Humor is a way of saying we're all seeing the same ridiculous, absurd, infuriating things together.
One of the hardest lessons of childhood is reckoning with the instability of the world.
Barack Obama took office in the middle of a massive financial crisis. He was handed a bunch of messes all around the world and at home.
If there is one way that I would sum up what the 2016 election was on cable news, it was world-class journalists interviewing morons.
We've been dealing with censorship around multimedia, about multinational companies and the content they create, for a very long time.
Part of my job as a presidential speechwriter (along with great writers like Jon Favreau and David Axelrod) was finding that sliver where 'presidential' and 'actually funny' overlap.
Whenever you're talking about using humor in politics or in a policy speech or in a serious moment, you're talking about using it as a tool to engage people. That's why putting a joke in a political speech is a luxury, and it is always a risk.
As a rule, I think people in L.A. are interested in any writer who brings a different skill set and experiences. There's an attraction to novelty and to anyone whose writing isn't based in screenwriting. I had that novelty.
I will never apologize for selective editing to make myself look better.
When a joke works, it works. It can make a point in a really simple way; it can be a great little sound bite to put on television or share on social media. Humor has this incredible power in how we communicate about politics now, in part because there's something natural in the way it's communicated.
We are drowning in partisan rhetoric that is just true enough not to be a lie; in industry-sponsored research; in social media's imitation of human connection; in legalese and corporate double-speak.
One thing that is for certain is that there are tens of millions of people who are deeply unsatisfied with the way they get their political news.
