If you didn't catch Jon Stewart (of Comedy Central's The Daily Show) on CNN's Crossfire a few nights ago, you really missed out. (there's a link to it here.) It astounds me how out of all the numerous news commentators and networks out there, the only one who seems to demonstrate some real intelligence is a comedian!

Anyhow, Jon basically takes the Crossfire guys to task for simply helping the spin doctors and partisan rhetoriticians, rather than actually presenting truth to the American people. He went off on them and others in the media on how they contribute nothing to actual rational dialogue about real issues.

This drives me nuts too. I'm not complaining about a conservative bias or a liberal bias in the media (both are there), I'm complaining about the corporate money-making bias. Media no longer exists to present the public with the truth and to act as a safeguard against government corruption, it exists solely to make money. Thus our news organizations are now more interested in giving us sensational stories, political scandal, and pandering to either far right or far left viewers than they are with actually holding our politicians accountable.

I'm not typically a doom-sayer, but I have to say that if the media is going to so completely abdicate this role then we're just at the beginning of a short road to tyrrany. If the only people who can speak truth any more are the comedians, then who will listen as are freedoms are gradually taken away? The answer is no one. We'll all be too opiated on our reality tv, our Hardballs and Crossfires, our video games, and our gossip about Britney's next marriage. Why would the powerful need religion to placate the masses when TV will do it for them?