Better Know a District

Better Know a District (also known as BKAD) was a recurring segment on The Colbert Report. It offered a humorous examination of a different United States Congressional district in each segment and generally included an interview with that district's member of Congress.

Each segment began with basic information about a specific district, such as history and geography, and sometimes a humorously bizarre event that happened there. The district is also almost invariably referred to as "fightin'," as in the "Fightin' 11th." All segments featured an interview with its Representative.

One comedic maneuver that Colbert commonly employed in these interviews, particularly when he interviewed Democrats, was to ask the Representative a loaded question of either "George W. Bush: great President, or the greatest President?", or "the Iraq War: great war, or the greatest war?" When the interviewee tried to express his or her disapproval of Bush, Colbert usually stated that the only choice was between "Great or Greatest," and nearly always stated, "I'm gonna put you down for 'Great'." (He often referred to previous Democratic representatives whom he put down as saying Bush was a 'great' president.)

After the interview, Colbert added the segment to "the big board", a map of the entire United States with district lines drawn; the new district, shown in sparkling gold on a blue background, was usually very difficult or impossible to see due to its small size. Though many districts were profiled, the map always looked largely vacant overall.

Although the interviews intentionally showed most of the Representatives in an unflattering light, the Representatives' post-interview reactions have varied. Colbert's interview with Massachusetts Representative Barney Frank resulted in Frank lambasting the program (he was quoted on a later Report), while the interview with Virginia Representative Jim Moran pleased the Congressman — he told the New York Times that he thought Colbert "let (him) off kind of light."

...
Wikipedia