Jon Stewart, I Love You.

I am not afraid to admit that I am a fan of Jon Stewart. Although I would not categorize myself as a liberal (I would prefer the moniker of 'person who believes what she believes') I hold a great deal of respect for him. Although I am new to 'The Daily Show with Jon Stewart' and the man that is Jon Stewart, I can't helped but be somewhat captivated by him. I am not easily taken with hosts of television shows, but he's different. Even if I do love him per se, I do have my share of criticisms.

The Loves of Jon Stewart

1. He's a great speaker

Every time I watch Jon Stewart on his show, he knows exactly what to say and what to comment on to make me laugh. You could argue that it's because he funny or is a comedian, yet I would have to say that no one can capture an audience without charisma and expert forensic skills. One thing that contributes to Jon's good grasp of speech is that he is tactful; he chooses his words wisely. I would go on to say that he chooses his words better than most presidents do (hint: Hire him as your PR guy and you would probably start to lack absurdity in your comments Mr. Newt). Specifically, I would like to point out his Fox News Sunday interview/debate/great-moment-on-television-so-far when he stated that:

"I am a comedian first..."

Chris Wallace went on to argue that Jon was also in many ways a liberal idealogue that pushes a liberal agenda and that Jon seems to dance around questions about his [Jon's] 'journalistic' qualities by stating he is 'only' a comedian. Jon counters, due to his good choice of words, that he stated that he is a comedian first, he never denounced the fact that he could be anything else.

2. Crossfire, what an attack!

Remember Crossfire? I definitely do. Although I was at a young age at the time (10-11), I enjoyed watching two political pundits battling it out on television over random issues. Even though I missed the episode, Jon Stewart came along and sat in on the show to supposedly 'promote' his new book: "America, (The Book): The Citizen's Guide to Democracy Inaction." (Good read, it's funny. Don't take it seriously) Yet, once he started talking he immediately started pointing out that he disliked the show Crossfire and told the show to 'stop hurting America.' 

Good move. Even if I did like the show, it was just political theater more so than an actual news program. The argument here is that it was actually a debate/forum show, however, shouldn't a debate actually have a conclusion of sorts? If I can recall Crossfire, it was just shouting and political spin revolving around issues. I am assuming here that political theater to Jon Stewart means that it is a platform for poltics to 'act' rather than to actually be an area of discourse. Stewart makes a good point to note that if Crossfire was on another network (not a news network like CNN) then maybe it is proper; but it was on CNN. (He brings this up in many of his criticisms of other networks). The point of a news channel is to provide the public with accurate information filled with journalistic integrity. Entertainment should not be the priority. Journalism is.