Columnists
Calling Bob and Ray
Today is the day after “Super Tuesday,” the event that separates the wheat from the chaff in US presidential nomination politics. It’s one of those days during which you can legitimately wake up and say, “If this is Morning in America, give me late-night insomnia!”
But in order to deal squarely with the subject, let’s remove our hats, bow our heads and observe a moment’s silence for recently deceased Bob Elliott, one half of the famous comedy duo Bob and Ray. So famous, indeed, that I had not previously heard any of their skits, although I had seen plenty of their LPs in the used bin at the record shop. Thanks to the magic of YouTube, I was able to call them up to my heart’s content. And believe me, after listening to such classics as Slow Talkers of America, the American Paperclip Company, the Cranberry Grower, the Komodo Dragon, the Uncomfortable Air Conditioning Company and the Most Beautiful Face in America, my heart is very content.
Meanwhile, the comedy series entitled Race for the Republican Nomination is near ing its finale. At the start of the most recent episode, the field had been narrowed from 16 candidates to five, with two of them (Ben Carson and John Kasich) being kept around as fishbait. A ‘debate’ was taking place in Houston. Donald Trump and Marco Rubio were trading insults as to which one of them sweat the most profusely or stood in a puddle of his own making. Trump purported to be shocked at the language used by a former Mexican president to denounce his border-wall idea and said that he would build it 10 feet higher in retaliation. Rubio, looking to take the fight to Trump, wore the smirk of an adolescent who had just gotten away with calling his school principal a jackass. Meanwhile, to Trump’s left (!), Ted Cruz was stating it would be an act of treason to appoint a Supreme Court Justice who was not a clone of the late Antonin Scalia—as if other judges had somehow taken an oath to undermine the constitution—and that it was perfidy for a government to step in and rescue people dying on the streets for a lack of health care coverage. The debate got so out of hand they needed Jerry Springer-style bouncers to separate the combatants.
These characters were mildly funny for the first couple of episodes, but their burlesque has long since ceased to amuse. And it’s almost impossible to make fun of the characters in this race because, to put it bluntly, you can’t parody a parody. But after my dosage of Bob and Ray, I’m beginning to realize that the real comedians are not the politicians but the straightmen, the people who are constrained by their occupations to take this nonsense seriously. I’m talking about your Wolf Blitzers and your Anderson Coopers, who have to pose seroius questions like “Do you think Mr. Trump has helped or hurt in Oregon by reducing Jeb Bush to tears?” I’m talking about all your toadies who appear as panelists on CNN to interpret the facts, however unpleasant, in favour of their boss. (“Yes, it’s true Congressman Rancid came in 17th in the Rhode Island primary, but he doubled his vote from the Connecticut caucuses, which is something no other candidate can claim. If this momentum keeps up, he’ll keep doubling his way to the nomination”). And I guess I must also be talking about your David Simmonds—your suckers who actually tune in and watch this stuff. So when your wife comes home from choir practice, your attempt to come up with a reply to the innocent question “So what did you do tonight, dear?” inevitably turns into a punchline. “Oh, just finished watching a TVO documentary on the evolution of snails. My goodness, that survival- of-the-fittest business is quite something. You should see them go toe to toe. This? I was just watching Race for the Republican Nomination for a few minutes while I waited for you to come home.”
The airing of the final episode lies in sight, as it does for the companion series Race for the Democratic Nomination. But just around the corner lies the sequel, Race for the Presidency. And a Canadian spinoff production, Race for the Leadership will air this fall and culminate in May 2017. The potential Canadian candidate making the most noise is former Dragons’ Den and Shark Tank investor Kevin O’Leary, who bears a passing resemblance in his demeanour to Donald Trump. I doubt we’ll find much more humour in this series; so we’ll again be calling upon Bob and Ray.
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