CHRIS WALLACE: Jon Stewart, thanks for appearing again on Fox News Sunday.

JON STEWART:  Wasn’t my idea, Chris.  Last time, I looked like Kwai Chang Caine being schooled by Master Po.  My ratings actually fell off the next week.  So the suits at Comedy Central Central told me to take another shot at you.

WALLACE:  So, you got your marching orders . . . to do what?

STEWART:  Leave you whimpering like Jim Cramer, my friend, make you look like a boob.  [from jacket pocket pulls out small beaker, removes cover, tosses contents into Wallace’s face]

WALLACE:  [reeling] Whoa, what the hell!

STEWART:  Who’s the joke on now, Chris?

WALLACE:  [wiping face] Are you crazy?

STEWART:  Lighten up, Chris.  You need a sense of humor if you want to be taken seriously.  Hey, it’s only water, man.  [pointing to label on beaker] See, water–  H2O.  Says here right on the . . . [reads]  “HCl—hydrochloric acid.”  Oops. Mislabeled.  My bad.  Note to self: use cream pie or glitter next time.

WALLACE:  But why?

STEWART:  [reasonably] Try to understand my position, Chris. A sizable chunk of The Daily Show’s core audience hates your guts; they were PO’d when I showed respect and treated you like an equal.  That’s not who I am.  I humiliate right-wingers in a non-partisan way.  I had to return to redeem myself.

WALLACE: Your core audience?

STEWART:  Yeah.  Fox has the Birchers, the neo facists, LaRouchers, and unborn rights freaks.  My core’s a mishmash of animal liberationists, anarchists, human extinctionists, Palinphobes, water cooler thirtysomethings, and fever swampers from The Daily Kos and Democratic Underground.

WALLACE:  I reject your . . . . (more…)

Global warming hysteria has often been compared to religion, and rightly so. But, there’s also many theatrical elements to be found, facets of the genre “green drama” that are so very familiar to those of us who have spent our professional careers watching environmental tragedies debut year after year.

Global warming is the blockbuster production of the environmental movement. It’s the Broadway hit that has maintained the rapt attention of environmental activists and policy-makers throughout the course of three decades. The players are familiar, having honed their roles after years of practice.

The directors naturally, and predictably, cast big, bad corporations as villains, with Exxon-Mobil supposedly skulking behind the scenes, passing out bribes to spineless skeptical scientists and obstructing the heroic politicians and activists trying to save innocent mother earth, before it’s too late.  And what a victim to have! Sure, your average activist would be happy to be part of the local neighborhood production of: “Stop Building That New Factory Before It Kills All The Babies In Town (The Musical)”, but the Global Warming Show is truly big time. It’s not just the babies in town that are in danger, it’s everyone’s babies, everywhere. This production has innocent tribes living on sinking tropical islands and disappearing glaciers and forlorn polar bears. Global Warming; it’s the show that’s got it all! (more…)