You’re correct. I just couldn’t think of a smart way to say “make up bullshit wholesale.”
I remember Jon’s bully pulpit at his rally for moderation and bipartisanship that was so persuasive even his most slavish followers never mentioned it again.
I also saw the broadcast of the Mark Twain Prize last month. He managed to embarrass his poor son a dozen times, and those were just the ones they chose to air. So I know he has the ability to embarrass on a small scale, but for Nathan’s sake, I hope he doesn’t try it in larger crowds again.
I doubt Stewart is the answer – especially if he has no interest – but IMO a big job skill for the next Dem presidential nominee will be to creatively and entertainingly call the GOP on their bullshit.
Why? Not to embarrass Congress into action, but to consistently remind American voters who is responsible for things not getting done.
Faced with immovable GOP obstruction, our last two Dem presidents have:
- Obama: Said “I have a pen, and I have a phone.” (Not bad, but it only raised hopes that largely went unfulfilled.)
- Biden: Mostly just kept talking about bipartisanship and introducing weaker versions of bills until he finally got something through.
I would like our next Dem president, even while he/she is still a candidate, to continuously point out which party is fucking things up, and why you the voter aren’t getting what you want, and to do it in ways that will make it a regular highlight of the evening news and easily meme-able on social media.
TLDR: Let’s nominate someone who makes it feel ridiculous to vote for the Republican.
Is Jon Stewart a good leader? I see he only has 2 director credits on his IMDB page (oddly enough, one is for a movie called Irresistible where “A Democratic strategist helps a retired veteran run for mayor in a small, conservative Midwest town”). I think he’s a smart guy and a nice guy and pretty good at laying stuff out with the help of a team of writers. I think he’d make a great congressperson like Katie Porter - showing the facts and the receipts and stuff. But no matter how much I have enjoyed Stewart over the decades I’ve never thought “that guy should be leading us.”
Representing us, yes. Explaining to us, yes. Explaining to others in court or in hearings, yes absolutely. But he didn’t even want to be the guy on TV talking us all down from Trump. He just wanted to save farm animals and make a few points on Apple TV and do a couple bits from beneath Colbert’s desk. He’s a slacker (I’m a slacker). He doesn’t want to do it and I wouldn’t want to ask him to do it.
This American hasn’t yet forgiven Jon for abandoning his post at such a critical juncture (2015) to go raise goats or whatever.
I completely disagree with all of that. Virtually everything I’ve seen of Jon Stewart has been very impressive. When he’s trying to be funny, he can be very funny indeed, but he often speaks of serious issues, and he can be astutely analytical.
I really don’t recall what the rally you mention was or was not supposed to accomplish, but I would hardly judge the man on the supposed outcome of a single event, and one which was at least partly comedic. And it wasn’t a one-man event – it was a collaboration with Stephen Colbert, and it did garner four Daytime Emmy awards.
As for the Mark Twain Prize, I didn’t see the whole thing but I assume Stewart’s acceptance speech must be at least a large part of whatever it is you’re criticizing. That I did see, and I thought it was thoughtful, gracious, and well-spoken. He obviously loves his family, and I didn’t see anyone getting embarrassed over that. What I did see was an enthusiastic standing ovation at the end of it.
I’m not at all sure that Stewart would be an effective politician, but not for the reasons you seem to be claiming. I think the biggest issue is that his thinking and his rhetoric are on an intellectual plane that wouldn’t connect with the average voter. Remember the demagogue who astounded pundits by winning in 2016, and who remains very popular today among his worshipful acolytes. Stewart is more :“university professor” than “demagogue”.
Then you can’t comment on it.
Not at all. There were many scenes shots before the event in a roomful of comics and a lot of them showed Nathan cringing at what his father was saying.
Well, of course not. I’m mocking the claims in this thread, which aren’t serious enough to refute seriously. Being a satirist is just not a solid base for being a politician, though, and we can’t afford another know-nothing amateur.
Stewart or Stern. Please, no more amateurs.
To the OP: I would certainly take Stewart ahead of Trump, DeSantis, or even Biden.
But that still doesn’t mean that he’s a particularly great candidate for the job. He has the electability part down, sure, but he also needs to be able to do the job.
The job of the President isn’t to argue policy, it’s to manage a giant organization and to ensure that Congress has the sort of information that it needs to be able to effectively legislate. Stewart has no significant management experience.
I’d pick Stewart for Press Sec or speechwriter if the President had the right style.
This. Oh so much this.
Being a successful manager of a large operation, whether corporate or government is an acquired skill. I know that no-one is going to be truly prepared to be President, but that doesn’t mean a complete lack of skills is okay. How to make decisions, what issues need attention, who to call, when to call, what priorties; what long-range goals are in the country’s best interests; those are all skills that a manager needs.
I think that George Bush Sr epitomised that. He spent a lifetime in public service, including military, elected, and executive branch. He knew how the federal government worked and he had a strong knowledge of international affairs. All of that was essential when the Wall came down, Communism collapsed, and everyone was hoping for a relatively soft landing, which he, Gorby and Shevardnadze achieved. And, he also was able to respond to Saddam’s territorial aggression against Kuwait and put together a true coalition (not like the Potemkin coalition his son cobbled together), with the blessing of the Security Council for a US military intervention in the Middle East.
None of that happened by accident, or because he had “good people” advising him. Regardless how good the advice may be, he was the one making the decisions, choosing between different sets of good advice (because when you get to the Oval Office and have good advisors, all the advice is generally high-grade and thought out; it’s not choosing between good and bad; it’s choosing between the different good advice. And in foreign policy, Bush Sr made outstanding decisions, drawing on that lifetime of experience.
Jon Stewart is funny. That’s it.
If there were an available candidate of the caliber that could do justice to Stewart’s speeches they’d be president right now. Unfortunately, all we seem to have on the Dem side is a bunch of weak sauce mealy mouthed center right political apparatchiks with all the imagination, vision and competence of Aaron Spelling.
Electing somebody because he was so good at giving speeches to his base is exactly what got us into this mess.
Do not repeat. Don’t even think about it for one second.
And we rewarded him by voting him out of office in favor of a younger, hipper guy who captured people’s imaginations (for a while, anyway).
Like it or not, Trump has transformed what Americans expect from a president. (Or, more accurately, he solidified the transformation.) He was so goddamned awful as a human being and a president that he lost to Joe Biden, but Biden’s skills as a Washington insider, Congressional arm-twister and competent manager are far less important than the ability to convey an understanding of what people need and – even more important – why they aren’t getting it.
Again, not saying Jon Stewart is the answer. But we need a Dem president who can make it feel ridiculous to vote for a Republican, and I hope that person emerges sometime in the next 12 months or so.
Who died and elected YOU supreme being? Don’t tell me what to do–tend to your own knittin’.
Moderating:
Let’s dial back the snark. Thanks.
Not a warning.
Moderating:
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To suggest that “management experience” is what we’re looking for is quite ridiculous, given the last president and the upcoming slate of Republican candidates.
What we’re looking for primarily is someone with some balls and charisma who will motivate the non-fascist majority to get out and vote and win, to keep these lunatics out of office; and maintain that momentum into motivating a fragmented majority Democratic Congress into doing something about the existential threat to our democracy.
Charismatic leadership, confidence, inspiration, unflinching determination is what we’re looking for. The technocratic management expertise you’re talking about can come from assembling a skilled team of experienced advisors.
So you’re just coming back to repeatedly threadshit then?
As opposed to doing what exactly? This is the point where policy breaks down. It’s not enough to say a good President should be doing something. What do you think the specific thing is?
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Making a speech denouncing the Republicans. Yeah, right, that’s going to drive the GOP out of power. We’ve been denouncing conservatives since 1980 and they don’t seem to be going away. Looking ridiculous, looking dishonest, looking hateful, looking unconnected to reality, or looking like outright criminals doesn’t seem to be a problem for them.
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Get as much as you can get in the real world. Put out your dream bill. If it doesn’t get enacted, try a different version with a little less in it. If that doesn’t get enacted, try another version with pieces of the dream plan in it.
Those are the two choices. You can raise hopes which you can’t fulfill. Or you can submit weaker versions of bills until you get something through. Jon Stewart wouldn’t be doing anything different.