Just how big is the disparity between Jon Stewart and Fox News?
Only The O’Reilly Factor (2.8 million) drew more total viewers than The Daily Show (2.3 million). Jon Stewart beat everything else on Fox News. Stewart beat Sean Hannity by 246,000 viewers. He topped Bret Baier by 399,000 viewers. Jon Stewart beat Glenn Beck by almost 500,000 viewers, 1.812 million to 2.3 million. He beat Shep Smith (1.712 million) and Greta Van Susteren (1.702 million) by almost 600,000 viewers each. When Stewart and O’Reilly go head to head at 11 PM, Jon Stewart tops Bill O’Reilly’s replay by almost a million viewers (2.3 million to 1.321 million).
This is why Fox News both hates and fears Jon Stewart. Not only is he more popular than they are, but he devotes much of his program to exposing the biased reporting of FNC. Even worse, Stewart is teaching his younger audience what Fox News is all about. Stewart doesn’t exclusively take on Fox News. His problem is with television news in general, but since Fox is the biggest offender, they get most of his attention.
Jon Stewart is the biggest threat to Fox News’ future out there. He is literally teaching his audience, which is bigger than FNC’s, how to see through the partisan propaganda that Rupert Murdoch has based his network on. Stewart is educating an entire generation of viewers on how to watch cable news, or more specifically how not to watch Fox News.
Don't you just love getting good news the first thing on a Sunday morning?
Chris Wallace is interviewing the half term governor on "Fox News Sunday" this morning. After her actions on the family vacation, is this when FOX throws her overboard?
ReplyDeleteBill
Fox Snooze needs to be shut down for all the toxic waste that they generate daily. Everything on Fox is just lies, lies, and more lies.
ReplyDeleteOf course, Sarah Palin is the biggest liar by far as she spouts her vitriolic, malicious, spiteful, hateful, racist word salad. This putrid piece of garbage needs to be deported, waterboarding would be too nice for her.
Sarah is like the terrorist that came to dinner; the air she spews out is contaminated with toxic waste. She is a blight on society, she is by far the devil and she is corrupting this country.
This country will never recover until her mouth is duct taped and her hatred is silenced.
Sarah Palin put crosshairs on people, people were murdered and still yet this toxic non-human is still sputtering along preaching hate. She will never be happy until everyone else is silenced and she rules the world.
I fear for my family, my friends, my neighbors and my country. Those who support her are riding the HATE EXPRESS straight to hell.
I never watch Palin interviews, but if she went on The Daily Show I would totally watch it.
ReplyDeleteCome on Sarah, man up and do a real interview.
Stewart would be respectful
Wasn't Jon Stewart once named "America's most trusted news source"? Really. He showcases the hypocracy of various news media - mostly Fox. Yet, the hilarious titles, replays and take-offs give sane people a chance to laugh and relax a little, knowing that we are not alone. Stewart's writers must love coming to work as there is just so much fodder for great comedy minds. Thank God for Jon Stewart and all the political comics. They are performing a valuable service to the nation. Unfortunately, the MSM did not do its job or Sarah Palin would remain some dysfunctional wannabe from Wasilla. (And I still believe that Tina Fey played a great role in saving this country from Sarah Palin.)
ReplyDeleteFor the past 2 or 3 years, Jon Stewart has been among the most rational of voices concerning the state of politics in the USA.
ReplyDeleteIt's very sad commentary that a professional comedian is one of the few who can speak truth to power.
Chris Wallace could not have been easier on the half term governor today. The questions had to be given to her in advance. He even ageed with her that her Paul Revere babble was correct. I came close to becoming ill watching the interview.
ReplyDeleteBill
Jon Stewart for President, 2016!!!!!
ReplyDeleteSo, the Fox News Network medium is basically a flash in the pan? A painful, long burning incendiary device that will go out with guns blazing and take out as many non-conservatives as possible?
ReplyDeleteThere have been too many casualties with this powerful format that has been allowed to falsely advertise itself as 'news' - fair and balanced no less.
Listening to Frank Bailey call himself a Fox News Conservative raises the hairs on the back of my neck. . .I've never heard anyone proudly refer to themselves as CNN Liberals.
It's wrong to let any one source define their political leanings. I'd rather have well-versed pedagogues than one-channel assholes.
Stewart and Colbert are now starting to call out the media more on more on their failure to do their job and actually report facts.
ReplyDeleteI thought one of the most interesting interviews (and telling) was the one Jon Stewart did last week with Bill Moyers from PBS. Jon was very interested in talking about the state of interviewing, reporting and the media (discussing "good journalism).
Jon states that what is missing today is a sense of editorial authority - we're lost in the mere smoke of OPINION. People (reporters) dont want to keep their opinions hidden, they want to keep the facts hidden.
Moyer says "we are amusing ourselves to death....it's all about entertainment"....and who is more entertaining than that moron from Wasilla, Alaska!
Good journalism is comparative, not declarative, and this is where Moyers gives Stewart his props.
Jon gave a great reference to his interview with Donald Rumsfeld and how it affected him based on the words Rumsfeld used. If you did not see the interview with Moyers, forward to the middle of this link to watch. It's very telling about our media today.
http://www.thedailyshow.com/full-episodes/wed-june-1-2011-bill-moyers
If Chris Wallace agreed her Paul Revere babble was accurate then Fox should be banned from the air. If this interview was the litmus test for where Fox is at with Sara then it's clear Roger is using her to take over the GOP because she'll continue to intrude on the Republicans whenever they try to come together to nominate someone to run against POTUS. So the question now isn't what Sara is up to, it's what is Roger putting Sara up to because you know he wants her to do his dirty work then he'll kick her to the curb
ReplyDeleteThe interesting part of all this is that Jon Stewart delivers more properly vetted news on his comedy show than Fox News does on its news shows all day.
ReplyDeleteStewart, Colbert, and Maddow actually prepare for their interviews and ask good questions. Fox interviewers lack knowledge of those they are interviewing and the issues, so there is no point in listening to their uninformative fluff.
Gryph intersting take. I don't think anyone else as looked at Fox parodies as educational, but you make a good point.
ReplyDeletePeople should never totally rely on a single source of "news" or political analysis. Human bias is always going to slant any presentation.
And if every source says the same things with the same words, as I noticed when Nixon was in office, and since, still don't trust them for accuracy.
You are 100% correct, Gryph. My girls (19 and 25) will watch Jon Stewart and no other news show.
ReplyDeleteRecently, they complained when Fox News was on the TV monitor at their hair salon. (Mom, their headlines are hilarious!)
Ahhh makes this progressive momma proud.
It will be entertaining to see how the FauxNews acolytes try and spin this, seeing as how they incessantly gloat about them being "the highest rated cable news shows." I predict that they'll simply dismiss Stewart because he is not a "news" program. Well guess what? Nothing on FauxNews is actually a "news" program either.
ReplyDeleteMurdoch must pay these on air baboons EXTREMELY well. How else could he get former legitimate news professionals to willingly sell their souls and parrot the GOP/Ailes party propaganda?
The FauxNews Chicken Little routine can inspire breathlessly panicked fear for only so long. At some point even the faithful mindless drones who sup at the FauxNews trough will begin to notice that the world has actually NOT ended during Obama's reign of terror and death.
My one criticism of Stewart is that he is quick to trot out the false equivalency of "the liberals do it too" bullshit. No, they actually don't. There is no liberal equivalent of the FauxNews disinformation machine.
In that regard, Stewart is dead wrong.
Jon Stewart has raised the guntlet for journalism in the main stream media. He's definately educational while being a comic, a very difficult combination to navigate, and he does it so well.
ReplyDeleteWhile the Main Stream Media were chasing the shiney object along the east coast like chickens with no heads, hoping against hope to get that "money shot" photo to rais their ratings, Stewart watched the circus and did his thing.
I still want to see this woman do a sit down REAL interview with a serious journalist who's willing to ask the serious questions and press for truthful answers. What, exactly, does this woman stand for, beside grifting, dodging, and throwing flame grenades of hate?
It may take a while longer, but the tide will eventually turn towards a more responsible type of journalism.
ReplyDeleteThe fans of Faux News are old and slowly but surely dying off. The fans of Jon Stewart are young and have many years of skeptical television watching ahead of them. Unlike Faux viewers who ONLY watch one channel, the younger viewers tend to get much of their news online, which often means numerous sources. The scale will continue to tip away from Faux.
Punkinbugg (see above) also touched on another key point. Not only are Stewart's numbers much bigger than anyone else on Fox (other than O'Reilly--the thinnest kid at fat camp), Stewart has a much younger demographic.
ReplyDeleteIf I were Rupert Murdoch, I'd start sending dump trucks of money at Stewart & Colbert...until they both agreed to jump.
I mean why not? He's in the media business, and Stewart will bring a separate & younger audience. How did the FOX network get started, back in the day? It built off The Simpsons and Married with Children.
I appreciate Jon Stewart pointing out GOP hypocrisy, just wish it wasn't partisan. Assholes, thieves and crooks all around in the realm of US Politics.
ReplyDeleteJon Stewart, while admittedly entertaining, is just of a shill for the left, as the Fox stooges are for the right.
Why is Fox so evil because they're right leaning, when MSNBC, CNN, CBS, etc. all are left leaning.
Is it because of their tagline - "Fair and Balanced"?? The other networks don't admit their bias, why is Fox held to a double standard?
If you side with either the Dems or Repubs, you're a sucker. Both have their own interests before yours. And both sides reek of corruption and abuse of power.
It's theater, we're the foolhardy audience. The sooner we realize this, the quicker the media's ridiculous brainwashing influence of the American public will lessen, and we can take our democracy back.
Let's call it like we see it.
I don't think you can 'teach' people to see through FNC's layer of bullshit. If you can't see it for yourself you will never get it.
ReplyDeleteThis is either stunning innumeracy or a bald category error. The O'Reilly Factor is more popular, as measured by viewership, than the Daily Show. Fox News Channel is more popular, as measured by viewership, than Comedy Central. I don't like it either, but that doesn't mean I'm going to tear my shoulder muscles by patting myself on the back to make up for it.
ReplyDeleteI LOVE Jon Stewart. He serves a very important function debuncting the lies and distortions of the media. BUT let's please be clear--he should not be relied on for your source of news. He is NOT a journalist; he is a political comedian who fulfills an important vacuum, but he is NOT a news journalist.
ReplyDelete"but he devotes much of his program to exposing the biased reporting of FNC"
ReplyDeleteSo therefore the demise of FNC would probably also be the demise of Stewarts show.
Wait. So The Daily Show ratings almost beat the O'Reilly factor and beat every other show on Fox? This would be good news if The Daily Show were on 24/7, with fresh content every hour, up against every show on Fox. Right? Isn't the average total daily viewership on Fox still much, much more massive than the one daily hour of The Daily Show? Am I understanding this correctly?
ReplyDeleteI'm no fan of Fox News, although I do force myself to read their website. Their opinion shows (like O'Reilly, etc) are unwatchable, but if you are truly interested in educating yourself broadly, you have to force yourself to read things you don't agree with. These people truly see the world differently: what they choose to report and NOT report and how they spin it. It's important to understand how they think if we hope to create a meaningful dialogue.
He beat all these other people....during time slots he's not aired in? Is this that new math?
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