Last Week Tonight continued its coverage of the 2016 presidential election, or as John Oliver calls it “a horrifying glimpse at Satan’s Pinterest board.”
The Democratic National Convention started under a shadow after a leaked email scandal forced the resignation of the party chair, Debbie Wasserman Schultz. However thanks to a series of stirring speeches it got back on track. Oliver had kind words for First Lady Michelle Obama’s speech, thought former President Bill Clinton relived his relationship with Hillary “seemingly in real time,” couldn’t understand why Meryl Streep dressed up as “a plastic tablecloth on the Fourth of July,” and believed that Joe Biden will have a post–White House career as the “most inspiring SoulCycle instructor ever.”
However, conventions are judged primarily by the two people on the party’s ticket — Hillary Clinton and Tim Kaine, whom Oliver called “a human sweater vest” and “the portrait of the Vice President that came with the frame.” Clinton, who Oliver believes took the stage in “full pit-bull cosplay,” offered a detailed accounting of her presidential duties, and according to Oliver, her speech was preferable to Donald Trump’s who merely “opened his mouth and exhaled a swarm of locusts.” Perhaps the most surprising part of the convention for Oliver, though, was that the Democrats seemed to take much of the patriotic zeal usually associated with the Republican Party.
According to Oliver, people outside of the U.S. are as confused by Trump’s candidacy as they are by “the menu at Guy’s American Kitchen” and the Republican National Convention did nothing to make him seem more presidential, especially as it was skipped by both of the party’s former Presidents. While, according to Oliver, “the party of Reagan” was “very negative” at their convention, which he thought could be explained by the man currently at the head of the party.
Oliver’s main gripe with Trump (this week) was his response to the stirring speech Khizr Khan, the father of a Muslim Army captain who was killed in Iraq, delivered at the DNC accusing Trump of having “sacrificed nothing.” Trump spoke out saying that he thinks he sacrificed a lot, which Oliver saw as failing in his duty to comfort the family of a fallen soldier.
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