The Colbert Report is an American satirical late night television program that airs Monday through Thursday on Comedy Central. It stars political humorist Stephen Colbert, a former correspondent for The Daily Show.
The Colbert Report is a spin-off from and counterpart to The Daily Show that comments on politics and the media in a similar way. It satirizes neoconservative personality-driven political pundit programs, particularly Fox News's The O'Reilly Factor. The show focuses on a fictional anchorman character named Stephen Colbert, played by his real-life namesake. The character, described by Colbert as a "well-intentioned, poorly informed, high-status idiot", is a caricature of televised political pundits.
The Colbert Report has been nominated for four Emmys each in 2006, 2007 and 2008, two Television Critics Association Awards, and two Satellite Awards. It has been presented as non-satirical journalism in several instances, by the Tom DeLay Legal Defense Trust, and following Robert Wexler's interview on the program. The Report received considerable media coverage following its debut on October 17, 2005, for Colbert's coining of the term "truthiness", which dictionary publisher Merriam-Webster named its 2006 Word of the Year. The Report has also coined other neologisms, such as "freem".
The Report has had cultural influence in a number of ways. In 2006, after Colbert encouraged viewers to vote online to name a Hungarian bridge after him, he won the first round of voting with 17,231,724 votes. The Ambassador of Hungary presented Mr. Colbert with a declaration certifying him as the winner of the second and final round of voting, though it was later announced that the bridge would instead be named the Megyeri Bridge, as a law prevented it from being named after a living person. In 2007, the Democratic Caucus chair, Rahm Emanuel, instructed freshmen Representatives not to appear on the show's "Better Know a District" segment.
