By sheer coincidence, late night talk show legend David Letterman was scheduled to speak at The Atlantic Festival this week. His appearance came shortly after ABC decided to suspend Jimmy Kimmel’s late night talk show over comments he made in a monologue pertaining to the shooting of Charlie Kirk.
Naturally, with an opportunity such as that presenting itself, Jeffrey Goldberg, the editor in chief of The Atlantic, changed the topic of conversation with Letterman from discussing artificial intelligence and its role in entertainment to the threats facing late night talk show hosts like Jimmy Kimmel and Stephen Colbert.
David Letterman had already addressed the cancellation of not only Stephen Colbert, but also the show he created, The Late Show, even though it had higher ratings than both The Tonight Show With Jimmy Fallon and Jimmy Kimmel Live. This week, Letterman was asked what he thinks about what happened to Kimmel.
“Well, this is misery,” he replied. “And in the world of somebody who is an authoritarian, maybe a dictatorship, sooner or later, everyone is going to be touched. But this is me for 30 years. I did this for a living. So I see this happen. They took care of Colbert. That was rude. That was inexcusable. The man deserves a great deal of credit. He’s in the Hall of Fame nine times. And to be manipulated like that because the Ellison family didn’t want to trouble Donald Trump with this move. So, they got rid of him. Not only got rid of him, got rid of the whole franchise. You’re not going to have to worry about anything, Larry. It’s all gone. It’s fine. Good night.
“And then my good friend, Jimmy Kimmel. I, you know, I just feel bad about this because we all see where this is going, correct? It’s managed media and it’s no good. It’s silly. It’s ridiculous. And you can’t go around firing somebody because you’re fearful or trying to suck up to an authoritarian criminal administration in the Oval Office. That’s just not how this works.”
David Letterman takes aim at the FCC
“10 years ago, I was smart enough to cancel myself. But the other thing is the FCC. this guy, Brendan Carr. Yes. So this guy, the FCC, is ‘we can do things the easy way, we can do things the hard way.’ Who is hiring these goons? Mario Puzo? The FCC: we’re not happy until you’re not happy. For God’s sakes.”
Carr had said about Jimmy Kimmel prior to his suspension, “Frankly, when you see stuff like this — I mean, we can do this the easy way or the hard way. These companies can find ways to change conduct, to take action, frankly, on Kimmel, or there’s going to be additional work for the FCC ahead.”
“When I was a kid, I was like 20-years-old and I wanted to work at a radio station,” David Letterman continued. “So I went to Chicago to the FCC. You take a test, you pass the test, you have your third phone radio broadcasting license. That’s what the FCC does. If you’re a 50,000 watt clear channel radio station, once a year they’ll come and check your dials to make sure you’re not broadcasting at 55,000 watts. And God forbid you are, then you get an $8 fine. That’s is the FCC. I don’t know what is going on here.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RFrktJ6_X_M
He went on to say that “the point is, beating up on these people, rightly or wrongly, accurately or perhaps inaccurately, in the name of comedy, not once were we squeezed by anyone from any governmental agency, let alone the dreaded FCC. Republican, Democrat, never… because everybody sort of understood in the name of humor, in the in the name of commenting on what’s going on in the world, cultural events, why not? And by the way, the institution of the President of the United States ought to be bigger than a guy doing a talk show, you know? It just it really ought to be bigger.”
Letterman also added that Jimmy Kimmel had texted him that morning. “He’s sitting up in bed, taking nourishment. He’s going to be fine,” he said.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-lxAJUmjol8
The post David Letterman Addresses Jimmy Kimmel Suspension: ‘It’s Managed Media And It’s No Good’ appeared first on BroBible.
David Letterman Addresses Jimmy Kimmel Suspension: ‘It’s Managed Media And It’s No Good’
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