New York Times: Is Jon Stewart The Most Trusted Man in America?

The answer may well be “yes.” (NYT)

When Americans were asked in a 2007 poll by the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press to name the journalist they most admired, Mr. Stewart, the fake news anchor, came in at No. 4, tied with the real news anchors Brian Williams and Tom Brokaw of NBC, Dan Rather of CBS and Anderson Cooper of CNN.

And a study this year from the center’s Project for Excellence in Journalism concluded that “ ‘The Daily Show’ is clearly impacting American dialogue” and “getting people to think critically about the public square.” (NYT)

Yes. And there’s this:

Most important, at a time when Fox, MSNBC and CNN routinely mix news and entertainment, larding their 24-hour schedules with bloviation fests and marathon coverage of sexual predators and dead celebrities, it’s been “The Daily Show” that has tenaciously tracked big, “super depressing” issues like the cherry-picking of prewar intelligence, the politicization of the Department of Justice and the efforts of the Bush White House to augment its executive power.(NYT)

And this:

MR. STEWART describes his job as “throwing spitballs” from the back of the room and points out that “The Daily Show” mandate is to entertain, not inform. Still, he and his writers have energetically tackled the big issues of the day — “the stuff we find most interesting,” as he said in an interview at the show’s Midtown Manhattan offices, the stuff that gives them the most “agita,” the sometimes somber stories he refers to as his “morning cup of sadness.” And they’ve done so in ways that straight news programs cannot: speaking truth to power in blunt, sometimes profane language, while using satire and playful looniness to ensure that their political analysis never becomes solemn or pretentious.

“Hopefully the process is to spot things that would be grist for the funny mill,” Mr. Stewart, 45, said. “In some respects, the heavier subjects are the ones that are most loaded with opportunity because they have the most — you know, the difference between potential and kinetic energy? — they have the most potential energy, so to delve into that gives you the largest combustion, the most interest. I don’t mean for the audience. I mean for us. Everyone here is working too hard to do stuff we don’t care about.”.(NYT)

And this:

What the staff is always looking for, Mr. Stewart said, are “those types of stories that can, almost like the guy in ‘The Green Mile’ ” — the Stephen King story and film in which a character has the apparent ability to heal others by drawing out their ailments and pain — “suck in all the toxins and allow you to do something with it that is palatable.”

To make the more alarming subject matter digestible, the writers search for ways to frame the story, using an arsenal of techniques ranging from wordplay (“Mess O’Potamia,” “BAD vertising”) to exercises in pure logic (deconstructing the administration’s talking points on the surge) to demented fantasy sequences (imagining Vice President Dick Cheney sending an army of orcs to attack Iran when he assumed the presidency briefly last year during President Bush’s colonoscopy). (NYT)

Much more here.

A colleague of mine commented:

One of the remarkable things about Stewart’s material is how well it holds up. Go back and watch old segments from his primary coverage, for instance. It’s very clear that he saw the big picture, and recognized what stories were meaningful and which ones deserved nothing but pointing and laughing.

In a funny way, working as a satirist actually frees Stewart from the BS media cycle, and lets him a little more freedom to be a real journalist.

And it’s not really that Stewart really aspired to be what he’s become for some people, their most relied-upon news source. Who can forget his famous rebuke to the media? Remember when he went on Crossfire and told them that they were “partisan hacks” who were hurting America—after which they proceeded to prove that they don’t know the difference between a comedy show and a real news show? Heck, maybe they’re right and there no longer is a difference.

If you aren’t familiar with Stewart’s work, or haven’t been following him recently, I’ve got links to my personal favorites here (scroll down to the bottom of the page).

CROSS POSTED AT BUCK NAKED POLITICS