While many are singing Jon Stewart’s praises as his 16-year tenure hosting “The Daily Show” comes to an end, others are happy to see him go.
“Goodbye Jon Stewart’s ‘Daily Show.’ Good riddance,” wrote Karol Markowicz in a scathing Time op-ed on Thursday.
In the piece, Markowicz writes that as the host of “The Daily Show,” Stewart made his viewers “dumber.” His liberal leanings obliged him to go softer on Democrats and the Obama administration, all while being showered with praise for “eviscerating” and “annihilating” conservatives, she argues.
“Under Stewart, ‘The Daily Show’ became must-see TV for a segment of the population who considers the mocking of political opponents and their positions to be appropriate discourse, and worse — an acceptable method of news-intake,” Markowicz wrote.
She cites a Politico report that revealed Stewart would secretly visit the White House to receive advisement before reporting on political stories as evidence that he is the same kind of “partisan hack” that he was so quick to mock.
“When your writers are taking tips on how to joke about politics from the White House, it’s safe to say it doesn’t matter that your show is on Comedy Central,” she wrote. “It’s a bad sign for the country that any percentage of people got their news from this compromised comedian.”
Stewart himself joked about the report in a segment on Wednesday’s episode called “The Daily Show: Destroyer of the World.”
After bragging about news stories that have characterized him as “shredding” and “destroying” entities such as ISIS, Fox News and Wall Street, he came to the realization that all of his targets are still going strong. “What the fuck is going on here? The world is demonstrably worse than when I started. Have I caused this? Have my efforts all been for naught?” he said.
Stewart’s final episode of “The Daily Show” airs on Comedy Central Aug. 6 at 11 p.m. Trevor Noah will take over as host on Sept. 28.