The Daily Show this week had a number of very good clips, mostly centering on Iraq, Rumsfeld and Bush. In particular, they highlight the high-quality correspondents that the show still has, despite the loss of Carrel, Helms, Cordry and Colbert. Oliver, Bee, Riggle and Mandvi are filling in quite nicely, as you'll see below. <dl dt_class="field"> Fareed Zakaria (<a href="http://www.comedycentral.com/sitewide/media_player/play.jhtml?itemId=79462">Part I</a> and <a href="http://www.comedycentral.com/sitewide/media_player/play.jhtml?itemId=79461">Part II</a>) <div> Though he's always interesting, this interview with Zakaria is the best one yet; his analysis of Iraq and the Middle East is spot-on. He thinks that the whole Iraq Study Group is a subterfuge, an elaborate ploy, to make the US think that Bush gives a rat's ass about what anyone else thinks. He pictures it as Bush's faith against the facts on the ground---nothing else is going to enter into it for the next two years. Bush's faith doesn't stand a chance and neither do the people whose lives hang in the balance. To point up just how <iq>dire and deteriorating</iq> (in the words of the Iraq Study Group) the situation in Iraq is, he highlights the fact that <iq>1.6 million Iraqis have left the country</iq>. The population of Iraq is (was) only 26 million. That's about 4% of the population---equivalent to 12 million people leaving the US were it in the same situation. Think about how bad it must be to make so many people flee the country---<iq>that's not just a few car bombs</iq>. Considering the poverty in Iraq, there is probably a significant percentage who <i>would</i> leave were it within their means to do so. The right-wing's whining that the media only shows the "bad stuff" is bullshit. Nobody leaves their home without good reason; they leave when they fear for their lives. Under Saddam, people were not fleeing the country in such droves---as hard as it is to believe, we have made things much worse there. We have destroyed the country utterly, allowing the most unhinged elements of it to rise to power and wreak their havoc. Discussion of what America can do to "save Iraq" are moot. This stain on America's record is permanent and just as huge a disaster as the slaughter wrought throughout Southeast Asia three and a half decades ago. </div> <a href="http://www.comedycentral.com/sitewide/media_player/play.jhtml?itemId=79469">Flyover Statement</a> <div> Aasif Mandvi presents analysis and a positive interpretation of Donald Rumsfeld's statement that Iraq looks <iq>just fine</iq> when you fly over it---despite media portrayals of car bombs going off left and right. With tongue firmly in cheek---and with a biting sarcasm that holds up a mirror to America---Mandvi concurs, helping explain what Rumself was trying to get at: <bq>Iraq is a big country ... and much of it is <i>not</i> on fire. The media's problem is they're only focused on the <i>ground</i>. You see, everyone knows that the vast majority of the violence is confined to the surface of the earth and the 20 feet immediately above it. It's like just after 9/11, when the president said to a grieving nation, 'I know things look bad, but remember, most of America <i>isn't</i> smoldering.'</bq> That is just wicked. Aasif should show up more often. </div> <a href="http://www.comedycentral.com/sitewide/media_player/play.jhtml?itemId=79456" source="Daily Show">Don with the Wind</a> <div> As his <iq>six year reign of condescension comes to a close</iq>, Jon titles Rumsfeld's upcoming book for him, with <iq>how my 50s folksy interjections failed to fix a disastrous war</iq>. Rumsfeld's grating use of these outdated epithets to describe the incredible slaughter his policies, ideas and what passes for his leadership have wrought sends John into a tirade: <bq>We're three years into what may be the most poorly managed war in American history ... so enough with the 'golly!' and the 'gee-willikers!' and the 'oh my!' Those are apt for when, say, your pen leaks. But we're in what's, to be honest, .... a catastro-fuck. As a matter of fact, I believe this is a situation that calls for colorful language. I think we moved past 'up shit's creek' about two and a half years ago. Most people think we're just plain fucked! Double-fucked! So, 'gee willikers', 'golly goodness', 'jeepers creepers' ... that just doesn't do it! Other people just want to open their mouths and yell, <b>'you incompetent cocksuckers!'</b> ... I mean, I guess what I'm saying is <b>'Jesus fucking Christ.'</b></bq> </div> <a href="http://www.comedycentral.com/sitewide/media_player/play.jhtml?itemId=79519">Newsweak</a> This is Sam Bee at her shocking finest, helping the new <a href="http://english.aljazeera.net">English-language Al-Jazeera</a> transform itself for consumption by the American market. Since almost no cable services in the States are picking up the station (small wonder there ... corporate media at its free market finest), it's clear they need help. From adding dozens of flashy graphics on top of their logo (which is pretty cool) to recomposing their intro music (also not bad) to renaming one of the lead anchors (who accent is smoking hot) from Ghida Fakhry to Beverman(?) Gomez to Americanizing their content (<iq>Immigrants? Are they stealing your blond teenagers?...and, later, we'll take a look at why some of America's hottest celebrities <i>aren't</i> wearing panties.</iq>), Sam is just relentless in this one. <a href="http://www.comedycentral.com/sitewide/media_player/play.jhtml?itemId=79552">Rajiv Chandrasekaran</a> This interview with a Washington Post correspondent, who spent more than a year in Iraq, discussed his book, <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1400044871/ref=wl_it_dp/102-9858944-3933713?ie=UTF8&coliid=ILIBU0A3YZWU2&colid=1LHWHUPT9L3JT" source="Amazon">Imperial Life in the Emerald City</a>, about the kind of people and planning that went into the American takeover of Iraq. In particular, members of the civilian force sent there were chosen for party loyalty rather than skill set. The department of the interior was headed by a 21-year old Republican zealot. A 24-year old headed another department. The rebuilding effort was headed up by 3 people in Iraq where the Germans fielded 8000 for a similar effort in East Germany in the late 80s. Almost none of the people sent there knew Arabic---or, indeed, any other foreign language. Over <iq>half of the people who went to work for the coalition provisional authority had to apply for their first passport in order to go to Iraq.</iq>---clearly a worldly bunch ready to deal with an incredibly foreign culture. Hard to believe that didn't work out for us. <a href="http://www.comedycentral.com/sitewide/media_player/play.jhtml?itemId=79553">Curious George</a> <div> Another Jon Stewart gem in which he analyzes Bush's response to the Iraq Study Group. Tony Snow tells us that Bush has, in fact, read the book (amazing! First Camus and now this? It's almost like he's doing work), that he's in listening mode, and that he plans to consider the ideas in it...but only in the new year. It is Christmas, after all. In the president's own words, he's <iq>listening to a lot of advice ... to develop a strategy. One of the interesting things about this ... experience ... is that there's [sic] a lot of ideas and a lot of opinions</iq>. Almost six years in and he's experiencing conflicting views for the first time---what substance is this bubble of his made of? Because I'm sure the troops in Iraq would love to have some for their body armor. In the new year, Bush says <iq>I will be delivering my ... my plans, after a long deliberation ... after steady deliberation.</iq> As Jon said, <iq>and please, Mr. President, pretend I'm only seven years old.</iq> Thanks for, once again, contributing your pithy pearls of wisdom to the national debate and thanks for parroting some meaningless sentence fragments that sound like a seventh-grader's attempt at a book report on a book he's neither read and whose Cliff Notes were sold out at the local Barnes and Noble. Does it matter what's <i>really</i> going on inside his head if these are the only communiques that escape the deep, dark hole of his mind? No, it really doesn't. Which is why no one can blame you if you come to the conclusion that he's dumber than a bag of hammers. You've got six years of evidence to back you up and it's time to move on and stop listening to a single, goddamned word he says. It's a waste of everyone's time. </div> </dl>