Jon Stewart Attacks Fox News and Its Viewers

“Daily Show” star Jon Stewart went head to head with Chris Wallace on “Fox News Sunday,” denigrating both Wallace and Fox News viewers.
 

Stewart suggested that Fox hired Wallace as a “counterbalance” to the network’s more colorful personalities like Glenn Beck, but disparaged his approach to news reporting, while acknowledging that Fox’s mainstream rivals sometimes can be “sensationalist” and “lazy.”
 

“You can’t understand because of the world you live in that there is not a designed ideological agenda on my part to affect partisan change, because that’s the soup you swim in,” said Stewart.

“It reminds me of ideological regimes. They can’t understand that there is free media other places, because they receive marching orders.”
 

Wallace was quick to defend Fox viewers when the comedian said the media had let them down. Stewart accused the network’s viewers of being “the most consistently misinformed” media audience.
 

“I don’t think our viewers are the least bit disappointed with us,” said Wallace. “I think our viewers think finally they’re getting somebody who tells the other side of the story.”
 

Wallace then showed a tawdry clip from the Comedy Central Roast featuring Pamela Anderson.
 

“It’s not exactly ‘Masterpiece Theatre’ you’re working for,” said Wallace, which elicited a chuckle from Stewart.