Did David Letterman go too far?
Surely you’ve heard about the Sarah Palin/David Letterman drama. If you haven’t, read this. Or you can watch this. Basically he told a couple of jokes including Sarah Palin’s daughter. One saying that they had to keep Eliot Spitzer away from her and one saying that she was knocked up by Alex Rodriguez. Sarah and Todd Palin thought he was talking about their 14-year-old daughter, Willow. They publicly lashed out against him. Letterman claims he was talking about their 18-year-old daughter, Bristol (who was actually “knocked up” in the last couple years), and that he would never joke about underage girls in that way. Letterman then apologized (sort of not really) on his show. Then he actually really apologized on his show. Palin accepted the apology.
So what do you think? Was he talking about Willow or Bristol? Does it matter? Do the people that are outraged just need to get a sense of humor? Are we too uptight? Are we not uptight enough? Do we allow our comedians to get away with too much in general? Do we see these kinds of jokes in movies all the time? Does Sarah Palin really have a “slutty flight attendant look”?
Email this |
Subscribe |
Permalink |
Tags: David Letterman, Sarah Palin
no, she puts herself out there too much to be free from ridicule.
Letterman was being Letterman. I don’t think anyone besides the Palins thought he was talking about the fourteen year old. Mildly crude? Yes. Too far rape joke? No.
I’m just wondering why Eliot Spitzer and A-Rod aren’t more offended.
Scott, nice picture choice of Palin.
Everybody needs to calm down. Letterman is just doing his job. Palin is, I can’t even start because I loathe her so much. She sucks. I’ll just leave it at that.
Everyone knew Letterman was talking about the older daughter who had been knocked up. Palin just wanted to make a big stink out of it and get some attention. Maybe instead of pointing fingers at Letterman, she should have taught her daughter how to be responsible and not get knocked up as a teenager.
I think I am in the minority here, but I do think that Letterman went too far. Don’t get me wrong, I am a big Letterman fan, but kids should be off limits regardless of what they have done. I like what Obama said “I have said before and I will repeat again, I think people’s families are off limits, and people’s children are especially off limits. This shouldn’t be part of our politics, it has no relevance to governor Palin’s performance as a governor or her potential performance as a vice president. And so I would strongly urge people to back off these kinds of stories,”. Letterman has a kid and I imagine that he would not be happy if someone made a similar joke or comment about his son.
Having said that, I don’t think that Letterman meant any harm, nor am I one of those nut jobs that thinks that he should be fired or a be labeled a child predator.
He went too far. Whether or not he was thinking he was talking about the older, it was the younger. So making sexual jokes about a 14 year old is going too far. But what is really interesting, is Don Imus was fired for saying something inappropriate. I think that was wrong because we live in america. Freedom of speach. But if Palin’s daughter was Black, then Al Sharpton and the media would have been calling for him to be fired.
Though I never thought it was possible in any earthly realm or circumstance, I actually side with Palin on this one. The joke was awful. Even though I have a secret crush on David Letterman, I have to admit that he crossed a line.
Don’t make fun of Sarah Palin’s kids, David. Make fun of Sarah Palin. OK? OK.
Al Sharpton has sex with Sarah Palin’s 14 year old daughter.
Sarah is crazy. I mean really crazy.
What’s really crazy is how clean Dan’s kickflips are.