State College was treated to some political incorrectness last night thanks to the antics of Capitol Steps.

Based out of Washington D.C., Capitol Steps is a comedy troupe that specializes in parodying pop songs while satirizing current political events. Think Weird Al meets Al Franken.

Probably the most interesting thing about Capitol Steps is that some of the members are actually Senate staffers and altogether have worked in 18 Congressional offices and represent 62 years of collective House and Senate staff experience. Since 1981 they've put out 26 albums -- that's an album for each year they've been around.

Yesterday, they played to a decent sized crowd at the State Theatre, consisting mostly of middle-aged couples. Students were a scarcity at this event and with tickets at $33.75 a pop, understandably so.

The laughs began even before the show started as a voice bellowed from the speaker warning the audience that if someone's cell phone went off during the performance, they would stick them in between Donald Trump and Rosie O' Donnell.

The show kicked off with a parody of "Springtime for Hitler" titled "Springtime for Liberals" starring Hillary Clinton, Al Gore, Nancy Pelosi, and Ted Kennedy. After the number, Pelosi asked who in the audience was a conservative and who was a liberal. Two brave souls clapped for Conservatives and Pelosi thanked them for "taking time away from Fox News to join them." While it's not surprising that a liberal character is taking shots about Conservatives, I prepared myself for an hour and a half of jokes about Bush's low approval rating and Cheyney's poor trigger finger.

While these jokes did appear throughout the show, I was surprised at how little of a bias there actually was during the show. Whenever a conservative public figure took a low blow, their respective liberal counterparts would get their fair share as well.

As far as the jokes went and how funny they were, I laughed sporadically at the parodies. Probably the funniest was "Staying Alive" -- parodying the song of the same name -- which details the struggle that the last four remaining liberal judges on the Supreme Court must be facing in their old age.

But what made me really crack up was when Capitol Steps stopped singing and focused more on actual skits. A debate between John Kerry and George Bush over why the chicken crossed the road had the audience roaring with laughter and was one of the highlights of the night.

But for the majority of the show I found myself merely chuckling at the parodies. One of the challenging things about Capitol Steps' parodies is that you need to be very aware of current events. It seemed that skits or parodies dealing with US affairs had a bigger reaction than the skit about Alexander Litvinenko or Kurds in Iraq.

I'd be lying if I said none of the parodies made me laugh. I laughed at most if not all of the parodies. They were well executed and no one could say the performers had no talent. But unless you've got an extra $33.75 in your pocket and a real love of political humor, I'd recommend just watching The Daily Show and/or the Colbert Report. It's just as funny, if not more, and it won't cost you a cent.