Jon Stewart rips Chris Wallace for comparing Obamacare to Katrina: ‘You might be out of your f*cking mind’

By Arturo Garcia

While Jon Stewart went to town on Monday on media outlets for parroting Republicans and comparing the Affordable Care Act’s (ACA) troubled implementation to Hurricane Katrina, he stopped for a second to address Fox News Chris Wallace for saying Katrina “ended within a week,” while the new law could affect people “for years to come.”

“Are you out of your –” Stewart began to say, before stopping once he heard his audience’s collected groan. “Do you know you’ve disappointed our audience? They think you might be out of your f*cking mind.”

While he had no intentions of polishing the “.turd” that was the government health care exchange website healthcare.gov, Stewart said, he also mocked Republicans for being offended by the comparison, and pointed out that Gov. Bobby Jindal’s refused to allow his state to take part in one of the new health care exchanges offered as part of the ACA while accusing the White House of “bullying” Louisiana.

“Bullying?” Stewart asked incredulously. “The feds were gonna pay for the Medicaid expansion. How was that bullying? ‘Hey, four-eyes, you need to see an opthamologist, we can cover that. How is that bullying?’”

Frustrated, Stewart turned to his correspondents to find the proper George W. Bush-era debacle to link to “Obamacare,” with Samantha Bee choosing the debate over waterboarding political prisoners.

“Healthcare.gov is the towel Obama is wrapping around our faces,” Bee explained. “And the board is the failed promise of universal healthcare.”

“What’s the water?” Stewart asked her.

“I don’t know, water’s water, Jon,” Bee replied. “What am I, Robert Frost?”

Meanwhile, Al Madrigal reached back further and compared the new law to the second war against Iraq.

“When I think ‘glitchy website,’ the first thing that comes to my mind is, ‘decade-long war started under false pretenses,’” Madrigal said.

Watch Stewart and his panel discuss the failed “Obamacare” analogies, as posted online on Monday, below.

This article, Jon Stewart rips Chris Wallace for comparing Obamacare to Katrina: ‘You might be out of your f*cking mind’, is syndicated from Raw Story and is posted here with permission.

Watch The Daily Show play 'Racist or Not Racist,' with Key and Peele

Watch The Daily Show play 'Racist or Not Racist,' with Key and Peele

Jon Stewart brings on Aasif Mandvi, Jessica Williams, and a hapless Jason Jones to adjudicate racism in the news. Then he brings on two "impartial" judges.

By Peter Weber |

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Jason Jones drew the short stick on Wednesday night's Daily Show. Jon Stewart began the show discussing his lactose intolerance, but things got rolling when he brought on Jones and fellow panelists Aasif Mandvi and Jessica Williams to play a game he called "Racist or Not Racist." The premise was to determine whether certain people in the news are exhibiting racism — a question cable news talkers frequently ask but seldom answer, Stewart pointed out.
The gag here is that Jones is white, while Williams is black and Mandvi is Indian. It's more cleverly presented than that: As Williams and Mandvi continue to find things racist and Jones opts for words like "adorable" and "creative," the panelists all tiptoed around their own race — until Jones asked if Stewart would bring on some "impartial judges." He can't explicitly bring up race, but that's the smart, almost subversive point of the segment: The label "racist" is so toxic we often just dance around the issue of race.
Anyway, Stewart brought out two impartial judges to help Jones out: The comic duo of Keegan-Michael Key and Jordan Peele, who happen to be Stewart's guests in the later part of the show. (The Week's Scott Meslow conducted his own interview of Key and Peele in September)

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This was not the backup Jones was looking for. "Jon, they're not impartial," Jones pleaded — and at this point, "impartial" was an obvious code word for "white." Key and Peele made it explicit, noting that they're both mixed-race, "and it doesn't get more impartial than that." Things got a little tense, and then Key and Peele went off on some riff about sexual fantasies, and the "Is Jones Racist?" moment was over.
The rest of the segment returned to the "Racist or Not Racist" game, looking at recent flaps surrounding Washington Post columnist Richard Cohen and Sarah Palin. For those of you at home keeping score, Cohen was deemed "racist" (against white people) and Palin's comparison of the federal debt to slavery was just ridiculed.
Stewart rounded out the first part of the show by noting that New York City will officially have America's tallest skyscraper, as One World Trade Center was just judged to rise higher than Chicago's Willis (formerly Sears) Tower. Chicago isn't taking the loss of its four-decade-old crown without a fight. Stewart found the whole idea of competition between the two cities laughable... until Chicago claimed pizza superiority. This prompted him to go all gangster on deep-dish "pizza," accent and all. It's an impressive tirade. Watch:

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 Finally, here, if you're interested, is Stewart's interview with the stars of the eponymous sketch-comedy show Key & Peele:

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Peter Weber

Peter Weber is a senior editor at TheWeek.com, and has handled the editorial night shift since 2008. A graduate of Northwestern University, Peter has worked at Facts on File and The New York Times Magazine. He speaks Spanish and Italian, and plays in an Austin rock band.

Jon Stewart Mocks '60 Minutes,' Lindsey Graham Over Benghazi Report

 Tom Kludt – November 12, 2013, 7:35 AM EST

Jon Stewart had a field day Monday mocking both "60 Minutes" for airing a discredited report on the attack in Benghazi, Libya and a Republican senator who exploited the segment.
After what initially appeared to be an explosive report turned out to be "total bullsh*t," Stewart took on "60 Minutes," which he said "sort of acknowledged" the error on Sunday.

Stewart found it amusing that the program finally considered the "is it true question" after the Benghazi report aired.
The "Daily Show" host also noted that "60 Minutes" is "not the only victim here." Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) hyped the report, which spurred his vow to block every Obama administration appointee until survivors of the Benghazi attack testify before Congress.
The senator's response to the "60 Minutes" retraction gave Stewart an excuse to employ his finest southern accents.

 

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Jon Stewart fact-checks the media on Obamacare

Must-see morning clip: Jon Stewart fact-checks the media on Obamacare

President Obama's "opponents have been lying like motherf-ckers," said the "Daily Show" host VIDEO

By Prachi Gupta

On Tuesday night, Jon Stewart executed a brutal takedown of both President Obama, for his “dishonest” portrayal of the Affordable Care Act, and of media outlets and political pundits who are spreading lies about the healthcare law. (One conservative activist even said Obamacare was the worst thing to happen to America since slavery).
“His opponents have been lying like motherf-ckers,” said Stewart, before fact-checking several reports by CNN and Fox News.
“So many people seem to feel the need to stretch the truth to attack it,” said Stewart. “If something is genuinely bad, just telling the truth about it should be sufficient. There’s a reason ’12 Years a Slave’ doesn’t have vampires and zombies — it doesn’t need them! Not to mention that some of the arguments against the Affordable Care Act make no sense whatsoever.”

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Prachi Gupta is an Assistant News Editor for Salon, focusing on pop culture. Follow her on Twitter at @prachigu or email her at pgupta@salon.com.

Jon Stewart on CNN: Wolf Blitzer Asked Michele Bachmann to ‘Dumb it Down’ (Video)

 Dailies | By Brent Lang on October 30, 2013 @ 8:05 am

 

Stewart says CNN has reduced everything to good or bad, and that’s worse than being partisan

CNN may eschew the liberal politics of MSNBC and the conservative worldview of Fox News in the spirit of journalistic objectivity, but Jon Stewart says CNN is being worse than partisan: It’s being shallow.
“CNN has moved beyond this simplistic partisan world view to a simplisticier one,” Stewart said on Tuesday’s “The Daily Show.”
Also read: Bill Maher on Piers Morgan: Women Will Save Obamacare (Video)
Stewart said the network now boils down everything — from the latest developments in a murder trial to the Obama administration’s approach to healthcare reform — to the question of whether this is a good thing, or a bad thing.
“The beautiful thing about good/bad is that, like beige, it goes with everything in an equally unsatisfying manner,” Stewart said.
Also read: ‘The Daily Show’: Fear Not Obamacare Users – Congress is on the Case (Video)
Cut to Wolf Blitzer pressing Republican congresswoman Michele Bachmann to boil down her objections to Obamacare.
“I just want to make this clear: That’s Michele ‘I think vaccines give you brain damage’ Bachmann being told by Wolf Blitzer to dumb it down,” Stewart said.
Stewart noted that it’s not just Blitzer who is employing the new good/bad mandate and ditching nuance.
“It’s like the word went out from CNN HQ, ‘Look, nobody watches this network unless they’re in the airport or going somewhere, so 86 the professor talk and just let the people know: Does this story go in my happy bag or my sad bag,’” Stewart said. “Emoticon me. Chop, chop. These people have planes to catch.”
Watch the video:

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Even The Daily Show Was Shocked by This Racist GOP Leader's Responses

The Daily Show's "field reporters" have dealt with a fair amount of hilariously oblivious responses from interviewees over the years, but on last night's show, correspondent Aasif Mandvi appeared to have been caught off-guard by just how hilariously oblivious his interviewee was.

Speaking with Buncombe County Republican precinct chair Don Yelton on the subject of North Carolina's controversial voter ID law, Mandvi attempted to prompt a reaction by declaring "the law is not racist, and you're not racist."

Expecting Yelton to fire back with an unequivocal "no," Mandvi was instead treated to several long seconds of introspection, followed by, "well, I've been called a bigot before."

Then, as they say, things got weird.

Yelton attempted to explain away the charges of racism — always a good idea — by: 1. Insisting that one of his best friends is black; 2. claiming that the photo of Obama dressed as a witch doctor that he shared on his Facebook page was making fun of his "white half"; recalling how, when he was young, black people were called "negras"; and bemoaning the fact that black people can use the word "nigger" but he can't.

"You know that we can hear you, right?" asks a visibly nonplussed Mandvi.

But Yelton wasn't done yet: In a stunning acknowledgement of the law's true intention, the GOP leader admitted its main purpose was not to prevent alleged voter fraud, but "to kick Democrats in the butt."

Speaking later with the Mountain Xpress, Yelton seemed aware that his interview might make him seem racist.

"The questions were such that the answers can be played with. I expect them to play with my answers for racism," he told the paper.

Update 5:05 p.m.: Don Yelton has resigned his post as precinct chairman effective immediately.

Buncombe GOP Chairman Henry Mitchell called Yelton's comments on The Daily Show "offensive, uniformed and unacceptable of any member within the Republican Party," and called on him to step down.

The state's GOP leadership issued a similar call for his resignation, which he reportedly tendered this afternoon.

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Stewart mocks ‘Turd Blossom’ Karl Rove for having to ‘battle the stupid’ Tea Party he unleashed

By Arturo Garcia
Wednesday, October 23, 2013 0:23 EDT

Jon Stewart shed no tears for Republicans on the Daily Show on Tuesday night, pointing out multiple instances in which the same GOP players who cheered on the rise of the Tea Party are now working to contain the damage they’ve done to Republicans as a whole.
“It’s as though the entire misguided shutdown affair was a culmination of a decade-long strategy to rile up and politically engage the most rigid and ideological pockets of the Republican party,” Stewart posited. “Which is why Karl Rove has no right to complain about all these radicals ruining his nice Republican party, because he’s the one who invited them.”
As proof, Stewart cited Rove telling author Thomas Edsall in 2004 that Republicans were out to play to conservative voters’ “anger points” like marriage equality or “free health care for immigrants.”
That kind of thought process, Stewart said, is what led to the sight of Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) sharing a stage with the likes of Larry Klayman, who openly called for President Barack Obama to “put the Quran down, to get up off his knees, and to figuratively come out with his hands up.”
“Now old Turd Blossom here has to create a super PAC to attempt to battle the stupid he himself unleashed,” Stewart said of Rove. “So, no simpatico for a guy who started a fire that now rages out of control.”
Stewart also mocked Sen. John McCain’s (R-AZ) attempts to rebuke his Tea Party colleagues as hypocritical, dismissing McCain as the “single least self-examining Republican crazy enabler,” considering McCain picked another Tea Partier, Sarah Palin, as his running mate for his failed 2008 presidential campaign.
“You opened Pandora’s Box,” Stewart said. “You were the guy who gave the Mogwai a post-midnight all-you-can-eat buffet. You don’t get to complain that now the party’s overrun with gremlins.”
Watch Stewart sound off on Rove and McCain in a video posted by Comedy Central:

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