Leno: Liberal!

Jay Leno - famous for sitting on the fence - has given a tell all interview to the LA Weekly. It's a read!

"When you and I were talking on the phone, you said, yeah, maybe because of 9/11, maybe because of the Iraq invasion, there were periods when you gave Bush a pass.

Oh yeah, during 9/11, I gave Bush a pass. And I remember about two months had gone by, and then one day I sensed that maybe people were ready. And I remember I said, “Folks, if you don’t laugh at this joke, that means the terrorists have won.” And it got a huge laugh. And it wasn’t that funny. But they sensed that, now that it looks like the administration is using this as a crutch, it’s okay to come in slowly with the jokes and roll them in. I remember that joke was a turning point.

And you admit you gave Bush another pass because of Iraq?

When the war starts and troops go over, you give our president the benefit of the doubt. And then you realize the wool was pulled over our eyes here a little bit. I remember they always said the Vietnam War was over when Walter Cronkite said, “This is wrong.” Up to that point, was he a sellout? No, he was just reporting the news as he saw it. For the first few months of the war, the jokes all tended to be rah-rah. Anything other than Bush. Jokes against Osama bin Laden. And the French.

How do you make sure your political comedy is evenhanded?

I don’t have a file. So I don’t keep track. I get letters all the time that say, “How come you never make fun of Bush.” And I go, “What show are you watching?” I probably do twice as many Bush jokes as I do Kerry jokes. And then I get letters from people who say the same thing about Kerry. But I do a lot more Bush jokes."

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