As Jon Stewart concluded Comedy Central’s The Weekly Show podcast on Thursday, he attacked Fox News for citing my late night guest studies.
Against the backdrop of FCC Chairman Brendan Carr claiming cancelled CBS host Stephen Colbert was too far left, producer Brittany Mehmedovic observed, “I also noticed like Fox News is getting in on the party now by counting how many conservative guests are on shows versus how many liberal guests are on shows.”
Stewart didn’t see what the big deal was, “The entire bullshit of the—again, this is them trying to police and create rules that they would never follow. The idea that by having what may be a more left-leaning or progressive bent or just bringing in. That’s how Fox is popular. That’s how any of these people, you know, they all talk about ‘Gutfeld’s the most popular,’ yet he’s not popular because he’s a both sides guy. He’s not, you know, a fair use, like, you know, the Fairness Doctrine says, like, he’s relentless.”
I think more conservative guests on these shows would make better television and lead to a more well-informed audience, but the last thing I would advocate for is government-run comedy shows. I believe the First Amendment applies to everyone, including liberal comedians. The point of the studies is simply to show how these shows, which many consider to be non-partisan, unifying cultural institutions in a way that Fox News isn’t or more trustworthy than traditional news sources, are just MSNBC with jokes and more F-bombs.
As for Stewart, he rolled on with a mocking impersonation of former late night host Jay Leno, who agrees with me, “And, you know, after a day of watching Fox News and being bathed in their very purposeful propaganda, it’s a great way to top off the night, but it’s not the Jay Leno, like, ‘Yeah, and then you understand why you wanna offend your audience. Why, why not just do a show about, you know, why do you have to talk about things you believe? Why would you, why do you, why do you have to make jokes about things you actually think? And you fucking, I’ll just say, you know, I mean, I’m just gonna go throw myself down a hill and see if I can get a concussion.’”
Stewart concluded, “I mean, the whole thing is fucking ridiculous and it’s, it, if you look at the social media profile, all the people that complain about the left-wing bias, they’re all right-wing influencers, they all make their money, their entire economy is based on how willing they are to attack. And defame and to crush liberals. The whole thing is bullshit.”
Again, I would be very disappointed if I ever defamed anyone, although maybe not as disappointed as Stewart’s middle school English teacher, who probably cringed at the idea that counting guests is the same as defamation. Our job here at the MRC is to shine a light on the liberal media and tell the truth. If I have to make stuff up about the comedy shows in order to make a point, then I have failed. To that end, it is interesting to observe that Stewart never bothered to argue my results were wrong.
Earlier in the episode, in news that has nothing to do with me, Stewart was talking with former MSNBC host Mehdi Hasan, who had a particularly strange take on the defunding of PBS and NPR as it relates to the FCC and President Trump’s various media lawsuits:
This is a global playbook that Trump is borrowing from. India, Turkey, Hungary, what are, they all, what have all these countries done? Orban, Erdogan, Modi, they’ve all taken over the media in their respective countries, and they didn’t take over the media by sending tanks and armed men into newsrooms. They took over the media the exact same way that Trump is doing right now, through lawsuits, through economic harassment, through defaming, and smearing journalists, through violently attacking journalists who are covering protests, through all of these methods, through hollowing out public media, NPR, PBS, defunding. This is the playbook in India, in Hungary, in Turkey, in Russia, in Israel, and here in the United States now.
First of all, Trump hasn’t pushed anyone at NPR or PBS out of a window. Second of all, Israel? Just because Israel’s press—Haaretz notwithstanding—doesn’t sound like Mehdi Hasan doesn’t mean it doesn’t have a free press that bows down before Benjamin Netanyahu.
Here is a transcript for the July 30 show:
The Weekly Show
7/30/2025
MEHDI HASAN: This is a global playbook that Trump is borrowing from. India, Turkey, Hungary, what are they all, what have all these countries done? Orban, Erdogan, Modi, they’ve all taken over the media in their respective countries, and they didn’t take over the media by sending tanks and armed men into newsrooms. They took over the media the exact same way that Trump is doing right now, through lawsuits, through economic harassment, through defaming, and smearing journalists, through violently attacking journalists who are covering protests, through all of these methods, through hollowing out public media, NPR, PBS, defunding. This is the playbook in India, in Hungary, in Turkey, in Russia, in Israel, and here in the United States now.
…
BRITTANY MEHMEDOVIC: I also noticed like Fox News is getting in on the party now by counting how many conservative guests are on shows versus how many liberal guests are on shows.
JON STEWART: The entire bullshit of the—again, this is them trying to police and create rules that they would never follow. The idea that by having what may be a more left leaning or progressive bent or just bringing in. That’s how Fox is popular. That’s how any of these people, you know, they all talk about “Gutfeld’s the most popular,” yet, he’s not popular because he’s a both sides guy. He’s not, you know, a fair use, like, you know, the Fairness Doctrine says, like, he’s relentless. And, you know, after a day of watching Fox News and being bathed in their very purposeful propaganda, it’s a great way to top off the night, but it’s not the Jay Leno, like, “yeah and then you understand why you wanna offend your audience. Why, why not just do a show about, you know, why do you have to talk about things you believe? Why would you, why do you, why do you have to make jokes about things you actually think? And you fucking, I’ll just say, you know, I mean, I’m just gonna go throw myself down a hill and see if I can get a concussion.”
I mean, the whole thing is fucking ridiculous and it’s, it, if you look at the social media profile, all the people that complain about the left-wing bias, they’re all right-wing influencers, they all make their money, their entire economy is based on how willing they are to attack. And defame and to crush liberals. The whole thing is bullshit.
