There is an extended interviewbetween Stewart and O’Reilly, posted online at comedy central. I watched both parts and honestly, I gotta say, O’Reilly really got the better of Stewart. I really love the Daily show and I usually think O’Reilly is a blowhard idiot, but he made some good points. And he was actually funnier than the comedian.
I don’t know what’s wrong with me! First I start to actually LIKE Rick Perry… now I am seeing O’Reilly as the victor of this debate. What next?? Will I start reading Thatcher and Reagan fanfiction??
Haven’t seen it yet, but in what way did he win? I saw the aired version. It didn’t really even feel like that heated of a debate this time. Bill is mainly there for his Lincoln book.
If you mean the debate over taxing the rich…I think both made their points. Jon is right about Bill being overly dramatic(the whole quitting if his taxes go up thing). It’s silly.
Yep, it is a taxes equivalent of “If X is elected I’m leaving the country”.
He should count himself lucky he’d even have that option. I earn a fairly normal wage here in Sweden, much less than someone in my work would earn in the US or even my native UK, and I’m in the 50% bracket. And our sales tax (which he also moaned about) is 25%.
I missed the interview (fell asleep) and haven’t watched it on line yet, but why does anybody have to “win” an interview? Like Mahaloth said, he was there to plug a book.
From what I’ve seen of Jon Stewart as an interviewer, while he’s never shy about expressing his own opinions, he lets his guests express theirs as well and is usually a courteous host. I’ve only seen a couple of his interviews that could be described as adversarial.
Maybe I’ll change my tune after watching this particular segment, but I doubt it was framed as a competition going in.
It wasn’t. They bicker, but they clearly like each other and this interview was the friendliest one they’ve ever done. On the other hand I lost it the other day when O’Reilly made his threat to leave his show and Stewart used it as the intro to their new segment [read in a lifeless monotone] “No… Bill… Stop… Don’t…”
I felt the same way. I was skipping through channels when I caught that they were on. I’ve seen them spar before and was hoping to catch some of that again. But I didn’t see much sparring going on. I think even O’Reilly made the joking comment near the end “so then we agree”.
Just watched it. I certainly did not get the feeling that anyone bested the other or that there was even a particularly contentious debate between them. In fact I think there was the most agreement between them than in any past conversation. (ie. once they got passed Bill’s silly comment about not doing his show anymore if taxes get too high). Ultimately Bill agreed that a solution to the country’s economic problems should include BOTH spending cuts and increased revenue in the ideal sense.
Where I think Bill’s argument was weakest was in setting the bar for when he would accept raising income taxes at some idealistic and unreachable standard. Both agree that there is plenty of waste and corruption in government. Bill seems to think that once the government deals with all that (did he mean 100% of it??) then the government has the right to ask him for more money.
Over the last few years I’ve noticed Stewart more and more really strives to find points of agreement with his guests from the right and tries to build on these points with the hope that he might actually (ever so slightly) lessen the ideology gap between the 2 sides and even bring something tangibly productive out of it. During the whole Common thing with Bill, on his appearance on Fox he shifted the conversation at the end towards trying to get Bill to take a more active stance against banning assault rifles (which Bill has said previously he was against). Stewart had Huckabee on the show during the push to pass the Zadroga bill.
I believe Stewart really differentiates between those he thinks are hopeless ideologues, and those that, though on the opposite side of the aisle, he can work with.
I watched the full interview. I wouldn’t say anyone won but Bill is definitely a witty guy and he knows he has to be on his A Game when he is on TDS.
Trivia I noticed when playing the video: Bill’s last appearance on the show was almost exactly one year before to the day (it was one day off).
As far as his substance, Flat tax and Consumption tax (i.e. a National Sales Tax) are the “Intelligent Design” of Conservative economic dogma. It is just a repackaging of shifting the Income tax burden off the wealthy and putting in on the poor and middle class (who get hit harder by Sales taxes as a percentage of income).