TODAY'S LETTERS: Readers Respond to Jon Stewart/Chris Matthews Interview

By: E&P Staff Readers wrote in today about a column that E&P editor-in-chief Greg Mitchell wrote about the 'Daily Show' interview of Chris Matthews.

Jon Stewart Dismantles Chris Matthews
Heaven knows that Chris Matthews - follower of a fairly ordinary career path (Democratic aide, MSM journalist, television talking head) deserved some ridicule at the hands of John Stewart.

But Stewart blew it by invoking 'fascism', which was ridiculous, and put himself in the category of talking head he supposedly deplores. 'Fascism' has become a term without any meaning other than 'someone I dislike or with whom I disagree about politics'. It is always impending in America, at least for rhetorical purposes, to a certain sort of mentality, but actually seems to only strike in Europe, oddly enough.

Since you have had occasion to ridicule media people whom you accuse of the promiscuous use of the term 'communist', I'm sure you are ready to acknowledge - after a lifetime of hearing the term overused and therefore trivialized - that we need to retire the mindless use of the term 'fascist', too.


Mark Richard
Columbus, Ohio


Your editorial was right on the money.

Stewart was able to expose everything that is wrong with current media and politics just by not going along.

I don't think it's an exagerration that many have been waiting a decade for this.

Hopefully other media personalities will take the lead of Stewart and Jack Cafferty.

Luis P. Reyes
Los Angeles, CA


I am a huge fan of Jon Stewart, and Stephen Colbert as well.

What I saw on Tuesday night's Daily Show was first, an unfunny, hit-piece spoof-skit of a Matthew's-style show, and then an ambush interview. The skit was unfunny because it was not true. Good comedy is based on truth, and that skit was a video lie, and not representative, even in a comedic way of what Matthews does in his TV work. And it certainly wasn't representative of the comedic work the Daily Show does because it sucked comedy-wise.

Afterwards was the interview where Jon's point seemed to be that it's impossible to use practices from politics to successful and good ends in public life, and that Chris was some slimy jerk for writing that it was. Jon is, in a word, wrong. Jimmy Carter has done it with Habitat for Humanity and Bill Clinton has done it with the Clinton Global Initiative.

If watching lies and an ambush interview is your thing, and apparently it is, you enjoyed it. If you think it's unfair, you didn't.

I'm sure most Jon Stewart fans loved it, because they are shallow and undiscerning. And I'll keep watching Jon and Stephen, because they are usually honest and when they are---they are funny. Consistently funny Hilarious really, the best on television. But at being honest and funny, Jon Stewart failed on both levels Tuesday night.

I think Jon has a chip on his shoulder carried over from his Crossfire interview, and he has dumped all political talk show hosts into the same "You're hurting America" category. Other words for dumping people into the same category and judging them negatively are 'bigotry' and 'predjudice.'


Patrick Gorse


I read this like I would a thriller. With shallow breathing, short sips of wine and quick clicks on the down arrow.

You write well - you tell your story, unadorned, with simple art in every sentence - Japanese almost.

Thanks for making the Herculean seem effortless.


Arthur Decco