Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Reality always gets a vote in the end.

Democracy cannot function without a free press.

Balloon Juice, where there is always someone who will say you’re doing it wrong.

A sufficient plurality of insane, greedy people can tank any democratic system ever devised, apparently.

Trump’s cabinet: like a magic 8 ball that only gives wrong answers.

One way or another, he’s a liar.

Find someone who loves you the way trump and maga love traitors.

The “burn-it-down” people are good with that until they become part of the kindling.

Hi god, it’s us. Thanks a heap, you’re having a great week and it’s only Thursday!

I desperately hope that, yet again, i am wrong.

The cruelty is the point; the law be damned.

Many life forms that would benefit from greater intelligence, sadly, do not have it.

Michigan is a great lesson for Dems everywhere: when you have power…use it!

I swear, each month of 2025 will have its own history degree.

Never entrust democracy to any process that requires Republicans to act in good faith.

A democracy can’t function when people can’t distinguish facts from lies.

But frankly mr. cole, I’ll be happier when you get back to telling us to go fuck ourselves.

“Perhaps I should have considered other options.” (head-desk)

Celebrate the fucking wins.

Some judge needs to shut this circus down soon.

In my day, never was longer.

I really should read my own blog.

Only Democrats have agency, apparently.

Do not shrug your shoulders and accept the normalization of untruths.

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Reader Interactions

65Comments

  3. 3.

    BDeevDad

    Love the quote captured on screen:

    If you need a goat f**ked, CNN will do it.
    – John Oliver

  4. 4.

    EdTheRed

    Honestly, “We’re gonna have to leave it there” is Lexicon worthy. Too.

    As in: Abruptly and prematurely ending discussion following the utterance of an obviously and demonstrably false statement, thereby conferring legitimacy upon said statement. Typically followed by a commercial break and/or inane high school yearbook-level human interest story.

    E.g.:
    Orly “ORLY” Taitz: “It iz clear, this man, this Barack Hussein Obama, is a Kenyan! He’s a Muslim!”
    CNN “Journalist”: “And we’re all out of time, so we’re just going to have to leave it there. Thanks so much for your time, Orly Taitz, DDS, Esq. Stay tuned, we’ll be right back with some hot new youtube footage of Miley Cyrus breaking up with Twitter.”

  6. 6.

    GambitRF

    If they took the time to correct falsehoods on the air, how would they have time to show random people’s twitters and cell phone pictures of hurricanes?

  7. 7.

    Chief

    Stewart was absolutely on fire last night. Just a stinging rebuke of everything CNN has been doing for the last decade.

    Fact-checking an SNL sketch, but not their own interviewees . . . you don’t get much lower than that.

  8. 8.

    dmsilev

    @JenJen: At roughly 3 o’clock this morning, she’ll wake up to find a severed horse’s head in her bed.

    Or, since she’s from Maine, maybe it’ll be a single lobster claw.

    -dms

  9. 9.

    joes527

    Not to worry.

    I’m sure that the CNN fact checking department has moved on from SNL and is now focussing on Comedy Central.

  11. 11.

    dmsilev

    How soon until CNN runs their new special, “Generalissimo Francisco Franco: Is he still dead? CNN Investigates.”?

    -dms

  14. 14.

    slag

    Depressing.

    I don’t know. I find it empowering to see these concerns and frustrations discussed on The Daily Show. Just knowing that somebody somewhere (especially somebody with an–admittedly too small–audience) thinks the same stuff I think is a rare sanity touchstone. I, for one, will take what I can get and be happy for it.

  15. 15.

    Kryptik

    You know, CNN, when people try to leave the rhetorical equivalent of a flaming bag of dog shit on your front stoop, you usually don’t just ‘leave it there’.

  16. 16.

    valdivia

    Totally OT but have you guys seen McMegan’s latest post on health reform? She posted that *today* of all days? What an idiot.

  18. 18.

    scav

    @aimai: Obvious – they’ll manage to convene a panel consisting of the leftist historian who will mention that not only is there a tomb but he was born in 1892 and would be getting on a bit and then they’ll showcase the guy who insists he saw Franco with Elvis eating fries at a gas station in Reno. And we’re out of time.

  19. 19.

    Kryptik

    @aimai:

    Investigate? What’s that?

    What’s wrong with letting someone claim that Obama is really the zombified corpse of Franco and that we know this because we never see Obama and Franco in the same place? What’s wrong with just ‘leaving it there’?

    Seriously…I think ‘leaving it there’ is almost worse than ‘fair and balanced’, because you don’t actually have to have the ‘other side of the story’ to legitimize something batshit crazy.

  20. 20.

    matoko_chan

    CNN is interested in sales, not truth.
    They need gladitorial controversey, so GOP whackadoodle memes have to get equal time.
    capitalisma si!

  21. 21.

    thomas

    I watched that last night and thought, “More proof that if you want to get the news you don’t watch the news.”
    Stewart et al were great.

  24. 24.

    Ash Can

    @Demo Woman: I’m not too sure. This is, after all, the party that continues to alienate voters one minority group after another, and that claimed after losing seats in 2006 that it did so because it wasn’t loony conservative enough. In other words, they’ve sacrificed numbers for ideological purity before; there’s no reason to think they’ll change now.

  25. 25.

    asiangrrlMN

    I’m still snickering. “Leave it there.” “Leave it there.” “Leave it there.”

    Jon: Leave it WHERE?????? I don’t even know where the fuck there is any more!*

    *OK, I paraphrased. Sue me.

  30. 30.

    Leelee for Obama

    @Ash Can: May the FSM answer that prayer! I’d volunteer to count their dwindling votes just for shits and giggles.

    I wonder how fast the Public Option will be accepted as Holy Writ after that PWC report was shown to be entirely full of shit. You’d think they’d have at least TRIED to look professional-it’s like they phoned it in while they were running to the bank to cash the check, before AHIP stopped payment!

  31. 31.

    Legalize

    I wonder if the latest Hitler / Obama comparison is a hilarious send up of the “Downfall” bit where Hitler hilariously gets upset about Obama’s health care plan or something. Only not hilarious. And really stupid.

  32. 32.

    General Winfield Stuck

    If it weren’t for bad news, It seems we’d have no news at all.
    At least Stewart delivers it with a chuckle.

    More depressing, but maybe educational, is the Frontline season premiere tonight on “Obama’s War” in Afghanistan.

  34. 34.

    slag

    @Legalize:

    Next on CNN: Land sharks posing as UNICEF employees, an epidemic.

    That would actually be an improvement over their coverage of census employees, I understand.

  40. 40.

    Comrade Dread

    I’ve become convinced that a combination of the death of old people and teh Google is actually the only thing that can save us now.

    And I think you’re giving journalists too much credit if you think they’ll bother Googling any statements that get passed on to them from someone in power.

  41. 41.

    Strawmanmunny

    @slag:

    True. It’s nice to know that at least I’m not alone out on an island somewhere.

    It’s like bizarro world everyday. Not so much depressing as just endlessly frustrating.

  42. 42.

    SenyorDave

    I have notcied that John King NEVER follows up on supposed “statements of fact” by guests such as Kyl. The $100 billion + from tort reform that “everyone agrees” on is absurd, unless it is over a period of 100 years.

    I used to work in insurance, and tort reform was always considered a joke. Sure it will lower the expected losses, but the idea that the expected savings would be passed on linearly to the public. That’s a complete joke, each group would pocket a piece of the savings.

    The doctors in Texas made off pretty well from tort reform, lower insurance costs, no perceptible rduction in fees.

    The bottom line is that tort reform is reducing your legal options, it affects your right to seek redress. Anytime you are doing that, you should be very sure of the outcome, becasue it probably will not end up being what you thought it would be.

  44. 44.

    Comrade Kevin

    To the GOP, “tort reform” has absolutely nothing to do with saving money or fixing any alleged problems with out legal system. It is all about attacking trial lawyers, a group they think is some monolith of Democrats.

  46. 46.

    Leelee for Obama

    @Comrade Kevin: The fact that Mel Martinez, their wondrous choice for my State to be Senator, was a trial lawyer never failed to make me stare at them like bugs under a microscope. He made a fortune before he went into politics officially. IOKIYAR. What’s the word I’m looking for? Oh, yeah, hypocrites.

  47. 47.

    Redshirt

    I’m convinced most Repugs these days don’t even know what “Tort reform” means. Instead, they pick up certain phrases from their daily talking points, and repeat them with no understanding of the content. As long as Obama ain’t fer it, they can’t get behind it, whatever it is.

    UPORDOWNVOTE!

  48. 48.

    slag

    @Strawmanmunny: That moment when Jon Stewart clenches his fists and tears up that piece of paper in stymied irritation. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve done that very thing for that very reason. Getting rid of all my teevee channels was the fastest way to a better night’s sleep that I’ve ever encountered. [shakes fist at cloud]

    It looks like Matt Yglesias has reached relatively similar conclusions.

  49. 49.

    Demo Woman

    Well the health care bill passed out of the Senate. This is a small step but hopefully soon we can all be Red Kittens and have quality, affordable health care.

  51. 51.

    JK

    Last Week, it was David Letterman’s kick-ass monologue and now this brilliant takedown of the Clown News Network. As our politics and media get increasingly worse, the comedy gets better. We’re going to hell in a bucket, but at least I’m enjoying the ride thanks to Letterman, Stewart, Colbert, Maher, et. al.

    At this very moment, CNN’s crackerjack staff led by Tom Foreman and Christine Romans is preparing a point by point refutation of Jon Stewart’s hitjob.

    We’ll Have To Leave It There is the perfect title for a companion book to Stewart’s epic evisceration of CNN.

  52. 52.

    Redshirt

    Kill yer TV, at least the news channels.

    I stopped watching all news shows except for the morning news, and then I only want the weather and traffic (disappointed to see this morning while waiting for the traffic, they briefly covered the health care bill, and had the AHIP Evil Lady on, whomever she is.

    I get all the news I need from blogs, google news, The Economist, and that’s about it. Much less stressful.

  53. 53.

    beabea

    I have been feeling better since I made the decision about a month ago, to no longer watch CNN. I simply no longer allow it into my home.

    Now, seeing the constant steady drip of bullshit, banality, and corporate-mandated journalistic malpractice that is CNN, concentrated by Jon Stewart into one powerful 11-minute dose, it makes total sense why I would feel better.

    Just as one would necessarily feel better after giving up drinking out of one’s toilet bowl.

  54. 54.

    Sue

    I’m better informed after a half-hour of Jon Stewart than a day of CNN. Once I’ve checked out Rachel Maddow for a few minutes, I’ve got it all covered.

  55. 55.

    Martin

    This is a small step but hopefully soon we can all be Red Kittens and have quality, affordable health care.

    You do realize that she got knocked up in 2002. She’d been on a list all this time waiting for an open room in L&D.

  56. 56.

    Chi-city

    Love the comparison of the Gay Rally on Washington D.C. v. the Tea Baggers Rally. There was no number count, no big media coverage but the Tea Baggers get outrageous coverage. Classic.

  58. 58.

    Malron

    In a related story: right now on MSNBC Tamron Hall and David Shuster are doing teases to a segment asking “is Barack Obama’s indecisiveness (on Afghanistan, gay rights and health care reform) making him ineffective as a leader?

    One of the sources they cite as critical of Obama’s approach to governing: Jon Stewart.

    Face.
    Fucking.
    Palm.

  59. 59.

    toujoursdan

    Just C-Span.

    I have satellite TV from Canada and there was much more coverage on the CBC news channel Newsworld and French Canadian news channel Reseau de I’information, than there was on the American cable stations.

    Both networks ran it as their top news story and featured interviews from activists at the rally.

  63. 63.

    colleeniem

    @BillCinSD: It’s funny you say that, because I heard Steve Inskeep on “commie-pinko” NPR use the SNL sketch as a framing point when discussing the reaction to the Nobel Peace Prize.
    No foolin’.

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