Jon Stewart Zings the Fourth Estate
KURTZ: Welcome back to RELIABLE SOURCES. We sat down in New York with Jon Stewart, the host of "The Daily Show" on Comedy Central. Stewart and his team of intrepid reporters have been keen observers of the presidential election with the coverage they've dubbed "Indecision 2000." Let's take a look.</s>JON STEWART, HOST, "THE DAILY SHOW,": Now last week's debate in New Hampshire was one of the first times voters had a chance to see how the candidates stacked up against each other. "The Daily Show" was there in force with exclusive team coverage that included brand new custom-made jackets.</s>VANCE DEGENERES, CORRESPONDENT: What will happen tonight? Will it be a well-mannered love-fest or a roll-in-the-mud, knock-down-drag- out slug-fest? One can only hope for low blows galore.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Senator Thompson, given Governor Bush's relative inexperience, how tempted do you think he will be to use one of his lifelines tonight?</s>SEN. FRED THOMPSON (R), TENNESSEE: One of his lifelines?</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Fifty-fifty or call a friend.</s>STEWART: And now the next president of New Hampshire.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I have a foreign affairs question from the millennial edition of "Trivial Pursuit." Who became the hottest pop star to come out of Iceland in the mid-1990s?</s>SEN. JOHN MCCAIN (R), ARIZONA: To come out of Iceland?</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Out of Iceland, that's right. The hottest pop star. Iceland, don't dodge the question. What do you have against Iceland, Senator?</s>KURTZ: And joining us now, Jon Stewart. Welcome.</s>STEWART: Thank you very much. Happy to be here.</s>KURTZ: All right. You make fun of honest, hardworking, public- spirited journalists. And you make a lot of money doing it.</s>STEWART: Yes.</s>KURTZ: Don't you feel a little guilty?</s>STEWART: Yes. Shame is a better word, Howie. I feel shamed by what we have to do to make a living. And I don't sleep well at night. No, I mean, we try and focus where we're going. There are definitely times where we miss the point or throw something out there that is probably crasser than we would like. But for the most part...</s>KURTZ: It's only television. It's cable.</s>STEWART: ... Yeah. For the most part, though, it's also, it's the world of humor, which - you know, I always find it interesting where - because your show, which I watch quite frequently, is always great because it's you and Bernie, and then it's let's say three reporters. And you guys are always bringing up these points about how the world of media is covered and...</s>KURTZ: Ethics. Standards.</s>STEWART: ... ethics and the whole thing. And all the reporters go off. And the final question is always, "So do you think the media really went over the line on that issue?" And they're all -- the conclusion is always this, "No, I thought we did a pretty good job. Yeah, I thought we were good, yeah." You know, it's always that. I think what the problem is actually is that on an individual level they don't realize the aggregate of what it is to the American public that for a particular network's resources it may not be overwhelming. But when you tie it all together, it is.</s>KURTZ: Talking about that aggregate...</s>STEWART: Yeah.</s>KURTZ: ... what is it about the news business, all the many sins? We could spend an hour-and-a-half...</s>STEWART: Right. Right.</s>KURTZ: ... that most ticks you off?</s>STEWART: I've got the time.</s>KURTZ: That gets under your skin? What ticks you off about the news business?</s>STEWART: I think it's that, you know, look, this is just purely from a viewer standpoint. It's that I guess I have in the same way that people get angry about the government not performing up to a higher level. I think there's sort of a level of integrity that we expect from public figures, fair or not, whether it be the news or the government, that maybe isn't being reached because they're functioning like entertainment. It's sort of this weird blending...</s>KURTZ: Odd indictment coming from you.</s>STEWART: ... No, no, no, it's not, because I'm in entertainment...</s>KURTZ: Right. You're unabashed.</s>STEWART: ... But clearly, though, I don't have a higher mandate. My mandate is make it funny. And if it's not funny, no one has to watch it. And...</s>KURTZ: And you're gone.</s>STEWART: ... quite frankly, even when you make it funny, no one really watches it. Sorry. But the...</s>KURTZ: But we wrap ourselves in the 1st Amendment...</s>STEWART: ... That's what I'm saying.</s>KURTZ: ... and then we stick microphones in people's faces.</s>STEWART: You wrap it in the 1st Amendment. I mean, the whole idea of sort of journalism having a higher mandate than just a regular entertainment show, my point is that you function by ratings in the same way that we do. And that's I think what is the crux of the difficulty is that you have - I mean, you've got 24 hours to fill a day, not just you, but Fox, but all these 24-hour news networks. Jerry Lewis, you know, he does that one day a year. And even that by hour 13, they're bringing on a guy who's doing the glasses and making the things. So...</s>KURTZ: So it's this relentless...</s>STEWART: Right.</s>KURTZ: ... vacuum. You can't have dead air, right...</s>STEWART: Right.</s>KURTZ: ... You've got to have something on.</s>STEWART: Can't have dead air, and...</s>KURTZ: You think pushes it more toward the entertainment side of the ledger.</s>STEWART: ... Entertainment, and in some respects, what happens is the bar of responsibility gets lowered. In other words, I mean, the examples just in this past year, right after the Columbine incident, a terrible tragedy, those kids were on TV during a hostage crisis. That's not right-to-know. That's not 1st Amendment. That's endangering the lives of people in a hostage crisis. And it's not responsible to be able to - I remember right after Columbine, I read in the paper - and I don't mean for this to come off in any way as so critical. I have a great respect for a lot of the people that do the stories. But there was an article in the paper about who was first breaking the Columbine story.</s>KURTZ: Right. You beat somebody else by 16 seconds.</s>STEWART: Right. And I just thought, but that wasn't a question...</s>KURTZ: You think it's kind of heartless?</s>STEWART: ... Not only does it seem, it seems like you're forgetting what you're doing. You're forgetting that what you're doing is trying to give people an impartial analysis, an informative version of the day's events. You know, I don't think they should ever take a camera to a tragedy victim's house and say, "How do you feel?" Because you know what, until you're going to get an answer that's not some version of "terrible..."</s>KURTZ: Right.</s>STEWART: ... that's not news. Of course.</s>KURTZ: And it's intrusive, and all those other things.</s>STEWART: And it's intrusive. And it's prurient. And I don't think it's reasonable.</s>KURTZ: How about the great pageant of democracy, the presidential campaign?</s>STEWART: I quite honestly believe that the fishbowl has created fake candidates, that it's now - it's all theater, it's all entertainment, and that they are using focus groups in the same way that my show uses focus groups, and the same way that CNN probably uses focus groups. They're using polls to that same extent. It's a weird melding of the same tools that entertainment follows. But people in the public arena in that sense should have a higher mandate...</s>KURTZ: In the same sense...</s>STEWART: ... than what we use.</s>KURTZ: ... you probably can't get elected president unless you're good on television</s>STEWART: I mean, that started with the Nixon-Kennedy debates. As soon as Nixon started sweating, that was the end of his campaign that year.</s>KURTZ: They looked better on radio. You did an event in New Hampshire where you...</s>STEWART: Right.</s>KURTZ: ... assembled a big panel, and you beat up on the likes of Sam Donaldson, Claire Shipman, Jonathan Alter. I think you had a pretty good time.</s>STEWART: But we had no idea we were going to be beating up on them to that extent.</s>KURTZ: Well, but do you think that journalists are unusually, or some would say pathetically, thin-skinned about having the camera turned and having their conduct on trial?</s>STEWART: I think they're not accustomed to it. And what was interesting to me was as soon as we flipped the tables, they began acting as candidates act, testy to a certain extent, a big evasive, sort of evasive.</s>KURTZ: What do you mean sort of defensive?</s>STEWART: Sort of defensive. Not you. You are a paragon of virtue.</s>KURTZ: Give me some quick takes. Let's run through some names. Larry King.</s>STEWART: Trend-setter. Will be having babies past Anthony Quinn's age, probably until about 140. Pretty soon, his kids, they'll take over. It will be a dynasty. All the young Kings will soon take over.</s>KURTZ: Ted Koppel.</s>STEWART: The man.</s>KURTZ: Yeah?</s>STEWART: Pure and simple.</s>KURTZ: Big fan?</s>STEWART: I'm a huge fan of Koppel's. I really loved the stuff he did this summer with the hour-long specials. But I think he's terrific. And "Nightline" is one of the shows I like the most.</s>KURTZ: "60 Minutes."</s>STEWART: You know, they set the trend for these - unfortunately, they set a trend that "Dateline" and "20/20" have jumped on and somewhat perverted.</s>KURTZ: How's that?</s>STEWART: And that's the difficulty. Because they use scare tactics, where "60 Minutes" not so much. When you turn on "20/20," have you ever seen a promotion for that? "Do you know what's in your laundry room? Could it kill your children? It might."</s>KURTZ: But that's become the game now. They scare people into watching?</s>STEWART: They scare people, scare people into watching. I truly believe that that's what's going on. I don't think maybe it's necessarily cognitive. But that's what it's become. And that's what the shame is, is that it's the question of - this interview with Elian Gonzalez is a great example of just crazy. I mean, you know, what's next...</s>KURTZ: Diane Sawyer on</s>ABC. STEWART: ... a hard-hitting expose of the kid from "Jerry Maguire"? This is a 6-year-old boy. You don't do interviews with 6- year-old boys. And to call it a visit, you know, that's what your aunt does. She visits. She pinches the cheek. This is not - that's not a subject. I think in some respects people are just trying to be first rather than being good.</s>KURTZ: OK.</s>STEWART: And I think that's a real danger.</s>KURTZ: We'll put you down as a critic of ABC and Diane Sawyer...</s>STEWART: No, no, no, but again...</s>KURTZ: ... in that instance. All right.</s>STEWART: ... in that instance, I think the pressure to get ratings has overwhelmed what is a really strong industry of very intelligent people.</s>KURTZ: Bob Dole, star commentator this year on Comedy Central.</s>STEWART: Wonderful man.</s>BOB DOLE, FORMER U.S. SENATOR: I don't want two debates a week, as Al Gore suggested. I mean, nobody would be watching. But...</s>STEWART: I honestly, I would only watch because to me Al Gore is like the Yule log. I mean, he puts me out...</s>STEWART: ... He is so - it's when you have - you know like when you have like a white noise machine...</s>DOLE: Well, not only that, when he gives a fireside chat, the fire goes out, right?</s>STEWART: Exactly.</s>STEWART: He, just wonderfully dry sense of humor. And wonderful dancer. Oops...</s>STEWART: ... No, he's - I've had a wonderful time with him.</s>KURTZ: But you're going for the celebrity, for the big name, to get people to watch your show.</s>STEWART: Absolutely. But here's the difference. I'm a fake journalist.</s>STEWART: We're not actually really reporting on things.</s>KURTZ: We're going to use this tape in the future.</s>STEWART: Yeah, please. Believe me, no, I'm a comedian. And we're on level above strippers on the show business ladder. So believe me, I know my place.</s>KURTZ: Comedy Central's Jon Stewart, host of "The Daily Show," turning his critical lens on us. Up next, reporting from the White House, Leonardo DiCaprio, the furor over his ABC News interview with President Clinton.