"Don't news people have to tell you what they know when they find it out?"

"Isn't that the difference between news and a secret?"

.@jonstewart is getting whiplash watching CNN pivot from promoting Jake Tapper's "bombshell" book to lamenting Joe Biden's cancer diagnosis pic.twitter.com/pShybi5F6e

— The Daily Show (@TheDailyShow) May 20, 2025

Jon Stewart performs his classic oh-no-how-can-people-be-so-stupid mugging...

... as Ezra Klein reads 14 steps to apply for "Build Back Better" funding but I'm going to assume that some smart people knew what they were doing and plenty of people made money doing things this way:

Jon Stewart screams 'OMFG' and is rendered speechless after hearing all 14 steps to apply for 'Build Back Better' funding:
Ezra Klein: "We have to issue the notice funding opportunity within 180 days that's step one.
Step Two: States who want to participate must submit a letter… pic.twitter.com/n2B3knnNY8

— Eric Abbenante (@EricAbbenante) March 28, 2025

ADDED: There's so much talk about how the Trump administration — especially DOGE — is moving too fast, so it's good to look back at the Biden administration, which was, as Klein tells it, moving way too slow. Slowness is the choice of those who love government and want more government, government that never ends. Look at what they did, not at what they said they wanted to do. Do they get problems solved or do they feed off unsolved problems?

Jen Psaki locates Joe Rogan and Theo Von in the "right-wing ecosystem," but Jon Stewart isn't having it.

Jen Psaki says @joerogan and @TheoVon are in a “right-wing ecosystem” which is “supportive of the Trump enterprise” pic.twitter.com/X4HFhByX6m

— Chief Nerd (@TheChiefNerd) February 14, 2025

Jon Stewart mocks anti-Trumpers for overdoing their accusations of fascism.

"The constant drumbeat of encroaching fascism will erode the credibility we will need if — hopefully if and not when — it hits. But the truth is that for now, his most objectionable actions have taken place almost entirely within our designed Democratic system.... Look, I really hope that Democrats figure out a way to contain this guy.... How would you use this power?... Tell people what you would do with the power that Trump is wielding and then convince us to give that power to you...  Enough with the 'He's Hitler'...  What would you fucking do?"

Exactly. I love Stewart's reset for the new Trump era. 

"Even when he's lying out of his teeth, he's lying in an authentic way."

Says Ben Wikler, chair of the Wisconsin Democratic Party, in what is my favorite moment of his long interaction with Jon Stewart on "The Daily Show": 

"People can smell authenticity. They can feel it. And I think Trump is a disaster for the country. It's very clear he does not think before he talks. He just says it. And there is something that draws people towards him about that. Even when he's lying out of his teeth, he's lying in an authentic way."

I really do think that what people like about Trump is that they feel that he's saying what he thinks. Some of the things he thinks are not precisely true. They may be exaggerations or simplifications or things he's heard people saying — "They're eating the pets" — but we're seeing his thoughts. It's authentic in a way "that draws people towards him."

I also liked when Stewart said to Wikler, "It’s like wrestling a bear. You’re a giant man with a golden tongue" (at 9:54).

Jon Stewart gives Democrats the chewing out they deserve.

"Democrats never once mentioned Arnold Palmer's cock. Never once. Yet focus group after focus group said, you got anything on Arnold Palmer's cock? If not, can you at least stand there and sway to 'Ave Maria' for, like, an hour? Can you at least do that? But it's a delight to hear about why it happened from so many people who were so wrong about what was going to happen...."

That made me laugh out loud, but don't let it make you think Stewart mainly takes sideswipes at Trump. He does not. Watch the whole thing.

Jon Stewart daringly but silently calls Bill Clinton a sexual predator... then coyly laughs about it.

Comedian John Stewart is now calling out the hypocrisy at the DNC. pic.twitter.com/zfzfltVmp3

— Jonathan Choe (@choeshow) August 24, 2024

Stewart is getting points for bravery.

"Oh! Oh! I am a Democrat. Oh! So sad, so cold, so hungry! The world is dark! The world in the future, she's bleak!... The worst nightmare kind of scenario! It's a doom loop!"

Jon Stewart enacts the drama of the Democrat's recent emotional arc:

"In the span of a week, Democrats have gone from the despair of a certain Trump presidency to the joy of a statistical tie...."

The audience cheers wildly at the joy of a statistical tie.

"The Daily Show" gives us 17+ minutes of this week's show, which I think is pretty good. Highlights:

"100,000 white women? That is a giant group of white women. I believe the scientific term is actually a 'goop' of women...."

Montage of "Joe Biden is going to be the nominee.... Biden's not going anywhere," etc....

A gesture at a JD Vance/couch joke...

Montage of Republicans emoting about the "coup inside the Democratic party" and a connection to the January 6th "coup"...

"Isn't there a grosser way you can say" that Kamala Harris slept her way to the top?

Ted Cruz providing the occasion for Jon Stewart to offer a delicate way to call him fat... 

A "she was a DEI hire" montage followed by much pricking of your conscience for thinking about race.

Jon Stewart's view of the Trump trial: It's a test of the media's fairness and accuracy.

"If the media tries to make us feel like the most mundane bullshit is earth shattering, we won't believe you when it's really interesting. It's your classic boy who cried Wolf Blitzer."

"It would never have been realistic for New York, with its chronic housing shortage, to house an open-ended number of migrants at city expense."

"But Mr. Adams’s mismanagement of the crisis made it clear he never had a workable strategy to deal with it. Last May, for example, the mayor opened a flagship welcome center for migrants in the old Roosevelt Hotel in Midtown Manhattan. Since then, he has allowed the building, two blocks from Grand Central Terminal, to deteriorate in plain sight. Some ground-floor windows are blacked out, and mattresses hang from a huge metal trash receptacle in the street. Mopeds block one sidewalk, and graffiti defaces the side of the building near Grand Central...."

From "The Disappearance of Mayor Adams" (NYT).

Mayor Adams makes a notable appearance in this "Daily Show" segment (which is long but really good, going after multiple targets, not just Republicans):

"I guess, as the famous saying goes, Democracy Dies in Discussion."

Says Jon Stewart, on "The Daily Show" last night, responding to critics who accused him of "bothsidesism" for aiming some of his humor at Biden:

The test is whether Stewart can stand up to these critics or whether he will take direction from them. He makes a joke of apologizing to them and offering them a fresh slab of the kind of comedy they demand — he goes after Tucker Carlson. Fine. That was well done. But I don't want Stewart cowed by his critics, and I hope as last night's show proceeded, he made fun of some Democrats too. I can't tell you whether he did or not, because they didn't put the whole show on YouTube as they did last week, and I don't currently have the Paramount streaming service. I was considering subscribing just to get this show. I still am. I want what's going to make Democrats get haughtily indignant and say "bothsidesism."

"[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).

Jon Stewart returns to "The Daily Show" (and they've put the whole thing up on YouTube).

I like the way he's still got exactly the same style — same intonations, same attitude, same laughing at himself. This is "The Daily Show" as I know it, and I've pretty much avoided all the hosts who replaced Stewart after he'd gone. I think this is great, but he's only doing Mondays, so it won't be habit-forming.

With Jon Stewart's return to "The Daily Show," I was going to say it's fine, because Generation X did not get its full and fair chance to make its mark on the culture.

But Jon Stewart is 61. He was born in 1962. He's a BOOMER!

Boomers, Boomers, Boomers. We were born to dominate the culture forever. I say "forever," because without us... well, it's all always been about us. What is anything without us? 

Generation X is and was always in our shadow. Eventually, we'll pass on, but it will be too late for them. The Millennials — The Generation Created by Us, the Boomers — have always overshadowed Gen X, and as the Boomers vacate cultural space The Millennials will seize it as their rightful entitlement.

Now, let me cherry-pick from news articles about the return of Jon Stewart to "The Daily Show":

"One image shared by a user on X, formerly Twitter, was viewed 47 million times before the account was suspended on Thursday."

"X suspended several accounts that posted the faked images of Ms. Swift, but the images were shared on other social media platforms and continued to spread despite those companies’ efforts to remove them.... Researchers now fear that deepfakes are becoming a powerful disinformation force, enabling everyday internet users to create nonconsensual nude images or embarrassing portrayals of political candidates."

From "Explicit Deepfake Images of Taylor Swift Elude Safeguards and Swamp Social Media/Fans of the star and lawmakers condemned the images, probably generated by artificial intelligence, after they were shared with millions of social media users" (NYT).

Combining a photo of the head of a famous person with a photo of someone else's body is an old trick. I remember when Jon Stewart did it to the Supreme Court Justices in his book "America (The Book)." From 2004:

"Jon Stewart’s show on Apple’s streaming service is abruptly coming to an end..."

"Mr. Stewart and Apple executives decided to part ways in recent days.... [P]otential show topics related to China and artificial intelligence were causing concern among Apple executives, a person with knowledge of the meeting said.... Apple’s foray into entertainment has raised the risk of collateral damage to its brand or estrangement of the diverse customers who buy its pricey iPhones and iPads...."

From "Jon Stewart’s Show on Apple Is Ending/Mr. Stewart and Apple are parting ways because of creative differences over 'The Problem,' people with knowledge of the decision said" (NYT).

"Everybody calls me like, ‘You see Dave on 'SNL'?... Well, he normalized antisemitism with the monologue.'"

"I don’t know if you’ve been on comment sections on most news articles, but it’s pretty f-----g normal. As you know, it’s incredibly normal. But the one thing I will say is I don’t believe that censorship and penalties are the way to end antisemitism or to gain understanding. I don’t believe in that. It’s the wrong way for us to approach it.... Dave said something in the 'SNL' monologue that I thought was constructive, which, 'It shouldn’t be this hard to talk about things.' And that's what we're talking about. Whether it be comedy or discussion or anything else, if we don’t have the wherewithal to meet each other with what’s reality, then how do we move forward?"

Said Jon Stewart, quoted in "Jerry Seinfeld says 'subject matter' of Dave Chappelle's 'SNL' monologue 'calls for a conversation'/Chappelle's opening routine on last weekend's episode of 'SNL' has been criticized for 'normalizing antisemitism'" (Fox News).

The headline writer must really not like Jon Stewart... or maybe he just didn't read the bottom half of the article. If you're curious what Seinfeld said, it was much more distanced and wary: "I did think the comedy was well-executed, but I think the subject matter calls for a conversation that I don’t think I’d want to have in this venue." That's three "I thinks"s in one sentence.

Perhaps that wariness is more indicative of genuine fear of anti-Semitism. But Seinfeld, it seems, has always stayed in neutral territory, and social and political discord is Stewart's milieu.

Jon Stewart treats a Democratic Congresswoman as if she's brilliant because she came up with the phrase "No shit, Sherlock."

Rep. Katie Porter (D-CA): “This is the Republicans all day long: ‘Inflation’s bad!' No shit, Sherlock. Of course inflation’s bad. I too go to the grocery store. That is not a policy statement.” pic.twitter.com/L313mWZ0tf

— The Recount (@therecount) November 4, 2022

Jon Stewart suddenly reinvents himself.

In the space of a year left wingers and their allies in big tech have moved from ridiculing and silencing anyone who suggested covid may have come from a Chinese lab to ridiculing anyone who doesn’t believe covid came from a Chinese lab. It’s head spinning.

— Clay Travis (@ClayTravis) June 15, 2021

"Gervais cannot understand why supporting free-speech will make him a rightwinger."

"... '[H]e declined to back away from any of his anti-woke jokes, his discussion of the n-word at a comics’ roundtable, or his insistence that everybody is fair game for mockery. To hold otherwise would be to grant classes of people special protections — comedy "privilege." He won’t do it.'... The same reasons Gervais is now a public enemy for the liberal-left, even though he is an atheist who votes for the Labour party, is the same reason Tucker Carlson is hated, or the reason Donald Trump and Boris Johnson are despised. Tucker Carlson is supposed to be instinctively free-trade and open borders, given his socio-economic background. A New York Billionaire with three wives, is not supposed to be defending Evangelicals from ever-encroaching sexual liberation. A classics scholar from Oxford shouldn’t oppose a European superstate in favour of a narrow national interest. And yet, they all went against what their supposed class interests are. And thereby, for good or for bad, broke the consensus. Anyone who goes against scripture is naturally deemed a heretic. Gervais has also joined the ranks. Good."

From "Ricky Gervais is the heretic we need right now" by Sumantra Maitra at something called The Post Millennial (found via Real Clear Politics).

In my own little way, I identify with this. It's how I got myself perceived as a right-winger. And now I'm taking a second look at the quote I put in the headline: "Gervais cannot understand why supporting free-speech will make him a rightwinger." I don't believe that for a minute! Gervais can understand. I wouldn't put anything that is humanly comprehensible beyond his understanding. It's the intensity and vigor of his understanding that makes him the comedian that he is. He's using his powers and refusing to be boxed in by the strictures of leftist comedy-killers. And there's no richer comedy material than the controlling prudes who say That's not funny.

This made me think about the recent episode of Joe Rogan's podcast where he interviews Jon Stewart.  I tried to listen to it...



... but I didn't get very far, and I don't think Joe was enjoying himself too much either because the thing doesn't even reach the hour-and-a-half mark. Joe normally goes well over 2 hours with his guests and often over 3 hours. That's the idea: Things flow and open up. But Jon was a drag. He wasn't funny. He did, interestingly enough, admit that he'd burnt out on "The Daily Show," that the routine of reading the script the writers prepared for him in that outraged tone felt awful from the inside.

Ricky Gervais writes his own material and keeps going, thank God.