Cantor chuckles at SNL

From Darrell Hammond’s winking Bill Clinton to Dana Carvey’s snickering George W. Bush, Saturday Night Live has a long tradition of parodying the nation’s top politicians.

Add Republican Whip Eric Cantor to that list.

In fact, Culpeper’s Congressman says he’s fan of the show.

“I thought it was very funny,” said Cantor, 45, of SNL cast member Andy Samberg’s por-trayal of him in the opening spoof Saturday night. “I’m still chuck-ling about the actual skit.”

The parody portrayed a meeting of Republican leaders talking about the new president and his economic stimulus plan, which they were all sure would fail and make them look good come next year’s election. In the skit, Samberg as Cantor declares Sean Hannity of Fox News, “The smartest man in America.”
In an interview Tuesday in Culpeper, Cantor — five-term representative for Virginia’s Seventh District — said he was a fan of Hannity’s, adding, “I think it’s hilarious.”

The Congressman, however, doubted he would be asked to do a cameo appearance on SNL anytime soon like Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin did last year.

“I don’t quite think I’m going to rise to that, but again, a big fan of SNL. I like the show and I hope that they continue to attract a discussion of things poli-tic for younger people,” Cantor said. “I think that’s the real value.”

Turning serious, he also addressed how the GOP is staying relevant with the younger con-stituents who watch SNL, saying he encouraged President Barack Obama, even before his inauguration, to post the full details of the economic stimulus package online for all to see.

“We’ve to got to make sure we are accountable and transparent,” Cantor said. “But the level of detail required for my standard has not been online. We need to show the taxpayers where their dollars are proposed to be spent and where they actu-ally end up being spent.”

About an hour later in Colorado, Obama signed off on the $787 billion stimulus package, saying, “We expect you, the American people, to hold us accountable for the results.”

Therefore, the president said, he has launched Recovery.gov, “So that every American can go online and see how their money is being spent.”

Cantor said Republicans don’t want the stimulus package to fail, but that there are serious doubts it will be successful. The Republican proposal, he said, was simpler and more focused on creating jobs.

“This bill was put together in the same old fashioned way that Washington always puts a bill together,” Cantor said. “It’s about muscle not merit. We have to be prioritizing our spending right now. We are borrowing all this. The American people have very little confidence that it’s going to do anything.”

The Republican Whip, however, acknowledged the GOP doesn’t have the greatest financial track record.

“There is a needed amount of contrition on the part of the Republican Party,” Cantor said. “The fiscal record that we left leaves a lot to be desired. But given where we are now, I think all of us ought to come to the point where we can work together. This election was about that change, right?”

Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s stimulus bill that ultimately passed Congress and is now law did not meet that standard, he said.

“I do believe we could have done a lot better.”