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ShareWhen Jon Stewart took as over as host of The Daily Show in 1999, displacing then-host Craig Kilborn, the show was little more than a modestly amusing satire program modeled loosely after SNL’s “Weekend Update” sketch: good-natured celebrity-bashing, a healthy dose of political lampooning. Today, the show is a potent cultural institution, boasting one of the largest viewerships in modern history for a cable program.
The Daily Show‘s influence over voter perceptions has been well documented—a 2006 study by East Carolina State found that Daily Show viewers, while considerably cynical of the electoral system, demonstrated a higher degree of interest in politics as a whole. Of course, Stewart, who now serves as managing editor of the program, dismisses such stats as irrelevant, arguing that the sole purpose of the program is entertainment, and as such, it has no obligation to be “fair” in the same way that real news programs do. By its own logic, The Daily Show has insulated itself from attacks of journalistic bias by virtue of the fact that it is a comedy show, and therefore free of the rhetorical constraints that underpin “serious” journalism—an entity it regards with a healthy degree of skepticism.
But Stewart’s March 12 interview with Mad Money’s Jim Cramer leads one to wonder whether or not the show’s sense of humor might be slipping, which could leave many viewers feeling alienated. Given the scope of the program’s influence, it’s not a stretch to imagine the repercussions of this extending into the political sphere.
Stewart had already made a career as a comic and had enjoyed a few stints on several short-lived MTV programs before taking Kilborn’s place, and so it was little surprise that he excelled in the capacity as host. He was quick-witted, self-deprecating, and undeniably likable. But it wasn’t until the 2000 presidential elections that the full scope of his political wit became apparent. Stewart and his team of farcical news commentators, including soon-to-be comedy icons Steve Carrell and Stephen Colbert, worked diligently to highlight the inherent absurdity of the election process—exemplified in that case by the Florida ballot debacle, which provided nearly a season’s worth of material for the show’s writers. The cast’s sarcastic portrayal of themselves as “real” journalists underscored the twisted relationship between politics and media in America—the result of which, ironically, was that viewers began to regard the show as an actual news program.
By 2004, more young people (18-29) were turning to the show as their primary source for news. With a growing guest roster of authors, political analysts, and upper-echelon Washington elites, it was clear that the show was becoming something more than just a comedy program. People were no longer watching it simply because it was funny; they were watching it because it was important.
This was also the year of Stewart’s now-infamous guest appearance on CNN’s Crossfire. Presumably, hosts Tucker Carlson and Paul Begala had hoped that having a comedian on might take some of the edge off the customarily turgid program. Instead, Stewart blistered the two men, whom he referred to as “partisan hacks,” for furthering the growing ideological divide between political parties and thus serving the interests of the Washington elite and not those of American voters. Carlson, clearly incensed by Stewart’s remarks, claimed that he thought Stewart had come on the show to be funny. “Oh, no no,” Stewart replied dryly. “I’m not your monkey.”
The show’s coverage of the 2004 presidential election between George W. Bush and John Kerry solidified Stewart’s reputation as a savvy cultural critic, but more importantly, it offered a clear demonstration of comedy’s efficacy as an instrument of rhetorical analysis. Says Robert J. Thompson, Director of the Center for the Study of Popular Television at Syracuse University: “Actually, when it’s done well, comedy in this country can become a counterbalance to journalism, like journalism is a counterbalance to government.”
To be sure, humor is what it is because it’s rooted in some larger complex truth. Jokes are a palatable way of examining those things about ourselves, either culturally or individually, that may otherwise not be so easy to stomach. A successful joke operates as a kind of reductio ad absurdum, highlighting the deceptively large gap between language and meaning.
Of course, by definition, a counterbalance acts in opposition to its subject, and so in order to be an effective instrument of rhetoric, comedy must often maintain a certain degree of distance between itself and ideology. This is not to say that a comic must regard all ideologies with the same degree of cynicism, but it is important to keep in mind that mistrust of one ideology or set of ideologies does not necessarily entail an endorsement of its opposite. When comedy begins endorsing particular views, it often degenerates into propaganda, as evidenced by FOX’s short-lived fake news program The ½ Hour News Hour. Arguably a response to The Daily Show, the program made no effort to hide its Republican leanings, crafting the majority of its jokes as passive-aggressive jabs at Democrats, featuring such guest commentators as Ann Coulter and Rush Limbaugh.
Of course, anyone with a moderate understanding of irony can tell you that the reason a show like The ½ Hour News Hour doesn’t work is because, in a way, we already know the punchlines before they arrive. It makes no attempt to disguise the fact that it functions on behalf of one side of the political spectrum, and so it operates as little more than poorly-crafted political propaganda. There’s never any larger truth underpinning the gags, and thus no incentive for viewers to invest on an intellectual level.
That FOX even believed a response to The Daily Show was necessary indicates its having mistaken the show’s mistrust of conservativism as an open endorsement of liberalism. And while it is true that The Daily Show did support Barack Obama in the 2008 election, and that it tends to be more critical of Republicans than Democrats, this certainly does not mean that it fully endorses the Left. In fact, as Michiko Kakutani pointed out in her 2008 New York Times interview with Stewart, The Daily Show is largely characterized by its cynicism toward all ideologies, not just those of a Republican bent.
By this measure, it seems that The Daily Show has become its own sort of counterbalance to the major news networks, which it perceives as having forsaken the quest for truth, functioning instead as vehicles for political and corporate gain—an attitude best exemplified by the much-YouTubed skirmish between Stewart and Jim Cramer.
