Working in TV news, I would pitch stories about how people were dying in prison
because of COVID and, like, you know, racist AI.
You see what they say no to, and you see what they say yes to and why.
Here's the thing. No one ever wants to be a journalist because of ratings.
Ultimately, the reporters, the producers, the researchers--
They are 100% doing that from a space of, like,
there's truth that needs to be uncovered here.
But success is defined as ratings.
And it's like Nielsen ratings, which are--
There's less than 50,000 Nielsen families representing the entire US.
It literally makes me think. I'm like,
"Am I representing what Iranian Muslims watch?" Like, it doesn't…
Are you a Nielsen family?
We were once. Like, no joke, when I was, like, 13.
You'd fill it out.
Like, you'd be like, "Uh-huh, we watched this."
And, like, the thing is, it's like anything else,
like any kind of homework.
At some point, you're like, "Oh, shit, we forgot to fill-- I don't know.
Just say I watched Seinfeld. I don't fucking know."
[Stewart] Right. So, to tie it up,
- the shitty model of news that we are fed… - [Reza] Yes.
…is based on an antiquated system that is not reflective of who's watching it.
- That's the strange thing. - [Chelsea] Yes.
It was my family doing it for, like, seven bucks a month or whatever.
Can I tell you something? And I appreciate this.
That your Muslim family just wrote in Seinfeld.
- [laughing] - Because…
I can't tell you how much that elevated my people.
[all laughing]
[audience cheering, applauding]
Boom!
[grunts]
Hey, everybody.
[cheering, applauding continues]
Thank you very much. Nice to see everybody.
Thank you so much for joining us. My name is Jon Stewart.
I gotta tell you something. [stammering] I am so glad
that you are joining us tonight, of all the shows.
You know I have great respect for each of the, uh--
I think it's, like, four shows that we've done. [chuckles]
[audience chuckles]
We've done, like, four of them,
like I'm an Etsy store of shows.
I'm knitting each one myself.
I love them all. They're all gems.
[scattered laughter]
Don't patronize me.
But tonight, we're talking about…
the news media and--
- [audience booing] - Yeah!
Yeah.
It is for me my bête noire, my white whale, the pea under my mattress.
I'm very bothered by it.
Now, generally our news media has been collected
into two major categories, for the most part.
You got your-- your what they call the mainstream, liberal, corporate media.
Mm-hmm?
And then you got your right-wing, also mainstream, corporate media.
I'm gonna leave Facebook and TikTok for another day.
One side of this media equation believes
they are the purveyors of truth and justice.
The guardians of our democratic republic.
The other side is effective.
[audience laughs]
Now, we're not gonna talk about right-wing media for this whole program.
We're just gonna show you how fucking good they are at accomplishing their goals.
Let's start with our story, uh, uh,
and begin with a gentleman named Christopher Rufo.
Rufo wanted to make critical race theory into a political winner for Republicans.
This was his stated goal.
[chuckling, muttering]
It's not so easy. [laughs]
I'm kidding. Have a look.
It's absolutely astonishing how critical race theory has pervaded
every institution in the federal government.
And I call on the president to immediately issue this executive order
and stamp out this destructive, divisive, pseudoscientific ideology at its root.
The fucking guy-- "I-I call on the president."
Who the fuck-- Let me tell you something. He's the president of the United States.
Christopher Rufo, he goes on, uh, that other idiot's show on September 1st
and calls on the president.
Well, guess what?
His words echoed impotently,
all the way to September 17th.
Students in our universities are inundated with critical race theory.
This is a Marxist doctrine holding that America is a wicked and racist nation.
[audience groaning]
Aren't cult leaders supposed to be charismatic?
[audience laughs]
That's the weirdest delivery.
[audience cheering, applauding]
[mumbling] This is, uh-- This is…
This is Kool-Aid…
fruity and delicious.
You should drink it.
Not around walls because…
Giant pitcher.
Fucking 16 days from the time that guy went on Fox News and said,
"I call on the president to do something about critical race theory,"
to when the president did something about critical race--
Now, of course, you can't always rely on a president binge-watching your show
and writing down whatever you tell him to do.
So, in this new age of Biden, right-wing media had to work a little harder
on their bespoke harm-to-table critical race theory nonsense.
Kids across America are being force-fed the critical race theory poison.
You have to get organized.
Turn around and say, "I don't want Marxists--
I don't want communists teaching my kid."
Complain vocally, loudly.
[protestors chanting] Shame on you!
So you're the racist.
This is an unlawful arrest! I have a First Amendment right--
Parents have had it, Jack.
I don't really think I've seen something spur up with so much passion
out of the grassroots.
It's not grassroots. You fucking started it.
You lit the fire, and then, as it was warmed up,
were like, "I've never seen a fire like this. This is a--"
It's like when a dog vomits on a carpet
and then eats it…
and looks at you like…
[audience chuckles]
Can I get a treat for cleaning that up?
No!
You made the mess in the first place.
Suddenly we're banning CRT, we're restricting race teaching,
we're banning books.
And Florida has legislation to make it illegal
for a white person to feel uncomfortable.
In Florida.
[audience laughs]
Good luck arresting humidity.
[audience laughing]
My balls are sticking to my leg.
Officer!
Remove-- All right.
That would be such a bad call to get over the radio.
Yeah, we got a sticky ball situation down in, uh…
in Ocala.
The right-wing media,
working seamlessly with their political arm,
made that happen.
Well, you know, Brian,
we were the only channel that covered critical race theory,
and that became a big issue.
[guffaws]
[imitating buffoon] Uh, sure did.
[normal] But that's how fucking good these guys are. That's how good that--
And if you're gonna battle this coordinated effort,
political and media together,
we're gonna need a hero.
A hero brave enough to heed the call of a society in grave danger
of succumbing to CRT panic and "Let's go, Brandon" memes.
Who's that hero?
There is no democracy without journalism.
Our job is to speak truth to power.
Our job is to shine a light in dark corners, to hold the powerful to account.
[Tom Hanks] Because knowing empowers us.
Knowing helps us decide.
Knowing keeps us free.
[audience chuckling]
[audience laughing, applauding]
I mean, seriously.
But in an age of weaponized mis- and disinformation,
secrecy and political polarization,
the one group that stands at the ready to shine light into that darkness
so that the good ship America
needn't stub its toe on the post-midnight snack of fascism--
I'm mixing metaphors.
But the point is this.
The fourth estate has claimed that they stand ready twixt America and peril.
A bulwark to creeping fascism.
Our media, they are the watchers on the wall.
No, that's the wrong-- Okay, that's--
That's the wrong watcher and the wrong wall.
That's the wall. That's the watcher.
Yes.
Thank you. "To the ramparts, heroes!"
[shouting] Three, two, one!
[cheering] Happy New Year!
[cheering]
[audience laughing]
Well, America, it's been a pleasure.
We're fucked.
Because unfortunately,
if they are the one thing that stands between America and chaos,
we are in trouble.
Because rarely has there been an institution that has such a distance
between its aspirations and its execution.
And thus,
"The Problem with the Media."
The media keeps informing us
how incredibly important they are to our survival.
Because knowing keeps us free.
But when given crucial informational tasks,
they instead build us prisons of,
"What the fuck are you people talking about?"
For instance, a few years back,
there was concern that the president of these United States
may have outsourced our electoral integrity to a foreign power…
not of the allied persuasion.
And had fired his top cop
rather than risk the subterfuge being exposed.
Journey back with me to 20 aught 17.
[imitating flashback music]
Nothing? We don't have any of the-- All right.
The Department of Justice reveals that they will appoint a special counsel
to now oversee the FBI investigation into Russian meddling
and any possible collusion.
Former FBI director Robert Mueller will now lead the investigation.
[mutters]
Well done.
You told us what was occurring,
you gave it a tonal gravity that I thought was appropriate,
and it was delivered with just the right soupçon of handsome.
It-- It was a very handsome delivery.
So, what happens now?
One, a special counsel truly works in secret.
And if any special counsel is gonna obey that rule,
it's a guy like Bob Mueller.
Virtually everything that happens with the special counsel
happens behind closed doors.
The special counsel investigation, of course, is secretive.
Robert Mueller does not leak.
Mueller runs a very tight ship.
Once again, I--
I'm sorry. I congratulate you. Well done.
The special counsel works in secret. That's factual.
Bob Mueller is tight-lipped. That's slightly subjective, but still.
This segment leaves our democracy's pulse oximeter at a healthy 97, 98.
Bobby Mueller.
"Bobby Three Sticks," as agents called him.
- [reporter] Why'd they call him that? - Robert Swan Mueller III.
[audience chuckles]
And slowly, the oxygen drops.
And thus began the turn to darkness.
Let the overplaying of the media's hand commence.
If you do have something to hide,
Mueller is probably the last person you would want to be investigating you.
Bob Mueller is gonna investigate this aggressively,
and if there's any wrongdoing, he's gonna find it.
Director Mueller, uh, is gonna get to the bottom of it.
He will find it.
If you have a kid and you despair that there's not a hero in America,
wake up bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. Robert Mueller's it.
The republic just got a chance of saving itself.
We're not on fucking Tatooine.
[audience laughs]
We're not looking for a child of prophecy.
We need a competent prosecutor working diligently to find the facts.
And we don't need you narrating and overblowing
and elevating the stakes of every moment.
This is Watergate.
Watergate, basically.
The peril to the president is just as great.
Is this bigger than Watergate?
In some ways, this could be worse than Watergate.
Well, you know, Bernstein, certainly the coverage of it will be.
[grumbles]
Even though it was already explained very clearly…
"The special counsel operates in secret."
"Bob Mueller plays it close to the vest."
It did not stop the public from being dead center in the information blast zone.
[reporter] A bombshell from Robert Mueller.
This is not some Friday night news dump.
This is a Friday night explosion.
Bombshell after bombshell.
…latest bombshell in an arsenal of bombshells…
[reporter] Robert Mueller's twin bombshells.
[all] Bombshell. Bombshell. Bombshell.
…a potentially huge bombshell…
…bombshell from The New York Times.
The paper of record is reporting
special counsel Robert Mueller has dozens of questions for President Trump.
Bombshell, bombshell.
Detective has questions. Bombshell. Hungry people like food. Bombshell.
I also have a question.
Do you think we are fucking stupid?
That's the responsible, measured way they handled something they actually knew.
Then it started getting weird.
Folks, this could be a game changer if this report is true.
On one to ten, how big are these developments? If, in your view, true.
No one should underestimate how big this is if it's true.
[reporter] Really big deal if true.
If true, is it a big deal? What else does it speak of?
If it is true, it would appear to be significant evidence of collusion.
If true--
If the report is proven true-- We have not confirmed it.
No other major news organization has confirmed it.
But if it's true, what does it mean, big picture, for the Trump presidency?
Well, the Trump presidency would be over.
Is there a multiplier you use
that, uh, X times what we know equals what you imagine Mueller knows?
Yes, yes, there is. There--
I know this equation.
It's the thing when you make your calculator spell "boobies."
[audience laughing, applauding]
You press it in, you press the thing, and then you turn it over.
And you show your friends it says "boobies."
There were so many "if trues" in there, it was like a high-stakes tarot reading.
But you know what?
It's not like any other important news happened in 2019.
That's why they had the resources to do things like this.
The CNN stakeout team says they haven't seen Mueller leave for lunch today.
He usually does.
My God, no lunch.
Could he have packed a sammie from home?
[audience chuckles]
But, ultimately, after two years of speculation and innuendo
and flat-out bullshit, they were sure of one thing.
If you're Donald Trump, the news does not appear to be good.
"The walls are closing in" might be a better way to put it.
…walls closing in on him.
- Walls are closing in-- - The walls closing in--
- …closer and closer… - …closer and closer…
…closer and closer to the president.
It does appear like we're getting closer. Closer to the top.
That actually didn't appear like they were getting closer. That last one.
It seemed like there was a big gap that he could get out.
It looked like he could get out the top on that one.
The other ones, I thought yes.
And the news media promised,
promised that it was gonna be a finale to remember.
Now there is talk of indicting the president.
Now there is talk of jail time for the president.
This is going to be earth-shattering.
There is just no way that this is not going to be
one of the most significant events in the history of the United States.
If anybody from the Trump family, extended family, is going to be indicted,
it would be in the final act.
- The noose is tightening. - They are--
And that people might go to jail.
- You're exactly right. Th-- - For the rest of their lives.
If true.
And then, after two years of just edging themselves to a Mueller climax…
[scattered laughter]
[audience laughing]
Interesting audience of fetishists we have in here.
[audience laughs]
That's kind of a bombshell in and of itself.
There's a lot of-- lot of knowing edging joke people in here.
The-- [laughs]
[audience laughs]
Dirty, dirty motherfuckers.
[audience applauding]
You know, you can't…
When they're wearing masks, you can't really tell.
It's like the opposite of Eyes Wide Shut. It's just--
I don't even know what we're talking about anymore.
Yes.
Getting back to our subject at hand.
After two years of edging themselves to a Mueller climax…
[audience laughing]
…the day finally arrived.
CNN's special coverage of the release of the Mueller report
begins tomorrow morning, 6:00 a.m.
Ticktock, ticktock. We should have a Mueller clock down there.
- Right. - We're just about two hours away--
[reporter] This is people waiting for the report.
It is 11:05 a.m.
The attorney general said that at 11:00 a.m. eastern time
this report would be handed, uh, to Congress.
Melber, do you have it?
It-- It is up. Uh, is it online?
- And it's been posted. It is online. - Okay.
[audience laughs]
You can go to www.justice.gov
and I think it's, uh, /storage/report.pdf.
Be ready, uh, in terms of toner and paper.
We have to print it ourselves?
NBC doesn't have a Kinko's? Is that what you're telling me?
You finally have real breaking news, and I have to get it myself?
I'm gonna read it live here with you.
Kind sir, I beg of you, no.
What I'm reading here is the beginning of the treatment of this.
And we're gonna go as we go live today, Brian.
Uh, but Bob Mueller defining, in order--
On page 76 of volume two, uh, Mueller offers a theory.
The president, quote--
"The president wanted to protect himself from an investigation into his campaign."
Okay. Now, keep listening.
448 pages. Who can claim victory?
He said at the end, "It's 400 pages.
Who can declare victory here?"
I believe Satan can.
You motherfuckers spent two years filled with breaking bombshells
and urgent explosions
and teed up a season finale for the ages.
A noose-tightened, closed-walled, family-style jailgasm.
And all we got was a fucking book report that we had to print ourselves.
[audience laughs]
I owe the producers of Lost an apology.
[audience laughing, applauding]
This was the worst finale… ever.
And maybe it would have landed more dramatically
if you hadn't already reported on Trump AG Bill Barr's Mueller report SparkNotes
a month earlier.
Major victory for President Trump.
The summary now from the attorney general, who said,
"Mueller and his team found no collusion, no conspiracy."
Big, big win for this president.
All the questions surrounded the president--
Did he obstruct justice? They just cleared him.
They've cleared the president.
And the craziest part is, throughout the entire time,
great reporters were doing impressive work,
but you wouldn't know it
because it was all smothered in so much news cum.
[audience laughing]
And if anything is going to kill our democracy,
it's gonna be news cum.
Take a quick look at this.
Good evening. We start with breaking news.
- Breaking news. - Breaking news.
- We make… - …money…
- …when you… - …watch the news.
- So our… - …only goal…
- …is to… - …try to keep…
- …you… - …watching.
- We, the media… - …want you…
- …afraid and… - …angry at one another.
- We wanna… - …stir up trouble.
- We do that… - …through stories…
- …promoting… - …fear and outrage.
Every night. This is what we do.
- Plus, we have… - …some snazzy graphics for you with…
…all the bells and whistles…
- …so we can… - …convince you that…
- …every story… - …is urgent…
- …even if it isn't true… - …because…
- …it helps make sure that… - …our ratings are higher than ever.
Right? I mean, it's been easy money for so long.
[audience cheering, applauding]
Hello.
Welcome back now. Uh, I hope you enjoyed that.
The media is such an important part of, uh, a democracy's immune system.
But can the saviors of our democracy be saved themselves?
We've convened a panel of media insiders
to talk more about why this happens and what we can do to hopefully fix it.
We've got Chris Stirewalt, who is a former politics editor at Fox News,
and now he's a contributing editor at The Dispatch.
We've got Sean McLaughlin, vice president of news at E.W. Scripps,
which owns 60 local news stations.
And joining us remotely,
Soledad O'Brien, who is a former anchor at CNN and NBC
and now founded her own multiplatform production company.
Thank you guys so much for joining us.
[audience cheering, applauding]
The reason why I chose the Mueller report to kind of do the autopsy on was
they talked a lot about the disappointment in the Mueller report,
but that disappointment was the fruit of the seed that they planted.
And doesn't that kind of reporting overwhelm and cancel out
all the other really interesting and smart and considered reporting that exists?
The problem is that we've become moral imbeciles
- as we are being… - Ah!
…spoon-fed little pieces of outrage day by day.
No, stay with the story. No, stay with the story.
You can't lose any number. That's the problem.
The death knell is if your numbers go down.
That's why we only get one story at a time.
Producers know that that will work and that will rate,
so we're gonna stick with the thing that people are expecting
and that they know.
'Cause if you take it away from them, they may get mad,
the number may go down, and they may go someplace else to get it.
So as long as the delta-- the ratings increase from yesterday,
uh, keeps going, you're gonna obviously keep doing that story,
but you've gotta milk it a little bit more.
You know, you get a minute-by-minute ratings printout. [chuckles]
You know exactly what your--
You get a minute-by-minute ratings printout at CNN?
Everywhere, not just at CNN.
And it's called the minute-by-minutes. You know exactly--
You can tell, what story was I in when the ratings went up
and what story-- Uh, look, at the end of the hour we lost a bunch of people.
Whatever that was, figure out, we should never do that again.
- They will say it explicitly? - [O'Brien] Yes.
They will say that's a dog.
People left on that Afghanistan story, so fuck that.
- We're not doing that again. - We can't lead with Afghanistan.
It just kills us.
We can't lead with Afghanistan. Look at those numbers.
I think what people don't realize is, it's a ratings-driven business.
But it's also driven by meetings.
People have meetings and make decisions every day
that affect the tone, tenor and direction of coverage.
- Is that spoken about… - Yeah.
…explicitly in the newsroom like when you were at CNN?
[O'Brien] Yeah, there are tons of meetings.
You have meetings that set the agenda for the network,
that set the agenda for the morning shows,
that are gonna set the evening show agendas.
You have to divvy up who's gonna have which guests,
because you can't have everybody shared on every single show.
And then the shows themselves have specific meetings.
What are we gonna start with? What are we gonna end with?
Who's the guest? How long do they get?
I think this idea of "You know, hey, we just report the news"
is, um, ridiculous, because of course it's a zero-sum game.
If you're covering something,
then that means you're not giving coverage to something else.
- Right. It strikes me that Fox… - Mmm.
You worked there for a while.
You were, uh-- You removed yourself from it after you--
- Well, they removed me. [laughs] - They removed you.
- For those of you who don't know-- - They shot me out of a cannon.
- Chris, uh-- - [laughing]
He was on the election desk.
He called Arizona for Biden
because Biden had gotten more votes there, which…
[audience applauding]
…uh, was an enormous error in judgment.
- And I think we all agree-- - Our bad, our bad.
With Fox, in some respects, during the election
they got primaried from the right to some extent.
OAN and Newsmax came in and said,
[chuckling] "You think that's crazy? Listen to this."
And it looks like Fox, after being primaried from the right, went,
"We're gonna--
We're just gonna knock the legs out from under our competitors
by just embracing that in a much more pure way."
The truth is, social media provides a morphine drip
for these producers to keep them like,
"Okay, we're in the zone. This is what the people want."
They're following social media.
They're actually on Twitter and Facebook, going,
"What are these people up in arms about?"
That's right. And they can say in a meeting,
"Oh, this is really clicking today. This is really going.
This got a bunch"-- Holy crokinole.
You can see a television news story in which people are like,
"This-- This idiot said this about this idiot on Twitter,"
and they treat it like it's a whole news story.
So it has permeated the thinking in very profound ways,
and it's made us dumber.
I really like that you used the expression "holy crokinole."
[all laughing]
It is an expression I've never heard.
And I will be adding it to my vocabulary to replace "fuck."
- [Stirewalt laughing] - [audience laughing, applauding]
But-- But it strikes me that Fox wouldn't be as "that's a dog" news-wise.
It's more like, "That doesn't fit our audience's bloodlust."
[stammers] I think the two things go to the same end in this way.
Uh, Fox is a much-- I was there for ten years.
When I started,
in a news division meeting, if you talked about the ratings,
it would have been gross.
Uh, by the time I left, I heard show--
I heard producers and people in the news division
talking openly about ratings this, ratings that.
- Did they get the minute-by-minutes? - [Stirewalt] Some people did.
And that actually-- The diffusion of those reports changed over time,
and it became much more ratings-driven.
So, basically, what the news is saying to us is, "This isn't our fault.
It's your fault."
They are outsourcing the responsibility of news gathering
and-- and news telling to--
"Well, if they would watch better stuff, we'd show them that."
But that's not the audience.
- They're connected. - That's not the audience.
That's-- That's someone's view of the audience, right?
There's someone in an office who says, "Listen. Young people.
- I guess that means"-- - No, I-- I understand that.
But it takes a long time to figure out what the audience wants.
And I-- When I first started at The Daily Show, right?
They were really on us to do a lot of pop culture shit.
And I was-- This was my last shot in TV, and I knew it.
I was 35. I'd been down the road a ton.
And what I said to them was, "Let's make a deal.
Let me do the thing that I believe in.
And if it sucks, and it doesn't sell you enough beer,
you can fire me."
In other words, we developed a thing that we believed in.
And the audience showed up.
Rather than doing research on what the audience wanted…
- [audience applauding] - …and backing into it.
And there are so many
good, talented, passionate journalists
that are getting the life sucked out of them by a system that is backwards.
Is that-- Is that correct?
Let me throw out a different narrative on this.
Holy crokinole. It's about time.
[all laughing]
I think what this is really about is a lack of courage of changing the model.
The part about the minute-by-minutes,
you're looking at data that is already incredibly flawed from the beginning.
- And the more-- - What data? Where do they get their data?
Well, Nielsen provides ratings for most broadcast products.
- [Stewart] Nielsen? - Yeah.
The group from the '50s with the book that you write in?
Well, but-- And the main theory behind their methodology hasn't changed any.
In the '70s and '80s, when you had the dials
and there was five options, it-it worked pretty well.
Now look at what's happening. You have hyperfragmentation.
You have people consuming content all the time
on all kinds of different devices and platforms,
and it just hasn't kept up.
So now you take that data, you start splicing it down to minute-by-minute.
You take bad data, make it smaller and focused.
[stammers] You got nothing.
How in their right mind has nobody stepped back and said,
"You know, uh, Nielsen ratings are often written on papyrus."
And at some point you just start realizing,
I wonder if what we're looking at has any degree of realism at all.
I think it's about systems. Like, well, listen, I'm in the system.
And this is how the system is.
And if I would like to get paid--
continue to be paid the money that I'm making,
which is seriously good money,
do I really want to fight the system?
I think for most of the journalists working there when I was there,
they love journalism as I did, and I do,
but I think, you know, it-- [sighs]
The mission was to do the best work that you could do and win.
You know, win is in the ratings.
Win is making sure that you're getting picked up by The New York Times.
Win is not about educating the public.
It's not so complicated.
Real Housewives is a really good model. The reality show, right?
This idea, the person who's willing to go there, go over-the-top,
they become better known. They get paid more money.
It's successful.
Your guests who are willing to go over-the-top,
the person who's willing to say the thing no one's willing to say,
that person is good TV.
If they're good TV then they're gonna get booked.
Well, cable's moved to opinion.
You know, what's the difference between opinion and what's the news?
Local's never gotten into that game.
And thank God. I think it's one of the things that's gonna save us.
[O'Brien] Local news has not really done
what cable news has made an art out of, right,
which is the-- the chaos as good TV.
Local news has to--
To serve the people watching, they have to cover the community.
They can't just have two people screaming at each other
for four minutes and say, "Gentlemen, thank you for joining us.
We appreciate your time."
Yeah. I mean, I just think you're watching
a different local news broadcast than I am.
Because from when I watch local news,
it's basically just a quick run-up
of, uh, who's raping what and who's murdering who.
And then I get a little bit of something on the Giants and the weather.
- But if you… - But--
But if you look-- But this is exactly the top two reasons
people don't watch local news, for those who've gotten away from it.
Number one, it makes me feel poorly about my community.
And number two, it stresses me out.
Those are things we can fix.
Every day when we decide what goes in our newscasts,
we have the ability to change that narrative.
Again, it's gonna take a while to get there--
Fluff is powerful, and fluff is bad.
- Uh, and-- - That sounded dirty.
[laughs] Well, if you're doing it right.
- Holy crokinole, that sounded dirty. - Holy crokinole, that fluff is good.
Fluff is powerful, fluff is bad.
I need fluff.
Okay, but let's be clear. Nobody's talking fluff.
Now, I'm-- That was not an accusatory fluff.
- Yeah. [laughs] - Uh, this is to say--
This is to say what differentiates news from entertainment is
that sometimes we have to tell you what you don't want to hear. Right?
We are supposed to be the vegetables, right?
We are supposed to be the nutrient-giving portion of the plate, not dessert.
What cable news has tried to do and what local news sometimes does
is get the green beans in the shortbread.
And you've got now-- You've turned the news into entertainment,
and you're treating entertainment like news.
Both of those are bad things.
News should be news. Entertainment should be entertainment.
- [audience cheering, applauding] - Boom!
Soledad, the last word.
Number one, don't put liars on television.
- It's such a basic rule-- - [laughs]
- [O'Brien] I mean… - [audience applauding]
It's so weird to me that literally liars are platformed all the time,
every single day on cable
and then on some of the big Sunday morning shows on networks as well.
It's just a mistake because it's-- That's a cannibalization, right?
It eats away at your-- your credibility.
And also, I think, if you feel like, okay, but I do have to put this person on
because they are in the middle of an important story,
there's no little rule that says everybody gets handed a hot mic
and they get to be on live television.
You can interview people to really understand their story
or even use pieces of it.
But you don't have to air somebody's entire story where they're lying.
Just tape them first.
But I don't know that there's a will to make a big change when, frankly,
the other way pays pretty well
and, you know, gets you in The New York Times
and makes you famous.
I don't know.
Soledad, square this for me with the high-minded rhetoric,
'cause I know exactly what the blowback of this episode is gonna be.
"Fuck Jon"-- "Holy crokinole Jon Stewart."
[all laughing]
"You don't understand. You're lumping us in.
We do amazing work.
Democracy dies in darkness."
That doesn't square in any way to how this thing is actually put together.
Because one speaks of integrity and courage and editorial authority.
And the other is a crass manifestation of selling beer.
- So square that circle for me. - [O'Brien] One--
[audience applauding]
One is the PR department saying,
"What should our strategy look like
in order to try to build or, in some cases, rebuild trust
with a viewing public that's lost trust in media?"
And the other is, "Listen, we gotta go for these ratings."
Well, I can't tell you how much I appreciate
the conversation from all of you.
I feel not much better at all.
[all laughing]
I want to thank everybody for joining us,
Chris Stirewalt, Sean McLaughlin and, of course, Soledad O'Brien.
Uh, we'll take a little break and be right back.
- [audience cheering, applauding] - [no audible dialogue]
We're not gonna have an interview with somebody who runs a news division
or used to run a news division.
So far, it's been a resounding no.
You're an industry that relies on transparency and access.
And-And democracy dies in darkness.
And you're saying that locked in a fucking closet.
- Right. - With the lights out.
And you won't say it on camera.
These are people that stand outside of people's homes
after their child has been murdered
and say, "Talk to me. Come out and tell us"…
- You owe us! - …"how you feel."
And they act like they owe them.
And then you ask them to just come on and defend their fucking business model.
Have you tried going outside their house and being like, "Fucking talk to us"?
[all laughing]
[Stewart] Let me explain to you why we're here.
Uh, first of all, no one else would talk to us.
- So, thank you. - [chuckles]
So we spoke with a lot of heads of news divisions.
And, uh, they are reluctant to speak on the record.
Do you have an idea of why they might be so reluctant to speak publicly?
Well, I think that, um, news organizations,
there's a sense that they are being scrutinized and being criticized
in a way that they've never experienced before.
And I think there's a bit of a bunker mentality that has set in.
- Mm-hmm. - Um, I think it's very, very hard
when you're constantly, constantly being criticized by--
Who would criticize the news?
Who would do such a-- such a thing?
[stammers] That's terrible.
[clears throat] All right. It's my fault.
But you know what's interesting?
The people that we talked to would all say,
"Well, you know, you've got to-- you've got to deliver the ratings."
They call them the minute-to-minutes, right?
How much of it is the ratings pressure?
And how much of it is a self-consciousness
over accusations of liberal bias
or accusations of a political agenda?
What concerns would they express to you in that situation?
ABC News reported to me in one form or another
for probably 35 years, 30-some-odd years.
And my advice to them was to not hear the noise as much,
to continue doing the job that, uh-- that we've entrusted them to do.
[Stewart] Right.
Which is to tell the truth, to state the facts.
To present the news in an accurate and a fair and in a timely basis.
But we never sought to drive ratings or even bottom-line success
at the sacrifice of what we consider to be quality.
It just wasn't-- It wasn't part of our discussion.
What they will tell you,
and maybe they didn't say it, you know, in those meetings,
is the producer of the piece will be cognizant of the minute-to-minute ratings.
The executive producer of the show will be cognizant of those.
And the decisions that they make
were almost entirely built on what they thought might have rated.
- It's been a little daunting. - If you're asking whether
there have been incidents when news organizations failed to carry things
because they don't think they'll be of interest to their audience,
I'm sure that's the case.
- I'm not saying instances. - But here's--
- That's been shaping-- - You think it's a regular thing.
And not told in the right way.
See, that-- that's-- I would argue that there are stories that are not told
because there's a belief that people aren't interested in them.
I don't think there are stories that are told
that are told inaccurately
just to make them more interesting to people.
- It's not inacc-- - I'm defending an organization
- as opposed to news in general. - [Stewart] Right.
- I just don't have enough-- - But trust in news
during the Cronkite era was-- It was one of the most valued institutions.
Today, it's somewhere between Congress and herpes.
You know, in terms of its Q rating. What happened?
It starts with technology enabling an explosion of programming…
[stammers] …which includes news and information.
And with that, I believe, has come a dilution in quality.
The more volume, typically, as it grows and grows and grows and explodes,
results in, in my opinion, a loss of quality.
And then you look at what is presented as news on social media,
and you can immediately conclude
that a lot of what is presented that people think is news is not news
as certainly we knew it when we were growing up
and what we were taught news should be.
- Um-- - Right.
So I think what people believe is news is really opinion,
and opinion is very different than that.
Opinion is a-- is a bias.
But you're in a business
where the first word you say, the first thing you say
at the top of every broadcast is, "Our top story tonight."
That's opinion.
It's subjective.
There's this strange disconnect
between the high-mindedness of what they say they do--
"democracy dies in darkness"--
versus the reality of how they produce it.
"Breaking news tonight. Everyone will die. Watch us."
Because their business model is based on engagement.
It is an editorial decision to decide what story to tell first.
But you're suggesting that that in itself is, uh,
an example of a lessening of quality or a bias--
It's-- It's bias. If you don't admit-- I'll give you an example.
If you lead every night with the Mueller report,
Mueller, the Mueller investigation…
They created a television show, they created the O.J. trial,
out of the Mueller report.
That business model, it feels like,
overwhelms whatever journalistic credibility exists.
And isn't that what needs to be fixed?
I do believe that many news organizations,
feeling embattled by the-- Trump and the Trump, uh, era…
- Mm-hmm. - …um, reacted to it,
um, perhaps, by building up his potential demise.
In other words, I think-- I think there was, uh, almost a glee felt.
If that were a singular example, right?
When we withdrew forces from Afghanistan,
there was, appropriately enough, a pretty big focus on it.
- Big story. - Very big story.
- Should have been a lot of focus on it. - I think you're absolutely right.
But the focus on it was one of high dudgeon
over how could this happen, and why did it happen and what's going on.
But we'd been there since two thousand and--
Twenty-some-odd, twenty-- twenty-year war, right?
Isn't some of the context of what happened based on no one covering it
in a significant way over the past ten years?
Well, you're suggesting if it had been covered on a regular basis,
then we wouldn't have been surprised
by the speed at which the Taliban took over the country
as we drew down our forces?
- I'm saying if it had been covered more… - Right.
…maybe we wouldn't even have been there that long.
What I'm saying is that we are not well informed,
that the news media goes all-or-nothing on everything,
that they're like eight-year-olds playing soccer.
And if you've ever seen them--
Everybody grab-- Everybody running to the ball.
Everybody run to the ball.
And that there's no perspective because--
So, I could argue
there are some stories that have not been covered enough
maybe because there's a belief that the audience isn't interested in them.
Maybe because even news organizations get tired
of presenting them on a regular basis.
Although, I don't know incidents of that.
You don't think that the outrage nature of the coverage
- was a bit overhyped in that-- - I mean, the only thing I could argue
is maybe if it had been covered more,
America would have been more outraged earlier about the fact that we were there.
That's my point.
Then maybe the pullout would have happened earlier.
- Or more responsibly. - I dunno. I lived through the Vietnam era.
Let's just say we'll conclude war is hell, right?
- Therefore… - Yes.
…if news organizations cover the hell, maybe we won't have wars.
When news narrows their focus of coverage,
people get a skewed picture of what our reality is.
I think you're being a little too critical, in my opinion, of news overall.
That's not to say that news organizations don't hype big stories,
because many of them do,
and sometimes overhype, sometimes to a fault.
- Um, but-- - When do they not--
I'd be more curious as to when you thought they didn't.
[stammers] We'd have to go back to the biggest story of our time.
COVID cri-- COVID. Was that overhyped?
- 900,000 people in the United States… - I think that--
…have died from it. Doesn't feel overhyped to me.
No. I'll give you an example with COVID that I think is apropos.
Mask wearing.
The political conflict over whether or not to wear masks,
and the overwhelming majority of conversation is speculation
about what that means to freedom and this person's anger about it.
And so little of it is, what does it do?
Why do surgeons wear them?
- I think that part of the story was told. - The overwhelming--
The part of the story that was told already is that people should wear masks
because, from a scientific perspective,
- there's a real reason to do so. - Right.
And, I don't know, does the audience need to be reminded again
and again and again of that?
Why are they reminded again and again that it's causing a fight?
By hyping conflict, aren't they also escalating that conflict?
Were they hyping conflict, or were they covering conflict?
- I think-- - Covering it too much is hyping it?
I think their coverage of conflict hypes it,
and I actually think they drive a lot of it.
So I guess if there's more and more incidents of people going crazy
about mask wearing,
I guess I could argue it should be covered.
Now, if you're asking me whether I think
there's probably been too much made of that… probably.
I would-- [chuckles]
Don't you think coverage can influence behavior?
Can news influence behavior?
Sure, it can. Absolutely.
Which is why I think it's so important for news to act responsibly.
- Um, look. It has just as much a power-- - Boom.
Just as it has a power to do good, it has a power to do bad.
What can be done to manage it more responsibly?
It's managed responsibly by some organizations, and by others it's not.
Look, people are not as held accountable for inaccuracies.
So there's that issue.
And then there's the whole issue of profiting from-- I'll call it inaccuracy.
- In other words… - [Stewart] Right.
…from opinion and from, well, presenting things in an inaccurate fashion.
I think if you're looking at overall,
the pot of-- that isn't considered news today,
it's-- We're in a-- It's a problem.
So to answer your question,
I don't know what the answer is in terms of fixing it.
Let's use Fox News as an example, because I think it's a good example.
Roger Ailes had an idea. I don't know if you knew Roger at all.
Roger came to me and wanted to run ABC News at one point.
Before, believe it or not, in the early '90s.
Boy, that would have been-- that would have been a Trojan horse.
Yeah, we weren't looking for someone at that point. [laughs]
So I wasn't in need, but I met with him.
It's really clear that he is advocating or was advocating a political position
and used his storytelling ability and his narrative ability
to create this powerhouse
that is really the media arm of a political movement.
Look, if-- if Roger Ailes had concluded-- well, which he did,
that there-- that news had a bias-- that the then-existing news organizations,
specifically cable news, had a bias and was ignoring the right
and that he was gonna go out and create an organization
that was not going to be biased…
- But that's the-- - But he didn't do that.
- He was cynical. I don't think he was-- - He didn't do that.
He thought there was a business in being biased.
- Correct. - But then what we've also seen is
that other news organizations then pivoted in another direction
as a countermeasure to what he was doing.
- So… - Correct.
That, to me, was a huge mistake,
'cause I think that was at the expense of credibility,
at the expense of being accurate,
at the-- I would argue even at the expense of being responsible.
Can you do a profitable news organization
that also is--
has the strength to cut through the noise
in this media environment?
It's almost impossible, really, today. I don't know how you would do it.
You'd have to--
I don't think you can create a subscription news service
that would generate the kind of revenue you'd need to cover news right.
And advertising is typically reliant on consumption,
so you'd have to really be betting
that you could drive huge amounts of consumption.
What would you do? How would you fix it? Or what--
[Iger] I've thought about it a lot.
If you were gonna create it, how would you do it?
You have to start completely from scratch.
But not because you're trying to erase mistakes of the past,
but you're trying to erase perceptions that have been created over time.
And you'd have to populate it
with people with incredible credibility and responsibility and accountability.
It sounds very idealistic, doesn't it?
It sounds incredibly idealistic.
- But maybe we need it. I don't know. - But shouldn't it?
I still think of that idea of a news organization
that is more cognizant of what that business model is.
And that maybe there's money to be made
that's not as relentlessly, uh, hyperbolic.
But I don't know-- I just don't know how practical that is.
In terms of you don't know that that's a winner as far as, like…
that it could be financially viable.
Well, financially viable is-- Well, even-- Yes.
But I'm much more interested in
whether it would truly make a difference in the world.
I feel like it has to
because I've seen the impact that one news organization has had
on the deterioration of it.
Somebody's got to generate fodder that's better quality.
And it feels like--
So I guess what I'm asking you is, will you run that?
[laughing]
You're not the first person who's asked me to consider--
Well, here we are then.
So-- So--
So that's what this is about.
You seem to have an idea for it. You have an affinity for it.
You've run these larger organizations before.
People have presented me with that concept.
- They have. - And?
Well, I haven't said yes to it because I'm not sure how practical it is
or how effective it would be. I don't know.
Thank you very much for sitting down with us.
- We very much appreciate it. - My pleasure.
[audience cheering, applauding]
Oh, thank you, everybody.
Thank you very much for watching tonight's show.
Uh, please send all of your hate mail directly to Apple.
For more on tonight's topic,
please check out these resources to continue the conversation.
Also, as you may know, we have a podcast.
It's like, uh, the Jackass movies, but we hurt ourselves with words.
[Stewart, audience laugh]
And if that wasn't enough, we got ourselves a little newsletter there
that is gonna look very nice in your spam box.
So, thank you and good night to all.
[audience cheering, applauding]
So, one thing you learn in TV news
when you're writing headlines and copy and things like that are
you want to use, um, phrases as opposed to, like, sentences.
"A tree crashed" is not an interesting sentence.
You want to say, "Trees crashing."
- As though it's happening right now. - Correct.
And you also want to start every sentence with "tonight."
It'll all start with, "Tonight, trees crashing."
- [Reza gasps] - Oh.
How do we reflect urgency tonight?
Why "exclusive"? When they say, "Tonight, exclusively, we talk to…"
And it's somebody you're looking at on every network, and you think,
is there any-- What do they think of as exclusive?
Oh, yeah. They think that if you hear how special something is,
you will watch it more.
"This is just for you, girl. Okay, girlfriend. Shh."
[Jay] Oh, my God. The news is a fuckboy.
"I don't do this for everybody."
"But since you asked…"
[all laughing]