‘Gutfeld!’ Crushes Colbert and Co. (with Some Help from Bill Maher)
Fox News superstar scores highest ratings since April 2021 debut
Late-night TV is as ideologically rigid as “The View.”
Colbert. Meyers. Kimmel. Fallon. Oliver. Stewart and friends. They all lean relentlessly to the Left. There’s less than zero diversity of thought.
Stephen Colbert on the Trump Truth Social post that included a newspaper sub-headline referring to ‘the creation of a unified Reich’:
“Evidently MAGA now stands for Make America Germany Around 1938.” pic.twitter.com/6Tt8XwPPQY
— Bob Geiger (@GeigerNews) May 22, 2024
HBO’s Bill Maher is a quasi-exception. He’ll mock his fellow liberals on HBO’s “Real Time with Bill Maher,” but he consistently calls the “far-Right” the true threat to America.
It’s one reason Fox News’ “Gutfeld!” started strong and hasn’t let up in the ratings wars. He’s rebellious, right-of-center and willing to poke Democrats in his monologues.
Diversity!
This week, host Greg Gutfeld proved the power of a broad range of views.
He invited Maher onto his show to promote the comedy veteran’s new book, “What This Comedian Said Will Shock You.”
The result?
The show snagged its highest ratings in its three-year history. (“Gutfeld!” previously aired at 11 pm EST but shifted to the 10 p.m. hour last year)
Greg Gutfeld vs Bill Maher on Trump
Maher: “Can you really picture this guy [Trump] going, you know what, I lost. That’s it.”
Gutfeld: “He did!”https://t.co/u0wZKW2ljL
— Mr Producer (@RichSementa) May 21, 2024
The episode featuring Maher alongside Dr. Drew Pinsky, Kat Timpf and Dana Perino drew an average of 2.9 million viewers. That, plus 342,000 in the 25-54 age bracket, both bested the late-night competition.
The episode featured some strong clashes between Maher and the rest of the panel. It wasn’t a wildly imbalanced affair.
Dr. Pinsky leans to the Left, but has drifted to the center on recent issues like the pandemic and media bias. Timpf is a self-described libertarian, while Perino and Gutfeld hold more center-right views.
The exchanges proved feisty but fun, with Maher proving a good sport and the others enjoying the clash of visions.
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Maher’s “Gutfeld!” appearance marked his first time on the show. It’s no accident.
While many (most?) liberals wouldn’t set foot on the show’s stage, Maher has repeatedly reached across the aisle on both “Real Time with Bill Maher” and “Club Random.”
Earlier in the week, he squared off against the hosts on “The View,” taking rhetorical fire from the Left. The same day he appeared with Megyn Kelly, and he struggled to keep up with her command of the facts.
Bill Maher: “HILLARY NEVER SAID TRUMP WAS AN ILLEGITIMATE PRESIDENT”
Megyn Kelly *plays a clip of Hillary saying that exact quote*
Bill Maher: “….ok.…” pic.twitter.com/W1bRyUUiTX
— End Wokeness (@EndWokeness) May 22, 2024
Gutfeld is the only show I watch on live TV any longer. Considering the state of the country and the horrors the democrats put on us daily, it’s one of the few things that can make me laugh.
I used to tune into Greg’s first show “Red Eye” when he had the singer from GWAR on. GWAR on the FNC was a site to behold lol!
Greg Gutfeld is immensely entertaining. It’s no wonder he is making a killing with the late night ratings. And let’s face it, Megyn got Bill Maher but good.
He. Is. Killing. It!
Maher’s Trump Derangement Syndrome is on a Robert DeNiro level. He seems to be ok with election denying as long as it comes from his side. He himself has called Al Gore the 43rd president.
It’s so true. Maher is smart, funny and wise … but when Trump comes up all of his cognitive skills go out the window.
I don’t agree with smart/funny/wise, but that is in large part a matter of taste. But not entirely.
Smart? What is plain about Maher is that, like so many on the left (and in the words of Mr. Reagan), “so much of what he knows isn’t so.”
Funny? Toto disappoints: Claiming that Maher “struggled to keep up with [Kelly’s] command of the facts” is way beyond polite; it’s dishonest. At best Maher doesn’t know what he is making jokes about which is what I find so tedious about his “comedy;” at worst he’s doesn’t care, so he makes stuff up, just like Stewart or Colbert. In making an ordinary joke, a comedian gets to create the premises and can be as wacky as he needs to be to get the joke to work (A rabbi, a camel, and a Martian walk into a bar…”). In observational/political humor, by contrast, the world as it is is the premise, so jokes tend to be harder to craft. Far too often, Maher and his writers are lazy and just invent the premises, as he did with Kelly, and then pretend it’s insightful, when in fact it’s just false.
Wise? Maher is wise enough to see a profitable niche for a guy, who has long been hard left and so has “street cred” and some insulation from leftist attacks, helping himself to some very low hanging comedy fruit that reveals one naked emperor after another.
This Bob Geiger communist does nothing but shill for Stephen Colbert. And he claims to be a veteran. I don’t believe him.