On Thursday's Late Show, Stephen Colbert began his monologue by noting that "Trump's transition continues its transitioning." That's about all that anyone outside of Trump Tower is sure of at this point, Colbert said, "but I do know that his team has not yet called the Pentagon — possibly because he knows more than the generals, or maybe he's just never going to call them. Maybe he'll just launch a literal tweet war: '@Pentagon please bomb Syria #LyingNewYorkTimes' — it's funny 'cause it's true."
Colbert called the Pentagon to make sure its phones worked, and decided that maybe Trump's tweeted belief that climate change is a hoax perpetrated by China is a bigger threat to the world — as China apparently believes, clarifying this week that it did not in fact make up global warming. "Just hold on — things have gotten so bad now that China is telling us to care about the environment?" Colbert said. "Have you seen Beijing? No you haven't, because it's hidden behind their air."
Colbert ended on a little personal rant. "The Oxford English Dictionary has named its word of the year for 2016, and it's 'post-truth,'" he said. "And I am pre-enraged. First of all, 'post-truth' is not a word of the year, it's the two words of the year — hyphens are for the weak. Second, 'post-truth' is clearly just a ripoff of my 2006 word of the year, truthiness." Colbert was not impressed with how NBC News defined his word, and gave his own definition from 2005: "The belief in what you believe to be true rather than what the facts will support." Then he read the definition of post-truth: "Relating to or denoting circumstances in which objective facts are less influential in shaping public opinion than appeals to emotion and personal belief." Sound familiar? "Oh, I personally believe I'm getting ripped off," he said, but he handled it gracefully enough. Watch. Peter Weber
The Week
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