Monday, March 16, 2009

Cramer v Stewart

I haven't commented yet about the showdown between Jim Cramer of CNBC and Jon Stewart on the Daily Show. It was an interesting event. First, Stewart stopped trying to be funny during the interview, and grilled Cramer on why guys like him and his co-horts at CNBC are cheerleaders instead of journalists. Also, since guys like Cramer do understand what goes on inside the financial biz, he wanted to know why they were not alert to the dangers of the crazy leverage and derivatives whose crash caused the panic.

Cramer was put in a tough spot. He is just one guy with a show on the network, not the managing editor, but he was now forced into explaining the behavior of the network. He was surprisingly humble and contrite, which was a good idea since he knew that Stewart had enough video clips to make him look like the world's biggest deuchbag.

My friend Budd Bailey, who is in fact a real journalist, has a nice explanation of the role of journalism in today's world. See the link at the right.

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