Jon Stewart addressed head-on the specter of censorship looming over U.S. late night talk shows on Thursday with an over-the-top portrayal of a politically obsequious television host under authoritarian rule.
Stewart hosted the Comedy Central program one day after ABC suspended Jimmy Kimmel’s late-night show indefinitely following comments he made about the assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk and two months after CBS said it would cancel the show hosted by one of President Donald Trump’s fiercest critics on TV, Stephen Colbert.
The show opened with a voiceover promising adherence to the party line.
“We have another fun, hilarious administration-compliant show,” it said.
Stewart lavished praise on the president and satirized his criticism of large cities and his deployment of the National Guard to fight their crime.
“Coming to you tonight from the real (expletive), the crime ridden cesspool that is New York City. It is a tremendous disaster like no one’s ever seen before. Someone’s National Guard should invade this place, am I right?” Stewart said.
“The Daily Show” set was refashioned with decorative gold engravings, in a parody of gold accents Trump has added to the fireplace, doorway arches, walls and other areas of the Oval Office.
Stewart fidgeted nervously as though he was worried about speaking the correct talking points. When the audience members reacted with an “awww” he whispered: “What are you doing? Shut up. You’re going to (expletive) blow this for us.”
He took on a more stilted tone when he started describing Trump’s visit to the United Kingdom, calling the president “our great father.”
“Gaze upon him. With a gait even more majestic than that of the royal horses that prance before him,” he said.
Stewart’s featured guest was due to be Maria Ressa, the journalist and author of “How to Stand Up to a Dictator.” Ressa also shared the 2021 Nobel Peace Prize for her fight for freedom of expression in her home country of the Philippines.
Yeah, funny, clever. But the time for funny and clever might have passed. I think I would’ve honestly found this more impressive had he gone on there and plainly said what needs saying, presumably resulting in being taken off air.
What needs saying being “The Trump admin is using the murder of Charlie Kirk as an excuse to get rid of the first amendment.” along with other dry but important truths about Israel’s ongoing genocide, ICE raids, etc.
I am a big fan of how Jon Stewart usually conducts himself about divisive political topics. While I get what they tried to do with the bit, it didn’t feel fitting.
I think his interview with Maria Ressa was more impactful than the news-anchor bit.
Same, it wore thin quickly, and I found myself looking forward to a pivot that never came. I would have rather seen some no-bullshit “wtf is wrong with you” type rhetoric from him after the satire.
He does that every week with very little traction though. I understand the desire to try something different.
“I announce my candidacy for President of the United States”
No, no more celebrity politicians
So just more of the same career politicians that have brought us to the point we’re currently at?
Yeah cos if I’m being honest mate Trump, the celebrity politician, has done a hard right into a police state… That’s sort of a 100% hit rate, to me, for “celebrity politicians are nutjobs”.
Zelenskyy was a celebrity, but I know nothing about his actual political leadership so I can’t really judge 🤷♂️
It was always quite obvious he would be suspectible to that, though. It’s bizarre that this guy was a big name celebrity aged 70 the first time he was elected, yet Americans still pretend there was absolutely no way they could have seen any of this coming. You literally had 70 years of data that told you what kind of person you were electing.
So to tie it back to Stewart, what part of his previous 62 years on this planet makes you think he is a nutjob?
I don’t think he specifically is a nutjob. I don’t really know the guy. I just have a bad feeling about celebrities near the levers of power, given the track record.
Name someone better.
No, seriously. Name someone who can:
Get elected
Do the job better than Jon Stewart.
When you can do that, you won’t have to convince me to support them; I’ll already be on board.
Until you can name someone that can meet that criteria…
What does the “get elected” criteria mean? Anyone who runs can “get elected”, right? Am I wrong? I don’t know if there’s any disqualifying factors that I’m not aware of other than like, convictions or something (not that that bothers the current dictator)
So, no actual name springs to mind?
I was being genuine about not understanding the criteria, sorry - I can’t point to a name if I’m unclear on the criteria :/
But yeah, how about Bernie Sanders? AOC?
Bernie is too damn old. He’s not a viable candidate anymore.
AOC’s policies are good, but she has the same problem that Hillary had: the GOP has been running against her for 2-3 election cycles now. Her nomination will bring more opposition than support.
Oh right fair enough 🤷♂️
are those two failures by criteria 1? Is that what criteria 1 meant?
I’m cool with one more, if he did run. The man has an actual moral compass and cares about people, just look at how long he’s fought for 9/11 first responders. If the people want a celebrity, we could do worse.