The World Around You

Jon Stewart is a wonderful man, he truly is. I am constantly harrassing people for saying they support the President in everything he does, because no one should be trusted that much. I have finally found someone who I agree with in literally everything I have heard him say, and tonight Jon was masterful. He took Tucker Carlson and Paul Begala of Crossfire to the woodshed.

STEWART: What is wrong with you?

(APPLAUSE) CARLSON: Well, I’m just saying, there’s no reason for you — when you have this marvelous opportunity not to be [John Kerry]’s butt boy, to go ahead and be his butt boy. Come on. It’s embarrassing.

STEWART: I was absolutely his butt boy. I was so far — you would not believe what he ate two weeks ago.

(LAUGHTER)

(CROSSTALK)

STEWART: You know, the interesting thing I have is, you have a responsibility to the public discourse, and you fail miserably.

CARLSON: You need to get a job at a journalism school, I think.

STEWART: You need to go to one.

The thing that I want to say is, when you have people on for just knee-jerk, reactionary talk…

CARLSON: Wait. I thought you were going to be funny. Come on. Be funny.

STEWART: No. No. I’m not going to be your monkey.

(LAUGHTER)

BEGALA: Go ahead. Go ahead.

STEWART: I watch your show every day. And it kills me.

CARLSON: I can tell you love it.

STEWART: It’s so — oh, it’s so painful to watch.

(LAUGHTER)

STEWART: You know, because we need what you do. This is such a great opportunity you have here to actually get politicians off of their marketing and strategy.

CARLSON: Is this really Jon Stewart? What is this, anyway?

STEWART: Yes, it’s someone who watches your show and cannot take it anymore.

Crossfire , Hannity and Colmes, Hardball and all of the other shows that politicos feel like they have to watch have brought us down and have certainly contributed to the level of discourse we see among politicians today and the level of disillusionment among the citizenry. Jon is absolutely right when he says journalists are not supposed to be contributing to the problem and to try and for Carlson or Begala to try and take him to task for saying it is insane. As he constantly attempted to point out, he hosts a COMEDY show that sometimes has ten times the journalistic integrity of Crossfire. What does that really tell us?

**UPDATE: Wonkette is all over this story.

**UPDATE: Media Matters for America also highlights the appearance.

**UPDATE: The Free Speech Zone has the video.

Let me know what you think of the new design. I’ve also made the move form Moveable Type to WordPress. Big thank you to Kathy Kinsley for the assistance!

The Governor of Alabama thanked the Alabama State University Board of Trustees yesterday for reversing course and approving a plan to begin teacher testing in the state. I no the other hand am going to scold the board for playing games with this matter in the first place. They thought they could stall the process just a little bit longer, they thought they could squeeze just a little bit more and so they voted it down. The thing that caused them to reverse course was a threat from Judge Myron Thompson that he may simply remove them from the lawsuit, therefore the plan would not need their approval. So, my thanks go to Judge Thompson.