When SNL made fun of Bush in 2000, I laughed. I really liked Bush, but I laughed. It was funny. Will Ferrell pried into the fissures of Bush’s manner and personality and exploited it and transformed the character into a whole new thing. Darrell Hammond and Tina Fey did the same thing with Clinton and Palin, respectively. Their caricatures almost make you like those people more, because you kind of understand them more when you see them being made fun of. And so, I’m a little sickened by how the media, in general, has refused to make fun of Obama. I know, I know, they love him and adore him – but still, it’s frustrating. I was listening to a New Yorker podcast, where the reporter essentially said that it was impossible to make fun of Obama, because there was nothing to mock about him. What a joke. Everybody can be mocked, and I can think of a thousand ways to mock Obama (his messianic qualities, his disavowal or aversion to much of his past, his All Things to All People rhetoric…all these things can become quite funny in the right hands).

In this Post article, Eugene Robinson says as much, explaining that it’s just not safe to make fun of Obama because he’s black. He describes a Don Rickles’ joke (about Obama) that bombed on Letterman.

Americans are rightly proud of the historic advance that Obama’s election represents. Our nation’s struggle with race and racism goes back nearly 400 years; we can afford to take a few weeks or months to savor this moment. Those people in David Letterman’s audience were feeling a little protective of the president-elect. They weren’t quite ready for him to be turned into a borscht belt punch line.

Actually, when you read the joke, you’ll see that they didn’t laugh because it wasn’t funny. Thankfully, the Daily Show has gotten things rolling in the right direction with their “Greatness Watch: Road to Rushmore” segment, mocking the press’s adoration of the man. That’s a start.