Tony Hale, aka Veep’s sycophantic Washington body man Gary Walsh, hovered behind Democratic VP candidate Tim Kaine tonight as the candidate met Late Show host Stephen Colbert in the green room, whispering helpful information– including the name of the show. Kaine was making his late-night comedy debut, but held his own in the comedy bit with the two pros.
Preliminaries over with, Colbert reminded viewers the first presidential debate will be held on Monday, September 26,
and that his show will broadcast live after the debates this fall. “You’re gonna want to tune in, because anything can happen, because during the debate, I’m going to play this game where I drink the whole time. Any time they talk.”
After debating fave Philippians passages from the New Testament – Kaine being a former missionary – Colbert challenged Kaine to tell viewers something about which he disagrees with running mate Hillary Clinton. “You think I’m new at this?” Kaine , explaining to Colbert his “deal” with Clinton is that he will be candid with her in person but not surprise her in public.
Asked his thoughts on Donald Trump’s apparent-though-still-fluid changing to a kinder, gentler position on undocumented immigrants, Kaine said, “I don’t buy it because” and then began speaking fluent Spanish, ending with “idiota.”
“What is the Spanish word for ‘pander’?” Colbert joked. Kaine told him there was none, winning that round too. He also gets points for playing the harmonica with Jon Batiste and Stay Human, when the show came back from an ad break.
A running mate is supposed to be the POTUS candidate’s “attack dog,” Colbert reminded Kaine, saying he was taking off Kaine’s leash, so he could respond to Donald Trump calling Hillary Clinton a “bigot.”
“When Hillary Clinton got out of law school, she was working to help advance racial justice in the juvenile justice system in South Carolina, and fight school segregation in Alabama,” Kaine began, sounding like a guy who knew that question was coming, given the leitmotif of Trump’s day.
“And I, about that time, got out of law school, and was battling housing discrimination in the South and in Virginia,” Kaine continued smoothly.
“At his early career Donald Trump was a real estate guy who got sued by the Justice Department for discriminating against people in housing, writing the letter ‘C’ on applications if they were minority,” Kaine said, warming to his theme.
“Hillary Clinton has got a track record, all the way back to being a middle schooler in a Methodist youth group, of trying to advance priorities for others. Donald Trump is for himself.”
After two segments with Kaine, Colbert brought out Hale to ask him if Clinton and Kaine should watch HBO’s Veep for pointers.
“Don’t watch it,” Hale advised. “There’s not good models of politics on my show….I think it’s more about office politics. These people are positioning themselves to get ahead…they’re atrocious people.”
