Government records show that FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover thought standup comedian Mort Sahl was a "very sick man," and that the feds kept close tabs on Sahl's jokes about them, believing that he and like-minded comedian Lenny Bruce were receiving material from "communistic" sources.
Sahl, whose barbed political commentary paved the way for generations of anti-establishment comedians, died last October at 94. His FBI files, obtained by Reason through a Freedom of Information Act request, show that the FBI was quite sensitive to Sahl's frequent jabs at it and Hoover.
