Friday, September 17, 2010

Jon Stewart Uber Alles

Take It Down a Notch?  This is really an interesting test of Jon Stewart's ability to frame the political discourse.  Can a reasonable person pull the US back from the brink of polarization?  Can one comedian overcome the incentives of the political system?  It will be interesting to see how it plays out.  I understand why he needs to frame it as "both extreme left and extreme right" are guilty of going to far, but, really, the extreme right is far more powerful both in the Republican Party and in the Fox News editorial offices than the far left.  This year, the key memes have been those of the right--that Obama is a socialist, Muslim, and Kenyan traitor, essentially. 

But I don't mind a bit of marginalizing the far left who equated Gore with Bush (hey, that worked great, didn't it?) if it means that the rabid anti-conservatives of the right (Palin, Cheney, Beck) face some competition for framing the choices. 

I admire what Stewart is trying to do, besides sell more books.  I am not sure it will work, but as the saying goes:

"It's so crazy, it just might work."

1 comment:

Mrs. Spew said...

Well, it might be sabotaged. Stephen Colbert is joining Stewart, or rather, marching on him in protest with the March to Save Fear that will also take place on the Mall on October 30th. I so wish we could go! Our D.C. friends, please go and take pictures.