Jon Stewart: Fox News Reporting Debt, Unemployment and High Gas Prices Is a GOP Conspiracy
Comedian Jon Stewart apparently thinks the economy is just fine and that any news outlet that says otherwise must be doing it because they don't want President Obama to get reelected.
Even more preposterous, on Tuesday's Daily Show, the host did an entire segment on how Fox News reporting the national debt, unemployment, and rising gas prices is all a Republican National Committee conspiracy (video follows with highlights and commentary):
After playing some clips of various news organizations – hysterically including Fox! – reporting some of the recent good economic numbers, Stewart said, “You just had to go and get better while Obama was still in office, didn’t you? You couldn’t hold off nine little months, nine teeny tiny little months? So it’s good news, unless you work for a media organization whose job it is to make sure Obama doesn’t get reelected.”
From there, Stewart played video clips of various Fox anchors, hosts, and contributors having the unmitigated audacity to talk about the spiraling national debt, stubbornly high unemployment, and soaring gas prices.
Even funnier, some of the reports were from Fox Business Network. How dare a financial news channel talk about things like national debt, unemployment, and gas prices!
Stewart incredulously quipped, “The numbers are real, but they’re not good. In fact, they’re bad. Actually, they’re fake. And even if they were real and good, they wouldn’t matter because it’s about how bad you feel – and that’s where we come in. Fox News: Rooting for America to Fail Since November 2008.”
He continued, “But their early February pushback on the economic indicators is all over the place. You rarely see Fox this disorganized. Luckily on February 10, the Republican National Committee sent out this pundit prep document.”
After showing it to the crowd, Stewart said, “It emphasized how to mitigate any damage that may be occurring from the improved economy.”
Not surprisingly, the document mentioned three specific problems that pundits should be focusing on: national debt, unemployment, and the price of gas.
Shocking that the GOP would want pro-Republican pundits to focus on these items, especially as the debt and the unemployment rate have been on the minds of most Americans for years. Now that gas prices are approaching all-time highs, Fox apparently needed pressure from the RNC to cover them as well.
But Stewart wasn’t done, for he then aired more clips of FNC and FBN anchors, hosts and contributors talking about – wait for it! – debt, unemployment, and gas prices.
After this, Stewart played what he thought was the smoking gun to prove the connection: Fox and Friends co-host Steve Doocy actually reading from a newspaper report about the RNC edict, and then talking about high gas prices.
“You can’t do that,” Stewart exclaimed. “You just gave the game away.”
Actually, it was Stewart that gave the game away, as he exposed that much like virtually every liberal media member in the country, he is and has been rooting for Barack Obama since 2008.
It's not odd that news organizations would report the national debt, stubbornly high unemployment, and soaring gas prices.
What's odd is that for over three years, virtually every news outlet besides Fox downplayed budget deficits and the poor condition of the labor markets - and/or blamed both on former President George W. Bush - and are currently underreporting gas prices and/or making the case they're not Obama's fault.
Stewart is clearly displeased that Fox is going against this dishonest grain and actually telling its viewers the truth about these negative economic factors that threaten to derail any recovery that might now be taking root.
To Stewart, reports that undermines the President he loves should be ignored, at least until after the elections, and any outlet going against this tenet must clearly be in bed with the RNC.
It curiously doesn't bother Stewart that by withholding such information from the public virtually every other media organization including his is in bed with the DNC.
(H/T FBer David W. Livingston)
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Comments
Yep. It's a conspiracy.
Submitted by c5then on Wed, 02/29/2012 - 12:26pm.
FoxNews is conspiring to bring facts and truth to their viewers. How dare they!
Here is what is going to happen, The economy is going to crash back into another deep recession and Obama is going to lose in November. FoxNews viewers will be able to say, "Well, saw that coming." Viewers of other "news" outlets will be perplexed and surprised and wondering how this could have come out of nowhere.
Viewers of MSNBC will wonder why Obama just doesn't declare himeslf Emperor and issue a proclamation that the economy is fine and everyone is required to purchase at least $150 of government mandated stuff every month ($1000 if you are not on welfare).
Madison and Jefferson and Franklin built a Republic - Roberts killed it!
M-BS-NBC
Submitted by djwolf12 on Wed, 02/29/2012 - 2:04pm.
Wait until election night........The cries of Racism from 30 Rock will be shreiking so loudly that I will actually here them here in northern NJ. I will bet that the first person to call for Obama to sign an executive order reversing the election results will be Chris Matthews.
⇒ It's comedy!
Submitted by Cool Arrow on Wed, 02/29/2012 - 12:34pm.
Just wanted to scoop balboa's newsflash, certainly destined to be his most in-depth offering of the day.
Broke
Submitted by CJohnson on Wed, 02/29/2012 - 12:38pm.
Oh Mr Stewart, have you been in a grocery store lately? You are an expense everyone will live without when milk and gasoline hit 7$/gallon. Just try to make it funny.
Stewart is a funny guy
Submitted by PJRyan on Wed, 02/29/2012 - 12:41pm.
and, like all libs, a master of obfuscation. I actually think he's smart enough and introspective enough that one day the light will click on for him. It may have already, but the 'Daily Show' gravy train prevents him from coming out.
I'd like to be able to limit him to 5-word answers and ask him if the mainstream media has a bias and what the real unemployment rate is. If his answers are 'no' and any number less than 15%, then he continues to have no credibility. And I continue to have no regrets for missing the occasional genuinely funny moments on his show.
He was correct in telling Chris Wallace that the MSM are lazy, desperate sensationalism whores, but is far too smart to claim that...pick one...let's say...Schieffer...wouldn't doff full bimbo makeup and a Li'l Bo Peep outfit and report that Santorum may have picked his nose in middle school if BO told him to.
What will Stewart say if the jobless number for 2/2012 is 9%?
Submitted by Galvanic on Wed, 02/29/2012 - 12:49pm.
Will he accuse the Bureau of Labor Statistics of being part of the Conspiracy?
Since the Obama campaign can't describe the economy as good, it and its MSM echoes have made a conscious effort to paint the numbers as "encouraging" -- in other words, things ain't so bad.
But come Election Day in November, voters won't determine the health of the economy by Axelrod's spin, but on whether they have a job or not, the price of gasoline at the pump and food at the market, and their confidence in the future.
The numbers reported by the BLS
Submitted by c5then on Wed, 02/29/2012 - 1:00pm.
Will be just what the administration tells them they will be. As more and more people fall off the unemployment rolls and stop looking for work, the official unemployment number will continue to drop.
Madison and Jefferson and Franklin built a Republic - Roberts killed it!
You have to admit it was
Submitted by balboa on Wed, 02/29/2012 - 12:57pm.
You have to admit it was pretty funny that the Doocmeister read directly from the Republican cheat sheet.
I do think the first part of Stewart's bit, while funny, was flawed. This happens any time there's "good news" announced: the other side shows why it isn't actually good news.
⇒ Now that's better
Submitted by Cool Arrow on Wed, 02/29/2012 - 1:03pm.
Honest, analytical, concise.
I agree with you. It was funny, and while it's obvious liberals follow talking points, some Conservatives do the same.
I think it's important these talking heads cite sources, in the way Jim Pinkerton does when he cites MRC.
Glad I didn't take you up on
Submitted by bretzysdude on Wed, 02/29/2012 - 1:17pm.
Glad I didn't take you up on the bet you made above, Cool Arrow. I would've had to pay up.
"Predictable" by the Kinks comes to mind...
Uh, yeah.
Submitted by c5then on Wed, 02/29/2012 - 1:05pm.
"This happens any time there's "good news" announced: the other side shows why it isn't actually good news."
And the point of this blog entry and the whole site is that Stewart and the rest of the liberal media only point it out when it's the "other" side doing it.
Madison and Jefferson and Franklin built a Republic - Roberts killed it!
what's wrong with Fox?
Submitted by almostacowboy on Wed, 02/29/2012 - 1:35pm.
Don't they know that the RNC wants women to die? [sarc]
Jon Stewart
Submitted by djwolf12 on Wed, 02/29/2012 - 1:49pm.
Always keep this in mind.........Stewart said that Harry Truman committed a War Crime for Hiroshima and Nagasaki during WWII. When called out on it, he, as what cowards do, retracted his statement. People that trust this man to get the news are severely stupid.
Yet it was perfectly ok with
Submitted by NC Cop on Wed, 02/29/2012 - 1:54pm.
Yet it was perfectly ok with this a**hat when the democrats used Iraq against Bush in 2004 to try and get Kerry elected.
The most hypocritical people on the face of the earth.
And the Democrat Party economic talking points in, say 2004?
Submitted by Gary Hall on Wed, 02/29/2012 - 3:24pm.
Something tells me that the whole Democrat party machine - and their talking points memos - and Jon Stewart, were not celebrating the economic recovery following the recession Bush inherited from the Clinton era made worse by the attacks on 9/11.
(;~/ gary
Oops - add Robert Reich to the "GOP" conspiracy
Submitted by Gary Hall on Wed, 02/29/2012 - 3:58pm.
Here he (former Clinton Labor Secretary - and big time liberal Democrat) is today:
The negative wealth effect of home values, combined with declining wages, makes it highly unlikely the US will enjoy a robust recovery any time soon.
Looks like another point that Fox News should be using.
I didn't see Jon Stewart reference Reich. LOL
(;~/ gary
The Mainstream Media: Rooting for America to fail since 1968
Submitted by BarneyFrankenstein on Thu, 03/01/2012 - 2:53am.
If Fox is "since 2008" then the mainstream has been actively rooting for America fail since its pro-death Vietnam coverage from Cronkite.
Besides, wanting Obama to fail is different than wanting the country to fail, like liberals did when they rooted for us to lose the Iraq war.
Ironically, Stewart and Cronkite have both been called "the most trusted man in America" all the while having an axe to grind against US foreign policy and conservatives in general.
Plus, you have to define what "fail" means. In supporting OWS, the mainstream media is giving de facto support to communist/socialist/marxists who want the American free market system to collapse. Conservatives just want Obama's version of government to fail but they are the only group of the two who wants the country to remain as the founders intended.
So put that in your pipe and smoke it, Stewie.
Odd. Per your own statement,
Submitted by cathartic1 on Wed, 02/29/2012 - 7:47pm.
Odd. Per your own statement, FNC was provided a document meant for the pundits by the RNC, but then turn around and show that it was actually anchors and hosts - not the pundits for whom the document was intended - using those statements, and that's considered "not odd"? I thought talking down the economy was a bad thing?
Somehow
Submitted by BosTarus on Wed, 02/29/2012 - 8:21pm.
I feel like everyone here would be crazy up in arms if the situation was flipped. I'd imagine this site would have a field day with a memo like this from the White House or the DNC. I can practically hear the cries of "State Run Media!" if the news was reporting from White House talking points memos (not that that isn't what's happening already, granted).
OBAM IRONY OF THE WEEK...
Submitted by reelman46 on Wed, 02/29/2012 - 9:38pm.
IRONY OF THE WEEK
Gas prices soaring…oil supplies up…we are even exporting oil BUT Obama
(aka the happy business basher) refuses to act against "demon" oil!
Why? Because his objective is high gas prices.
A minor reason may be states/fed get a good boost in revenue
from gas per gallon taxes…which softens the OzBama economic pain a tad.
Its always political agenda first and Americans last.
Doug Schexnayder, Ph.D. (theconservativecrawfish<
Obama has a cure for high gas prices
Submitted by Boudin on Wed, 02/29/2012 - 10:07pm.
Make em higher, by adding 40 billion to the price!
Now dont that make you feel better?
Let me ask a question. Do you
Submitted by balboa on Wed, 02/29/2012 - 10:10pm.
Let me ask a question. Do you think Bush could have done something about the high gas prices?
I think this Senate sure as heck can
Submitted by Boudin on Wed, 02/29/2012 - 10:12pm.
Bush left office with Gas at 1.80, so I guess the obvious answer is a definite YES
It seems like the right was
Submitted by balboa on Wed, 02/29/2012 - 10:15pm.
It seems like the right was claiming, much like the left is now, that the president has no way of influencing the price.
And I'm sure you were there
Submitted by NC Cop on Wed, 02/29/2012 - 10:17pm.
And I'm sure you were there to challenge the left's claim that Bush was responsible for higher gas prices, eh???
Probably not. I don't know
Submitted by balboa on Wed, 02/29/2012 - 10:20pm.
Probably not. I don't know much about economic policy.
I probably assumed that high prices were good for Bush's buddies in the ol business, though.
"Probably not." Shocker.
Submitted by NC Cop on Wed, 02/29/2012 - 10:25pm.
"Probably not."
Shocker.
I know!
Submitted by balboa on Wed, 02/29/2012 - 10:30pm.
I know!
I am sorry
Submitted by Boudin on Wed, 02/29/2012 - 10:31pm.
I don't know much about economic policy.
Dont seem like you want to know either.
Fact is, the only ones who benefit from high gas, is our Gov, and the middle east.
Happy now?
"Dont seem like you want to
Submitted by balboa on Wed, 02/29/2012 - 10:36pm.
"Dont seem like you want to know either."
How so?
Bal
Submitted by Radical1979 on Wed, 02/29/2012 - 10:15pm.
Well the media sure did.
Maybe the productive should quit
Submitted by Boudin on Wed, 02/29/2012 - 10:10pm.
Maybe we can starve them out!
it's a comedy show
Submitted by right of way on Wed, 02/29/2012 - 10:36pm.
what's really sad, is that a lot of people consider the daily show their primary news source. just imagine getting your news from a comedy network. it just shows how immature and ignorant lib dems are.