These two photos, above, were taken the same day, Tuesday, September 30, in the United States. Two sets of men shaking hands. Both photos staged before live audiences ansd television cameras.
The top shot records Stephen Colbert’s visit to Jimmy Kimmel Live, which is on the road in Brooklyn, NY. for a week of episodes before over 2,000 audience members at the BAM Howard Gilman Opera House. The two late night compatriots were greeted with thunderous ovations. The special shows continue there this week through Friday on ABC and Citytv. Try to watch them there rather than on YouTube the next day, the network sales teams will thank you.
The other photograph is of US Secretary of War Pete Hegseth and US president Donald Trump. Their show was before 800 generals and other top US military oficials were summoned from around the world to the Marine Corps Museum in Quantico, Virginia.
Now, as a neutral observer watching from Canada (okay, not exactly neutral these days), it seems that people were having more fun at the Kimmel show. The stage was lavishly dressed like a Broadway play set in Coney Island. People visiting Monday got free Mint Mobile subscriptions from cell phone frontman and occasional actor Ryan Reynolds, who was there to promote his new documentary on John Candy. The party contunued with Flava Flav and Public Enemy on stage suggesting we all “fight the power.”
Tuesday’s show featured Stephen Colbert and was a love-in for the two late night talk show hosts the Trump administration has worked hard to silence in recent months and weeks. Kimmel later traveled the 8.4 miles from the BAM Theatre in Brooklyn to the Ed Sullivan Theatre in mid-town Manhattan, home for the next eight months or so of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert. That’s where the party continued the same night, with another late night talk show guest, NBC’s Seth Meyers, also seized the solidarity moment for a quick photo op.
Meanwhile, in Quantico, war-tested military leaders were being lectured about weight and training requirements as well as the terrors of woke-ness by two former TV hosts. The president of the United States told them that he had advised his Secretary of War to consider using American cities as military training sites.
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Distractions aside, here’s an interesting fact: at midnight that same Tuesday night, the US government had their funding cut off after Trump’s Republican party failed to agree with Democrats on a spending bill. Not sure how this will impact the president’s just-announced plan to send troops to war-ravaged Portland, in response to what another late night talk show host, Jon Stewart on The Daily Show, characterized as something (an episode of Game of Thrones?) Trump saw on TV.
Me, I’d rather visit the country I saw on ABC. In a heartbeat. Damn it loks fun. Another way of looking at these contrasting American snapshots: which of these shows, the Kimmel one or the White House one, would you like to see cancelled?
