The Daily Show's John Oliver, reporting "live from Baghdad," concludes that "the Iraqis are to blame for the mess we've got themselves into"

JON STEWART: All right, Iraq is broken. But here's the good news: It's not our fault.

Fox News's CRAZY JOHN GIBSON, "My Words" (Dec. 17):
"Whose fault is the trouble in Iraq? Bush's fault? No, it's the Iraqis' fault."

Michigan Sen. CARL LEVIN (Nov. 16):
"We cannot save the Iraqis from themselves."

The unspeakable CHARLES KRAUTHAMMER on Fox News (Dec. 8):
"The Iraqis are more interested in having a civil war than actually fighting with us."

California Sen. BARBARA BOXER on MSNBC (Nov. 16):
"What are they doing with this freedom? They're killing each other."

[title of segment displayed: THEY-A-CULPA]

JON STEWART: Those ungrateful bastards!

Correspondent John Oliver joins us live from Baghdad. John, thank you so much. An interesting twist, John. What do you make of these comments that the Iraqis themselves are to blame for their deteriorating situation?

JOHN OLIVER: Well, to me, I think that any shrewd observer will come to the conclusion that the Iraqis are to blame for the mess we've got themselves into. And the truth is, I don't get the sense that they seem to care what it's doing to us.

JON S [confused]: What . . . what it's doing to us?

JOHN O: We've spent a lot of time, money and ammunition in Iraq, and they've just taken it all. And what have they given us in return? Some of the ammunition. [laughter] Americans have been torn apart by this war, and the Iraqis don't seem to have a single empathetic bone in their body. And I've seen a lot of their bodies. [pointing at "Baghdad" behind him] The place is literally littered with them. [laughter, changing to moans] Actually, that's another problem: the litter. It's embarrassing.

JON S: But John, why do you think that this is?

JOHN O: I blame the Iraqi media--criticizing from high up in their ivory bunker. You know, Jon, it's six days till Christmas, and I've yet to see a story here in Iraq on how Americans are traveling less due to high oil prices. I'll be honest with you. A lot of the people here, I'm not sure they want us to win this thing.

JON S [after a pause]: That's the insurgency. They're actually actively fighting against us.

JOHN O: Yeah, exactly! Not very patriotic. [laughter]

JON S: John, do you foresee a way out of this?

JOHN O: Absolutely. It's time for the Iraqis to submit to America's will that they be self-reliant, to yank themselves up by their bootstraps. And no more self-pity. [in falsetto, while shaking his hands in "fear"] "Oh, look at me, the Great Satan took my bootstraps." Stiff upper lip! Well, just look at Iran. That's a shining example in the region of democratic reform. [laughter]

JON S: So that's our strategy? For Iraq to become like Iran?

JOHN O: Absolutely! It's what our military strategists have always called "the worst-case scenario." [laughter--John has the fingers of both hands crossed] Happy holidays.

JON S: Thank you very much, John. John Oliver, from Baghdad.


AFTERNOTE ABOUT THE JOHN OLIVER ILLUSTRATIONS

No, you haven't gone blind, and your ISP hasn't suddenly started censoring your DWT feed. There aren't any John Oliver illustrations here. I just wasn't willing to inflict on you--once again--the few decent shots of him from the burgeoning British comedy career out of which The Daily Show snatched him so suddenly--and so happily.

I spent a full hour trying to hunt down a current shot. I'm pleased, I guess, to see that there's now video of John's dazzling Daily Show segments all over the damned Internet. But I do my TV-watching on TV, not on the computer. My point in offering these occasional transcripts, in addition to (yes) being able to share them, is--for all that we lose by not having the visual and performance elements--to be able to take our time and really appreciate the language, the writing, the words. Still, I would like to be able to supplement those wonderful words with at least a suggestion of the visual context, and you'd think it would be simple enough to "capture" a still image from the video clips. But I even had this very segment up and running, or rather up and running and paused, but I'll be damned if I could figure out how to preserve that image.

At least in the course of my search, futile though it was in terms of the actual objective, I got to read bits of interviews and behind-the-scenes rapportage and viewer commentary, and I see that a lot of folks have been similarly delighted by the stuff John's been doing on the show. In one interview--from early in his Daily Show experience--he expresses great pleasure at the remarkable creative freedom he has on it, while also noting astutely that it isn't a "springboard" to anything. This strikes me as sadly true. It's hard to think of any performance format in either the U.S. or the U.K. that he could now just "walk into." Instead, it looks as if he's going to have to invent for himself whatever it is that he does next.

Meanwhile, it would be hard to imagine a talent and a vehicle more perfectly suited to each other.--Ken