Mark Harris says the Jimmy Kimmel Live! host has become the “most unlikely spokesman for a nation baffled and frustrated by Trump and the Republican Congress in 2017.” Kimmel’s insistence that he’s “not great with this kind of thing” is exactly why he is late-night’s most important host, says Harris. “His reluctance — he didn’t ask for this — is what makes him so essential,” Harris adds. “In politics, elected officials fear few things more that the swing voter, or the voter who goes from indifferent to galvanized. That does not describe Seth Meyers, who gets into politics with welcome precision and terrier avidity, or John Oliver, who makes a banquet of wonkish specifics. Kimmel doesn’t — or didn’t until this year. His awkwardness — his voice quavers when he’s angry or upset, he can ramble, and every word isn’t perfectly chosen — is the awkwardness of someone who is awakening to the fact that 'politics' can’t be walled off in an area that’s separate from personal experience.”
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TOPICS: ABC, Jimmy Kimmel Live!, The Nepotist, David Letterman, Jimmy Kimmel, Jonathan Kimmel, Jon Stewart, Seth Meyers, Las Vegas Shooting, Late Night, Trump Presidency