the Jon Stewart/Jim Cramer dust-up

The Guardian, in the UK, natch offers a good op ed:


America cheers as satirist delivers knockout blow to TV finance gurus

For the past 10 days the US has been gripped. Even President Obama tuned in as the country's foremost TV comic, Jon Stewart, unleashed an extraordinary broadside against TV's top financial commentators for their part in the unfolding economic crisis.

First came the imperial marching music and a fiery explosion. "You've watched snippets of them for days, or meant to after your friends sent you the link," a voice boomed with mock gravity. "Tonight, the week-long feud of the century comes to a head."

It was a comically absurd drumroll for what, on the surface, was merely a squabble between TV presenters. In one corner, Jim Cramer, the closest thing to a celebrity in American financial journalism. In the opposite corner, Jon Stewart, the satirist and host of the fake news programme The Daily Show on Comedy Central. But unlike many a big fight, this one more than surpassed the hype. Nothing less than financial reporting itself was put on trial " and found severely wanting.

Balance of article:


http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/mar/15/usa-tv-jon-stewart-economy

if cramer is "the closest thing to celebrity" where does that leave larry kudlow ?
larry can certainly outscream cramer anytime of the day .
what a sorry picture the U.S. financial industry presents to the world !
hbg

Cramer gets the highest ratings and appears on more network shows as a guest then Kudlow.

Now if Stewart had done more sarcastic satire toward their style of "financial advise" all along it might have helped but the format of his show attacks major current events -- he's not an investigative reporter.

He only means to make us laugh, but, like I stated, often the best part of his shows are the politicians and political writers that get exposure they don't get anywhere else that makes the show worthwhile. His questions are almost always more pointed and unflinching than any other interviewer on television.

i certainly enjoy jon stewart's wit and barbs .
the best part is really when he lets his guests "sizzle" and lets them expose their weaknesses and contradictions themselves .
that's really much better than attacking them .
hbg

ps i often wonder why politicians and others go on his show , knowing that they'll look their own worst enemies . i guess they think that as long as they get "exposure" - any exposure - that's better than remaining an unknown - and that probably works well in politics .

I wouldn't recognize Kudlow if I saw him.

Cramer is everywhere. I watched Iron Man today and Cramer is even in that!

I don't mind any of that. He's a bright guy, and better at some of his social commentary than his comedy. What I object to is that he attacks people under the guise of moral outrage for ratings.

For example, he went on CNN Crossfire and told the hosts that they were political hacks, and were bad for America. They asked him why he was criticizing them for not being "hardball" enough when he does "softball" interviews himself (when interviewing Kerry in the example) and his retort is that he is comedy and can be entertaining while they have to be serious.

I have a lot of the same qualms as he does, but that's television. Entertainment value cuts away at serious "hard hitting" journalism on television. He made a career out of exactly the same format he criticizes others for, but hides behind labeling, because he is "satire" and "comedy" he excuses his own pandering for entertainment while holding others to a standard he doesn't hold himself to.

So when he criticizes Cramer for using stupid sound effects for entertainment, while he makes stupid faces and fart jokes for entertainment it's hypocritical. That when he attacks others he gets good ratings (his Cramer interview was the second highest ratings he has got) makes it self serving.

I have no qualm with him airing his political opinions, but these are often low blows. He's an entertainer who wants to have it both ways, he wants to be able to seriously criticize the media and also deflect the very same criticisms against him because of his satire format.

If Cramer's stupid sound effects are bad for America, then so are Stewart's stupid rubber faces. If he's going to take people to task for not being serious enough then maybe he should reconsider doing comedy.

I happen to agree with the majority of his political opinions, but he's still a hack doing entertainment, just like Rush Limbaugh. Just because he shares my politics doesn't mean I'm going to forgive his use of politics as a bludgeon to drum up publicity and ratings.

I agree with you here. I like JS (never listen to Rush), but I agree.

roberty wrote :



the difference imo is that people listen to cramer for financial "advice" (the hot tipster) , but when they listen to stewart , they are simply looking for entertainment (and perhaps enjoy a politiciam squirming when he makes a fool of himself) .
hbg

Cramer's show is entertainment too. That's why he screams and yells and uses stupid sound effects. And oddly enough, Stewart took him to task for the entertainment, criticizing him for the theatrics on the show.

And if people are taking stock tips and using it for their personal finances blindly that is a problem, and it's a problem no matter where they are getting their tips. Cramer is not much worse than your average serious professional, despite his stupid antics.

Stewart's criticism is largely to do with style, not substance, and how the show is marketed by the network. And once again, he's not holding himself to his same standard. He lectured Cramer about his show's cheeky "In Cramer we trust" promotion lending Cramer more credence than he deserves, but Stewart is on a similarly inordinate pedestal as well with the whole "voice of this generation" nonsense.

They are both TV entertainers who are taken far more seriously than they deserve, but one makes waves for himself by chiding the others for stooping to entertain and taking himself both too seriously and not seriously enough. Stewart doesn't have more sides of his mouth to talk out of. He's a comedian who soberly dons the mantle of what is good and bad "for America" before hiding behind his satire when it's pointed out that he's guilty of the same superficiality as an entertainer.

robert :

if cramer's show is supposed to be entertainment , he should be appearing on the comedy network - but he isn't - he is appearing on MSNBC .
not many people would be paying any attention to financial news or advice given on the comedy network - they'd just have a good chuckle .

when MSNBC open their stock market reporting for the morning with the slogan :
"from new york - the financial capital of the world" , "ordinary" americans assume that they are getting it straight from the horse's mouth and not from the horse's "other end " .

perhaps MSNBC could be sued for misleading adverising , because there is now some doubt that new york is still "the financial capital of the world" .

i have not watched cramer often and never taken him seriously , but i can understand that some people who have no financial knowledge have paid at least some attention to him .

when i listen to "car talk" and similar programs , i sometimes do pay attention to them since all i now about an automobile is how to drive it .
so i do appreciate some of the advice given . i would not think that they are trying to scam me .

take care - i do enjoy these exchanges of various opinions greatly - even at my age i keep learning new things - though i may have trouble remembering where i put my car keys (often they are already in my coat pocket while i hunt for them all over the house) !
hbg

I agree hamburger! Besides, Cramer has a large following otherwise one would
not see the fluctuation of individual stocks after Cramers yay or ney. He's
downplayed perfectly good, financially healthy stocks only to retract his statement two weeks later where promptly the stock went up again.

Saying that he's a pure entertainer and he's got no take on the stock market
is simply not true, he is part of the manipulation process.

Talking all around the meat of the thread aren't we? Hedge funds and direct market manipulation, I believe, were the key issues discussed on the program. Somehow we got switched to the morality and /or ulterior motives of the two debaters. Both presented what I felt were cogent arguments, more so by Jon Stewart.
Be that as it may the discussion was not relevant to morality as much as it was to questionable market practices.
The faint odor of red herring lingers.

There's no way Jon Stewart will drop the stand-up punch line comic tradition and punctuating it with his grab bag of expressions. If he was habitually taking a dead serious hit at other media such as CNN or CNBC, I would wonder what happened to the "give 'em enough rope" approach. However, he seldom does and obviously this has been a pet peeve like the Crossfire mob who invited him on and all the pie-in-the-sky financial advice given, it seems, our of a crystal ball. BTW, Crossfire is gone, so it doesn't look like CNN had much use for them either. Does he do this for ratings? He's already trounced the cable ratings, mainly because the only show on network TV who has competed is Saturday Night Live with the Weekend Update, their recent specials and, of course, the opening of the show with Tina Fey's incredible take-off of Sarah Palin.

Jon Stewart is seldom personally angry about a particular group or individual taking most of the political news as the same foibles and follies it always has been, but I think he was personally angry with the Crossfire group and Jim Cramer. It showed. Was it for ratings? I don't believe that.
He's not hurting for ratings. He doesn't bother to hid his political bent.

The last half of the show when a learned and respected writer is on, Stewart becomes more serious, has actually read the book, gives a concise review within the time frame, and Amazon.com has devoted a whole section of controversial books (and DVD's) derived from the show:

http://www.amazon.com/Books-Authors-Daily-Show/lm/R31VP29I9YV3WQ

That Jim Cramer was vehemently denying everything Stewart was throwing at him and then gets on the show and becomes a doormat is astounding.

i'm not expecting any discussion about morality on either MSNBC or the comedy network

for moralty i may have to choose VISION TV - which i only watch for old british TV comedies - some of which are quite raunchy <GRIN> . i'm at times surprised that VISION TV brings those shows - not for the advertising revenue , i would hope !!!
hbg

Of course, I forgot "The Colbert Report" as far as Stewart's competition but that's a spin-off of The Daily Show and Steve Colbert is a very close friend of Stewart. It's all an hour show of satirical comedy with politicians the main target. It's an easy target.

Stewart, Colbert and other cable shows who basicially thumb their nose at the establishment effectively cut-off at least 70% of advertisers. Bill Maher is on HBO and doesn't worry about advertisers. ABC didn't fire Bill from Politically Incorrect, the advertisers did.

I personally don't think there's any form of guarantee that any network or any outlet of any sort will not carry entertainment. People have to recognize it for themselves. In show business there is going to be compromise for entertainment value no matter what the network.



Like I said earlier, it doesn't matter where they are hearing the advice, they need to vet it themselves.



And what exactly would make the show trustworthy to you? Cramer's track record is not much different than a "serious" pro's advice might be off by.

When he makes stupid sound effects, how does this make a difference in what his advice is?



If we are getting this nit-picky then Stewart's show shouldn't bill itself as news. Some undiscerning fool might not get the joke.



That is the problem then, not Cramer. With or without Cramer that kind of person is screwed. Financial advice is inherently very risky business. Anyone giving any kind of financial advice in any kind of format can cause the undiscerning investor to lose money.

So when the market is down across the board, it's very easy to pick on financial advisers. Even Stewart admits that his qualm really isn't with Cramer but the whole financial industry, but that Cramer was just the "face" of it that he unfortunately picked.

Well that particular misfortune was not accidental, Stewart has a range of more worthy targets but they aren't on television and as visible so he went after what would give him television ratings: a fellow TV entertainer.



And here's the rub, Stewart did not demonstrate that Cramer is scamming people on his show. He merely took issue with one single tip that Cramer got spectacularly wrong (and anyone doing hours and hours of predictions a day will get something wrong) and then took issue with style like the silly sound effects he uses (if anything the theatrics should stay, it's the most visible disclaimer on the show that it's entertainment).

If his qualms were really substance-based it'd be a horse of a different color. But Cramer was just an easy and visible target, and part of my objection is that Stewart's decision to make him the scapegoat for the general anger at the financial community is decidedly unfair.



Likewise to you sir.

I must have missed something -- where did Stewart claim Cramer (I can't help thinking of Seinfeld) was "scamming" people (meaning he made any money off their failed investments)? Stewart had time for only one example (I'm sure he could come up with more, as he has, in fact done in the past several months) but was criticizing the entire media for laying off the "financial wizards" just like they laid off the "war wizards." He's done his part with the taking some seriously damaging pot shots at the war wizards but I agree he did not take enough shots at the financial wizards. He certainly made up for it while admitting he was also taken in by those selling a glass half empty as a glass half full.

RG - I've been thinking about your beef with Jon Stewart. I've decided I'm perfectly fine with him attacking other media personalities. Wasn't the whole point of the daily show to lampoon news and politics? Isn't the show's success based on the fact that people enjoy exactly that? So when there is nobody willing to humble themselves after making some gross mistake or lack of journalistic/political duty, I think people want them to wear a little egg on their face.

I'd go as far to say that the more Stewart does this, the better he is doing his job. Bait or not, I think it's fairplay. CNBC needs to share some same and loss of face IMO.

T
K
O

At the very outset of the STEwart show was a graphic with this deep voiced announcer person stating that"Tonight, we will have your attention for the requisite amount of time that will translate into yet more profitable commercial rates"

It isnt that the typical DS viewer isnt familiar with the way that basic cable works its business.
I think that, absent a good product that the DS presents us, they wouldnt recieve the sponsorships and Emmies that they do.

Im thinking that this interview could be eligible for a PULLITZER.