Colbert raises $171,000 for charity
1 hour, 29 minutes ago (Thursday 24 January 2008)
$171,525 is a lot of money for a joke to raise.
That's how much Stephen Colbert's "WristStrong" bracelets have raised since the mock talk show host began selling them as part of his "wrist awareness" campaign, started shortly after he broke his left wrist last June.
On Wednesday night's "The Colbert Report" on Comedy Central, the comedian presented the proceeds to the Yellow Ribbon Fund, a charity that assists injured service members and their families.
Colbert has sold the bracelets — a parody of Lance Armstrong's cancer-awareness "LiveStrong" bracelets — and distributed them to any celebrity he could convince to wear one, including Katie Couric, Brian Williams and New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg.
Colbert earlier auctioned off the cast from his broken wrist, raising $17,000, which also benefited the Yellow Ribbon Fund. The bracelets have since been a badge of honor for the so-called Colbert Nation.
Since returning from the writers strike without his writing staff, Colbert has managed to get a portrait of himself hung at the National Portrait Gallery in Washington D.C., where it will hang between the bathrooms and near the "America's Presidents" exhibit for about five more weeks.
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On the Net:
http://www.colbertnation.com
http://www.comedycentral.com/shows/the_colbert_report/index.jhtml
http://www.yellowribbonfund.org
