President Barack Obama made it clear just what he thinks of Saturday Night Live, which is quite a lot. He made a point of its importance as a challenge to the powerful.
The show has been hammered as unfunny and unfair by Donald Trump over Alec Baldwin's impressions of the President-elect.
But the Presidential Medal of Freedom awards ceremony at the White House Tuesday gave the current President a chance to get some equal time—at least on the White House stream of the event—for rebuttal.
That came during the award for SNL creator Lorne Michaels.
"After four decades, even in this fractured media culture that we've got, SNL remains appointement viewing," the President said. He said it was "still a challenge to the powerful, especially folks like me," and not only a mainline into the counterculture but the culture as well.
The citation for Michaels' award read, in part, "Under his meticulous command as executive producer, Saturday Night Live has Entertainment audiences across generations, reflecting and shaping critical elements of our cultural, political and national life."
