I couldn’t agree more. I LOVE his sense of humor, and it’s so dry that now I can’t watch him doing the real news without thinking he has his tongue in his cheek. He’ll be reporting something completely serious and I start grinning just because it’s him.
This is, ironically enough, an example of exactly the point that Stewart was making: As another poster already pointed out, the news media today are not driven by a desire to report the news or to dig in and find the real facts or to help people, they’re driven by the desire to make money. That’s the same stupid-ass short-term view that Stewart was decrying; “who cares what we’re actually saying, whether we’re reporting the truth or not, giving people something that actually helps them or not, as long as we keep getting those ad dollars.”
If any of those idiots making the decisions could actually see past their fucking noses, they might realize that they could do real reporting AND get the ad dollars. Suppose, in some mythical world, the powers-that-be at CNBC saw the light. They started having shows that did real reporting. Analysts and interviewers that made the points and asked the kinds of questions that Stewart was making and asking last night. Ok, maybe they’d lose some “access” to CEOs (or, as Zakalwe points out, maybe not). Maybe SOME of their advertisers would pull out. But then maybe, in the longer term, they’d find that their viewership was going UP as the public realized that CNBC was actually giving them the real, unvarnished truth, and reporting on things that would truly help them. And if that happened, I can promise you that they’d have no shortage of advertisers. Not every company in the world lives and dies by what financial analysts say; I’m sure there are plenty of companies that would have less to lose by honest reporting than to gain by advertising around honest reporting.
Robot Arm may be right, but there’s nothing inherent in the system that makes it have to be that way.
Well, Exapno did say, “everything on Comedy Central,” not “everything on The Daily Show.” Which means that Stewart would be called upon to defend
Mind of Mencia. Which is a fair comparison, really. If the purpose of Comedy Central is to make people laugh, surely Mind of Mencia is as big a failure on their part as Cramer’s advice on Bear Stearns is on his. And when you look at it, all that happened because of Cramer’s failure is some people lost money. Comedy Central, on the other hand, gave Carlos Mencia a television show.
Motes and planks, my friend. Motes and planks indeed.
Slight hijack, but I want to respond to this.
The stock market does not exist with the expectation that it will, or even should, always go up. The public market provides private companies a place for “liquidity events.” That is the point.
What does time have anything to with the morality of profit/loss? Is holding for 1 month OK? 6 months? 1 year? 10 years? 30 years? For every transaction there is a willing buyer and willing seller. If I bought a stock that went up 30% in a week, why shouldn’t I be able to sell it to someone who wants to buy? I also disagree that being long a company implies one believes in its long term success. In the same way, being short a company doesn’t imply one believes it will eventually go bankrupt.
On topic - Yes, the Cramer slaying was beautiful.
When Stewart went on Crossfire, he basically said that lots of Comedy Central shows were crap. Do you think he wouldn’t say the same thing on CNBC?
When I was a kid, the networks looked upon their news as a public service, funded by the profits they made from their entertainment. I’m sure that CBS News wasn’t making a lot of money on its wide network of correspondents. And network news back then mattered. I’ve seen it written that Vietnam was lost when Cronkite gave up on the effort. Food stamps exist today in no small part because CBS News created an expensive documentary on hunger in America.
Sometime in the late '60s or early '70s they found that local news shows showing fires, kittens, and things to scare people got better ratings and made more money than those actually covering government and serious issues. That’s when the slide began.
Great post, btw.
And I think the point of the clips was to show that Cramer was especially qualified to see through the CEO crap. Stewart actually complimented him on his knowledge. Anyone can do non-challenging interviews and publish press releases, but only fools put trust in the product that results.
I know it’s been said before, but it’s troubling that one of the most substantive discussions of what has transpired on Wall Street over the past few years is on a comedy show.
Omg. He was almost crying at one point. That interview was blatantly not comedy.
Part of me wants desperately for Stewart to go into legitimate journalism. I think he’d have a place on any news show if he asked. But then he’d be part of the establishment he’s ridiculed for so long, and as it stands he can probably be more effective where he is now.
I’m having a hard time keeping up with this thread, so if I touch on something already mentioned, I apologize.
To those saying Jon should have given him more adequate response time. You’re probably right. I just got the sense that, if Crame rhad been given more of an opportunity to speak, it would be dead air, or the same arguments he used multiple times throughout the interveiw.
That said, I do have a little bit of respect for Cramer for going through with this. I at least hope CNBC doesn’t use him as a scapegoat. He had the balls to go on. I think he showed a lot of regret, which is the ONLY way he could have handled it without me totally vilifying him.
I want to know if the “In Cramer We Trust” is gone yet.
Any CNBC viewers able to comment?
-Joe
I’m sorry, but I do not understand your point.
Yes, CC airs Mind of Mencia and it is pure crap.
But there are those who find it funny, enough so that it could last for several seasons. And all CC did was say it was funny, not that had any useful purpose or reliable information. Why would Stewart need to defend this?
It’s a joke, dude.
I think it was more of a joke about how horrible Mencia is. You’re vivisecting a joke.
-Joe
Plus Jon already makes fun of some of CC’s programing.
They also have the same problem that the non-financial 24 hour news networks have. Namely the need to fill 24 hour of news which leads to sensationalizing what little news there is. It’s especially hard to do this if your audience are buy-and-hold 401(k) investors. In my office building we have CNBC running on a number of TVs located strategically to make us look high tech professional (and like we know how to buy and mount televisions). When we first started I often found it catching my eye as I walked by because by all accounts a major (financial) catastrophe had just happened. Interestingly, they didn`t seem any more alarmed when actual financial catastrophe struck. It’s like, “OMG OMG 10 out of 10 crazy stars - oil is up $3 in one day!”, and “OMG OMG 10 out of 10 crazy stars - The government isn’t bailing out Lehman and they’re closing down!”. To be fair, they started having 10 little heads on screen at once. But for the most part it’s like there always has to be something REALLY IMPORTANT happening.
Exapno’s point was a joke, but it was still a point. Jon Stewart, while he acknowledged it was unfair that Jim Cramer had to defend all of CNBC, still expected him to do it. Nobody would expect Jon Stewart to defend all of Comedy Central, nor would he, if history is our guide.
Oops, my bad. :o
During the latest interview, what clips were played of anyone other than Cramer?
-Joe