When you tell a joke, you take a risk, according to storyteller Bill Harley. <\/a> \u201cThe joke teller is making an estimation of what the group is, and then telling a joke that helps to define that group,\u201d he explains. \u201cA joke says, \u2018You\u2019re like me \u2014 you\u2019ll think this is funny.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n That\u2019s why women tells jokes to each other they\u2019d never tell in front of men, why Republicans tell jokes to each other they wouldn\u2019t tell to Democrats, and why atheists avoid certain topics they find funny when socializing with their evangelical neighbors.<\/p>\n I\u2019m guessing some of you don\u2019t double as Margaret Cho fans. However, though 30 Rock<\/em>\u2019s audience skews Democratic, many Republicans follow the of the Emmy Award\u2013winning series\u00a0religiously, tweeting the best lines in real time. Those spoken by Jack Donaghy \u2014 Alec Baldwin\u2019s wealthy, conservative NBC executive \u2014 are some of the best on television.<\/p>\n For example, in one episode, Kenneth \u201cthe Page\u201d Parcell \u2014 an office assistant from a rural, religious background \u2014 talks to Jack about voting: \u201cOh, uh, no, sir. I don\u2019t vote Republican or Democrat. Choosing is a sin, so I always just write in the Lord\u2019s name!\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThat\u2019s Republican.\u201d Jack replies. \u201cWe count those.\u201d<\/p>\n Or, when Jack meets a man with head trauma: \u201cOh, in his mind Reagan is still president? [Then, to the brain damaged man:] You lucky bastard.\u201d<\/p>\n 30 Rock<\/em>\u2019s\u00a0executive producer, head writer, and star, Tina Fey, causes conservatives to tune in every week. In Season One, a subplot had Donaghy dating Condoleezza Rice \u2014 who recently reappeared, in person this time, as Donaghy\u2019s ex.<\/p>\n But wait \u2014 isn\u2019t this the same Tina Fey whose Sarah Palin impersonation was perceived by many conservatives as a long-running cheap shot at the former Alaska governor?<\/p>\n In Fey\u2019s new memoir, Bossypants<\/em>, she talks about her reluctant embrace of playing the GOP\u2019s vice-presidential <\/a>candidate. The two do resemble each other \u2014 Palin revealed in her best-selling book Going Rogue<\/em> that she dressed up like Fey one Halloween. Fey, however, was busy with 30 Rock<\/em> and had reservations about being political in her comedy. She explains of one controversial \u201cWeekend Update\u201d sketch she performed, \u201cI would have chosen to stop short of being overtly political if I\u2019d had more time to smooth it out, because one: I think it\u2019s more powerful for comedians and news anchors to be impartial, and two: I am a coward.\u201d<\/p>\n For those interested in the skits that garnered SNL <\/em>their highest ratings ever, Fey includes the actual sketches and even discusses how they determined whether jokes were off limits (yes, there were some even they<\/em> thought were over the line). She also says that Governor Palin offered her daughter Bristol to babysit Fey\u2019s baby, Alice, when the candidate made her memorable cameo on the show. (Fey thought it was a very motherly offer, but Alice was too young to stay up for the show.)<\/p>\n And it\u2019s true that Fey is not \u201cone of us,\u201d despite growing up in a Republican household. But she does manage to make Jack Donaghy one of the most endearing conservatives on television. Plus, she so deftly skewers her own (liberal) character week after week that 30 Rock<\/em> might be the best place on television for Republicans to get a few laughs at a Democrat\u2019s expense.<\/p>\n If humor in some way mysteriously defines our \u201cgroup,\u201d Fey blurs the lines. I\u2019m a conservative Republican who drives<\/span><\/a> a pickup truck with an NRA sticker on the back window. Yet, Bossypants<\/em> caused me to snort and giggle so much on a recent flight that I had to wait to finish it until after my seatmate fell asleep.<\/p>\n The book chronologically describes Fey\u2019s childhood in Upper Darby, Pa., and her time at the University of Virginia. (She describes herself as a \u201ca wide-hipped sarcastic Greek girl\u201d and \u201can achievement-oriented, drug-free adult virgin.\u201d) She moved to Chicago in 1992 to study improv at the famous sketch-comedy theater Second City. She got a job as a writer at Saturday Night Live<\/span><\/a><\/em>, which eventually led to her becoming the show\u2019s first female head writer.<\/p>\n The most hilarious<\/span><\/a> chapter is one about the torturous nature of photo shoots, followed closely by a funny description of failing to live up to breastfeeding<\/span><\/a> expectations. No political screeds there. She also includes a funny and even occasionally touching prayer for her daughter. (\u201cLead her away from Acting but not all the way to Finance. Something where she can make her own hours but still feel intellectually fulfilled and get outside sometimes and not have to wear high heels<\/span><\/a>.\u201d)<\/p>\n A few political topics do show up in this book \u2014 gay marriage (she\u2019s for it), gender bias in the workplace (she\u2019s against it), weight (she\u2019s for fatness and thinness depending on the season of life), and how to behave as a female in the workplace (\u201cAlways wear a bra. Even if you don\u2019t think you need it, just\u00a0.\u00a0.\u00a0.\u00a0you know what? You\u2019re not going to regret it.\u201d). Mostly on display, however, is her ability to avoid pretty big issues. She brings up the prominent scar on her face, for example, only to explain why she wasn\u2019t going to bring it up. (It is the result of a stranger slashing her behind her house when she was a kindergartener.) Only toward the end of the book does she truly delve into personal territory. These later chapters deal with motherhood and her ongoing struggle over whether to have another child (though on her book tour she announced<\/a> she\u2019s pregnant<\/span><\/a>).<\/p>\n For some, Fey\u2019s politics and her shots at Sarah Palin taint her so completely that they just can\u2019t get there \u2014 against the backdrop of breastfeeding misadventures they still see and hear a nagging leftist. But I\u2019m not sure that\u2019s fair. After all, funny is funny, and sometimes it\u2019s all right to set aside politics, ignore the occasional lefty remark, and laugh at humor rooted in a life that \u2014 in many ways \u2014 is not unlike our own: a quirk-filled and often embarrassing journey through home, family, career, and back again.<\/p>\n So what assumption does Tina Fey make about her audience? Who does she think we (her readers) are? Mostly, she thinks we\u2019re people who live normal lives and want to laugh on occasion.<\/p>\n