News Satire Roundup: October 23rd-October 27th

Sunday, October 23 – Unsurprisingly, we opened on the debate, along with Trump’s “roasting” at the Alfred E. Smith Memorial Foundation Dinner – ayiyi.  My favorite part was John’s plan to get Trump to concede if he loses the election by a) Trump betting John that he’ll lose, so he’d at least be winning the bet and b) John offering Trump his Emmy (since Trump was mad about losing to The Amazing Race) in exchange for concession.  The main story was on opioid addiction, looking mainly at prescription painkillers but also how such addictions frequently lead to heroin.  A complex, disturbing story about looking for the balance between needed pain relief and narcotic dependence, as well as the companies that profited to people’s serious detriment.  I really liked what John said about how Big Pharma’s promise of quick, cheap, and easy pain relief created a massive problem whose hard-fought solution will be none of those things.

Monday, October 24 – I’d known the show wasn’t filming on Monday and figured it would be a repeat, but I found another clip show waiting for me on the DVR.  This one focused mainly on the period surrounding the three debates.  It’s insane how much further/faster the election has gone downhill than it had even a month ago.  I laughed out loud at the clip of Trevor citing Trump not paying federal income tax as the election’s “biggest scandal so far” (how innocent we were then…)  Since it was all so recent, though, there wasn’t much of note here.  I liked that they included excerpts from Ronny’s piece about the Fox News segment in Chinatown and Hasan’s piece asking RNC attendees about Trump’s proposed Muslim ban (I think that might have been the only bit that was made prior to debates.)  I’m pretty sure they showed Jordan’s piece asking Trump supporters about the Access Hollywood tape in its entirety, which was surprising.

Tuesday, October 25 – Felt like kind of a hodgepodge show.  Trevor started with a quick bit on social media indiscretions, from Justin Timberlake’s voting booth selfie to a man Snap Chatting the birth of his child.  Okay story on the largest refugee camp in France being shut down – I enjoyed the offense Trevor took at it being called “The Jungle,” but Roy’s on-location report felt a bit lacking.  A piece on Trump’s First 100 Days plan dovetailed into his litigious nature, since suing the women who’ve accused him of sexual assault is a big part of his plan.  I got a kick out of Jordan’s extremely-targeted “Lawyers for Donald Trump” infomercial promising to defend against such scourges as “facts” and “tapes of things you said.”  I liked the guest, CNN’s Dana Bash; it’s always interesting to hear journalists talk about the experience of covering Trump, and I laughed when Trevor asked if she was doing her part in the media to “rig” the election.

Wednesday, October 26 – Loved the story on Biden wishing he could “take [Trump] behind the gym” to settle things between them.  It was all good – Trevor arguing that everyone knows behind the gym is for hooking up, election insanity that wasn’t scary or appalling for once, Trump’s blowhard ways – and I liked how it opened up into a story about media slant, how we consume our news rather than the news.  Two-guest night.  First up was pollster John Della Volpe.  He wouldn’t cop to rigging the election, but he shared some of the more impressive numbers and explained why rigging a poll wouldn’t benefit a pollster.  Second was Phil Collins – I’d thought he was there to perform, but he was promoting his memoir.  I enjoyed what he said about the extraordinary music scenes he was able to enter as a young man, from encountering the Beatles in their Abbey Road days to knowing Eric Clapton on a first-name basis.

Thursday, October 27 – After (briefly) mourning the loss of Vine, it was straight into a story on Obamacare.  Overall, I thought it was critical but reasonable, looking at the flaws in the system while acknowledging the disproportionate hatred gets in Congress and falling on the side that it needs fixing, not scrapping.  To help us through the dull talk of health insurance, we were given with numerous YouTube clips of ill-advised stunts resulting in definite painful injuries.  With more of Trump’s “rigged election” talk (kudos to Trevor for working in a logical Jeffrey Dahmer comparison!), Desi and Eliza took to the streets to show just how to rig a poll.  Eh – I get what they were going for, but it wasn’t that funny and didn’t have much to say.  Decent interview with the rapper Jeezy.  I enjoyed his description of what trap means to him, and his anecdote about paying for throat surgery out-of-pocket was more amusing than a story like that ought to be.