The Daily Show
Journalist Jon Stewart?
On November 11, 2009, a story broke that Fox News’ Sean Hannity had doctored footage from a GOP healthcare rally to make the turnout seem thousands higher than it actually was. The clip,[1] featuring Republican congresswoman Michele Bachmann declaring that “between twenty and forty-five thousand people had assembled,” cut back and forth between actual footage of the ten-thousand person rally[2] and the September 12th highly attended tea party rally led by another Fox News commentator, Glenn Beck. Hannity, and by extension Fox News, was chastised not only for the bias but also a lack of journalistic ethics, forcing Hannity to make a public apology.[3]
So who was the investigatory journalist who brought this story to light? It was Jon Stewart, the host of the satirical news program The Daily Show, which airs four times a week on Comedy Central. This was not the first time Stewart has been likened to a journalist. In 2008, the Pew Research Center asked Americans to name the journalists they most admired. For the first time ever, a comedian—Stewart—was chosen as the fourth most admired journalist.[4]
[1] Comedy Central, “The Daily Show with Jon Stewart,” November 10, 2009.
[2]Philip Rucker, "Activists bring 'tea party' to Capitol Hill; House Democrats' health bill denounced as 'Pelosi-Care,'" Washington Post, November 6, 2009, A04.
[3] Mark Silvia, "Hannity says sorry for using wrong rally video," Los Angeles Times, November 13, 2009, accessed February 10, 2010, http://articles.latimes.com/ 2009/nov/13/nation/na-hannity-crowd13.
[4]Pew Research Center, "Journalism, Satire or Just Laughs? The Daily Show with Jon Stewart,” Journalism.org, May 8, 2008, accessed December 1, 2009, http://www.journalism.org/node/10953.
[1] Comedy Central, “The Daily Show with Jon Stewart,” November 10, 2009.
[2]Philip Rucker, "Activists bring 'tea party' to Capitol Hill; House Democrats' health bill denounced as 'Pelosi-Care,'" Washington Post, November 6, 2009, A04.
[3] Mark Silvia, "Hannity says sorry for using wrong rally video," Los Angeles Times, November 13, 2009, accessed February 10, 2010, http://articles.latimes.com/ 2009/nov/13/nation/na-hannity-crowd13.
[4]Pew Research Center, "Journalism, Satire or Just Laughs? The Daily Show with Jon Stewart,” Journalism.org, May 8, 2008, accessed December 1, 2009, http://www.journalism.org/node/10953.