Last October, Stephen Colbert arrived on Cornell University’s campus to the sight of thousands of ecstatic students and Ithaca residents eagerly anticipating his arrival.

In the span of 15 minutes, tickets to Colbert’s hotly anticipated performance sold out, and a second one was scheduled for the same weekend. In total, 10,000 Cornellians came out to hear the Comedy Central pundit speak, a record-setting turnout for an event organized by the CU Programming Board.

This year, however, the results weren’t as impressive.

The CUPB brought not one, but two high-priced celebrities to campus—Howie Mandel and Bill Maher ’78—and both performances were colossal flops.

The Cornell Daily Sun reports:

But 12 months later, the programming board, a student organization responsible for major lectures and entertainment events, is in anything but high spirits. After producing two under-sold big-budget productions in Barton Hall — Howie Mandel sold 1,633 tickets and Bill Maher ’78 sold 2,450 out of 5,000 available seats — CUPB is left to face a tight budget and tough questions.

“In terms of our losses, we don’t have a definite figure yet,” said CUPB President Tara Tavernia ’09. “We did, however, sell fewer tickets than anticipated. We’re not sure how much money we’re out because we’re still calculating our costs from the shows.”

Whether people are watching their dollars in lieu of the current financial crisis, or this year’s slate of performers was out-of-sync with Cornell students’ tastes in entertainment, no explanation for the profit losses is certain.

It’s definitely the latter.

Howie Mandel has not been relevant since his Jheri curl days on Bobby’s World, and Bill Maher… well, this isn’t Columbia.

Cornellians don’t want serious political commentary; we want some of the tongue-in-cheek variety.

In other words, if you can’t get Stephen Colbert again next year, get Jon Stewart.