"[Jon] Stewart intends to host 'The Daily Show' through Election Day. In order to succeed, whoever comes after him will need to avoid the excesses of the format..."

"... that he popularized: so-called clapter comedy, a phrase that has been credited to [Seth] Meyers which describes the kind of jokes that, instead of making audiences laugh, elicit applause by pandering to their preëxisting beliefs. Stewart resorted to such lines at least occasionally during his tenure; in the Trump era, the tactic exploded. The use of clapter as a crutch, and a general ethos against 'punching down' among moral-minded standups, has rendered much of today’s political comedy predictable...."

Writes Inkoo Kang, in "Jon Stewart Knows 'The Daily Show' Can’t Save Democracy/The comedian transformed the late-night landscape before his departure almost a decade ago—and returns to reckon with a nation that’s been transformed, too" (The New Yorker).