Jon Stewart Baltimore riots: The Daily Show takes on CNN's shallow coverage.

Watch Jon Stewart School CNN on How to Cover the Baltimore Riots

Watch Jon Stewart School CNN on How to Cover the Baltimore Riots

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Brow Beat
Slate's Culture Blog
April 29 2015 12:39 PM

Watch Jon Stewart School CNN on How to Cover the Baltimore Riots

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Jon Stewart was in fine, familiar form last night in his monologue on the Baltimore riots and the mainstream media’s apparent inability to cover them with any semblance of nuance. (We’re looking at you, CNN.) Harking back to the racially charged riots of the 1960s, ’70s, ’80s, and ’90s, Stewart said, “These cyclical eruptions appear like tragedy cicadas, depressing in their similarity, predictability, and intractability.” Unless you’re Wolf Blitzer, who professed on air, “I don’t remember seeing anything like this in the United States of America in a long time.” (Blitzer also said the same thing during the Ferguson clashes just several months ago).

Assuming his much-needed role as cable news’ unofficial ombudsman in the wake of his admission of weariness with such a position—and providing some much-needed laughs around this extremely depressing topic—Stewart reminded us why we’ll miss him when he leaves The Daily Show in August.

L.V. Anderson is a former Slate associate editor.