There seemed to be a pretty clean divide on political comedy among the late-night hosts: Stephen Colbert and Seth Meyers do it, Jimmy Kimmel and Jimmy Fallon don't. For now, Kimmel seems to be muddying that water. His weighing in on health-care repeal was supposed to be a one-time thing; then he was grudgingly dragged back in by Bill Cassidy, the publicity-desperate senator. On Monday night, after a mass shooting that left 50 dead in his hometown of Las Vegas, Kimmel again got political.

Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell and Speaker of the House Paul Ryan and a number of other lawmakers who won’t do anything about this because the NRA has their balls in a money clip also sent their thoughts and their prayers today. Which is good, they should be praying. They should be praying for God to forgive them for letting the gun lobby run this country.

That's where the humor peaks. This isn't like the monologues Kimmel delivered during the health-care repeal efforts, with explanatory skits and threats to pound hypocritical Fox News pinheads. There's nothing to soften this or to diffuse the sadness and desperation you can hear in Kimmel's voice, emotions that any not-deranged American is probably also feeling right now.

I want this to be a comedy show. I hate talking about stuff like this. I just want to laugh about things every night. But that seems to be becoming increasingly difficult lately. It feels like someone has opened a window into hell. And what I’m talking about tonight isn’t about gun control—it’s about common sense. Common sense says no good will ever come from allowing a person to have weapons that can take down 527 Americans at a concert. Common sense says you don’t let those who suffer from mental illness buy guns. You know, in June of last year, the NRA fought to make sure people on the no-fly list can buy guns. They’re not allowed to get on a plane, but they’re allowed to own a very dangerous gun. Who thinks that makes sense? Them, I guess. The [senators] who voted with the NRA. Maybe I’m nuts, but I would like to think we could put politics aside and agree that no American citizen needs an M16—or 10 of them.

That might be nuts. But Kimmel points out that crazy-high percentages of both Democrat and Republican voters support tightened gun regulations. And the U.S. is usually pretty quick to respond to public-safety threats when the danger isn't a gun, like drunk driving or Kinder Eggs.

You know in 1980 we had a big fire at the MGM in Las Vegas. It was horrible, right? I mean, 85 people died, you could see the fire. I was 13 years old. I’ll never forget, a man jumped out the window. It was a terrible thing to see. And then a few months later there was another fire at the Hilton and five people died. And you know what they did? They changed the laws. They made major changes to the fire safety codes and it hasn’t happened again. Why would we approach this differently? It’s a public-safety issue. And something needs to be done already.

It's bold for a comedian to do a 10-minute monologue with basically no jokes in it. And especially for Kimmel, who doesn't usually follow the Jon Stewart model of late night and runs the risk of burning out audience patience already tested by health care. But this isn't what a play for ratings, or a pivot to a new format, normally looks like. Even Kimmel's sign-off is apologetic.

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