Hillary Clinton got the kid-glove treatment during her SNL appearance this weekend, and several critics noticed that there were no jokes about her private email server.
"Notably absent from the skit were any jokes pointed enough to draw blood,"
wrote CNN Political Commentator Errol Louis. "There were no references to questions about classified communications ending up on Clinton's private email server, or about ethics issues related to the money raised and spent by the Clinton Foundation."
"Notably absent was a crack about her private email server,"
wrote CBS News. "Overall, the skit was friendly toward Clinton."
In past skits, comedian Kate McKinnon elicited roaring laughs with her impersonation of Clinton, but the satirist pulled her punches on Saturday night, where the two palled around and even sang together.
As The New York Times put it, McKinnon has previously "played the candidate as unhinged by ambition" however, "the satire was comparatively toothless" this time around.
"There was no mention, for instance, of the controversy over the candidate’s using a personal email server while secretary of state," it pointed out.
NPR noticed much the same, saying simply, "Clinton didn't talk about her emails."
"Clinton ended her cameo singing with a pal. Badly. And without a total command of the lyrics. That's about as relatable as she could get," the public radio outfit concluded.
"One suspects that Clinton's team negotiated limits to how vicious the humor could get," wrote CNN's Louis. "Had the 'SNL' writers subjected Clinton to anything resembling the Palin treatment, she probably would have nixed the whole package."
"Republicans did not fare nearly as well as 'SNL' began its 41st season," CBS reported. "The opening sketch made fun of Trump and his wife, Melania, and a faux commercial pitched a pill that cures people of thinking they can be president — specifically low-polling GOP candidates Rick Santorum, Mike Huckabee and Jim Gilmore."
The Hollywood Reporter was underwhelmed with the Trump jokes, writing, "With an entire summer to prepare for lambasting the Republican frontrunner and an entire summer for Taran Killam to practice his impersonation, the result was a slew of predictable non-jokes about Trump's bombast, his hair and Cecily Strong doing a globe-spanning accent as Melania."
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