Furor over Stewart-Colbert rally

JackReacher · Nov 1, 2010

Double Down said:

I was there.
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Sonuva! I knew there was a reason I should have gone.

Inky_Wretch · Nov 1, 2010

My favorite sign from the rally was one that said "I want more tortillas when I order fajitas at a restaurant!"

YankeeFan · Nov 1, 2010

DanOregon said:

Had to laugh reading some of the coverage of the rally. Crowd size as a barometer of success? Check. Hitler pictures/Partisan name calling called out? Check. Wondering what it all means? Check.

Don't think I read anything mentioning Stewart calling out the cable nets for stirring things up.

I really loved the traffic metaphor at the end. "Sure there is a jerk who cuts in when it's not his turn, but we don't make him an analyst."
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In his new role as a political leader, which is what you call somebody if he hosts a rally on the Washington Mall for over 200,000 people, Jon Stewart was a little hemmed at the Rally to Restore Sanity on Saturday. Because sanity should know no party, partisan rhetoric was not on the teleprompter.

So instead the host of “The Daily Show” took steady aim on the one American institution that everyone can agree to hate: The Media. Within the first minute of his deft, very articulate stump speech at the end of the rally, Mr. Stewart turned his gun sights on the, um, fake news, which he called, “the country’s 24-hour political pundit perpetual panic conflictinator,” which, he added, “did not cause our problems, but its existence makes solving them that much harder.”

“The press can hold its magnifying glass up to our problems bringing them into focus, illuminating issues heretofore unseen or they can use that magnifying glass to light ants on fire and then perhaps host a week of shows on the sudden, unexpected dangerous, flaming ant epidemic,” he said, to roars of approval from the crowd.

It was a beautiful day on the Mall, and who doesn’t like kicking the press around, but speaking of ants, media bias and hyperbole seem like pretty small targets when unemployment is near 10 percent, vast amounts of unregulated cash are being spent in the election’s closing days, and no American governing institution — not the Senate, not the House of Representatives, not even the Supreme Court — seems to be above petty partisan bickering. Mr. Stewart couldn’t really go there and instead suggested it was those guys over there in the press tent who had the blood of democracy on their hands.

Distrust of the media was laid down throughout the rally by video montages of ranting broadcast bobble heads. Even with the vast gulf between their faux respective beliefs, Mr. Stewart and his co-host, Stephen Colbert, found common ground in the failings of the press. Mr. Colbert awarded some media outlets a medal for helping keep fear alive; Mr. Stewart gave out his awards to average Americans who go about their business every day in lives built on compromise and comity.

“We work together to get things done every damn day! The only place we don’t is here,” he said, gesturing toward the Capitol, “or on cable TV.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/01/business/media/01carr.html?_r=1&src=tptw
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JayFarrar · Nov 1, 2010

Inky_Wretch said:

My favorite sign from the rally was one that said "I want more tortillas when I order fajitas at a restaurant!"
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Weird, I also want more tortillas when I order fajitas as well. Finally something we can all agree.
And I DVRed the rally and have watched portions of it. Seemed fairly straight forward to me. Some music, some comedy, some crowd interaction and lots of media bashing.

DanOregon · Nov 1, 2010

The Roots were seriously awesome. You wonder where they found time to rehearse all of that stuff.

YankeeFan · Nov 1, 2010

Interesting:

After reflecting on the Jon Stewart rally, MSNBC’s Keith Olbermann, host of Countdown, is suspending his show’s “Worst Person in the World” segment. On tonight’s program, he announced that he is ending the long-running feature, with an “eye toward discontinuing” it.

http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/251851/olbermann-suspends-worst-person-robert-costa
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HeinekenMan · Nov 2, 2010

YankeeFan said:

Interesting:

After reflecting on the Jon Stewart rally, MSNBC’s Keith Olbermann, host of Countdown, is suspending his show’s “Worst Person in the World” segment. On tonight’s program, he announced that he is ending the long-running feature, with an “eye toward discontinuing” it.

http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/251851/olbermann-suspends-worst-person-robert-costa
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Perhaps he was afraid he might be moving to the top of his own list of the worst people in the world. I love Stewart's show. But I have never watched Olbermann. It's not because I dislike his politics. I just don't find him entertaining.

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Furor over Stewart-Colbert rally

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Furor over Stewart-Colbert rally

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