>> stephen: tonight, can republicans reach out to latino voters? yes-- to hand them an empty daiquri glass. (laughter) then a new face for a beloved american brand. get ready for snap, crackle and lil' wayne. (laughter) and my guest robert ballard will discuss the 100th anniversary of the sinking of the "titanic." i'm going ask him to draw me like one of his french girls. (laughter) the n.f.l. debuted more aerodynamic uniforms. now there will be less bag when players are carted off the field. (laughter) this is "the colbert report." (cheers and applause) captioning sponsored by comedy central ( theme song playing )

( cheers and applause ) >> stephen: thank you so much. (audience chanting "stephen") >> stephen: thank you so much! welcome to the "report." good to have you with us. (cheers and applause) hello to you, hello to everybody in here. hello to all my viewers in cedar borrow new yousy. (laughter) nation, i don't like to brag, it gets in the way of my boasting. but today i am proud to boast that i have something new to brag about. >> the "colbert report" the

super pac segment receives a peabody award. >> stephen: we won a peabody! (cheers and applause) whoo! whoo! whoo! (cheers and applause) folks, thank you. i am so happy to finally have a second one. now my peabodys and my emmy cans double date. folks, this highly prestigious award is bestowed on the greatest shows in radio and television and it's my favorite award to win because it is determined by one criterion: excellence! (cheers and applause) but unlike most things, this isn't just about me. i want to thank everyone on the show for all their hard work and the staff of my super pac who, thanks to the f.e.c. rules, are allowed to be the same people.

(laughter) and a huge shoutout to my super pac advisors trevor potter and ham rove. (cheers and applause) ham, just for this you are going to survive another easter dinner trevor, no promises. and i share this award with the members of the supreme court whose citizens united ruling made it possible. just as cnn could not have won their peabody for their coverage of egypt without the brutal regime of hosni mubarak. (laughter) you guys are the real heroes. most importantly, this award is thanks to everyone of you in the nation who donated to colbert super pac. heroes like harry balsac. apoop mapanz and suq madiq. (laughter and applause) and, of course, i can't leave out donor munchama quchi. (cheers and applause)

congratulations, munchama, your name is now smon mouse with excellence. (laughter) folks, last night mitt romney crushed rick santorum in washington, d.c., maryland and the important swing state of wisconsin. and this can only mean one thing. >> there's no way you can do the math and see any other result. mitt romney will be the nominee. >> the race, like i said, for all practical purposes is over. >> let's be honest, it's probably been over for quite some time. now we can say it with more authority. it's over. anybody who pretends otherwise is trying to make good t.v. >> and willie geist knows better than to try to make good t.v. (laughter and applause) nation, we have finally achieved a national groundswell of mitt-thusiasm and we must unite behind one candidate so we can plummet toward victory in november now, is mitt the best

candidate? no. is he the true conservative candidate? uh-uh. (laughter) but he is the most candidate. (laughter) and i believe with some of my heart that now more than ever someone should run. (laughter) and it appears that mitt is. therefore the next president of the united states must be-- anybody else jumping in? no. did you check? last chance. okay. mitt romney! whoo! (cheers and applause) all right, that's enough. that's enough. i'm sure that will feel better next time i have to say it. but now romney has to do something that does not come naturally to him-- appeal to voters.

specifically one key demographico. jim? >> the hispanic vote is very important. >> this becomes a real problem for the republican party. >> they're struggling with hispanic voters. we saw a big falloff in the hispanic vote for republicans and those voters are very important, as i mentioned, in a lot of swing states. >> they are an important voting block. there is a school of thought that if you don't have the latino vote at around 33% that you cannot win the general election in november. >> stephen: yes. republicans will need to work hard to capture the latino vote instead of their current strategy of capturing latinos. (laughter) but that i believe romney has a shot because of his hispanic roots that run deep. >> my father was born in mexico. >> stephen: yes! his father lived in mexico until he set out for a better life by driving over the border with young mid-strapped to the roof of his car. (laughter) you see, back in 1885, mitt's great grandfather miles park

romney emigrated to mexico to escape religious persecution of mormons. sadly, the u.s. government simply would not leave mr. romney and his wife and his wife and his wife and his wife and his wife alone! (laughter) in fact, romney had such latino appeal that according to a fox news poll if the election were held tomorrow he would claim a whopping 14% of them! now, 14% sounds bad, but 16% are undecided. and if romney works hard and captures them he... (laughter) ... would still lose very badly. (laughter) (cheers and applause)

now why aren't hispanic americans responding to the mitt romney phenomenon? >> if you look at mitt romney's positions on things like the dream act, immigration reform, even sonia sotomayor being on the court, he's taken a hard line. >> he has said that all 11 million immigrants, most of them latinos, should self-deport. even if they've lived here since they were children. >> he's calling arizona's anti-immigration laws a model for the country and campaigning with the author of that bill. he's probably on the wrong side of every issue important to latinos. >> stephen: mitt had to take all those anti-immigrant positions to appeal to the g.o.p.'s conservative base in the primary and that leaves him and the republican party in something of a bind. how do they now appeal to the hispanic voters without coming off as a bunch of immigrant-coddling amnesty huggers? well, once again, colbert super pac comes to the rescue. with a bold series of one ad that explains the republican position on latino issues in a

language they can understand english with a spanish accent. (laughter) >> (in spanish accent) president obama promised he'd fix the economy. instead we have record deficit and high unemployment. where are the american jobs i came to steal? >> do we even have a health care system for me to abuse? >> if things get really bad, there will be competition for the crimes i want to commit? >> i am diablo! i will crush you! tequila! >> hispanic voters, don't let washington push you around. vote republican in 2012. then kindly see yourselves out. : (speaking spanish) (cheers and applause) >> i don't know about you but i

think we're a lock for next year's latin grammy. we'll be right back. (cheers and applause)

(cheers and applause) >> stephen: thank you very much. welcome back, everybody, thank you. nation, now long time viewers of this show know that i'm a huge fan of oatmeal. i like eating foods with the word "meal" right in the name.

helps me remember what i'm doing. (laughter) and when it comes to oatmeal, quaker oats is the classic american brand i always reach for. but it looks like my beloved oats are sewing some wild themselves. (laughter) >> quaker oats is giving its famous mascot a makeover. the famous quaker known by insiders as larry-- i had no idea-- is getting a new hair cut and losing weight and five years off his age. >> the guy on the left side of your screen is the older version. his face is now slimmer, though, and tanner. he's lost that double chin. >> we are such an obsessed culture with plastic surgery. >> and it worked. i hear he's banging the land o'lakes girl. (laughter) in fact, this facelift was such a success i think all our commission mascots could use a freshen up. toucan sam, i know a great guy on the upper east side that can fix that beak. and think how much better

michelin man would look after lap band surgery. and come on, i cannot be the only one who would love to see some double ds on the aflac duck. (laughter) yeah. nice af-rack. (laughter) but, folks, the new larry isn't a hit with everyone. in fact, it's been traumatic for my mentor, long-time quaker oats spokes walrus wilfred brimly. (laughter) you see, wilfred calls me up on time to time to offer advice from one star to another and i record all of my phone conversations for inclusion in my upcoming audio memoir "stephen colbert's all of my unedited phone calls 2007-2012." well, tonight i'd like to share a distressing call i got from wilfred just last night. (phone ringing) >> stephen: hello? >> hey, hollywood.

>> stephen: wilfred? >> it's wilfred. wilfrid brimly. >> stephen: jesus, wilfrid, it's 3:00 in the morning. >> there's a stranger in my house. >> stephen: what? wilfred, are you okay? where is he? >> he's on the oatmeal box! (laughter) i've never seen him before. what'd they do to larry? >> wilfred, just calm down, that is larry, he just lost a few pounds. >> well, i'll be damned, he looks good. >> stephen: i'm glad it was a false alarm, good night will ford. >> i'm fat. (laughter) the. >> stephen: no, no, you're not. >> i used to be in great shape. you know i was a rodeo clown. >> yeah, i know wilford. >> i was in "the firm." you know what they used to call me on the set of "the firm"? >> stephen: no, what did they call you? >> the firm. >> stephen: listen to me, you look exactly the same as you did in "the firm." >> no, i don't, i'm a tubby

timmy. >> stephen: no, no, you're an attractive, distinguished man. >> you ever see that movie "cocoon." >> stephen: yes. >> i asked you a question, did you ever see "cocoon"? >> stephen: yes. >> that movie is horse (bleep). old people getting younger. try telling that to my prostate. it's the size and weight of a regulation bocce ball. >> stephen: wilford, why don't we talk about this tomorrow. (grunting) what are you doing? >> crunches. okay, i'm out of the chair and i'm going start on my crunches. >> stephen: go back to bed. what's that noise? >> i'm doing some home lipo. i've got a turkey baster duct taped to a shop vak trying to find my naval. oh, that's not my naval! turn it off! (dial tone) >> stephen: wisdom of the ages. we'll be right back. (cheers and applae)e)

(cheers and applause) >> stephen: welcome back everybody, my guest tonight is a deep sea explorer here to discuss the 100th anniversary of the sinking of the "titanic". in 15 years, i will release this interview in 3-d. (laughter) please welcome robert ballard. (cheers and applause) hey, mr. ballard, thanks so much for coming back, good to see you. you were on here once before but

there's a special anniversary coming up. >> absolutely. >> stephen: what is the actual anniversary of the sinking of the "titanic". >> it would be april 15. >> stephen: tax day. >> 2012 at 2:20 a.m. newfoundland time. >> stephen: some people may already know this but you found the "titanic". >> i did. >> stephen: how did you find it? >> well, i looked for it. >> stephen: you don't stumble across... >> no, i was looking for something else at the time. the "titanic" as you know was a cover for a series of military operations i was doing. >> stephen: so you were actually trying to find something that the military had lost? >> two submarines on either side of the "titanic". the scorpion and the thresher. we didn't want the soviets to know we were going there so we needed a cover. and the "titanic" became... but the military wanted me to find the thresher and scorpion. in particular the scorpion had

nuclear weapons on it. >> stephen: and it sunk? >> it sunk and we don't like to leave those around. >> stephen: no. >> so my job was to tell everyone i was going here. but instead i got go here and here and then i got to go there. >> stephen: did you know it was there? >> roughly. so when the thresher and scorpion blew up they left a debris trail and they told me how to find the "titanic." don't look for the "titanic." all of the groups that tried to find it failed. i said let's not look for it, it should have a debris trail much longer. if you want to photograph a deer in the winter, you don't look for the deer, it's hiding. look for the footprints. so we look for the footprints of the "titanic" from the debris, we picked up the trail and walked into the "titanic" and that's how we found it. >> stephen: this monday at 10:00 p.m. on the national geographic channel off special "save the titanic" with bob ballard. >> right. >> stephen: that's too late.

(laughter) i don't mean to burst your bubble but that's too late. >> save what's left. >> stephen: it sank! >> but you can seizely... people are making tour guides there now. >> stephen: can i go? >> yes, you can. just write a check for $66,000, it's yours. >> stephen: that's it? >> that's the price of a tour dive on "titanic". but here's the problem, we found the "titanic" in 1985, we went back in 1986 and made a mosaic of it. we came back 20 years later and put them side by side. you can see why the submarines a landing. they're loving it to death. they knocked off the crow's nest leaving all sorts of garbage and we're trying to say look, this is the "titanic" but you don't get to gettysburg with the a shovel, you don't take belt buckles off the "arizona" right? so visit but don't touch. (laughter) >> i got out of jury duty.

>> you say that people are loving it to death. >> yes. >> stephen: has anyone gone down there and made love? because i remember that model t and the sweaty hand print on the mirror. >> a couple got married on the "titanic" in the submarine which i think is a little over the top. >> stephen: or actually under the bottom. >> yes. (laughter) >> stephen: so why... people say they're harming it but isn't it sea junk? why should we protect it? >> no, no! you can protect a ship by telling the people visit it but don't crush it quite honestly-- and this may sound far out even for you-- you can paint the "titanic." >> stephen: what? >> when you build supertankers they're the size of a football field. they can't dry dock those guys anymore. they can use robots-- very simple-- to clean the hull of the ship and they have paint they can apply under water. so i've applied for a permit to

go out and protect the ship from corrosion. to go down there and paint the "titanic." >> stephen: why don't you start to paint the "titanic" and say "boy, this sure is fun..." (laughter) >> i could! >> stephen: get somebody else to say let me do it. like huckleberry finn! now, people are bringing things up from the "titanic." how do you feel about that? >> not in favor. >> stephen: why not? >> when i found it... i went to the smithsonian, the british museum and i said look, i'm going to go back, i can recover our objects. will you display objects from the "titanic" if i bring them up? they said "absolutely not." the split sewnian said "no." the british museum said know. there's nothing down there that says "titanic." it says white star line and we have a room full of artifacts from the sister ship of the "titanic". there's nothing to learn. >> stephen: so you could make some cash.

>> but to drag that thing up out of the bottom of the ocean, put in the times square, put an olive garden on the bottom... (laughter) the s.s. "cha-ching" my friend. (laughter) >> i went to the survivors. there were 24 alive when i found the "titanic" and i asked them and they said "treat it... it's the graveyard of my parents." >> stephen: the amazing thing about the deep association that things down there in an oxygen-starved environment they stay preserved. >> phenomenonal in. just last summer we're in the black sea we come across the perfectly preserved ship wreck from 500 b.c. still there. i have found ships... i've found more ancient ship wrecks on the deep sea than then else. there's more history in the deep sea than the museums of the world combined there's no guard on the door. >> stephen: you know what? put a guy down there in a folding chair. (laughter)

>> for centuries... we have robots like guard dogs. they can sit on a chip wreck and if someone comes they run up and.... >> stephen: shoot them. >> they could do that. >> stephen: mr. ballard, thank you so much for joining me. mr. ballard, "save the title nick" with robert ballard

(cheers and applause) >> stephen:'s it for the captioning sponsored by comedy central - hey. could i get your lucretia mott on this? - what is this? - budget approval for travel and hotels for the moms. - the moms? what moms? - the staff moms that are gonna be on the mother's day show that nbc is making us do after their ill-fated decision to re-air the pilot of bitch hunter.