Colbert to the rescue

Stephen Colbert is quite a phenomenon. Apparently, his "Colbert Bump" for visiting politicians may have some truth to it. This even for a basic cable show! Bill O'Reilly likes to brag that his viewers know their stuff and The Daily Show/Colbert Report's viewers are "stoned slackers." Yet viewer research by Pew shows that in fact, TDS/Colbert viewers know slightly more about the news than O'Reilly viewers (and dramatically more than FOX watchers in general). They are also more educated (31% have a college degree vs. 24% for O'Reilly), even though they are younger (26% under 30 vs. 16%). If Colbert truly does have influence on this election, may Barack Obama's act of putting "distractions" from the real issues "on notice" actually have an effect.