Yeah, I'm going to gush about Jon Stewart now
I think sometimes people tend to forget that one of the most powerful cards in the deck is The Fool. The Fool, the Trickster, the Jester is the only person allowed to look at the King in the face and say, "You, sire, are naked." And, more than that, he gets away with it. He tells the truth, no matter how uncomfortable or ridiculous it is.
I don't know if you've been paying attention to Jon Stewart and the Daily Show's recent "feud" with CNBC but it was, in my opinion, a really cool and important one. Basically, Stewart has been poking fun at the financial cable news network for selling people on the idea that they can get rich quick and not doing actual, serious reporting. Jim Cramer (who hosts a show called "Mad Money") happened to get a particularly heavy dose of the criticism, partially because he was going around fighting back and partially because he is a crazy buffoon on his show (it features him yelling at the camera and pressing buttons to make sound effects such as , "Buy, buy, buy", and "Moooo"). So Stewart invited Cramer onto the Daily Show for an interview - the full, unedited version can bee seen here, (scroll down and find the unedited clips) - and basically tore him a new one. Poor Cramer could do nothing more than offer a mea culpa and look red-faced as Jon Stewart marched the misdeeds of Cramer and his network out for everyone to see. I remember when Jon Stewart went on "Crossfire" a few years ago. Tucker Carlson and Paul Begala at least had a few weeks (or months) before they were cancelled. Poor Jim Cramer probably woke up this morning without a job.
Anyway, you should really really do a service to yourself and watch the full interview. Jon Stewart (who, of course, has home court advantage) comes off amazingly well and says some of the most brilliant things anyone has said during an interview. He is actually practicing what he preaches. The whole interview kind of gets into technical details but, hey, this is the internet and anything that is unclear can be made clear with a few mouse clicks. By the end, the enraged look on Stewart's face says it all. He doesn't hold back and, unlike any pundit on Fox News, MSNBC, or CNN, never yells and screams to get his point across. He uses WORDS instead. Well reasoned, brilliant words. (The humor probably helps the medicine go down a little as well.) In fact, some part of me doesn't believe that Jon Stewart can actually have as strong of convictions as he appears to. We were all raised on the Simpsons (which Matt Groening has said is an attempt to teach people not to trust authority) and cynical grunge music from the 90s. But maybe there's hope.
I don't know if Jim Cramer and CNBC will actually change their ways (I wish that they will) but it's nice to see that there is someone trying to make a difference in a smart and wonderful way.
I don't know if you've been paying attention to Jon Stewart and the Daily Show's recent "feud" with CNBC but it was, in my opinion, a really cool and important one. Basically, Stewart has been poking fun at the financial cable news network for selling people on the idea that they can get rich quick and not doing actual, serious reporting. Jim Cramer (who hosts a show called "Mad Money") happened to get a particularly heavy dose of the criticism, partially because he was going around fighting back and partially because he is a crazy buffoon on his show (it features him yelling at the camera and pressing buttons to make sound effects such as , "Buy, buy, buy", and "Moooo"). So Stewart invited Cramer onto the Daily Show for an interview - the full, unedited version can bee seen here, (scroll down and find the unedited clips) - and basically tore him a new one. Poor Cramer could do nothing more than offer a mea culpa and look red-faced as Jon Stewart marched the misdeeds of Cramer and his network out for everyone to see. I remember when Jon Stewart went on "Crossfire" a few years ago. Tucker Carlson and Paul Begala at least had a few weeks (or months) before they were cancelled. Poor Jim Cramer probably woke up this morning without a job.
Anyway, you should really really do a service to yourself and watch the full interview. Jon Stewart (who, of course, has home court advantage) comes off amazingly well and says some of the most brilliant things anyone has said during an interview. He is actually practicing what he preaches. The whole interview kind of gets into technical details but, hey, this is the internet and anything that is unclear can be made clear with a few mouse clicks. By the end, the enraged look on Stewart's face says it all. He doesn't hold back and, unlike any pundit on Fox News, MSNBC, or CNN, never yells and screams to get his point across. He uses WORDS instead. Well reasoned, brilliant words. (The humor probably helps the medicine go down a little as well.) In fact, some part of me doesn't believe that Jon Stewart can actually have as strong of convictions as he appears to. We were all raised on the Simpsons (which Matt Groening has said is an attempt to teach people not to trust authority) and cynical grunge music from the 90s. But maybe there's hope.
I don't know if Jim Cramer and CNBC will actually change their ways (I wish that they will) but it's nice to see that there is someone trying to make a difference in a smart and wonderful way.