People keep sending me links to pieces on right-wing websites that argue that Stephen Colbert's ratings are in the toilet because he's too Liberal and much of America won't watch him because of that. This position ignores two rather significant bits of evidence…
One is that Colbert's ratings aren't that bad. He usually finishes in second place ahead of Jimmy Kimmel, and he seems to have gotten extra boosts when he does live shows tied to the day's events in the election — i.e., his most political episodes. As one who feels his show has declined in quality the last few months, I'm actually a bit surprised his ratings are as good as they are.
Secondly, he's not the most Liberal guy in late night on any of the three major networks. Seth Meyers is and his ratings are just fine. He almost always wins his time slot and the drop-off from his lead-in (Jimmy Fallon) is about the same percentage of drop-off that Letterman had when he followed Carson in that slot or that O'Brien had following Leno. Here's a nice bit of Trump-bashing that Meyers did the other night…
