Jon Stewart: Some of His Best Moments

Ryan Gibbs – Crossfire

Here’s what I wanted to tell you guys: Stop. Stop hurting America. –  Jon Stewart on the October 15, 2004 episode of Crossfire.

Did you know that Jon Stewart’s appearance on Crossfire is taught in journalism schools? At least, it was in mine. The appearance is a discussion point in Bill Kovach and Tom Rosenstiel’s bedrock The Elements of Journalism, too.

The first thing you need to know about this is that Crossfire was a pretty terrible show–the worst of the opinion screaming matches that cable news seemed to love in the 2000s, and typical of CNN’s programming before it became too busy with its 24 hour marathons of Lockup: Raw to pay attention to some of the biggest news stories of the decade.

YouTube clips of Stewart’s appearance are often labeled as him “destroying” the show. I’d argue that what he did was more along the lines of a dismantling, slowly unwinding a godawful program like a kitten does to a ball of yarn. Almost immediately after being introduced, he comes in with why he agreed to come in the first place, and it’s not to promote America: The Book. He states that Crossfire and its glib political shouting matches are “hurting America” and that its hosts are “partisan hacks.” He tells them, “You have a responsibility to the public discourse, and you fail miserably. ”

Tucker Carlson tries to turn the tables–how can Jon Stewart criticize Crossfire for being a terrible forum of opinion when he lobs goofy softball questions at someone like John Kerry? Stewart answers: he’s a comedian doing a comedy show on a comedy network, and he’s not required to ask any real questions.

Of course, the interesting thing about this whole deal is that Stewart has become one of the best interviewers on television because his questions are often blunt and humorous but are genuinely thoughtful, and he does manage to get real answers from them. But at the end of the day, Stewart is a comedian. Those polls that say that he is the most trusted man on television says less about him and more about how deeply flawed most television journalism was then and still is right now.

I don’t consider Stewart to be a journalist, but he’s absolutely had an effect and an influence on journalism and young journalists especially. Many of my friends from my college’s journalism department name Stewart as someone who has greatly influenced them. We all reacted to the news that Stewart was retiring the same way our parents did about Walter Cronkite. While on the whole we didn’t like television news all that much, it’s still interesting that a fake newsman has more of an impact and influence on us than any actual TV anchor.

Anyway, Crossfire got canceled in January 2005, with CNN’s CEO admitting that he understood Stewart’s criticisms of the show and hinted they were the among the reasons the program was being canned. After the show finally left the air that June, Stewart’s appearance became pretty much the only thing anyone remembers about it. As it should be.