Subcultural engagement for the 21st Century...
Barbelith is a new kind of community (find out more)...
You can login or register.

Underground > Switchboard >

Jon Stewart Rips Crossfire a New One

*

14:17 / 16.10.04

Transcript
Videos

Jon Stewart gets serious with the Crossfire guys and they are disappointed. They wanted comedy, and he wanted to tell them something valuable. They cry.

He mentions that it would be hard to top the Bush administration in terms of absurdity and the studio audience cheers wildly.

I think Stewart has a valid point. His show doesn't have a responsibility to ask newsworthy questions and really get the answers out of the candidate. Crossfire claims to be a debate show, and in that sense they do have that responsibility. Nonetheless the Daily Show is a more newsworthy show than Crossfire. (rhetoric)Why is that?(/rhetoric)

15:33 / 16.10.04

I've literally just watched this!

I think it's so interesting to watch news people miss the point that the fact that people watch the Daily Show for actual news reflects very badly on them.

I've been watching the Daily show for a while now and am under no illusion that it's a viable substitute for a good news source. At every opportunity you'll hear Jon Stewart talk about how it's a FAKE news show. The problem in US news channels is that the Daily Show is now more trusted than they are by the populus. A SATIRICAL show.

Brigade du jour

15:45 / 16.10.04

Ooooooh, good question that.

Thank you for the link, as I live in the UK and don't see much US television. Every time I do, however, I am reminded of how slick and (to use Jon Stewart's description) disingenuous a lot of it seems to be. The way the guy on the right responded to being called a 'dick' with a big fake laugh is an excellent example of that, I think.

I agree that Stewart has a valid point. I also think that the other guys on the show there either utterly failed to recognise it, or more likely knew he was right but couldn't admit in a million years because they would have to work that much harder to improve their stagnant debate show.

But, you'd better take what I say with a pinch of salt because I haven't seen much of this programme before, only the type of programme I strongly suspect it to be. Consider this a first impression.

15:54 / 16.10.04

I think I'm in love with Jon Stewart. I don't have cable, but I've been catching what I can online and friends have been taping. He is very smart and real and Crossfire is exactly what he says--your impressions are not wrong; it's plastic, fake debate.

00:06 / 17.10.04

I was watching this last night. It's excellent - particularly as Tucker Carlson is an odious tool. But the central point, that the "political news media" are just a knockabout circus where you can see "left" hitting "right" with a pugil stick, is completely true. That's why people are actually treating a comedy show as being equivalent to a supposed "news" one - there's no real difference, it's all entertainment, and it's perceived as that. Fair play to him for not being defensive about being supportive of Kerry, either - that would have implied that he was trying to portray himself as a news source.

For UK readers, I would really advise you to get out your Bittorrent and go to suprnova.org to download some Jon Stewart. It's pretty much the best political satire that is going on on US TV at the moment.

03:05 / 17.10.04

He's also on the cover of US Rolling Stone this (possibly past) week, advertised as "the most trusted name in news," and I think they're probably correct, he is the most trusted name in news, and I think Jon Stewart is correct that that fact that this is really, really sad.

*

13:11 / 17.10.04

I think one of the problems with US news is claiming to be presenting an unbiased view. Obviously they're not presenting an unbiased view, but this is only obvious to those of us who know there's no such thing as an unbiased view. When the news claims to be objective, anyone who wants to be or appear objective simply has to parrot what the news tells them. Then those who disagree are obviously "biased".

The Daily Show is more trusted because they are up front about their biases. This makes their opinions a whole lot less insidious, and I think even people who think news shows can and should be objective can sense that.

I think an improvement would be for a wide selection of people to rate views presented on news shows as "moderate" "slightly liberal" "right wing" etc. and then have this rating prominently announced after every commercial break. No news show would escape. At least people would know whose ideas they were parroting.

Spyder Todd 2008

17:28 / 18.10.04

Wow. Those idiots just do not get it, do they. Jesus...

20:11 / 18.10.04

I want to marry Jon Stewart, and have, like, ten thousand of his babies.

20:55 / 18.10.04

Yeah, the world could probably actually use ten thousand Jon Stewart babies.

I missed this on TV so thanks for the transcript & vid link. It's so great that (unlike the Crossfire people) Stewart's using his position of power (celebrity) to say something useful and honest. I just love that he gets invited as "the funny guy" and flips it by being serious - too bad that trick's not likely to last long, once he gets himself a reputation.

I feel the same way as Stewart about the media - outraged and sad at once that they're totally shirking their responsiblities to the public, that the news outlets are bigger jokes than the comedy shows. I don't want the newsmen to shill for "my side," a la the CBS memo gaffe, I want them to do their jobs. Investigate. Report. Find out the truth behind the talking points, rather than just parroting the talking points. The anchormen are transparent, they're mere structural frames, and the reporters are hardly more than summarizers. In all honesty I'd endorse The O'Reilly Factor over CNN Headline News, because the one is blatant BS, while the other is BS masquerading as factual information.

21:31 / 18.10.04

Like a lot of people I vaguely associated CNN with "decent enough journalism" until I actually watched it over the run-up to the Iraq invasion, and while it was going on. It was utterly disgraceful. Wolf Blitzer in a bulletproof vest standing around in the desert and endless Pentagon-supplied "experts" talking about battle tactics.

People still call it the "Communist News Network" (ho ho, about as funny as "Bliar") but only those who live in a weird Coulterbubble.

10:56 / 20.10.04

Every english speaking human should watch this clip.

12:29 / 20.10.04

It's everywhere in Detroit. Guys at work are watching it, guys at school are watching it, my Dad is watching it.

wembley can change in 28 days

12:42 / 20.10.04

And you can watch the Daily Show's fallout clip (Jon back in top form of course):

http://laweekly.blogs.com/joshuah_bearman/files/Daily_Show-Crossfire_Fallout.mov

13:20 / 20.10.04

Just out of interest, can anyone find a clip of the Paxman-Howard interview from May 1997?

14:58 / 20.10.04

I doubt that we'll be able to find it. Rather, I doubt I'LL be able to find it. What was it about?

15:50 / 20.10.04

It was an interview by Jermey Paxman - a Journalist reknowned for ruthlessly pursuing the hard questions with Michael Howard, then home secutary now Leader of the opposition. The Interview revolves around the question of whether The Home secutary threatened to over-rule the governor of Parkhurst Prison - something that the home secutary did not have the power to do. I remember watching the interview as it was broadcast - it was a joy to behold as Paxman asked the same question 'did you threaten to over-rule him' on 14 seperate occasions. As Howard flounders it becomes increasingly apparent that he cannot deny that he did effectively exceed his authority by threatening a course of action he could not pursue.

I sometimes wish that Paxman could be loaned out for the US elections...

18:21 / 20.10.04

I think that's entirely plausable. We DO have Bono showing up at conventions, after all.

22:31 / 21.10.04

I doubt that we'll be able to find it. Rather, I doubt I'LL be able to find it. What was it about?

www.uknova.com will hopefully have the Howard interview up this weekend. That's a rumour I heard on the internets. BitTorrent is the way forward, folks.

18:23 / 25.10.04

As promised, UkNova now have the Paxman/Howard interview. You have to register and be able to use BitTorrent, though.

Our Lady Has Left the Building

10:37 / 07.01.05

CNN Ditching 'Crossfire' — Jon Stewart: 2, Tucker Carlson: 0.

[New CNN President Jonathan] Klein noted that CNN will return to true reporting and useful information, and eschew the opinion, discussion and rhetoric that has shaped the news landscape for the past several years. It's the type of work that Carlson [who had reportedly decided to leave the network months ago]... hopes to continue, and the commentator is reportedly in talks to do just that for one of CNN's competitors.

14:10 / 07.01.05

Ha! What are the bets Carlson ends up on Fox?

Solitaire Rose as Tom Servo

04:29 / 17.01.05

Carlon already has a show on PBS (and it's pretty bad...typical sloppy opinion disguised as journalism), but my guess is that he'll wind up on MSNBC, or as I like to call it, "Fox News Wihtout Any Balls Or Ratings"

09:22 / 25.01.05

Now in non-bit-torrented form - The interview between Jeremy Paxman and Michael Howard I referred to above...

Its part of the celebration of the 25 years of newsnight here