Jon Stewart on the mainstream media

*stands up, slowly claps* Stewart just told it like it was.

 

Wallace cut him off, but I wish Stewart would have returned to his point about how misinformed the typical Fox News viewer is. The poll numbers that came out showing how little that group knew about what was happening in Iraq were staggering. That's the easiest way to explain the difference between Fox and all the groups it compares itself to: Had any of those groups led their readers/viewers so badly astray there would have been major hand-wringing, but at Fox it was cause for chuckles and high-fives.

 

I agree here. A good reporter would've said, "What's your evidence for saying that? You're calling my network's viewers a bunch of idiots because of my station. What makes you say that?" Perhaps Wallace knew the answer and didn't want to ask it.

 

One thing TDS does on a regular basis that few news shows do (though I have seen it done a little more in the last few years) is contrasting a statement made by a politician with the exact opposite statements that politician has made in the past. Or a politician saying "I would never...," and then showing a clip of the politician having once done exactly that. The strongest argument for "lazy" is that so many in the biz, particularly the Sunday talk show or 24-hour news end of it, take every politician's statement at face value.

 

Research is a lot of work.

And you have to pay people to do it...

 

Agree completely. I wish real news agencies did more of this, even if they presented it with less hilarious snark as you would see (that's a compliment) on TDS.

 

Sounds like Meet The Press with Tim Russert

 

Which kind of proves the point, no? I can think of TDS, Colbert and MTP as shows that use that tactic. I think some pundit shows (Olberman, O'Reilly, etc.) will attempt to use clips as "gotcha!" moments, but very rarely do straight news programs do it.

 

DING!

 

Most clips have some form of context. Ignoring the context to preserve your "gotcha!" moment is not journalism.

Politician can utter something that includes a "but" or "unless", and the gotcha clip will exclude the qualification.

 

It's gotten worse, but there's a long history of that. Look at McCarthyism.

McCarthy would make a speech, wave a piece of paper, and say, "I have 50 Communists in the government on this list!" Then he'd go, make another speech, and change the number.

And the press would just report it. When a few reporters would try to call McCarthy out on his BS, either they would be accused of being Communist sympathizers, or McCarthy would just ignore him. Meanwhile, you had some in the press who supported him.

Instead of the press saying, "We want to see the list, Joe. Right now. Or we're all going to write that you're a drunken liar," McCarthy ranted for four years, screwing over a lot of people.

 

That was a very, very bad time. Peoples' livings snatched away from them, with no recourse, thanks to the drunken, staggering pantload and his cohorts.

Who can forget Simple J. Malarkey?