The Daily Show/Awesome

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


There's a very good reason why Jon Stewart was voted America's most trusted newscaster after Walter Cronkite passed away [1].

general

  • The moment when a comedy show, hosted by comedians and written by comedy writers, became a respected news source and considered to be the watchdog of other news shows and channels — their statements taken as valid opinions, and the show given actual credibility. Again, these are not journalists, reporters, or newscasters. These are comedians (a fact that drives the rest of the News Media community up the wall). While in some aspects it is a very disturbing commentary on our society, I think that is the Daily Show's true moment of Utter Awesome.
    • Jon himself responded to this with "If it's true, it's terrifying. We're not really watchdogs, we're the kind of dogs that lick each other's balls." A pretty funny response, but oddly enough, it speaks volumes about his character — he's been called the Mark Twain of our time, but he's absolutely determined to never let it get to his head, which is a quality that is very admirable.
  • Perhaps a minor one, but this troper is impressed at how the videos hosted on The Daily Show's website often end the very moment Jon finishes his monologue (especially those on serious issues), cutting out the outburst of audience applause that must have followed (examples here and here). To him it reinforces that Jon truly is in it to make things better, and not for any personal fame.


2001

  • September 20, 2001: Jon's speech about 9/11 definitely qualifies, along with being a Heartwarming Moment as Stewart visibly holds back tears and talks about the strengths of America. (WARNING: If you're not planning on bawling your eyes out, this is not the link to click.)
    • This more so than anything else probably marks the point where The Daily Show became more than just a joke news show.


2004

"I fought the law, and the law lost!"

    • Probably the best part was when the Crossfire guys were complaining how Jon also failed journalistic integrity, Jon countered with "You're on CNN. The show that leads into me is puppets making prank phone calls! What is wrong with you!?"
    • Recently made even more awesome by having a new show segment named "Crossfire" appear (using the original Crossfire's same logo and opening graphic(!)). Jon's reaction? "hey! That's a good name for a show! Someone should use that!"
  • October 18, 2004: Jon's rant about Crossfire the Monday after his appearance.

Stewart: I went to this place, Crossfire, which is a nuanced public debate show named after the stray bullets that strike and kill innocent bystanders in a gang fight. So I go to Crossfire and, let's face it, I was dehydrated — it's the Martin Lawrence defense; I hadn't, perhaps, my proper water that day — and I had always in the past mentioned to friends... and... people I meet on the street that I think that show... blows. So I thought it was only the right thing to do to go and say it to them personally on their program. But here's the thing about confronting someone with that on their show... they're there. Uncomfortable! And they were very mad, because apparently, when you invite someone on a show called 'Crossfire' and you express an opinion, they... they don't care for that. Apparently, my opinion was not-- I've seen this show! That's all they do is express opinions! They just shout at each other! But apparently if that opinion is not one of your standard right/left opinions, they just... bwuh! But I did, I told them that I thought their show was... uh... hurting America, and they came back at me pretty good. They said I wasn't being funny. I said to them, "I know that. But tomorrow I will go back to being funny, and your show will still blow."

    • For bonus points on the Crossfire appearance, at one point when Tucker Carlson is trying to shut Jon down by calling for a commercial break, he says "You're not as funny on our show as you are on your show", which makes Jon lose his temper and say "You're as much of a dick on your show as you are on any other show!" This, after all the time Jon has spent trying desperately to get even a single neuron to fire in either of the hosts' heads, is the point at which Carlson cheers up and says "Yeah! Now you're gettin' into it!"


2005

Corddry: I've been here for a couple of days, now, and if God gave me this particular spot of land, I'd be wondering what I'd done to offend God...


2007


2008

Stewart: You know, I'm sorry...normally we have all our writers we've got a big room of people kicking that sound byte around, but right now, it's just me. So... (taps pen against desk) let me just see if I can very quickly whip something up here... (thinking noises) Ooo! Ooo, ooo! I've got something! Uh...FUCK YOU.

(raucous Studio Audience cheering as Jon pauses to adjust his suit)

Stewart (nerdy voice): Still Got It~!"

  • October 17, 2008 - Jon performed at the homecoming festivities at Northeastern University in Boston. During the performance, he comments on Sarah Palin regarding small towns as pro-America.

Stewart: "She said that small towns, that's the part of the country she really likes going to because that's the pro-America part of the country. You know, I just want to say to her, just very quickly: Fuck you!"

    • After several people continued on the small town vs big city mentality with some people saying that Ground Zero happened to be godless and New York City is elitist, Jon decided to add to his previous quote regarding Palin

Stewart: "We're all a little chafed here about this whole 'some parts of the country are real and American' and other parts are not. This weekend I was performing at Northeastern and I just read the statement that Sarah Palin had made about the 'pro-American' parts of the country and I...in response to that, I think I might have said, you know, 'Fuck you!' That's just my way of saying that I think that's a profanity to say, and I was answering with a profanity. But it's not really fair, and it makes it seem like I'm just addressing Governor Palin about this, and I'm not, it's just this whole entire theme that there's more American areas, or some people love the country, some people don't. So what I meant to say is, 'Fuck all y'all!' "

  • December 9, 2008: In terms of interview pwnage, this discussion with Mike Huckabee over gay marriage certainly qualifies.


2009

  • January 5, 2009: Jon's take on the Israeli attack on the Gaza Strip that began in late 2008, which was refreshing when so many politicians were repeating the mantra that Israel was just defending itself. Although Your Mileage May Vary, lots of people thought it was extremely awesome.
  • March 12, 2009: Jim Cramer gets owned. Jon broke CNBC's Mad Money host in the clearest, most brutal explanation of the financial crisis yet. Comedy Central: The place to go to watch two guys have a serious discussion on finance. And yes, he did not only predict every defense Cramer was going to make, but prepared video clips of Cramer himself contradicting that position.

Stewart: Roll two-twelve!

    • This, of course, came after Jon spent a good chunk on an episode the week before eviscerating CNBC's financial coverage because Rick Santelli (who could be pinged as one of the sources for the Tea Party movement, as he led other stockbrokers in protest of the fact that federal money was going to bail out mortgages on the floor of the Stock Market in a segment for CNBC) dropped out of an interview.
  • June 18, 2009: For an MOA of a completely different kind, this interview with Mike Huckabee over the subject of abortion in which Jon shows his true mastery of public discourse in a deep and extensive, yet respectful discussion with the former governor on the views of pro-life vs pro-choice. To put this in perspective, after crushing Crossfire with its shallow attempts to make discussion and debate into nothing more than cheap entertainment, Jon Stewart turns right around and shows those chumps how it's done.
    • Which is probably why Huckabee continues to appear on the show, even though he and Stewart clearly have opposing views on just about everything. It's about respect, people.
    • In fact, several conservatives have stated that they love going on the Daily Show, simply because Jon is so respectful to them. They know they're not going to get berated for their opinions. In the April 6, 2011 interview, Jon flat-out tells Huckabee he loved him because he forces him to challenge his perceptions, and he's obviously not talking about the bad way.
      • Play along, know your stuff, don't pull a Betsy McCaughey and overtly skew the facts, and The Daily Show is a platform from which you can talk pretty directly to people who would never listen to you otherwise. It's probably the only show in which disagreement with the host is encouraged and celebrated. Jon rarely wins conclusively when his "opponent" genuinely knows what they're on about; they get equal talking times, they make their points and listen carefully to the other, and then Jon breaks the mood with a stupid joke and the band plays them out. It's glorious.
  • August 20, 2009: McCaughey, a think tank-ish person who was against various provisions in a proposed health care reform bill, the interview being here. At the beginning of the interview, she walks out onstage with a binder holding half the proposed bill in untranslated legalese, and states that it says doctors must provide mandatory end-of-life care (i.e. providing counsel designed to eschew health care in favor of dying peacefully). She even comes equipped with the page numbers that the language is on. Jon immediately rips into her, saying that the word "mandatory" isn't in the bill at all, stating that it doesn't require doctors to force people into choosing end-of-life care over preventative measures, and then demanding that she look up the language in the bill. It takes a commercial break for her to find it, and then he immediately rips apart her interpretation as ill-advised and just plain wrong. It's definitely worth seeing just for the embarrassment she is forced to suffer through as she's thoroughly denounced by a comedian.
    • And just to top it off, she resigned from her job the day after. Keep in mind this is one of the people associated with defeating "Clintoncare", and a comedian made her back down in shame.
    • Even better in the extended version:

Stewart: You have no evidence of this!
McCaughey: Of course I do, b-

Stewart: WHERE?!

    • The best part is when he rips out the page she claims has her proof. "Let me take that, because you clearly don't need it."
    • It helps that she clearly just wanted a chance to rant at the audience; she constantly interrupted Jon, talked over him, looked at the audience instead of the person who was interviewing her, and tried to use irrelevant anecdotes to gain sympathy, and carrying in the bill when she obviously had no intention of consulting it (or she would have had the page marked) was just grandstanding to make herself look smarter. So seeing him absolutely eviscerate her Insane Troll Logic-dependent arguments comes across as just desserts for treating his show as a platform to preach from.
      • Lampshaded by Jon near the end of the interview, when she yet again looks at the audience. "WHO ARE YOU TALKING TO?!"
      • He's on something of a roll. Around a week after that he got conservative commentator, Bill Kristol to say the average American citizen doesn't deserve the best possible health care the country is capable of providing, because that's provided to soldiers by the government and he's against government run health care.
  • October 12, 2009: CNN was recently defeated again when Jon raked them over the coals for fact checking an SNL sketch while failing to fact check other stories. As an example, in one of the stories, interviewee Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council underestimated the population of America by almost 23 million and CNN let that go unchallenged despite being, as Jon put it, "Off by a factor of Australia."
  • October 29, 2009: Jon lays the smackdown on Fox News like never before, utterly crushing every argument the network has ever attempted to use to justify its slogan of "Fair and Balanced."
  • November 5, 2009: Jon deconstructs political pundit Glenn Beck in Beck's own unique style.
  • November 10, 2009: The time where Sean Hannity "messed up" on his show and spliced footage from Glenn Beck's protest rally in with another protest and Jon called him out on it.
  • November 12, 2009: The Daily Show proceeded to have even more fun at Hannity's expense when they announced they had made an error and that "Jon Stewart was right." It's almost like Fox News is intentionally messing up...
  • November 19, 2009: Jon calls upon "Senior Asskicker" Mick Foley to act as the personal bodyguard of a young boy who refused to say the Pledge of Allegiance in support of gay rights.
    • Is now this page's picture
  • December 8, 2009: Jon calls out not only Fox News for making up numbers in a poll (which added up to 120%), but also Fox & Friends anchor Gretchen Carlson for "dumbing down" to fit with the network's anti-intellectual bent. She was the valedictorian of her high-school class, was Miss America in 1989, graduated with honors from Stanford, studied abroad at Oxford, and is a virtuoso violinist, very much at odds with her on-screen persona. One wonders how much she's being paid...
    • Insult to injury? the actual source for the numbers in the poll Fox News showed actually has the numbers presented as follows: Fifty-nine percent (59%) of Americans say it’s at least somewhat likely that some scientists have falsified research data to support their own theories and beliefs about global warming. Thirty-five percent (35%) say it’s Very Likely. Just 26% say it’s not very or not at all likely that some scientists falsified data. Fox News removed the "At least" part and also failed to take into account that the three numbers could have come from 3 different samples.


2010

  • January 14, 2010: The time that, right after the Haiti Earthquake, when Jon called out Rush Limbaugh, Pat Robertson, and Rachel Maddow for their total insensitivity and heartlessness in the face of such unspeakable tragedy. He even responded to Robertson by quoting the Bible at him.

"Have you read this book?!"
"It almost sounds like it's about f***ing EARTHQUAKES!"

Olbermann: "A fetid swamp", you say, sir? This from a guy who reached a professional apex when he was the host of Short Attention Span Theatre, 1991? You want some "baseless name-calling"? You are a...nah, you know what, you're right; I have been a little over the top lately. Point taken...sorry.

  • March 18, 2010: Jon utterly eviscerating Glenn Beck over a course of sixteen minutes. "Burn" isn't the correct term. "Flamethrowered then napalmed" is. Also see below.
  • March 29, 2010: Wyatt Cenac's take on Right Wing violence as a reaction to the Health Care Vote. "Bring it on, we've got guns too." going further to say that if a vote that you disapprove of entitles you to use violence, then what is he entitled to do in response to your violence?
  • April 20, 2010: You know you're creative when you manage to not only communicate a thorough rebuttal leading to a reiteration of "Go fuck yourself"...but you do it in gospel choir.

Stewart (with the choir backing him up, preacher-style) Bernie Goldberg, I don't need to satisify your version of what fair satire is or should be. I'm not fair! I'm not balanced! You're criticizing me for not living up to your tagline! And you dismiss any criticism as further evidence as how the rest of the media persecute you. You like to pretend, Bernie Goldberg and Fox News, that the relentless conservative activisim of Fox News is the equivilant of the disorganized liberal influence you find on NBC, ABC, and CBS. But Fox News - you may be able to detect a liberal pathogen in their bloodstream, however faint. But Fox News has such a crazy over-reaction to that perceived threat. You're like an auto-immune disorder. I'm not saying the virus doesn't exist in some small quanity; but you're producing waaay too many antibodies. Fox News...you're the lupus of news. So, I guess what I'm sayin' is this:

Choir GOOOOOOO...

Stewart ...as long as fair and balanced is how you sell yourselves...

Choir FU-(BEEEEEEEEP)...

Stewart ...I GUESS WHAT I'M SAYIN' IS THIS!

Choir ...YOOOURSEEELVEEES. (Stewart and chorus sing phrase over and over while dancing around)

  • May 12, 2010: "Glenn Beck has Nazi Tourettes!"
  • June 9, 2010: Tying into the long-running narrative against the idiocy the national media can display, we get this lambasting. Instead of confronting the serious issues ("What's the line between opinion, and opinion journalism? When does America's unwavering defense of Israel begin to compromise our unwavering defense of free speech? Does our media demonstrate a casual bias against the Arab world and the suffering of Palestinians? These are the hard questions reporters must be asking themselves in the wake of Thomas' departure."), cue numerous clips of news organizations talking not about those questions...but who gets Helen Thomas' seat in the front row.

Stewart: It's fun to see politicians and the people we count on to hold them accountable...super-soaking each other. Fighting over who gets to sit shotgun in the White House briefing room. Jockeying for an invitation to barbecues. Are you journalists, or are you rushing a sorority? What I'm saying is this — if the public wants reporters to start holding politicians accountable for their actions, then I guess the public just needs to really start throwing better parties, or having better perks.

  • June 15, 2010: The whole episode, wherein John takes President Obama to task regarding how he promised to end the Bush administration's treatment of detaining terrorists without trial as well as putting a stop to Extraordinary Rendition, only to take both of those things even further than Bush did. He ends by making a comparison to The Lord of the Rings, claiming that Obama has essentially become like Frodo did once he reached Mount Doom (especially hilarious since Colbert is usually the one who makes such comparisons).
  • July 7, 2010: When the babbling freakshow that is Fox and Friends decided to take shots at President Obama for once again reaching out to the Muslim world, and others at Fox News decided to pile on to the anti-Muslim sentiment, Jon once again took them to task for their rampant hypocrisy, and once again, t'was awesome.
  • July 28, 2010: Jason Jones questioning a homophobe's sexuality after the latter argued the Nazis persecuted the gays to hide their sexuality. Also, listing all the countries who allow gays in the military, which is a lot.

Scott Lively: The Nazis did persecute homosexuals to distract public attention away from their homosexuality.
Jones: So that which you hate the most...you secretly are.
(Beat)
Lively: I am not gay.
Jones: I didn't say you were.
...
Lively: In terms of activities on the battlefield, you just don't want to have people there that have no moral restraint.
Jones: So how do the other countries that have gays serving openly in their military control their soldiers? You know, countries like...Argentina, Austria, Australia.
Lively: I don't think that that's been going on for very long...
Jones: Hang on, I actually wasn't finished...Belgium, Bermuda, Brazil, Canada, Columbia, the Czech Republic, DenmarkEstoniaFinlandFrance GermanyIrelandIsraelItalyLithuaniaLuxembourgMaltaTheNetherlandsNewZealandNorway...

Lively: (talking over Jones): I have--I have--I've been to many of those countries...

Jones: ...RomaniaRussiaSloveniaSouthAfricaSpainSwedenSwitzerlandTaiwanUnitedKingdom and Uruguay.

  • July 26, 2010: Upon hearing of Shirley Sherrod's firing, Jon utterly lambasted all those involved, taking viewers mistep by mistep through the scandal. This is one of his most thorough jobs in recent memory. He nails the administration for watching only a contextless edited clip of Sherrod's supposedly incriminating speech and attempting to avoid admitting real fault by admitting only to bad methods of firing her, rather than bad actions in firing her at all. Then he nails the NAACP for claiming to have been "snookered" into believing Sherrod racist, though it was they who neglected to watch the full interview, and to realize that the edited clip had been made by a self-proclaimed hater of the institutional left, and thus might be a trap. Finally he skewers an Obama rep for, instead of apologizing and moving on, attempting to bookend his fleeting apology with a reprimand to...well, pretty much the rest of the world, for not spotting their error before they made it. To top it off, he and Oliver then parody the situation even further, and manage to tie it into the oil spill disaster at that.
  • August 19, 2010: After Fox News reporters play a shaky "guilt by association" game against the Imam in charge of the Ground Zero Mosque, Jon does the same with Rupert Murdoch. He then plays an 11-year-old clip of Charlton Heston perfectly summing up the situation, follows up with a clip of the show from that time of himself objecting to it, and coming back to say that he was wrong back then.
  • August 23, 2010: Then, the following week, Fox News inexplicably did the same thing, this time connecting the Imam to "terror sympathizer" Alwaleed bin Talal al-Saud, the same Saudi Prince that Jon had connected to Rupert Murdoch, and who owns 7% of Fox News' parent corporation! Jon, Wyatt Cenac, and John Oliver had a field day.

Stewart: That's right! The guy they're painting as a sinister money force owns part of Fox News!

    • That report deserves bonus points of awesome for using Fox News' own logic to show that the only way to cut off funding to the "terror Mosque" is to, as a nation, stop watching Fox News.
    • In that vein, Aasif Mandvi's takedown of the opposers of a proposed Muslim community center in Murfreesboro, TN. In the middle of an anti-Muslim ramble, he interjects "You do know I'm Muslim, right?" and spends the rest of the interview pretending to be calling a terrorist fellow Muslim on his cell phone.
  • September 16, 2010: Jon's interview with Bill Clinton is a rare example where the awesome moment goes to the interviewee. Clinton does most of the talking in the interview, but he's not trying to talk over Jon, and Jon in fact defers to him most of the time. Why? Because unlike, say, Betsy McCaughey, Clinton backs up all his claims with concrete facts and numbers, outlines and reiterates his points in an intelligent manner, and demonstrates repeatedly that he knows what the hell he's talking about. The extended interview is even better, because he outlines a plan for bringing the country out of the recession in a way that makes sense and doesn't rely on vagueness. Not only that, but the reason he came on the show in the first place was to promote Clinton's Global Initiative, an annual conference whose sole requirement for getting invited back is to actually go out and do something between meetings. If it wasn't for the sex scandal, people might have paid a bit more attention to what he was saying back when he was the one in charge of the country.
  • October 27, 2010: A self-proclaimed comedy show manages to score an interview with President Barack Obama. It originally became a Dethroning Moment of Suck for Comedy Central and Viacom, as the episode was available only through paid download. Stupid Executive Meddling.
  • October 30, 2010: The best moment for the show and Jon was the entire Rally To Restore Sanity And/Or Fear. Among that was Jon's reactions to the rally's critics (most of whom were from the left, oddly enough) saying that he disagreed with their assesment of the rally's message and apologizes if they feel he was less than clear in his stated purpose. He then goes on to state that people are allowed to have their own opinions and interpretations.
    • The Rally was a march on Washington of moderates to remind politicians that not everyone is a pyromaniac prone to making Hitler comparisons. 215,000 people showed up instead of the expected 60,000, they brought out a number of celebrity guests including Ozzy Osbourne (who played "Crazy Train" as part of a Funny Moment), and Oprah Winfrey made a video appearance on The Daily Show to hand out tickets. Jon's speech at the end of the rally was just incredible. A perfect balance of humor, logic, and hope.
  • December 13, 2010: Jon declares the Republicans' "monopoly" on 9/11 to be over, then shows a montage of Republican senators praising the heroism of the 9/11 first responders interspersed with clips of them refusing to provide them funding for healthcare while Lee Greenwood's "God Bless the USA" plays in the background.

Stewart: Guess what, Republicans? Here's the deal--your "We're-the-only-party-that-understands-9/11-and-its-repercussions" monopoly ends. Now. So...no more co-opting 9/11 imagery to get yourselves elected.[2] No more using 9/11 as the date when magically all your policies became "right."[3] No more using 9/11 to micromanage Manhattan's zoning decisions.[4] No using 9/11 as an excuse for why your Bush tax cuts never stimulated the economy in the first place...[5]or 9/11 as an excuse to do what you were going to be doing anyway.[6] No more using 9/11 as a price point.[7] You know what, Republicans, you use it so much, if you don't owe the 9/11 responders healthcare...at least you owe them royalties!

    • The whole epic Take That and What the Hell, Hero? in general, really, directed almost as much against genuine media for not speaking up about it as it is against the Republican party for its hypocrisy.
  • December 2010: On the last show of 2010, Jon had a panel discussion of now-disabled 9/11 first responders on, and had them offer opinions on Mitch McConnell's tearful goodbye to a Congressional colleague. Among other things.
    • And many credit that episode, and Stewart in general, as the reason why the 9/11 first responders bill finally passed. The New York Times even went as far as comparing Stewart, a comedian, to Edward R. Murrow! It also served as an effective rebuke to those critics of his who thought the Rally To Restore Sanity was ridiculing political activism.
    • No, no, the real awesome moment was getting Fox News to side with him. And you know what, they were the ones calling the Republicans bluff.

Shepard Smith: Who's gonna hold these people's feet to the fire when we - you know, we're able to 52 story building so far there at Ground Zero, we're able to pay for tax cuts for Billionaires who don't need them and is not gonna stimulate the economy [8], but we can't give health care to Ground Zero first responders who ran right into the fire? Went down there to save people?


2011

  • January 10, 2011: Jon's reaction to the Arizona shootings was tear-jerkingly awesome, and probably the most level-headed thing to come out of the tragedy.
  • January 13, 2011: ...And his chewing out the people commenting on the mourning service as if it was some sort of performance, such as calling the Native American who gave a blessing and prayer in the ceremony for being "weird", along with the students whooping in the middle of Obama's speech as if it was a rally.

"Ever been to an Irish wake? I've never been sadder and laughed harder in my life."

  • January 20, 2011: After the shootings in Arizona, a new call spread across the nation for people in public forums to abandon poisonous language, senseless hyperbole and constant Nazi comparisons. Representative Steve Cohen was among those who embraced this call to reasonableness...and then a week later started comparing Republicans to Nazis. Jon immediately called him out on this. Of course, the people on Fox News were all to happy to jump on the bandwagon for slamming Cohen for his lapse...
  • January 24, 2011: But when Megyn Kelly tried to get away with claiming that no one on the network uses Nazi comparisons, Jon sprang into action. He then proceeded to show four specific examples of Nazi comparisons in connection to the network. One of a comparison made within hours of Ms. Kelly's accusation (made by everyone's favorite saurkraut himself, no less), one with Bill O'Reily making the exact same comparison as Rep. Cohen, an exerpt from a newspaper article of Roger Alies (the guy in charge of Fox News) explicitly comparing Democrats to Nazis, and, most damning of all, one of a comparison made 10 months prior to Ms. Kelly's accusation...MADE IN FRONT OF HER FACE! So, case rested, sealed and closed. Right?...
  • January 27, 2011: WRONG!! Now, cue Bill O'Reilly trying to defend his above example by claiming that his (Bill's that is) use of the Nazi analogy was justified and that Jon had taken it out of context. When presented, said context does not actually justify O'Reilly's use of the Nazi analogy and still does nothing the refute Jon's actual argument. Naturally, Jon's answer was devastatingly concise and to the point. Interestingly enough, O'Reilly has been silent on the subject ever since.
  • May 5, 2011: John Oliver was interviewing a pastor and directly set him up to say that an imam would never let Christians worship in a mosque, before cutting away to a clip of an imam letting Christians worship in a mosque and Oliver popping in the clip to directly insult said pastor. The clip was prerecorded, too.
  • May 11, 2011: Jon tore Fox News apart for their attempt to drum up a controversy about rapper Common appearing at a White House poetry reading. Here, he shows a clip of the Fox News.com team interviewing him just a few months ago and praising his work and then goes off on them for basing their argument against him on one poem he wrote that appears to paint himself as a Scary Black Man but if they'd actually read the entire thing, they'd have seen that at the conclusion, he actually doesn't want to be that guy and wants to bring peace and prosperity to the community. And then here, Jon shows clips of George W. Bush giving a National Arts & Humanites Award to Johnny Cash, even though Cash has several songs containing explicit violence, eviscerates Sean Hannity for being offended at Common's poem but defending Ted Nugent after Nugent was shown calling for violence against Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton [9] during a concert in 2007 and finishes it off with his own spoken word piece, taking to task a bunch of Fox contributors and their constant obsession with trashing anything involved with the President and capping it by saying they blow.
    • Weirder still is the fact that not long after this, Mike Huckabee had Ted Nugent on as a guest, almost seeming like a subtle and passive-aggressive Take That against Jon's point. When Jon said "Oh, well maybe they'll be having a discussion on violence in music" and called it "a teachable moment". Upon finding out that they instead opted to have Huckabee play Cat Scratch Fever with Nugent, including lyrics like "I make the pussy purr with a touch of my hand, they know they're getting it from me.", Jon then mentioned that the subtitler must have been wondering if this was the same network that made a big deal over Common.
  • June 1, 2011: Jon schools Donald Trump on the finer points of pizza-eating in NYC.
  • June 7, 2011: Jon breaks a glass and cuts his hand, then continues the show for the entire sketch, noticeably bleeding.

Oliver: And as for you, Jon...(Stewart corpses)...and your visibly, visibly injured hand--that's a genuine problem. That's a genuine problem! Don't--that's...

(Jon Stewart holds up his bleeding hand, walking towards the camera showing it off)

Stewart: (walking back) Fuck!

Oliver: ...yup.

Stewart: We better hurry up the fucking bit, because I am bleeding out, motherfuckers!

    • Hey, anything having to do with the Weiner scandal, really, considering how clearly hard it was for Jon to do this at all. Keep in mind that he and Weiner were friends in college.
  • June 20, 2011: Jon Stewart manages to get Chris Wallace to admit on-camera that Fox News is neither Fair nor Balanced. That sound? That's the sound of pigs flapping their wings.
    • The entire interview is pretty much a 20 minute long moment of awesome for Stewart.
    • So awesome for Jon that Fox actually shot down the pigs later by coming out and saying, as Jon put it "I accidentally told the truth and now wish I could take it back."
  • June 21, 2011: Jon had to apologize and admit he was wrong over his statement that Fox News' viewers are the most misinformed, when the website politifact.com proved that they were always near the bottom but not always at the bottom. Heck, they claim that Daily Show viewers are less informed. He then says the following:

Jon Stewart: I defer to their judgement, and I apologize for my mistake. To not do so, would be irresponsible, and if I were to continue to make those mistakes and misstatements and not correct them, specially if each and everyone of those misstatements happen to go in one particular direction on the political spectrum, then that would undermine the integrity and credibility that I work so hard to pretend to care about.

Jon Stewart: ... and that narrative of conservative victimization is the true genius of what Fox News has accomplished: any editorial judgement in news, or schools, or movies that doesn't favor the conservative view is "elitism" and is evidence of "liberal bias", Whereas any editorial judgment that favors the conservative view is evidence of fairness and is done to protect them from liberal bias. And if you criticize Fox for this game, guess what that is evidence of? How right they are about how persecuted (Righties are). It is air-tighter than an otter’s anus

Jon: Government isn't perfect, but some people wish it was better, not gone.

Jon: We cooperate and we fight as hard as we can, because there will perhaps be disappointment, but there will be no shame.

John Oliver: You know this is a movie, right? This is a movie.

  • August 15, 2011: Ali Velshi comes in and dissects the financial crisis calmly and rationally and offers the explanation that at the root of the problem is not any one policy, but an ingrained opinion that government is bad and cannot be trusted. A very sobering interview.
  • September 12, 2011: The Daily Show remembers 9/13/01, the day we forgot the lessons of the day we had sworn we would always remember.
  • On September 27, 2011: While once again pointing out the silliness of people complaining about Chaz Bono being on Dancing With the Stars (primarily pointing out that the kids everyone insists his being a participant will confuse, will just think he's a guy dancing on a show because they're too young to know what a gender-change is), took another strike at a Fox commentator who insisted that children need to be told that changing your gender is wrong. "Now kids, I know you didn't ask me, but let me explain hetero-normative behavior to two people who still believe in cooties."
    • It's in the clip dedicated to how after Nancy Grace spent so much time whining about Chaz, she ended up showing a full boob on the show.
      • And then he tore apart the Fox commentators, who after pointing out Chaz had a knee injury that might have led to his bad performance and the female commentator (possibly seeing where this was going) said "Okay, let's move onto the Senate," the men started joking about Chaz's injury and sex change in a way that led John to compare them to seventh graders bullying you for lunch money. Epic.
  • October 17, 2011: Jon owns the religious debate of the GOP, not only calling the Perrys on their "religious persecution", but also pointing out the hypocrisy of a party centered on wealth claiming to also uphold the ideals of Jesus, while quoting the New Testament at them. Keep in mind that Jon is Jewish.
  • October 26, 2011: Aasif Mandvi vs. a Republican strategist on climate change. The entire time he is clearly being sarcastic, but she doesn't seem to understand this, and keeps pushing the idea that science is a conspiracy because the only people who are qualified to determine if science is accurate are other scientists.
    • She also insists that people be allowed to vote on what parts of science vs. creationism (and other things) are taught: "The American people should decide what is true." Just because a ton of people think 2+2=22 doesn't mean it's a fact.
  • December 5, 2011: Herman Cain announces his campaign ending, which results in a montage of "Big No's" from Se7en, Steel Magnolias, Tough Guys Don't Dance, and The Room. He fixes it by saying the nine greatest words ever to be spoken by a politician..." I believe these words came from the Pokémon movie." Jon Stewart then proves that he and his crew are complete and utter nerds by spouting numerous references to the movie in question and the franchise.

Jon Stewart: First of all, it's not the most motivational quote from the Pokemon movie. Mewtwo?
Mewtwo: I see now that the circumstances of one's birth are irrelevant. It is what you do with the gift of life that determines who you are.
Jon Stewart: Well said, well said, magic Japanese cat monster who was created as the result fo a genetic experiment and therefore has psychic powers that far exceed those of its fellow Pokemon, Well said. Of course, considering what led Cain to drop out of the race, this is the Pokemon 2000 line he really should have quoted.

Slowking: I could use pants.

Jon Stewart: To be fair to Herman Cain, we can't all be as wise as Slowking when he's wearing the Shellder of knowledge. Look it up, bitches.

    • It's safe to say any Pokefan watching had a tiny nerdgasm as Jon (or, at a minimum, his writers) showed off their nerd streetcred.
  • Then he declares War on Christmas the very next show, December 6th, imitating presidents all the way.
  • Dec. 8, Aasif Mandvi does it again, exposing Allegedly Free Game "Tap Fish" as an I-Pad app that makes a million dollars a month since people pay money to resurrect fish or buy better ones.
    • Nightmare Fuel for parents: 3 kids spent $1500 of of their dad's money on it, maxing out his credit card. While it's not mentioned how they did this, it's probably because I-Tunes stores your credit info (including the security number) and just needs your password to charge you.
    • And a child psychologist pointed out that kids won't make the connection that the game saps money due to just focusing on the bright fishes. This was pretty much proven by the older son laughing about how much he and his siblings spent and commenting on how if there was a "max out your dad's credit card" game they would win for sure. He also admitted that they "only" spent $1500 because that was all their dad had on the card.
    • In short, when Aasif told the CEO he was essentially a drug dealer--he was entirely correct.
  • December 13, 2011: Jon's barely contained rage at the controversy surrounding All-American Muslim.
    • Don't forget Jon's Take That to the child beauty pageant show Toddlers & Tiaras.

Mother: You're not a stripper, but shake your butt a little bit.
Daughter: Now why would you even say that?
Jon: Because, honey, she's a terrible mother.

2012

  • January 5, Jason Jones finds a Muslim Republican is not allowed into the official party. And one of the men who made pamphlets against him was the head of the local Americas Against Hate organization!

Jason Jones: What is your definition of against?

Oliver: This is what you rejected constitutional monarchy for.

  • January 17: Jon and Stephen do not coordinate on the Super-PAC (aka coordinate in a mildly weird but still usable way) to demonstrate how easy it is for candidates with lawyer Trevor Potter advising over the phone.
    • Notable is that Trevor said no one has ever gone to jail solely for coordinating with their Super-PAC but were instead fine 4 to 6 figures, and when Jon asked Trevor said that yes, the fine could be paid through the Super-PAC.
    • Jon and Stephen's faces during the whole routine where the discuss the ad space they've bought so far and how they've used it.
      • Since Herman Cain dropped out, some ads declared that any votes for Herman Cain would also be counted for Stephen.
  • January 18: Jon Stewart speaking out against the absurdity of SOPA and how practically none of the congressmen understand how the internet really works. Made even more awesome by the fact that Viacom, Comedy Central's parent company, supports SOPA. He even compared Viacom to Jabba the Hutt. That took balls.
    • Also for calling out the Senators who apparently think that there are no such things as computer experts, only nerds, smugly claiming that only they could explain that whole Internet thing.

Representative: Maybe we ought to ask some nerds what this thing really does. Let's have a hearing and bring in the nerds...
Jon Stewart: Really? Nerds? You know, I think the word you're looking for is "experts" to enlighten you, so your laws don't backfire and break the internet.

  • For all his constant self-deprecation, Jon manages to do 38 push-ups as part of a charity contest for wounded veterans. He still loses, meaning he'll donate about $20,000.
  • January 31: Jon talks to a Yale professor about the dishonest business practices perpetrated by companies like Bain and actually gets him to admit that the laws surrounding those practices are ridiculously lax.
  • Aasif Mandvi's interview with a Florida politician who supported a law requiring urine samples to get government benefits. After he goes on a long diatribe explaining people who receive taxpayer money should be happy to be drug tested, no matter what their hardships, Aasif takes him down with one question: "So who pays your salary?" The deer-in-the-headlights look on his face as he realizes what's coming is priceless! The whole piece is a beautiful exposing of hypocrisy, but that one moment was almost all that was necessary!
    • It gets better when, at an actual press conference Aasif asks, in front of everyone, for Gov. Rick Scott to please pee in a cup. And the cup is passed forward.
  • February 13, 2012: Jon takes the argument about "a war of religion" and some pastor on Fox News failing Godwin's Law and goes utterly berserk with it. Do not invoke Hitler Ate Sugar to a liberal Jew unless you want to get spanked on international television.
    • The whole rant is beautiful, but the one line that summarizes the whole thing: "You've confused a war on your religion with not always getting everything you want."
  • How about the time he called out the Republicans on the contraception issue and influenced Democrats like Harry Reid to go on the offense about it.
  • When Rush Limbaugh called Sandra Fluke a slut on his radio show just for testifying before Congress advocating the expansion of health insurance coverage for female contraception. Also various other conservative pundits complaining about having to pay for women's promiscuous sex, even though as Jon points out, "this isn't about paying women to have or not have sex. It's an insurance mandate from the government covering contraceptive medication." and "your tax money doesn't pay for it!" a fed up Jon:

"To the people who are upset about their hard earned money going to things they don't like: WELCOME TO THE FUCKING CLUB!! Everyone, everyone pays for shit they don't want to all the time. You know what? Reimburse for the Iraq War and oil subsidies and diaphragms are on me!"

    • The entire rant is a thing of beauty.
  • March 12: While still trying to stay respectful, he rips apart the basic issue with Grover Norquist's "no raising taxes pledge" that he had gotten many politicians to sign (namely that taxes pay for things like stoplights and roads and other public works).
    • At the same time, Grover argued calmly respectfully, making an civil, logical argument and citing evidence for his conclusions. Despite he and Stewart disagreeing on some very fundamental issues, they had a civil discussion and made their points respectfully; Grover argued that taxes are too high, and that when politicians are allowed to raise taxes they'll do that instead of the more difficult and politically risky maneuvers of cutting spending tax reform. Stewart argued that taxes are far too low, and that the absolutist opposition to tax increases was unfeasible because 1) it's to simple a policy for dealing with a complex system, and 2)he feels that people won't follow up on the second part of Grover's plan (Tax Reform) while applying the first as a political cudgel, and 3) the subtlety of Grover's message is lost because it resembles the extreme, hyperbolic rhetoric common to the far right without getting across the subtleties that Grover expressed on the show. The fact they had a civil discussion despite their extreme differences is a moment of hope in and of itself.
  • March 13: Jon rips Fox News for their hypocrisy in claiming that comedians (Bill Maher to be specific) use the "Just Joking" Justification as a shield against criticism, even though Rush Limbaugh does that frequently. He also used several examples to show that, contrary to what some say, comedians do face repercussions from jokes that cross the line.
  • Jon Oliver's expose on the U.S. Pulling funding for UNESCO for working with palestine over a Law 20 years ago that could be easily repealed and the hypocrisy surrounding it.
  • April 2: One sentence from Al Madrigal completely shows the racism and hypocrisy behind Arizona's ban on Mexican-American Studies (that according to "hearsay," teach resentment of white people): "I'm a black kid. Teach me about slavery without me feeling resentment towards white people."
  • April 3 is an episode of awesome. From utterly and eloquently deconstructing Sarah Palin to a smart discussion on the new strip-and-search law, rideculing it along the way.
  • April 23 has John Oliver interviewing Herman Cain. After roasting Cain for most of the show, Herman Cain does a short speech on an alien invasion. Oliver and the audience applaud the speech.
  • May 3: Aasif Mandvi strikes again. A Missoruri state rep proposed a bill to prevent employers from discriminating against gun owners (despite the fact that no known cases have ever been brought forward and the protections of the Second Amendment). Mandvi then interviewed the only known gay legislator in the state, who pointed out that the same person rallying against the nonexistent injustices towards the gun owners voted against making it illegal to fire a person simply due to them being LBGT. He goes back to the legislator and when she starts playing dumb about anti-gay employers, starts reading her a list of real people who have been fired due to being gay, and grilling her to tell him a single case of a gun owner being fired for his/her decision to be armed as counterpoint.
  • Jon ripping apart the Right for bitching about Obama "spiking the football" by using the fact he killed Osama bin Laden as a campaign commercial by rightfully pointing out the only reasons Republicans were bitching is because they were not able to run an ad like that themsleves.
  1. ↑ (although he points out in stand-up that anyone could've won against the competing choices)
  2. ↑ A political ad for George W. Bush is shown, with plenty of 9/11 imagery
  3. ↑ Senator Kip Bond (R-MO) suggesting anything going back to "a pre-9/11 mentality" can and will fail
  4. ↑ Newt Gingrich vocally objecting to the proposed mosque several blocks away from the WTC memorial/plaza
  5. ↑ "I wish we had a smaller debt--I wish we hadn't been attacked on 9/11
  6. ↑ George W. Bush discussing invading Iraq
  7. ↑ Rudy Giuliani tried to solicit donations of $9.11 from potential fundraisers
  8. ↑ Yep, he actually said that.
  9. ↑ (specifically, saying the following while holding a pair of machine guns: "Obama, he’s a piece of shit. I told him to suck on my machine gun. Hey Hillary, you might want to ride one of these into the sunset, you worthless bitch.")
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