The first thing almost everybody says about Jay Leno is that he's nice. He visits old friends in the hospital. He brings his new state-of-the-art motorcycles to local hangouts to the delight of fellow bikers. He gives out free tickets to The Tonight Show to star-struck autograph hounds.
So, what's a nice guy like this doing in the murky sludge of power politics? A Washington, D.C., think tank is monitoring his joke output. Political watchdogs are scrutinizing his relationship with the newly elected governor of California. And whether he likes it or not, America's leading late-night talk-show host finds himself on the leading edge of the merger of politics and entertainment.
A stand-up comedian who started out joking about cars and girls in the Ed Sullivan era, Leno served as a key conduit for Arnold Schwarzenegger's gubernatorial campaign, ranging from the Tonight Show announcement of Schwarzenegger's candidacy to Leno's introduction of the governor-elect at his victory party.
NBC executives defended that appearance as a personal decision, and the comedian has avoided serious questions about his increasingly powerful role as a funnyman who's become part of the political process. He declined to be interviewed for this story.
According to recent surveys, 10 percent of Americans -- and nearly half of those under 30 -- now use the late-night shows as sources of news about politics. The Tonight Show With Jay Leno, with roughly 5.5 million viewers, leads The Late Show With David Letterman, Jimmy Kimmel Live and Late Night With Conan O'Brien. When a Leno guest says or does something newsworthy, millions more see clips the next day on news shows or read about it in papers and magazines.
"What happens on Leno has more impact than [cable news networks] CNN, MSNBC or Fox," says Chad Griffin, a Hollywood political consultant.
Nixon: 'Sock it to me'
Candidate appearances on popular television shows are nothing new. Two months before the general election in 1968, Richard Nixon appeared on the premiere of Laugh-In, delivering the show's signature line: "Sock it to me."
"It was considered a brilliant stroke," says University of Califor-nia, Irvine, historian Jon Wiener, and it set the stage for candidate Bill Clinton playing the saxophone on The Arsenio Hall Show in 1992. Both Al Gore and George W. Bush followed suit with Leno in their presidential campaigns.
