The Daily Show's Jon Stewart laid into CNN this Monday for telling their audience they could find out about the Baltimore protests on Twitter rather than interrupt their blathering about the White House Correspondents' Dinner.
CNN took a great deal of heat on Saturday evening for going all-out in its White House Correspondents’ Dinner coverage at the expense of ongoing protests in Baltimore. [...]
“Once again, Washington’s best and brightest stayed home as the rest of Washington got together to walk the red carpet and dish about the red carpet walk in their finest evening wear,” Stewart mocked the star-studded D.C. event. “But here is the problem: While the A-list of america’s media-political complex fiddled on this Saturday night…” this happened: The protests in Baltimore over the death of 25-year-old Freddie Gray erupted into violent clashes between police and demonstrators.
Of course, CNN’s in-studio team covering the WHCD acknowledged the protests, with one panelist noting how “everyone is wining and dining and this is happening 50, 60 miles away,” and another saying how “important” the conversation was. Yet, within seconds, the CNN host said, “I do want to get to the red carpet.”
“It’s one thing to say, ‘Oh, that’s terrible. We should be doing that,’ and then go do it,” Stewart said. “But to say it’s terrible, we should do it, and not do it, it’s sort of like standing in the middle of the street going, ‘Oh, people are saying I shouldn’t be masturbating in the street, but, you know, my balls aren’t going to release themselves.”
And he wasn't done:
STEWART: Yes, CNN got shamed... they got shamed by Twitter about their editorial priorities by the same folks who spent a week violently clashing over the blue/black, white/gold question. [...]
And the worst part is how incredibly aware, yet simultaneously dismissive they were. [...]
To be clear, a guy on CNN just said, hey, if people are looking for news, I'm sure they can find it somewhere. It would be like Google going, what's your question? I don't know. Just look it up yourself. I'm busy! So get up. You've got the Yellow Pages. We're not really a search company any more, we just make the little animations for holidays. That's all we do.
Unfortunately for Stewart, he had some similar problems with his own "reporter" Jessica Williams when trying to get her to cover the protests in Baltimore as well.
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