Who a show has as a guest doesn't necessarily indicate how they treat that guest, nor does it indicate how they handle politics at other times, with other guests.

AHA!!!!

I agree with the first part, but as for the last part, Jon Stewart is able to make just about any celebrity interview funny even if the celebrity isn't funny (ex. Spice Girls). Maybe it's just me, but I've been amazed at how good a job Stewart has done with the interview portion of TDS over the years. For instance, I don't like Kelsey Grammer at all, but Stewart managed to make the interview last night pretty entertaining.

But for some reason Stewart becomes incredibly boring to me when he has a non-entertainer on the show. It's almost like he's scared to offend the person. I realize it may not be appopriate for him to joke around with some of these people and I don't mind that. It's just that there's been way too many of these interviews in the past month. Maybe this happened four years ago also and I just don't remember it.

Maybe I'm just too easily bored by politics. I want more interviews with the Spice Girls!

Hmm...the only times I've seen it become "one-sided" is when the interviewee becomes a bad interview. For example, I found Richard Perle's interview to be rather boring since he wasn't up to the banter Stewart was offering (and Perle didn't seem to have much of a sense of humor). In comparison, I think Whitman, Dole, McCain, etc. showed they could respond to Stewart's banter in kind, and the discourse becomes alot more interesting and "fair".

Of all of the times I've seen Stewart interview Republicans/Conservatives, I've never seen him:
- try to shame them/shut them up
- use rhetoric as fact


If the guest is a politician/political related, you can almost expect that politics will be part of the discourse. However, like I pointed out earlier, if Stewart isn't belittleing the other person, plus is giving them a forum to express their views, what else can you ask for? It's not Meet the Press - I think politicians are given alot more fair leeway on the Daily Show, and they get to be more humanized.

However, if said person is not a good interview (esp. if they start to resort to rhetoric as their answers), they'll get squashed because it becomes very evident that they have nothing else to say beyond a few pre-written sound bites.

Not just the political interviews: a bad interviewee can turn it into a bad interview (ie recently: Julia Stiles).

CaptainMarvel - Umm...dude, I don't even know how to answer that one. Does this mean this thread has no point whatsoever now?

What I want to know is why did y'all wait five years to complain? Seems odd to suddenly bring it up now.

It's a shame when the right-wingers realize they can't force everyone in the world to hold their views, isn't it? Seriously. I get the picture more and more that some (not all) conservatives wish they could find a "final solution" for the liberal menace and eradicate all sedition (Ann Coulter, I'm looking at you). Hell, I think people like Coulter and O'Reilly and Bush and Cheney gang are the worst thing that's happened to America since Joe McCarthy, but I wouldn't deny them the right to speak. You don't like Stewart's bent -- which is more liberal than it's not, but that's AOK to me -- don't watch it. It's just funny to me that it seems like the right wing rationale now is that you shouldn't speak at all if you're not supporting "our" president.

I haven't read any respones in the thread & I doubt anyone will read mine. But I boycott the Daily Show b/c they are so pro-liberal, anti-Bush it repulses me. I do think Stewart is extremely funny & they have some great comedic writers, but all they have such an obvious agenda it sickens me.

Yay. I was wondering how long it would take one of our liberal friends to equate conservatives not liking a liberal message with conservatives trying to suppress free speech. A few earlier posts bordered on it, but you just came right out and said it.

"Final solution"... . That's really nice.

I think Stewart is more moderate than anything else, and he just points out the absudity in things.

If things that the current administration says or does (WOMD) seem absurd, then it's his job to point it out and make us laugh at it's absurdity. And that goes for all the Democrats that are running right now - have you guys even been watching the show? It's been just as scathing to the left, as it has been to the right. But I guess we're all just selective as to what offends ourself and we just ignore the whole picture.

Did you watch the show that he was on? Apparently not, for if you had, you would have seen a witty, intelligent interview with a few good-natured jabs - Just like EVERY OTHER INTERVIEW HE'S EVER DONE! Hell, he was mighty nice to Patrick Buchanan...among others.

This thread is really pretty stupid - it's a fake news show that gets the majority of it's material from current events....there has always been a lot of political stories and guests....and since we went to war almost a year ago, and now we are in an election year with the white house and Congress in Republican control, it would stand to reason that they would get a tad more airtime. But again, if you actually watched the show, you would know that no one of any political stripe gets a free pass (again, unlike mr. Miller). If anything, I see Stewart as a somewhat jaded and extremely cynical man when it comes to politics - he doesn't seem to have much use for either side in the end.....he certainly doesn't back down from making fun of each and every one who manages to make the nightly news.

Whoa. I'm having an Otter moment.

You seem to be under the impression that I either don't watch the show or only infrequently watch it. That's far from the truth; I have a Season Pass to the show on my TiVo, and I watch it frequently.

I didn't see that particular episode, which is why I didn't comment on it in particular. But I disagree with your assessment that "EVERY OTHER INTERVIEW HE'S EVER DONE" has been completely professional and unbiased.

Feel free to disagree.

Well, turn the channel to Fox News...watch O'Reilly and Co. rant and have a good time.

They're not anti-Bush, they're anti-Bullshit.

They call Dean Kerry and Co out on the stupid things they say and do. Simply because they also call out the current administration on the stupid things they do and say, you're offended. Just seems that you're narrow-minded. For Chrissake, they call the Democrats running for president "The Run from the White House!"

Did anyone watch this interview? I thought Stewart was exceptionally reserved during the interview and didn't (for the most part) crack a single joke.
It was pretty hard considering who he was interviewing and the subject matter.

I never heard the audience so quiet during any interview. Ususally they laugh a few times, hoot, clap or do something, but you could have heard crickets chirping.

You have to understand, the people in power don't WANT the rest of us talking about news and what's going on in the world. They don't want us questioning the war, or their economic policies, or their end runs around the Constitution. They want us to shut up, watch American Idol, and buy more Amurr-ken flags.

If the Democrats were in power and as incompetent and corrupt as the current administration, I'm sure TDS would be skewering them too.

But, god man, it's a NEWS show parody. If you want to see stupid skits based on Britney Spears' marriage, just turn on SNL. Their comedy is pointless and irrelevent, should be perfect for all of you who can't stand the "liberal" Daily Show.

Prove me wrong, Captain.

"There are reminders to all Americans that they need to watch what they say, watch what they do, and this is not a time for remarks like that; there never is." -- gee, wasn't that the chief Propagandameister/White House spokesman who said that little bit of free-speech stomping? I'm not saying ALL conservatives feel that way, but there certainly are an ugly and vocal few, just like there are a few liberals out there who would censor anything they doesn't feel is p.c. I depsise both camps quite equally. Anyway I'm getting heavily OT with the gist of this thread here so I'll clam my big yap up for now...

Some people seem to be saying that the whole tone of the show is leftist, and some that it is just the interview parts where Stewart lets his bias show through. I think the reason we see so much material about the republicans is because they have a complete stranglehold not only on what is happening politically in this country - but also on the context of the 'national debate', or how every issue and event is framed. The right has managed to shift the widely agreed upon political spectrum so that true moderates are labeled as liberals, and a conservative like Joe Lieberman gets away with calling himself moderate. I think the Daily Show provides a service, an unfiltered critique of the powers-that-be in a humorous way. Unconcerned with appearing one way or the other - they'd make fun of a flat-earth society member, not have a headline like "Round or Flat? Opinions vary."

I think the lesson here is if anyone anywhere discusses anything remotely political, they will be viewed as somewhat biased to someone and irritating, no matter the forum or the situation or the intent.

I don't think I need to. When you compared conservatives to Nazis, you lost any credibility as far as I'm concerned.

A bonafide out of Otter experience

National Socialism was an extreme right wing movement, so why is it not ok for someone to make comparisons between somewhat extreme right wingers and extremely extreme right wingers? I don't have any problem with people criticizing some of the more extreme left wing ideology and making allusions to Stalinist communism, I think there is a legitimate point there.

If you're talking about comparing the political and economic tendencies of modern liberals to Stalinist communists and modern conservatives to Nazis, then maybe that's one thing. But I'd find it equally as offensive if a conservative said that modern liberals were going to organize pogroms and purges like Stalin did.

Sheesh.

What republicans have to realize is that when they have control over all three branches of the government, comedians simply aren't going to spend all their time making Chappaquidick jokes.

*Scratches Head* The last show I watched had them talking about how Lieberman was behaving totally insane pretending anyone was interested in him (and showed a funny clip of him being ignored) and the one I saw before that (a few weeks ago) was saying how the Democrats had absolutly no chance of getting into the White House because no canidate is strong enough. That last thing is a HUGE blow to Democrats, as many people vote on public perception as opposed to actually who they think is best.

It's just a comedy show, it really doesn't have an agenda aside from making people laugh by revealing really funny BS.

I like it!