The More Serious Side Of Comedy

In his interview with Jim Cramer, Jon Stewart made some extremely important claims that deserve to be taken very seriously. A comic uses humor to get attention, but there's often some anger behind the jokes. Who wouldn't be angry at the thought of the financial world gaming the system to make off with the money of those who look to them for advice? There are a lot of people around the world who are much poorer than they were a few years ago and they are starting to ask questions, such as how was the financial world able to get away with it.

We know that some people reported on the malfeasance going on. We've heard their names a lot recently, but they've been warning everyone for years. But their voices were almost drowned out by the more numerous, louder voices of the people making money off the scams. Which brings us to CNBC and Megan McArdle. They have both committed the same crimes, although McArdle's colossal ignorance and arrogance were as important as the profit motive in her actions. And now Cramer and McArdle are trying to retroactively rehabilitate their reputations. Both have been massively wrong, and hence they both feel it necessary to try to repudiate Stewart's reputation to save their own skins. Cramer blatantly, egregiously lied to Stewart's face and immediately had his head handed to him on a platter with direct evidence of his lie. We've seen the same with McArdle, as we and others point out her deceptions and self-delusions. Neither has any reputation left except among those who choose to use them to reinforce their own delusions.

Their credibility is shot and therefore McArdle must provide proof that the clips Stewart showed were manipulative, misleading, and out of context as she said. McArdle has made a ridiculous claim based on what is either a dishonest or very stupid belief that comics must hew to journalistic standards when criticizing journalists. But she has made the claim, and now she must prove it.

She won't. It would take effort to find the context for the clips, effort that any real journalist would take to prove her point and convince her audience. But this is McArdle, so she will either reiterate her baseless claim or ignore the matter altogether.

It must be pretty awful being an amoral, greedy bastard, but it must be even worse to be a lackey who worships them and slavishly reports whatever they are told to say, just to grab a few crumbs from their table.

UPDATE: And it's reiterate her baseless claim for the win!