Jon Stewart is No Good Corporal

After watching his interview with President Barak Obama and his rally on the National Mall it is clear to me that Jon Stewart is not the rabid leftist ideologue that some would have us believe. He does, however, share with most of the media and seemingly all politicians the pernicious habit of avoiding unpleasant subjects, no matter how important they are. When Stewart spoke with Obama he took his cue from practically every politician running for office this year and made no mention of our three foreign wars and our domestic one against people who use certain kinds of drugs. He did not, for example ,take the chance to ask Obama how it is fair that he gets to be President while someone else has to go to jail when they both smoked marijuana nor did Stewart use his opportunity to find out if the atrocities and unjustifiable behavior in Iraq and Afghanistan exposed by Wikileaks are still continuing.

In addition, the comedian failed to inquire as to why the President chose to follow the economic strategy of massive government interference employed by FDR when that course resulted in more than ten years of economic misery for the American people. Perhaps he did not want to embarrass Obama by pointing out that in 1938 five years after Roosevelt took over there were more people unemployed and more families on the dole then when he started us on the that ill conceived course in 1933. Maybe it would have been too painful for Obama to bring up the fact that twice in the last century, 1920 and 1980, the country was in just as bad economic distress as we are now and those in charge then, Harding and Reagan, did essentially the opposite of what Obama is doing now, which led in both cases to a quick recovery. Stewart also forgot to ask Obama how he planned to get the Japanese to bomb Pearl Harbor again.

In contrast to Jon Stewart we have people like Bradley Manning, Julian Assange, Daniel Ellsberg, and Sibel Edmonds. Chris Floyd has written a remarkably moving poem, The Good Corporal, and dedicated it to them.

The Good Corporal

Good corporal, good corporal, now what have you done?
You've laid out the dead in the light of the sun.
You've opened the door where the dark deeds go on,
Where the fine words of freedom are broken like bones.

Good corporal, good corporal, you tell us of crime
Done in the name of your country and mine.
Of torture and murder, corruption and lies,
In a land where no echo will carry the cries.

Good corporal, good corporal, now who do we blame
For the horrors you bring us, for this undying shame?
Should we lay all the guilt on the grunts with no name,
Or the high and the mighty who rigged up this game?

Good corporal, good corporal, don't you know the fate
Of all those who speak the hard truth to the State
And all who trouble the people's sweet dreams?
They're mocked into scorn and torn apart at the seams.

Good corporal, good corporal, what have you done?
You've laid out the dead in the light of the sun.

Jon Stewart is not a good corporal and I would argue that his silence is helping to kill innocent people.

Hat tip to Kenny Rodgers.