Obama Tells Jon Stewart: You 'Cannot Leave the Show'
Fulfilling yet another obligation as an outgoing president, Barack Obama paid a ceremonial visit to The Daily Show on Tuesday night, his farewell to another outgoing dignitary, Jon Stewart.
“I’m going to issue a new executive order,” said POTUS. “Jon Stewart cannot leave the show.” Then he added wryly, “It’s being challenged in the courts.” With a tone approaching jealousy, Obama said, “I can’t believe you’re leaving before me.”
With a scant couple of weeks left to do his Donald Trump imitation, Stewart dispensed with his usual opening comedy-editorial segment, saying, “Let’s get right to it — I’m sure there’s a fundraiser he has to be at.”
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The pair plunged into an array of topics including the Iran nuclear deal and the Middle East. Obama cast his recent achievements as “a lot of the work that we did early on [that] starts bearing fruit late” — i.e., now, in his final months in office.
One entire segment was taken up with a subject dear to Stewart’s heart: the news media. Asked about his attitude toward the media, he admitted that “early on,” his administration was “too guarded.” Even as he said this, Obama sounded guarded, choosing his words carefully. He said some news outlets “get on my nerves more than others.” He expressed frustration that in a “splintered, balkanized media” world, it was very difficult to have “a common conversation” about “the big, tough issues.”
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There wasn’t all that much comedy here. Stewart was busy being the smart-aleck grad student sassing the professor, which is a role we will both miss when he leaves (no one else will take that position when he graduates) and not miss all that much (over the past couple of years, Stewart’s dismay at political gridlock has become repetitively despairing, angry, jaded, and ultimately both bored and, on weaker nights, boring, and you can bet he knows it).
By the end of the half-hour, after Obama wrapped up a long-winded answer about future challenges, Stewart said, “Is that the advice you would bequeath to President Trump?”
Obama got a good laugh out of that, while also, we all noticed, taking care not to dis The Donald. No one, not even a newly loose Obama, needs that kind of trouble.
The Daily Show airs weeknights at 11 p.m. on Comedy Central.
