Jon Stewart–Jim Cramer conflict
On March 12, 2009, television personality Jim Cramer appeared as a guest on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart.
[5] On March 4, The Daily Show aired an eight-minute clip lampooning CNBC at the beginning of a segment in response to an outburst by Rick Santelli broadcast from the floor of the Chicago exchange.
[6] In one clip, a CNBC host reported American International Group (AIG) would not need capital, which The Daily Show followed with a list of the bailout money—amounting to billions of dollars—that the financial services firm had required since September 2008.
"[6][7] In another clip, Jim Cramer was shown simply affirming "Your money is safe in Bear Stearns", followed by a Daily Show statement that the global investment bank went under six days later.
Moreover, Cramer outlined, But through a clever sound bite, Stewart, and subsequently Rich—neither of whom have bothered to listen to the context of the pulled quote—pass off the notion of account safety as an out-and-out buy recommendation.
[11]On the episode of The Daily Show that night, Stewart jokingly responded with an apology for taking Cramer's comments out of context.
Stewart then stated, "He's not saying literally 'I'm asking you to buy Bear Stearns'; for that you have to go back a full seven weeks before the stock completely collapsed."
Stewart then showed additional video footage of Cramer on January 24, 2008 telling TheStreet.com TV viewers to specifically "buy Bear Stearns" stock seven weeks before it collapsed.
On The Daily Show that night, Stewart mocked NBC's corporate PR strategy by humorously being digitally inserted into Nickelodeon's Dora the Explorer and MTV's The Hills, both of which air on networks owned by Viacom, the parent company of Comedy Central and The Daily Show.
Cramer revealed trepidation to Martha Stewart about his upcoming appearance that night: "I'm a little nervous ... How bad is it gonna be?
"[19] On March 12, Jim Cramer appeared on The Daily Show with Stewart amid widespread media publicity that included a front-page article in USA Today.
[20][21] Stewart claimed CNBC shirked its journalistic duty by simply accepting information given to it by corporations, rather than playing an investigative role as a "powerful tool of illumination.
[23]Stewart said of Cramer in particular, "I can't reconcile the brilliance and knowledge that you have of the intricacies of the market with the crazy bullshit I see you do every night.
"[25] Not content with his explanation, Stewart showed videos in which Cramer recommended ways to drive down stock prices by spreading false rumors, deceiving the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), and deliberately misleading journalists.
He also pointed out the mass illusion on Wall Street and the finance industry in general that, in the words of former Merrill Lynch CEO Stanley O'Neal, "fixed income and credit (i.e. the economy) were no longer cyclical in nature", and that this illusion had permeated Wall Street and all other industries connected to it, including the finance networks.
[25] Stewart also fired back at Joe Scarborough by telling Cramer to relay the message that the nature of The Daily Show's satire is not to be fair.
"[35] Director of the Project for Excellence in Journalism Tom Rosenstiel stated his belief that it was Stewart's ambiguous position between news and comedy that allowed him to call out CNBC so aggressively.
Some sources also felt that Stewart's anger was a reflection of a general attitude held by the American public, such as Jon Friedman of MarketWatch.
[38] David Folkenflik of NPR stated, At times, Stewart crystallizes the frustration others have with the failings of the media with near-perfect pitch.
It's one thing for media critics like me to pore through hundreds of articles to say the press didn't quite do its job as a watchdog of the nation's financial system.
Instead, CNBC issued a broad statement in defense of its track record: Recognized as the worldwide leader in business news, CNBC produces more than 150 hours of live television a week that includes more than 850 interviews in the service of exposing all sides of every critical financial and economic issue.
[44][45] In a conference held March 18, the CEO of NBC Universal, Jeff Zucker, called Stewart's attacks on business network CNBC "incredibly unfair" and "completely out of line".
[46][47][48] Days after the airing of the program, a group of economists and progressives issued an open letter to CNBC and called for public signatures.
The letter demanded that the network set higher journalistic standards and said that, "Americans need CNBC to do strong, watchdog journalism — asking tough questions to Wall Street ...
"[49] The letter was signed by a variety of economists and journalists, such as Dean Baker of the Center for Economic and Policy Research and Doug Henwood, author of Wall Street and After the New Economy.
Their stated goal was to persuade CNBC executives to prioritize investigative financial journalism over Wall Street "access".
