# Canton, Kansas: Missing the Irony? (Colbert-related)
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/canton-kansas-missing-the-irony-colbert-related/458576
**Category:** Cafe Society
**Created:** [August 2, 2008, 4:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/canton-kansas-missing-the-irony-colbert-related/458576 "2008-08-02T04:39:11Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Dilton\_Doiley\_Philosopher\_King](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dilton_Doiley_Philosopher_King)
#### Post date: [August 2, 2008, 4:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/canton-kansas-missing-the-irony-colbert-related/458576/1 "2008-08-02T04:39:11Z")
On a recent episode of The Colbert Report, [Stephen Colbert apologized to the residents of Canton, Georgia](http://www.comedycentral.com/colbertreport/videos.jhtml?videoId=177952) (Comedy Central video link) for saying their their town was the “Crappy Canton” when compared to Canton, Ohio. Instead, he argued that he meant to say that Canton, Kansas was the “Crappy Canton”.
[CNN.com](http://CNN.com) (I don’t know if this has been broadcast on the cable television channel) hosts a [video of the townspeople of Canton, Kansas responding to Colbert’s “apology”](http://www.cnn.com/video/?/video/us/2008/08/01/strader.ks.colbert.reax.kwch). I think this warrants a few responses:
1. Are the people of Canton, Kansas so dumb as to the irony behind his response? Clearly the first Canton-alternative (being Canton, Georgia) was chosen at random, and his response in choosing Canton, Kansas was surely chosen similarly at random.
2. Since when did CNN start reporting on the uproars that The Colbert Report produces? Combining this with The Daily Show… dude, that’s so meta! (/ze) 🙂
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### Author:  [@Randy\_Seltzer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Randy_Seltzer)
#### Post date: [August 2, 2008, 4:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/canton-kansas-missing-the-irony-colbert-related/458576/2 "2008-08-02T04:59:55Z")
1. Looks to me like CNN manufacturing a story. I doubt anyone interviewed for that piece had actually seen the Colbert segment, and the correspondent simply showed each of them an expurgated version which contained only the insults and not the context. How would you feel if you were shown, with no context, a clip of an unfamiliar man from an unfamiliar program hurling undeserved nasty insults at your beloved home on national television? The interview with the mayor also looked highly decontextualized (read: edited to make him look stupid).
2. Slow news day.
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### Author:  [@panache45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/panache45)
#### Post date: [August 2, 2008, 5:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/canton-kansas-missing-the-irony-colbert-related/458576/3 "2008-08-02T05:10:22Z")
And apparently Colbert has never been to Canton, Ohio. The other two must be \*\*\*really \*\*\*crappy.
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### Author:  [@kelly5078](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kelly5078)
#### Post date: [August 2, 2008, 5:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/canton-kansas-missing-the-irony-colbert-related/458576/4 "2008-08-02T05:13:41Z")
1. Some people are a bit thick. Looks like the reporter went out of her way to find the thickest. I’d imagine there are quite a few people there who laughed their asses off.
2. It’s always hard to tell what, if anything, the people at CNN are thinking. But it looks like they picked the story up from [Fox](http://www.foxkansas.com/mostpopular/story.aspx?content_id=4143f4f9-c464-44a2-804a-e0e035ca280e). So that explains a lot. The NBC affiliate’s [story](http://www.ksn.com/news/local/26154044.html) is a lot less dimwitted.
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### Author:  [@mobo85](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mobo85)
#### Post date: [August 2, 2008, 8:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/canton-kansas-missing-the-irony-colbert-related/458576/5 "2008-08-02T08:22:13Z")
If that (hilarious) letter from the governor of Kansas shown in the NBC story is any indication, I’d say at least some people in Kansas are in on the joke.
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### Author:  [@mobo85](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mobo85)
#### Post date: [August 2, 2008, 9:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/canton-kansas-missing-the-irony-colbert-related/458576/6 "2008-08-02T09:10:50Z")
Now that I think about it, this reminds me of the way the media is taking a lightly mocking video of Miley Cyrus from four months ago and passing it off as newly-made evidence she hates her rival TV stars. Much like politicians, news outlets will do anything to create controversy where there is none.
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### Author:  [@Chefguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chefguy)
#### Post date: [August 2, 2008, 3:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/canton-kansas-missing-the-irony-colbert-related/458576/7 "2008-08-02T15:13:06Z")
News bulletin for Canton, KS: It’s on the _Comedy Central_ station.
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### Author:  [@WarmNPrickly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WarmNPrickly)
#### Post date: [August 2, 2008, 3:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/canton-kansas-missing-the-irony-colbert-related/458576/8 "2008-08-02T15:17:44Z")
The only question is: How many more Cantons are there?
ETA: [Canton - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canton)
looks like the joke can go on for a while.
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### Author:  [@Queen\_Tonya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Queen_Tonya)
#### Post date: [August 3, 2008, 2:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/canton-kansas-missing-the-irony-colbert-related/458576/9 "2008-08-03T02:00:50Z")
I need to have a girlfriending session with that CNN reporter about her wardrobe malfunctions. Us voluptuous gals have to be a bit more careful in our selections, did no one _tell_ her that her shirt was gapping open over the girls?!
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### Author:  [@mobo85](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mobo85)
#### Post date: [August 6, 2008, 4:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/canton-kansas-missing-the-irony-colbert-related/458576/10 "2008-08-06T04:45:20Z")
Dr. Colbert corrected himself tonight in a typical fashion- how could you not love a city that has a stop sign, hot _and_ cold water towers, and 1 Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander? Now Canton, South Dakota, on the other hand…
(Fun fact: Canton, SD was the home of America’s only Indian insane asylum. Colbert should love that one for his next apology.)
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### Author:  [@Agonist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Agonist)
#### Post date: [August 12, 2008, 3:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/canton-kansas-missing-the-irony-colbert-related/458576/11 "2008-08-12T15:31:00Z")
[QUOTE=WarmNPrickly]
The only question is: How many more Cantons are there?
ETA: [Canton - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canton)
looks like the joke can go on for a while.
[/QUOTE]
I did the exact same search immediately after I saw the episode. Anyone want to start a pool on what the next “crappy Canton” will be?
I wonder if there’s anyone in one of those Cantons campaigning on the Colbert Nation to be the next one?
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### Author:  [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)
#### Post date: [August 12, 2008, 3:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/canton-kansas-missing-the-irony-colbert-related/458576/12 "2008-08-12T15:51:52Z")
Slow news state, I guess. CNN says the video has expired, so I can’t see it. But I think it’s funny that this is basically the kind of thing The Daily Show used to do: interviews with small-town people that make them look stupid.
Of course, The Daily Show mostly stopped doing that stuff when Jon Stewart took over _and the show got good_.
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### Author:  [@Chefguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chefguy)
#### Post date: [August 12, 2008, 11:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/canton-kansas-missing-the-irony-colbert-related/458576/13 "2008-08-12T23:14:15Z")
[QUOTE=Marley23]
Slow news state, I guess. CNN says the video has expired, so I can’t see it. But I think it’s funny that this is basically the kind of thing The Daily Show used to do: interviews with small-town people that make them look stupid.
Of course, The Daily Show mostly stopped doing that stuff when Jon Stewart took over _and the show got good_.
[/QUOTE]
Really? Man, I think The Daily Show has _really_ gone stale. They do the exact same shtick over and over with a “reporter” doing a story while Stewart pretends he doesn’t get it, then Stewart giggling through an interview with some lame movie star. I’ve all but stopped watching it.
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### Author:  [@MovieMogul](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MovieMogul)
#### Post date: [August 12, 2008, 11:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/canton-kansas-missing-the-irony-colbert-related/458576/14 "2008-08-12T23:31:16Z")
[QUOTE=Chefguy]
Really? Man, I think The Daily Show has _really_ gone stale. They do the exact same shtick over and over with a “reporter” doing a story while Stewart pretends he doesn’t get it, then Stewart giggling through an interview with some lame movie star.
[/QUOTE]
Totally! Look at the big time lame-o movie stars they’ve had in the last 2 weeks alone! Sen. Chuck Schumer, Rep. Nancy Pelosi, [, Brian Williams, David Gregory, [url=[Fighting Words: A Tale of How Liberals Created Neo-Conservatism: Wattenberg, Ben J.: 9780312382995: Amazon.com: Books](http://www.amazon.com/Fighting-Words-Liberals-Created-Neo-Conservatism/dp/0312382995/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1218583644&sr=1-1)]Ben Wattenberg](]Ron Suskind[/url), [Bill Bishop](http://www.amazon.com/Big-Sort-Clustering-Like-Minded-America/dp/0618689354/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1218583720&sr=1-1). Talk about a bunch of primadonna, Hollywood-elite, overexposed media whores!
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### Author:  [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)
#### Post date: [August 12, 2008, 11:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/canton-kansas-missing-the-irony-colbert-related/458576/15 "2008-08-12T23:47:53Z")
[QUOTE=Chefguy]
Really? Man, I think The Daily Show has _really_ gone stale. They do the exact same shtick over and over with a “reporter” doing a story while Stewart pretends he doesn’t get it, then Stewart giggling through an interview with some lame movie star. I’ve all but stopped watching it.
[/QUOTE]
They have good nights and not so good nights. But it really was a completely different show when they were sending correspondents to Centerville USA to mock the members of the Bigfoot Sighters Club.
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### Author:  [@duality72](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/duality72)
#### Post date: [August 13, 2008, 6:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/canton-kansas-missing-the-irony-colbert-related/458576/16 "2008-08-13T18:40:06Z")
So who had [Canton, Texas](http://www.comedycentral.com/colbertreport/videos.jhtml?videoId=179260) in the pool?
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### Author:  [@Elysium](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elysium)
#### Post date: [August 13, 2008, 6:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/canton-kansas-missing-the-irony-colbert-related/458576/17 "2008-08-13T18:43:14Z")
I want to see Canton, MA chosen!
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### Author:  [@MovieMogul](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MovieMogul)
#### Post date: [August 15, 2008, 7:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/canton-kansas-missing-the-irony-colbert-related/458576/18 "2008-08-15T19:01:21Z")
[QUOTE=duality72]
So who had [Canton, Texas](http://www.comedycentral.com/colbertreport/videos.jhtml?videoId=179260) in the pool?
[/QUOTE]
Pool? He called it an incorporated outhouse! 😃 And that tourist video was awesome.
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### Author:  [@Larry\_Borgia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Larry_Borgia)
#### Post date: [August 15, 2008, 9:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/canton-kansas-missing-the-irony-colbert-related/458576/19 "2008-08-15T21:12:52Z")
[QUOTE=Queen Tonya]
I need to have a girlfriending session with that CNN reporter about her wardrobe malfunctions. Us voluptuous gals have to be a bit more careful in our selections, did no one _tell_ her that her shirt was gapping open over the girls?!
[/QUOTE]
You got me all excited and now I can’t play the video. ☹
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### Author:  [@Dilton\_Doiley\_Philosopher\_King](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dilton_Doiley_Philosopher_King)
#### Post date: [August 15, 2008, 9:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/canton-kansas-missing-the-irony-colbert-related/458576/20 "2008-08-15T21:15:17Z")
[Here is a new link to the CNN video.](http://www.cnn.com/video/?/video/us/2008/08/02/pkg.ks.canton.v.colbert.kwch)
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