What Stephen Colbert Told Democrats at His 'Secret' Retreat Talk

AP
J.K. Trotter 13,755 Views Feb 8, 2013

On Friday morning Stephen Colbert — the man or the TV personality, we're not 100-percent sure — addressed a group of House Democrats on retreat in northern Virginia. Anticipating the meeting's content, host Nancy Pelosi closed it off from press (who attended the rest of the retreat), but Colbert's comments soon leaked out via Twitter and several anonymous sources speaking to the media. Early on, Congressman Steve Cohen began tweeting out Colbert's one-liners (and snapped a picture of Colbert and Pelosi on stage):

Later in the afternoon, the Huffington Post collected even more jokes from Colbert, as relayed by several anonymous sources: 

On the issue of whether House Democrats will win back the House in 2014, Colbert said he's not sure Americans care either way. Congress is "less popular than colonoscopies," he said, "but just edging out meth labs and gonorrhea. Ironically, the last things we make in the United States."

Unexpectedly, Colbert touched on his sister Elizabeth Colbert Busch's run for Congress in South Carolina without falling into his contrarian alter-ego. According to a source present, he described her as "tough as nails" and said he believed she would win the race. Previously, Colbert has avoided mentioning, or jokingly subverted, his sister's nascent campaign. On Wednesday night's episode of The Colbert Report, for example, Colbert said that while his sister "is intelligent, hardworking, compassionate and dedicated to the people of South Carolina," he — the Republican caricature Stephen Colbert — couldn't possibly endorse her because she is running as a Democrat:

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