7 Political Jokers

Are Politicians Funny? Should they be?

Saint Ives, Thursday,

As everyone knows, humor often comes with a double edge, and is often very political. Or, as the great political writer, George Orwell puts it, in a more scientific style, its targets reflect the prevailing power structures. Orwell adds:

"Whatever is funny, is subversive, every joke is ultimately a custard pie... and a dirty joke is a sort of mental revolution"

In fact, jokes are often the only tool left to the powerless to subtly challenge the status quo. That's why political jokes were everywhere in the years when the whole of Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union were under the steely control of the state, and why political jokes can be a very ambivalent tool for both rulers and the oppressed.

Let's start our look at political jokers with Ronald Reagan, a highly effective politician who disguised a sharp mind under a carefully crafted image of being just a simple guy. America's wittiest president even poked fun at his own age and reputation for laziness, saying: "I have left orders to be awakened at any time in case of national emergency… even if I'm in a Cabinet meeting". Reagan was a refreshing change to countries - even other Western democracies - where jokes about an octogenarian president could lead to long prison terms.

But in fact, jokes for Reagan were not just for fun but were weapons in a political armory. On October 21, 1984, in the Municipal Auditorium in Kansas City, the second debate of the presidential campaign between Reagan and former Vice President Walter Mondale provided a memorable example of the use of a joke to reset the political agenda. As part of the question and answer session, Henry Trewhitt of The Baltimore Sun brought up Reagan's age noting that he was the oldest president in history. Trewhitt asked President Reagan, "Is there any doubt in your mind that you would be able to function in such circumstances?" Reagan, with a serious look that slowly developed into a smile, replied:

 

"Not at all, Mr. Trewhitt, and I want you to know that also I will not make age an issue of this campaign. I am not going to exploit, for political purposes, my opponent's youth and inexperience." 

The audience, Mondale included, laughed heartily. Recalling the event in a 1990 interview, Mondale conceded, "He got the audience with that, yeah. I could tell that one hurt. . . . That was really the end of my campaign that night."

Earlier this year, another elderly U.S. President, this time Joe Biden, was caught reusing his favorite ice-breaker as he greeted King Felipe and Queen Letizia of Spain yesterday – a year after trying out the same line on Boris Johnson.

President Biden, 79, turned to Felipe, 54, and joked: "We both married way above our station", as he and his wife Jill were received by the royal couple in the throne room of Madrid's Royal Palace.

The problem is, it is the same joke he used when greeting the then British Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, 58, and his wife Carrie (just 34!) at the G7 summit in Cornwall last summer!

Maybe Joe was trying to impress Britain's Johnson, who is famous for jokes and likes punning. Having ripped the UK out of the single market, leading to critical shortages in food, fuel, and gas, the British PM bragged about the prospect of other international trade deals to make up for a fraction of the trade that we've already lost.

He said: "After decades of bewildering refusal we have persuaded the Americans to import prime British beef – a market already worth £66 million." And here comes the punchline:

 

"Build back burger."

Johnson also quipped "Build Back Butter" when buttering some bread, and "Build back bitter"… whilst sipping some beer. Ho, ho ho!

Cross the English Channel through to France, where a few years ago (in 2017), President Emmanuel Macron, then aged 39,  cracked some jokes after smelling the fumes of marijuana when meeting a group of youngsters in French Guiana.

The youthful French leader, who was posing for a picture when he caught a whiff of the drug, teased the group of young people by saying: "This is not going to help you with your schoolwork – you see what I mean?" – adding that he would not treat people like children.

Let's now pop over now over to long-suffering Russia, where Vladimir Putin, once appeared to make a joke about nuclear war after being asked about comments he made (in 2018) suggesting that Russians would "go to heaven as martyrs" while everyone else would "just drop dead".

The Russian President's light-hearted response was shared on Twitter by the BBC's Francis Scarr, who tweeted: "There aren't many things less funny than Vladimir Putin attempting to joke about nuclear war".

Putin was appearing at the annual Valdai Discussion Club, where he was asked about comments he made at the same venue in 2014, in which he said Russia was ready to "annihilate" any attacker who would use nuclear weapons against it, but would never strike first. He replied:

"An aggressor should know that vengeance is inevitable, that he will be annihilated, and we would be the victims of the aggression. We will go to heaven as martyrs, and they will just drop dead. They will not even have time to repent for this."

The video clip showed an interviewer saying to Putin:

"We became a little nervous recalling your comments at this very event four years ago, that 'we'll all end up in paradise'. We're not in a hurry are we?"

Putin pauses - apparently for comic effect - sparking laughter from the audience, and prompting the interviewer to add: "You're thinking. That in itself is somehow alarming."

Putin then adds: 

"I did that on purpose to alarm you", chuckling in amusement before adding: "The effect has been achieved".

Putin is not natural joker, His buttoned-up face and cold, expressionless eyes turn anything he says into menace.

Germany's longtime leader, Angela Merkel, who once took a rollercoaster car with Putin in an all-too-contrived effort to be 'fun' for the cameras, is far less sinister, but still, somehow, witticisms die on her lips. Nonetheless, she once tried to crack a joke to graduates in Germany in 2019:

"Your smartphone probably has much more processing power than the Soviet Union manufactured copy of an IBM mainframe computer… that I was allowed to use for my dissertation in the German Democratic Republic in 1986!"

Oh dear… But on to a politician who did manage to be funny. The former Australian prime minister, Malcolm Turnbull, was once recorded skillfully mimicking Donald Trump and joking about his poll numbers, his attacks on fake news and his alleged links to Russia.

Leaked video and audio of Turnbull's off-the-record speech – which was also self-deprecating about his own poor opinion poll ratings – shows him impersonating the US president's unique oratorical style.

Malcolm and Lucy Turnbull and Chloe and Bill Shorten had arrived for the Mid-Winter Ball.
called punningly, and not very amusingly: "Thigh Splits and Political Whips" at Canberra's Midwinter Ball.

In his speech to this Australian equivalent of the White House correspondents' dinner, Turnbull says: 

"Donald and I, we are winning and winning in the polls. We are winning so much, we are winning, we are winning like we have never won before. We are winning in the polls. We are, we are. Not the fake polls. Not the fake polls. They're the ones we're not winning in.

"We're winning in the real polls.

"You know, the online polls. They are so easy to win. I know that. Did you know that? I kind of know that. They are so easy to win. I have this Russian guy.

"Believe me it's true, it's true."

But let's finish with a more typical example of politicians not-being-funny. The Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was forced to admit that he should not be "making stupid jokes in public" after a quip prompted the scorn of conservative commentators in the United States and elsewhere.

During a town hall in Edmonton, Trudeau interrupted a woman after she used the word 'mankind', saying he preferred… 'peoplekind'. Critics accused Trudeau of being too politically correct.

The incident was the latest attempt at failed humor by the 46-year-old prime minister. "You all know that I don't necessarily have the best of track records on jokes. I made a dumb joke a few days ago that seems to have gone a little viral", he told reporters in Ottawa, mentioning the 'peoplekind' remark.

"It played well in the room and in context. Out of context it doesn't play so well and it's a little reminder to me that I shouldn't be making jokes even when I think they're funny."