Jon Stewart

I realize that I put up a lot of stuff from Jon Stewart and the Daily Show.  But, the guy is a talented performer coupled with great writers and he make me laugh frequently.  I will keep posting clips and I will keep laughing at/with him.

But what is starting to worry me is the way that a lot of folks seem to be getting the bulk of their news from his show.   Granted, the guy can keep you up on the fact that the world's leaders are the same flavor of dumb-ass as the folks who elected them, but is that enough information for people to make a decision about things that are going on around them?

Granted, the mass market media that tries to pass itself off as a news source sure as hell isn't sufficient to the task.  The blogs and alt-media are just as limited, usually being tied to a singular focus and not especially interested in actually looking at both sides of an issue.

So what you have is the creation of a set of news sources that allow one to get a flavor of what is really happening behind the self-interest tinged squealing of the different sources that I have outlined above.  When I was stationed over in Europe during the last six months of my enlistment, I got into the habit every night of listening to the BBC World Service, Armed Forces Network, and Radio Moscow.  If I slept on the raw data, then thought a little bit about it, I usually managed to figure out what was happening.

I would recommend something similar.  I now tend to read the Economist, Naked Capitalism, and Foreign Policy.  I also let Jim over at Some Assembly Required troll for my outrage fix de jour.


The world is a complicated place.  Looking for one news source to make it simpler will not give you the "truth" will only let you become myopic.  Stop trying to simplify things to make it fit some model that you think that can understand.