Jason Newburger

BREAKING: BRAVO! Stephen Colbert defies his corporate bosses and reveals that CBS REFUSED to air his interview with Democratic Senate candidate James Talarico due to bullying by Trump’s FCC! It would appear that Trump and his team are very, very, very worried about losing the critical Senate race in *Texas* of all places, and they’re trying to put the clamps on the candidate they think can win — Rep. James Talarico. Hot off the heels of a viral appearance on The View where he showcased his eloquence and his leadership, Talarico was set to do The Late Show with Colbert…but Trump’s FCC stepped in to block it, telling the Colbert team that they could only release the interview on YouTube. “You know, you know who is not one of my guests tonight? That's Texas State Representative James Talarico. He was supposed to be here, but we were told in no uncertain terms by our network's lawyers, who called us directly, that we could not have him on the broadcast. Then, then I was told in some uncertain terms that not only could I not have him on, I could not mention me not having him on,” explains Colbert. “And because my network clearly doesn't want us to talk about this, let's talk about this. So, you might have heard of this thing called the Equal Time Rule, okay? It's an old FCC rule that applies only to radio and broadcast television, not cable or streaming, that says if a show has a candidate on during an election, they have to have all that candidate's opponents on as well.” “It's the FCC's most time-honored rule, right after no nipples at the Super Bowl. There's long been an exception for this rule, an exception for news interviews and talk show interviews with politicians. Now, that's crucial.” “How else were voters supposed to know back in 92 that Bill Clinton sucked at saxophone? But, on January 21st of this year, a letter was released by FCC Chairman and smug bowling pin Brendan Carr. In this letter, Carr said he was thinking about dropping the exception for talk shows because he said some of them were motivated by partisan purposes. Well, sir, you're chairman of the FCC, so FCC you.” Then Colbert REALLY laid into Trump and his authoritarian efforts to police speech: “Let's just call this what it is. Donald Trump's administration wants to silence anyone who says anything bad about Trump on TV because all Trump does is watch TV. Okay? He's like a toddler with too much screen time.” “He gets cranky and then drops a load in his diapers. So, it's no surprise, it's no surprise that two of the people most affected by this threat are me and my friend Jimmy Kimmel. When this letter dropped, we both talked about the letter on air, and then later, Carr defended it like this.” “If Kimmel or Colbert want to continue to do their programming, and they don't want to have to comply with this requirement, then they can go to a cable channel or podcast or a streaming service and that's fine. Great idea, man whose job is to regulate broadcast TV. Suggest everyone just leave broadcast TV.” “I can't interview James Talarico. I can't show any pictures of James Talarico. I'm not even sure I can say the words James Talarico.” “But what I can show you is what we always show when we have to pull material at the last minute. This tasteful nude of Brendan Carr!” Alarm bells should be ringing in the office of every elected Democrat, television executive, civil rights activist, and concerned citizen in America. This is a blatant effort by the Trump administration to censor speech, install a state-sanctioned media regime and meddle in our elections by keeping Democrats from being able to engage with mass audiences. Well, it’s not going to work. Let’s make sure Colbert’s interview goes mega-viral, win the Texas Senate seat, and take kick every last Trumper out of office!

Today's "1984"-type totalitarianism is more dangerous than the "tanks and torture"-type of totalitarianism in the past. There is no need to rig elections or overthrow governments if the ruling party, the media, and state-sponsored NGOs control the information environment.