Colin ..Horgan wrote:

“Do they give a Nobel prize for attempted chemistry?” asks Sideshow Bob on the phone during a prison riot, just before a toilet sails into the wall above him, smashing into pieces. He’s talking to Springfield’s right-wing talk show host Birch Barlow, (“the fourth branch of government, the 51st state”) a man who quickly advocates for Bob’s release. ‘Sideshow Bob Roberts’ (or episode 2F02) of the Simpsons aired over fifteen years ago, but its satire feels as fresh as last week’s Daily Show.

The reason it feels stale now is because our culture has gone basically nowhere, so the jokes appear tired, even if they’re as prescient as ever – the show still satirizes the same things it did fifteen years ago because it can.