Not a day after a segment on Michael Flynn that sacrificed comedy in an effort to keep the facts straight, Seth Meyers has rebalanced the scales, bringing Breitbart News spokesman Jeffery Sims on to explain everything Meyers’ left-of-center audience needs to know about the conservative website. The interview is a model of the “new civility” Trump’s presidency requires from the press: Meyers approaches Breitbart News with exactly as much respect as their long record of groundbreaking journalism requires, and the results speak for themselves. Watch this segment, and you’ll know everything about Breitbart News you’ll ever need to.
Silliness can be a powerful weapon against insults-to-the-intelligence like Breitbart—an outright refusal to engage with arguments that aren’t worthy of engagement—and this segment is a welcome relief from the kind of Trump-said-this-today-but-earlier-said-this-other-thing hypocrisy scoreboard that’s become such a big part of topical comedy since Jon Stewart. It’s going to be a long four years, full of complicated and often boring scandals that we’ll all have a regrettable duty to keep up with. With that kind of work ahead, it’s nice to be reminded of a simple, liberating truth about Trump, Bannon, Breitbart, et al.: These people are fucking ridiculous.
