Back in the classroom again.

by Cliopatria

This is it for me as guest blogger. It has been great fun but I have to get back to my day job, some other writing, etc. etc.. My final thought: Jon Stewart just called Robert Novak"a douche-bag for liberty" after dismantling Novak's piece on Kerry's war service and the recent"ads" around it. I've watched the Daily Show two nights in a row now and all I can say is, as much as I love Jon Stewart and crew, it is a sad, sad day for the Republic when I learn more from watching Comedy Central than I can wathcing the nightly news. Sigh.

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David Lion Salmanson - 8/13/2004

The Stewart questions to Clinton were hysterical. He'd start with somehting like "Does it bother you that in this administration Haliburton...[SEC report] and you had (pause) Travelgate? Clinton was on which reminded me why he was so popular despite his many failings.

Derek Charles Catsam - 8/12/2004

Originally, Stewart called Novak "Douchebag for liberty," but the other night he also called him "douchebag for freedom," so he's flexible.
Interesting also that Clinton chose to do the Daily Show but he decided against hosting SNL this fall.
dc

David Lion Salmanson - 8/12/2004

I think I'm sensing a post for next summer, or maybe an excuse to revisit the Mad Magazine's that took up so much of my youth.

Oscar Chamberlain - 8/12/2004

I've never watched the Daily Show, though I have had many students recommend it to me. I can't help but wonder if satire as a primary source for information increases cynicism.

There's an argument against that fear. Good satire requires a moral center, and that center is communicated implicitly. Like Jonathan, I gained much from the saitre of the 1970s, and it was because of that.

But how many of the viewers (or readers) get it? And how many only take it as another reason to assume that all politics and all politicians suck, so let's go get a beer?

David Lion Salmanson - 8/11/2004

This was going to be a longer post about changes in the media, the way we get news, the return of an antebellum esthetic in news etc. etc.. But that was way to big for me to handle. The scary thing is that I am not the only one, apparently a plurality of 18-35 year olds (not my cohort exactly) use the Daily Show as their primary news information source.

Jonathan Dresner - 8/11/2004

"The purpose of satire is to strip off the veneer of comforting illusion and cozy half-truth. And our business, as I see it, is to put it back again." -- Michael Flanders

Satire has always spoken great truth, particularly when hypocrisy was rife. A great deal of what I know about the 1970s, for example, comes from Garry Trudeau and Tom Paxton, and what they taught me has been supplemented, but never corrected.

Thanks!