The Daily Show guest host Michelle Wolf ripped into Henry Kissinger after the former secretary of state died on Wednesday at the age of 100.
Kissinger’s death sparked as much divisiveness as he did in life, with some hailing him as a master of global politics, while others labelled him a war criminal.
A panel on The Daily Show had their own take on the matter on Thursdat night, with the late diplomat at one point labelled the “war crimes GOAT”.
“Yes, Henry Kissinger is dead,” Ms Wolf said on Thursday.
“Which just goes to show you that if you have zero morals, you’ll lead a long, stress-free life.
“He committed massacres and lived to be 100, while the rest of us over here are dying at 47 because we can’t stop stressing over the time we waved to a person who was actually waving to someone behind us.”
She went on to enlist the help of The Daily Show correspondents Ronny Chieng and Michael Kosta as the three debated the question: Is Kissinger America’s “greatest” war criminal?”
For Mr Chieng, there is “no question” that Kissinger is the greatest war criminal.
“You know the last few weeks in high school, where you skim through like 40 years of terrible American history in, like, two days? That all him, baby! Vietnam, Cambodia, Chile—shall I continue? Pakistan, East Timor. This dude was doing massacres in countries that Americans didn’t even know were countries. He was putting them on the map and then carpet bombing them off the map,” Mr Chieng said.
The Daily Show guest host Michelle Wolf ripped into Henry Kissinger after the former secretary of statedied on Wednesday at the age of 100— (The Daily Show)
“He’s like a genocidal Carmen Sandiego.”
While Mr Kosta agreed that Kissinger would be part of any conversation about the greatest war criminals, he instead tipped former vice president Dick Cheney for the top accolade.
“The man shot his friend in the face, and it was one of the nicest things he’s ever done,” he said.
Mr Chieng disagreed with this assessment, quoting Kinnsinger: “To quote the great man himself. Go f*** yourself.”
But Mr Kosta refused to back down.
“How can Kissinger be the war crimes GOAT when he won the Nobel Peace Prize you f***ing idiot?” he said.
“That’s what makes him the GOAT, you f***ing moron,” replied Mr Chieng.
“Do you know how good a war criminal you have to be to win a Peace Prize for wars you escalated? The dude’s got the numbers and the hardware.”
In closing remarks on the show, Mr Kosta jokingly shared an important lesson.
“If there’s a war criminal in your life, tell them how you feel about them now,” he said. “Because you never know when they’re going to unexpectedly die of being 100 years old.”
Kissinger is remembered as a highly controversial figure after he and then-President Richard Nixon conducted a bombing campaign against Vietnamese communists in Cambodia.
He was also divisive for supporting repressive regimes across the world, including that of Augusto Pinochet in Chile.
Yet, some remembered him fondly for his influence on American foreign policy.
Former US President George W Bush led tributes, saying the US had “lost one of the most dependable and distinctive voices on foreign affairs”.
