Late Show host Stephen Colbert skewered Republican Senator John Kennedy of Louisiana this week for his opposition to common sense gun law reform.
The U.S. recently saw seven mass shootings in seven days, including a shooting spree at three Atlanta, Georgia massage parlors targeting Asian Americans and, most recently, a shooting at a Boulder, Colorado grocery store that killed 10 people.
With the Senate considering a pair of House-approved gun reform bills that would expand background checks for gun buyers and lengthen the time the FBI has to conduct these background checks, Republican lawmakers are scrambling to justify their opposition to the American public.
For his part, Senator Kennedy has repeatedly analogized mass shooters to drunk drivers, claiming that one doesn't make laws that get rid of sober drivers in order to lessen drunk driving.
Kennedy made the comments in a Senate hearing and, later, in a Fox News interview, saying:
"We have a lot of drunk drivers in America that kill a lot of people. We ought to try to combat that too ... the answer is not to get rid of all sober drivers."
In a lengthy segment on Late Show, Colbert issued a brutal takedown of Kennedy's remarks —and turned his own analogy against him.
Watch beginning at 2:28 below.
Now's Not The Time To Fix America's Gun Problem, Says GOP In Familiar Refrainwww.youtube.com
In response to Senator Kennedy's drunk driver remarks, Colbert said:
"OK, I'll take that deal. Let's regulate guns the way we regulate alcohol and cars. You got to be 21, got to pass a test to get a license, you got to have registration and insurance for your gun. If you move to a new state, you've got to do the whole damn thing over again, and you can't go out loaded."
Saying he'd "take that deal," Colbert called on Kennedy to support a regulation of guns that's similar to the regulation of cars and alcohol: imposing age minimums, requiring registration and insurance, and passing a test before legally operating one.
People largely agreed.
And Colbert didn't hold back in responding to Kennedy's "idiot control" sentiment:
"Oh, we definitely have an idiot control problem. It's people who don't recognize that this country has long had a gun problem, John Kennedy! So when idiots like John Kennedy refuse to do anything about getting rid of idiot's guns, it's clearly time to get rid of idiots like John Kennedy — and that means voting them out."
The comedian's demand for action was met with widespread applause.
Meanwhile, the internet continues to roast John Kennedy.
But thanks to the near-unanimous Republican refusal to consider even the most moderate reform measures when it comes to guns, Senate Democrats will likely have to reform the 60 vote threshold imposed by the filibuster before the House's gun bills have a hope of passing.
