BROOKE GLADSTONE: From WNYC in New York, this is On the Media. I'm Brooke Gladstone.

BOB GARFIELD: And I'm Bob Garfield. Will Vladimir Putin send Russian troops into Eastern Ukraine? Will Malaysia Air Flight 370 be located before its flight data recorder stops pinging? Can the Israel-Palestinian peace talks be revived? Who cares! The big questions at week’s end concerned the retirement of Late Show host David Letterman and Stephen Colbert's ascension to his chair.

  [CLIP]:

STEPHEN COLBERT:  But guys like us, we don’t – we don’t pay attention to the polls. We know that, that polls are just a collection of statistics that reflect what people are thinking, in reality.

  [AUDIENCE LAUGHTER]

And reality has a well-known liberal bias.

  [END CLIP]

BOB GARFIELD:  The first riddle is how comfortable the politically diverse audience of network TV will be with a comedian so associated with the political left. Colbert, in the character of a right-wing blowhard, has used irony as a bludgeon against conservative Republicans for nine years.

  [CLIP]:

STEPHEN COLBERT:  I’m sure you agree with me that it is a proud day to be an American, because thanks to a minority of the US Senate, we no longer have to live in fear of some maniac coming after those we love with a gun control bill.

  [AUDIENCE LAUGHTER][END CLIP]

BOB GARFIELD:  How might such satire play at 11:30 pm in Kansas and Oklahoma? Well, at least one actual right-wing blowhard says it isn’t meant to.

  [CLIP]:

RUSH LIMBAUGH:  CBS has just declared war on the heartland of America. No longer is comedy going to be a covert assault on traditional American values, conservatism. Now it’s just wide out in the open. It’s, it’s media planting a flag here.

  [END CLIP]

BOB GARFIELD:  Let’s just assume that CBS, a profit-making enterprise, isn't actually plotting to alienate exactly half of the network’s late-night audience. There remains the question of who even will be hosting Late Night, the preening pretend ideologue Colbert won’t be filling the chair. Instead, it will be occupied by the inveterate comedian Colbert, rarely glimpsed since his emergence as a star in 1997 on The Daily Show. Here’s the genuine Colbert in 2007, with Tim Russert on Meet the Press.

  [CLIP]:

TIM RUSSERT:  Is it hard going in and out of character?

STEPHEN COLBERT:  No, no. You know, I starred at Second City in Chicago, and the rule there, or the, the old, the old saying was, “Wear your character as lightly as a cap.”

 [END CLIP]

BROOKE GLADSTONE:  Maybe he does wear his character “lightly as a cap.” But I take its passing hard. Here’s Colbert with Letterman in 2005, just before launching The Report.

  [CLIP]:

DAVID LETTERMAN:  And, and the type of thing you’ll be doing on the show?

STEPHEN COLBERT:  Um, changing the world.

  [LAUGHTER]

You know.

LETTERMAN:  Wow! [LAUGHS]

COLBERT:  People are clamoring for -

LETTERMAN:  For, for world change.

COLBERT:  - for me. I've been on The Daily Show for years, but -

LETTERMAN:  How long do you think it'll take you to, to change the world there?

COLBERT:  Uh, I think we have an eight-week initial commitment.

LETTERMAN:  [LAUGHS]

  [AUDIENCE LAUGHTER][END CLIP]

BROOKE GLADSTONE:  Many said it couldn’t be done, a one-note character sustaining a show night after night after night.

  [CLIP]:

[LAUGHTER]

STEPHEN COLBERT:  Now, I know some you may not trust your gut, yet, but with my help you will.

  [LAUGHTER]

The truthiness is anyone can read the news to you. I promise to feel the news at you.

  [LAUGHTER][END CLIP]

BROOKE GLADSTONE:  Who could have imagined what a many splendid thing it could be, not just for skewering the right, but the nation’s increasingly splenetic zeitgeist that fosters the accretion of balderdash, which he confronts right at the source and for just a moment shames and shrivels it.

  [CLIP]:

STEPHEN COLBERT:  I’m happy to use my celebrity to draw attention to this important complicated issue, and I certainly hope that my star power can bump this hearing all the way up to C-SPAN 1.

  [END CLIP]

BROOKE GLADSTONE:  Legislators sat glumly at the subcommittee hearing on, quote, “Protecting America's Harvest.”

  [CLIPS]:

STEPEHN COLBERT:  I don't want a tomato picked by a Mexican. I want it picked by an American, then sliced by a Guatemalan and served by a Venezuelan in a spa where a Chilean gives me a Brazilian.

BROOKE GLADSTONE:  Hardly anyone laughed.

STEPHEN COLBERT:  My great-grandfather did not travel across 4,000 miles of the Atlantic Ocean to see this country overrun by immigrants. He did it because he killed a man back in Ireland.

BROOKE GLADSTONE:  It was hilariously painful.

STEPHEN COLBERT:  I trust that following my testimony both sides will work together in the best interest of the American people, as you always do.

  [END CLIPS][MUSIC UP & UNDER]

BROOKE GLADSTONE:  Stephen Colbert is a brilliant comedian who uses his powers for good. He seems to be a modest man, too modest perhaps, to see that by lightly shedding the cap of his creation, he’s depriving us all of a national treasure. And I’m not joking.

BROOKE GLADSTONE: From WNYC in New York, this is On the Media. I'm Brooke Gladstone.

BOB GARFIELD: And I'm Bob Garfield. Will Vladimir Putin send Russian troops into Eastern Ukraine? Will Malaysia Air Flight 370 be located before its flight data recorder stops pinging? Can the Israel-Palestinian peace talks be revived? Who cares! The big questions at week’s end concerned the retirement of Late Show host David Letterman and Stephen Colbert's ascension to his chair.

  [CLIP]:

STEPHEN COLBERT:  But guys like us, we don’t – we don’t pay attention to the polls. We know that, that polls are just a collection of statistics that reflect what people are thinking, in reality.

  [AUDIENCE LAUGHTER]

And reality has a well-known liberal bias.

  [END CLIP]

BOB GARFIELD:  The first riddle is how comfortable the politically diverse audience of network TV will be with a comedian so associated with the political left. Colbert, in the character of a right-wing blowhard, has used irony as a bludgeon against conservative Republicans for nine years.

  [CLIP]:

STEPHEN COLBERT:  I’m sure you agree with me that it is a proud day to be an American, because thanks to a minority of the US Senate, we no longer have to live in fear of some maniac coming after those we love with a gun control bill.

  [AUDIENCE LAUGHTER][END CLIP]

BOB GARFIELD:  How might such satire play at 11:30 pm in Kansas and Oklahoma? Well, at least one actual right-wing blowhard says it isn’t meant to.

  [CLIP]:

RUSH LIMBAUGH:  CBS has just declared war on the heartland of America. No longer is comedy going to be a covert assault on traditional American values, conservatism. Now it’s just wide out in the open. It’s, it’s media planting a flag here.

  [END CLIP]

BOB GARFIELD:  Let’s just assume that CBS, a profit-making enterprise, isn't actually plotting to alienate exactly half of the network’s late-night audience. There remains the question of who even will be hosting Late Night, the preening pretend ideologue Colbert won’t be filling the chair. Instead, it will be occupied by the inveterate comedian Colbert, rarely glimpsed since his emergence as a star in 1997 on The Daily Show. Here’s the genuine Colbert in 2007, with Tim Russert on Meet the Press.

  [CLIP]:

TIM RUSSERT:  Is it hard going in and out of character?

STEPHEN COLBERT:  No, no. You know, I starred at Second City in Chicago, and the rule there, or the, the old, the old saying was, “Wear your character as lightly as a cap.”

 [END CLIP]

BROOKE GLADSTONE:  Maybe he does wear his character “lightly as a cap.” But I take its passing hard. Here’s Colbert with Letterman in 2005, just before launching The Report.

  [CLIP]:

DAVID LETTERMAN:  And, and the type of thing you’ll be doing on the show?

STEPHEN COLBERT:  Um, changing the world.

  [LAUGHTER]

You know.

LETTERMAN:  Wow! [LAUGHS]

COLBERT:  People are clamoring for -

LETTERMAN:  For, for world change.

COLBERT:  - for me. I've been on The Daily Show for years, but -

LETTERMAN:  How long do you think it'll take you to, to change the world there?

COLBERT:  Uh, I think we have an eight-week initial commitment.

LETTERMAN:  [LAUGHS]

  [AUDIENCE LAUGHTER][END CLIP]

BROOKE GLADSTONE:  Many said it couldn’t be done, a one-note character sustaining a show night after night after night.

  [CLIP]:

[LAUGHTER]

STEPHEN COLBERT:  Now, I know some you may not trust your gut, yet, but with my help you will.

  [LAUGHTER]

The truthiness is anyone can read the news to you. I promise to feel the news at you.

  [LAUGHTER][END CLIP]

BROOKE GLADSTONE:  Who could have imagined what a many splendid thing it could be, not just for skewering the right, but the nation’s increasingly splenetic zeitgeist that fosters the accretion of balderdash, which he confronts right at the source and for just a moment shames and shrivels it.

  [CLIP]:

STEPHEN COLBERT:  I’m happy to use my celebrity to draw attention to this important complicated issue, and I certainly hope that my star power can bump this hearing all the way up to C-SPAN 1.

  [END CLIP]

BROOKE GLADSTONE:  Legislators sat glumly at the subcommittee hearing on, quote, “Protecting America's Harvest.”

  [CLIPS]:

STEPEHN COLBERT:  I don't want a tomato picked by a Mexican. I want it picked by an American, then sliced by a Guatemalan and served by a Venezuelan in a spa where a Chilean gives me a Brazilian.

BROOKE GLADSTONE:  Hardly anyone laughed.

STEPHEN COLBERT:  My great-grandfather did not travel across 4,000 miles of the Atlantic Ocean to see this country overrun by immigrants. He did it because he killed a man back in Ireland.

BROOKE GLADSTONE:  It was hilariously painful.

STEPHEN COLBERT:  I trust that following my testimony both sides will work together in the best interest of the American people, as you always do.

  [END CLIPS][MUSIC UP & UNDER]

BROOKE GLADSTONE:  Stephen Colbert is a brilliant comedian who uses his powers for good. He seems to be a modest man, too modest perhaps, to see that by lightly shedding the cap of his creation, he’s depriving us all of a national treasure. And I’m not joking.