Stephen Colbert seems both gleeful and oddly mad about the GOP health-care face-plant

Stephen Colbert... scolds? the GOP for failing on health care
(Image credit: Screenshot/YouTube/The Late Show With Stephen Colbert)

Stephen Colbert kicked off Tuesday's Late Show with some fake sympathy for the Republican Party: "Folks, I know it's a comedy show but I have some sad news tonight. As of 10:48 p.m. Eastern last night, the GOP health-care bill was pronounced dead, of terminal sucking. I clap when I'm heartbroken, too," he said, responding to the audience reaction. "It was always a long shot, because the Republicans control only all three branches of government."

Then Colbert rubbed it in a bit. "It is hard to overstate the level of failure here," he said. "The GOP crushed their car, at 90 miles per hour, into a cliff, with a grin on their face." He followed that up with a more elaborate (and more confusing) analogy, taunted the GOP with the "you had one job!" treatment, then said not to worry, because there's a Plan B: Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) "has a plan to introduce a bill simply repealing ObamaCare with no replacement. You know, just take it away and don't fix it — like how when your car gets a flat tire, you remove the tire, then cut the brake cables and push the car into a crowd of uninsured old people. Trump likes the plan," Colbert noted, but it quickly died, too.

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Peter Weber, The Week US

Peter has worked as a news and culture writer and editor at The Week since the site's launch in 2008. He covers politics, world affairs, religion and cultural currents. His journalism career began as a copy editor at a financial newswire and has included editorial positions at The New York Times Magazine, Facts on File, and Oregon State University.