New York Magazine: “Why Neoconservative Pundits Love Jon Stewart”:
Conservatives like Stewart because he’s providing them a platform to reach an audience that usually tunes them out. And they often find that Stewart takes them more seriously than right-wing political hosts, who are often just using them to validate their broad positions, do. Stewart will poke fun, but he offers a good-faith debate on powder kegs — torture, abortion, nuclear weapons, health care — that explode on other networks. “Shepard Smith did the same discussion [on torture],” says [Cliff] May. “He kept yelling me at me: ‘This is where I get off the bus! Not in my name!’ He wasn’t arguing with me. It was just assertions and anger. That’s not what Jon deals in.”
I meant to link to this article sooner, but forgot all about it until I watched Stewart’s recent, and lengthy, exchange with Betsy McCaughey, a major opponent to the proposed health care reform (watch part one, watch part two). Via