.
What a Sap/
Good post. I think some are missing the point here, Colbert is ‘playing’ the part of an idiot newsperson and he ‘played’ it to a hilt. Don’t blame him; that is what he does, it is Lofgren who should be censured. Testimony before the Congress is based on an oath to tell the truth. This guy was in his ‘role’ and therefore it is NOT the truth. How would Congress allow this? Even John Coyners was uncomfortable with all of this.
This just further shows how out of touch the democrat congress is that they would allow this farce before the committee. In a way, I am glad they did it. I was boiling inside knowing that they were making a mockery of themselves. They have time for mindless comedy, but not enough time to debate the expiring tax cuts? This will be the message.
I learned all about safety by working in a dangerous environment.
One of my friends was killed on a neighboring farm when a hydraulic line burst and the bucket on a front end loader came down on him. The farmer I worked for just said “That’s why I scream at you guys to stay out from under the damn things”. We learned that lesson by someone elses misfortune.
Rise n Shine at 4AM,
feed the cows, horses, pigs n chickens,
load the milk on the truck to the dairy,
back home, shower, eat breakfast,
walk off to school 3 miles, snow sometimes 6 feet deep drifts if plowed- got snowshoes--
Walk back home at 5pm,
go bring the cows home,
feed horses,
chop wood for the stove,
eat dinner ,
homework
sleep.-
Weekends gardens, chores etc.
nothin` to it;
I was 8 years old
tweren`t hard no how. [My mom made us walk to school. I still walk 3 miles a day.]
Next to harvesting, picking hay bales was fun! Used to ride on top of the stack of bales on the flat bed trailer.
It is amazing the kind of people we have to put up with today.
I am so sick of seeing people put all their energy into oversized egos while only caring about what they think and how they look to people.
If they would spend all that energy into being honest and sincere; they would be surprised how much happier they would be and something might actually get done for the good; instead of being consistently lied to and stolen from.
My young nephew needed money so he picked watermelons here in Phoenix, in the summer.
In the spirit of full disclosure, he’s a white kid.
Has anyone written about what a mockery this actually was to hispanic people? I found it all horribly patronizing and racist. Here were the elitists and government bureaucrats basically mocking and laughing at hard working LEGAL hispanics. They were basically saying that they didn’t want anyone to take their mexican slaves away and in fact, they needed more hispanic slaves to do manual labor that they are just too damn good to do themselves.
It not only was a waste of taxpayer dollars..it was the very definition of institutional racism imho.
Americans that voted for these people should be embarassed and ashamed of themselves.
Not that there is anything wrong with that!
Funny!
“How could the U.S. House of Representatives stand for this lunacy ?”
Why didn’t the Republicans WALK OUT!
I’d pay good money to see the SirePower man have his way with him.
I heard it is cheaper to pick grapes for wine in Australia than it is in California, even though CA relies on Mexican labor for picking and Australia has automated grape picking because there is no migrant labor there.
America used to lead the world in automating unskilled jobs out of existence. Now Unions fight every attempt. A little automation would go a long way toward eliminating those “jobs Americans won’t do”.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.