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Originally posted by Mike F+Oct 16 2004, 09:21 PM--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td>QUOTE (Mike F @ Oct 16 2004, 09:21 PM)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'>
To say that Tucker had him by the balls is to miss the point of the interview.
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I think what you're saying is that people increasingly need to be entertained by the news. If they're not, they'll find some place that does entertain them.
Hence the subtle rise of hip guys like Anderson Cooper (CNN) and Keith Oberrman (MSNBC) and the decline of dour guys like Tom Brokaw and Dan Rather. Take that point a step further and you have Jon Stewart and Dennis Miller.
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Saying that Jon Stewart is just a more exaggerated version of Anderson Cooper is to completely misrepresent what they do on the Daily Show.
The source of the humour on the Daily Show isn't to give the news in a flashy way, it's to point out the virtually never-ending absurdities that lie behind the stories and their coverage. If you don't know the stories before you watch the Daily show, you'll miss half the humour.
Jon Stewart's big beef with the Anderson Coopers and Crossfires is that they're at best ignoring the absurdities and at worst complicit in perpetuating them by simply allowing the talking heads from both sides to just come on and spout off their talking points unchallanged.
When he went on Crossfire and plead with them "You need to help us" he was saying that the mainstream news networks need to do in a serious way what he is doing with his dancing monkey routing because (a) not nearly enough people watch the daily show for it to make a significant difference, and (b ) you can't and shouldn't actually get the news from his show. [/b][/quote]
The text of the interview is pretty plain that Stewart was goofing around and not pressing Kerry on anything. To suggest he was serious is ludicrous, a fact he readily concedes in an admission that he was a butt-kisser in the interview. Not that there's anything wrong with being a comic on a comedy channel. As I said, it was funny. I laughed. I did the required thing. I didn't think Kerry was particularly serious about it either. It was an interview I would expect on Regis & Cathy. And there's nothing wrong with that.
It was only a "comedy show interview" if you insist on looking at if only from the point of view of "A good interview with a candidate must be focused on grilling him on issues, and since he didn't do that he was lobbing him softball questions."
If it were something other than a comedy show, that's exactly what I would expect. Stewart delivered a Kerry interview I would have expected given the venue.
I agree with Jon Stewart that its not his fault that people have been taking him seriously, which in turn makes him a target for someone like Carlson. Stewart, after all, in the CNN interview says he should be compared to Seinfeld . . . . yet we have opinion polls showing Stewart's an increasing source for news from the electorate. There's always that subtle conflict.
It's not just Carlson. There was the Ted Koppel half-joking, half-serious interview where Stewart got the same treatment.
If it helps, I don't take Tucker Carlson seriously either and I fully understand the point Stewart was bringing to the show and agree, as I pointed out in a post above, that partisan idiots shouting epithets at each other is fairly useless and accomplishes little. I don't bother with Crossfire myself.
Anderson Cooper and Keith Olberman are news readers, wandering near the centre with their questioning and trying to do it in a humerous or hip way in the interests of attracting ratings.
Carlson and his compatriot are something else, clearly partisan for a particular purpose . . . to entertain and, they think, try to tell us something about their respective sides.
I don't view the two groupss as the same thing.
What color is the sky in your world? The guy from CNN Crossfire had the guy from Comedy Central's Daily Show by the balls for not asking tough questions? And some how the guy from Comedy Central managed wrench his ball free with the hard hitting retort, "The show that preceeds me is puppets making crank phone calls". Game, set and match to the guy from Comedy Central. The dickhead from CNN never recovered because he failed to comprehend the comment. Obviously the guy from CNN had a real good grip on those balls. If they were any tighter he would have been George Bush and John Stewart would have been Usama bin Laden.
No, the funny thing is that YOU are the Tucker Carlson that Jon Stewart is pointing at, a totally partisan, take-no-prisoners guy that Stewart reasons must be arguing dishonestly in a world that can't possibly be black and white.
He was taking a shot at you and it flew right over your head.
But I disagree with Stewart. I think you believe in what you say and argue from a point of view you feel is right, just as Carlson and his compatriot do. You're not dishonest about it at all.
In fact, I love it when you talk.
Cowperson
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