I must confess I’ve been quite put off by Jon Stewart lately and the whole Daily show/colbert report saga for the way in which they have disparaged libertarians and the tea party movement. However, i found the following interview Stewart did with Greenspan back in 2007, and I have ti say I was pleasantly surprised. The guy’s actually quite smart, especially concerning the role the fed had to play in favouring stock trading ti savings by lowering interest rates, and why you need a fed if you’re supposed to have a free market. In any case, here’s a link:
Ted Kaczynski, aka the Unabomber, was also quite smart.
Jon Stewart is a shill. All of these people in the mainstream are shills. You don’t get to be bigtime in the mainstream, unless you shill. These folks are masters at manipulating emotion through the idiot box, and making you feel like they are on your side.
I always knew they were on the left, but I used to think of them as 5 times better than most. Latley though they have been unbearable.
Again, you only get to this point by being a shill. It’s all theater. Ron Paul never got anywhere, because he would never shill. Right now, he is arguably the highest profile Republican in the US, and they won’t let him chair a committee, and they might even try to run someone against him in the next election.
You don’t get to speak unless you carry the message.
Do you have any info on them running someone against RP, or is it just a hunch?
But if you looked at how Stewart got started both he, Mystery Science Theater 3000, and South Park alomst literaly made Comedy Central, hence why I don’t think they started as shills. I also would highly doubt Matt Stone and Trey Parker are shills (South Park creators). They both started making programs on a small fledging network with nothing to lose. Maybe that is why Stewart appeared less shill like, despite my very volitile hatred of leftism over conservatism, maybe he was actually a real person for awhile instead of the poster boy for hip leftism.
Correction: Craig Killborn actually started on the Daily Show (with Colbert as an original anchor), but Jon Stewart brought it to a whole new level.
sorry to triple post, but I think this article does sum up latley how I felt about the show:
It is so sad to start to have such an intense dislike for a show that I have loved since day 1.
Think of it this way, as liberty student put it. Obama won right. He’s in office with a known following. Jon Stewart uses mostly political humor. There’s only so much of a political view to pick from. If he went out with a libertarian view and just laughed it up on all kinds of issues that would work. But he needs to reach a wide audience. Does he consciously get up each morning and make it his determination to support Obama on his show one way or another? I don’t know. Yet Obama is what’s mainstream in politics and Stewart does political theater. So he’s going to make a show of what’s most popular in politics and that’s Obama. Also notice which shows use information or news to make comedy out of or other types of shows. Is the news or information mainstream? Is it about what’s hip in the news? Of course it is. They need to find something that is familiar so the wide audience can connect with it without having to explain too much about it on his own. He can joke about it and the people in the audience instantly recognize the topic. We’re thinking about this, but they don’t need to think to hard about it. What has been running in the news for a political show is what a political show wants to perform or else the audience won’t get it.
Now you can have a show on the minority party and that will gain sympathy. But the minority party always has to fall back on its base in order to survive its’ “minority time” or else it might dissolve if it becomes too transparent as not a viable winner for those people that oppose the majority political party in power (that’s why all these Republicans that didn’t say much during Bush years are all about State’s rights and succession, 2nd Amendment, Balanced Budget, Not accepting Stimulus packages, lower spending in D.C., National Security - the Republican’s have to fall back on their base, but during the elections they will try to reach across party lines cause they need as many votes as possible to win in the election they’ve been doing this for over century folks when are people going to wake up. That’s why libertarians talk about principles and that’s why Ron Paul is seen as genuine. He talks the same freedom talk no matter which party is in office. He falls back on his principles year after year, not back on his base like Republican shills who pander or pimp to their base). Stewart was never a gun-toten, anti-UN, anti-abortion (whatever else mainstream conservatives go for). So he can’t fall back on the Republican base during their “minority time” in power. Stewart has always been the other way and now he can theater it more. It’s a political show. There’s only so few political stances to take on mainstream issues for political parties. If he’s going to have a political show and become very popular, then he has to pick one side or the other and he definitely isn’t Republican. He’s Obama’s court jester. Making life funny and amusing for that political party. Of course he’s funny, so, you’ll have people from other political parties watching him, but don’t expect him to jester for them as much, maybe a little, but his Obama’s court jester right now.
It’s TV. It’s entertainment. It’s theater. It’s not to be completely serious. Especially somebody trying to be funny and reach a wide audience. How many people in that wide audience would read Rothbard? Not that many, he’s too serious for them. People want theater. They want entertained. They want life to be fun, grand, and joyous. TV reaches out to the baseline primal emotions to gain a wider audience. When the TV goes on don’t expect anything other than good old fashion theater. And since Stewart is politically oriented on his shows, then that’s what a shill is defined as in the dictionary. He likes Emmy’s. He doesn’t have a show about gardening.
In '96 when Dr. Paul came back to Congress, they ran a guy against him, and Gov. Bush (Jr) and Newt Gingrich campaigned for his opponent in the primary. IIRC, his opponent was a democrat who crossed the aisle. Meanwhile, Paul is a hardcore conservative who had already served several terms. And Paul just squeaked in because he’s a superior campaigner in his district.
Then in the last election, there was this local neocon, no real campaign to speak of, and suddenly he gets $100k in campaign loans (literally out of nowhere) and launches non-stop attacks on Paul. I mean, really vicious stuff. The guy had no chance of winning, but his campaign was run strictly to diminish Ron Paul because he was on the ballot for Congress and President simultaneously in Texas. The Democrats don’t even run candidates against Paul, because they know they can’t outflank him on civil liberties or war.
So, they have a history of attacking Ron Paul, and I wouldn’t put it past the GOP to try to eliminate him in the next election if he runs again.
It’s the running man. Even the news. I have a hard time believing anyone gets any worthwhile perspective or information from MSM. There are the odd exposes or documentaries, but for the most part, it is all just mindless rubbish, and it is specifically programmed to keep people stupid and staring into the box.
Yeah, I can see it now. Central bank has been established. Politicians are trying to appeal to the principles in the Constitution and they’re talking about a return to sound money and a sound economy on one side and on the other they are discussing America’s great role in the world as the light of liberty. And they’re all professing they know what’s best for America. Oh… that’s after the first president of the U.S left office.
Now let’s fastforward. Yeah, I can see it now. The central bank has been established. Politicians are trying to appeal what’s the best direction for America and they are discussing how the bailouts worked on one side and how a sound economy and sound money needs to exist on the other side. They’re all professing they know what’s best for America. Oh… that’s 2009…
Gradualism?
Huge. Which is why we have to be radical in our opposition. As Mises said, there is no third solution. Moderation always leads to Socialism.