Althouse: Contrary to Elitists, Trump Has An Advanced Sense of Humor Like Professional Comedians

Link to full blog post below:

The NYT writer (a former Obama speechwriter) talked about the "bipartisan Oval Office tradition" of "safe, well-placed quips that crowds are well primed to laugh at," which are the "presidential equivalent of dad jokes."

Yeah, that's not what Trump does. He's not about warming us all up and signaling that he's a good guy (which, by the way, is something a complete villain would do!). He's actually into comedy and may even do comedy for the sake of comedy and not necessarily as a means to an end (though he seems to believe that he's lucky and things work out for him if he does it his way).

The NYT writer observed Trump's tendency not to laugh at humor. But many professional comedians keep a straight face. I see that as a more advanced level of comedian. Laughing at your own jokes is "dad joke" style, and laughing at other people's jokes is kind of beta. Why do people laugh at the jokes of others? Sometimes, because it's really that funny, you laugh the way you'd laugh if you were alone hearing the joke on the radio. But mostly you laugh at other people's jokes to ingratiate yourself and display that you're a nice person who cares about feelings.

And if you are like that, you're probably not a high-quality comedian yourself, though I'm sure in front of a well-primed audience, you could deliver a scripted dad joke.

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