Comedian Jon Stewart Tuesday responded to Bernie Goldberg's criticism of "The Daily Show" host by performing a Gospel tune with the lyrics "Go f--k yourselves."
As a little background, Stewart last week went after Fox News and Goldberg ending the segment, "I've said it before, and I'll say it again: Go f--k yourselves."
This prompted a response from Goldberg on Monday's "O'Reilly Factor" wherein he accused Stewart of being "Jay Leno with a much smaller audience, but you get to say the f-bomb."
After a lengthy segment Tuesday addressing Goldberg's admonition -- which included the comedian actually admitting that there is liberal bias in the media!!! -- Stewart led a choir in vulgarity-laden song (video follows with partial transcript and commentary, song begins at 9:10, h/t Mediaite):
| The Daily Show With Jon Stewart | Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c | |||
| Bernie Goldberg Fires Back | ||||
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JON STEWART, HOST: Bernie Goldberg, I don't need to satisfy your version of what fair satire is or should be. I'm not fair. I'm not balanced...You're criticizing me for not living up to your tagline. Oh Lord. And you dismiss any criticism as further evidence of how the rest of the media persecute you. You like to pretend, Bernie Goldberg and Fox News, that the relentless conservative activism of Fox News is the equivalent, oh the equivalent, of the disorganized liberal influence you find on NBC, ABC and CBS. But Fox News, you may be able to detect a liberal pathogen in their blood stream, however faint. But Fox News is such a crazy overreaction to that perceived threat. You're like an auto-immune disorder. I'm not saying the virus doesn't exist in some small quantity. But you're producing way too many antibodies. Fox News -- you're the lupus of news. So, I guess what I'm saying is this:
CHOIR WITH STEWART'S DIRECTION: Go...
STEWART: ...as long as fair and balanced is how you sell yourselves...
CHOIR: ...f--k...
STEWART: ...I guess what I'm saying is this...
CHOIR: yourselves.
With that, Stewart and choir continued to sing the vulgar lyrics.
Unfortunately lost in all the gratuitous profanity was that Stewart admitted NBC, ABC, and CBS are liberally biased -- "the disorganized liberal influence you find on NBC, ABC and CBS."
Regardless of how "faint" Stewart might believe this influence is, at least he acknowledged it Tuesday night.
But doesn't that undermine his entire rebuttal?
Goldberg's point Monday was that the press are liberally-biased, and that Stewart is aiding and abetting such bias by almost exclusively focusing on Fox's conservative leanings.
Irrespective of whether or not "The Daily Show" host wants to be fair and balanced, the fact that he recognizes bias at the other networks but typically fails to call them on it while regularly attacking Fox makes him part of the problem AND thereby validates Goldberg's argument.
Earlier in the segment, Stewart said:
Not all of us have your guts Bernie. It takes a tough man to walk into O'Reilly's lion's den to criticize liberal elites.
Maybe so, but those same liberal elites know that when they go on "The Daily Show," the host is going to toss them softballs, which again was Goldberg's point.
To be sure, as a comedian, Stewart doesn't have to be fair and balanced.
But if he's going to continually attack Fox News for its biases, maybe he should give equal time to lambasting the networks he admits tilt left.
After all, that too was Goldberg's point, and something Stewart chose to ignore opting instead to set up a song with the lyrics "Go f--k yourselves," which also validated the Fox News contributor's argument.
Consider that Stewart during this segment responded to Goldberg, "[I]f you think I am Leno with the f-bomb, you know even less about comedy than you do about media and politics."
That seems a rather absurd comment given the amazingly vulgar ending to this segment.
Post facto opining: Stewart said the virus of liberal media bias exists "in some small quantity" and Fox is a "crazy overreaction to that perceived threat."
Sadly, this is where Fox-bashers on the left are dead wrong.
There's no small quantity of liberal media bias. It is pervasive throughout virtually all media with very few exceptions.
As Stewart seems to like challenges, let me offer one that I have offered to liberals for years and have yet to lose: for every conservative contributor he can name to ABC, CBS, and NBC, I'll name a liberal contributor to Fox. The last man to name such a contributor wins.
In the end, there are far more liberal contributors to Fox than conservative contributors to all of the broadcast network news programs COMBINED.
What this means is that people watching Fox get far more liberal points of view than people watching ABC, CBS, and NBC get conservative points of view.
As such, regardless of Fox's tilt to the right, it is FAR less than the broadcast networks' tilt to the left.
If Stewart cares to challenge me on this issue, he knows where to find me.
