At first, it seemed Chicago was safe from Jon Stewart’s wrath.
On his lone night anchoring “The Daily Show” during its week in town, the New York native opened with a string of jokes and observations strictly about the Democratic National Convention. Let the other hosts snicker about hot dogs and The Bean and Malört on their nights; Thursday, it was going to be strictly about the whole nation’s affairs.
But then … Fox News host Laura Ingraham’s remark that “you can’t eat good vibes” was too much. Stewart couldn’t hold it in any longer.
“I think,” he said, “you might confusing vibes with the TOMATO-INFUSED, SOUP-ADJACENT FONDUE … the WEAPON OF MASS LACTATION … that this city calls F- – -ING PIZZA!!!”
As Stewart crawled over his desk in hysteria, the crowd at the Athenaeum (or Anthenaeum, as Stewart called it) Center for Thought & Culture erupted, apparently aware that Stewart has bashed Chicago deep-dish for years.
But he offered one concession, muttering under his breath, “The bar pies are good.”
In contrast with the other, relatively greener correspondents who hosted the week’s earlier shows, Stewart’s monologue was more cohesive, more biting, more incisive. Traditional targets like Fox News and Donald Trump got zinged, but he also saved some venom for the Democrats and their claims of a diverse base.
The convention, he said, had “Democratic party icons [showing a photo of the Rev. Jesse Jackson] AND lifelong Republicans [Adam Kinzinger]. They had a guy yelling ‘Screw the billionaires’ [Bernie Sanders], followed immediately by a very happy billlonaire [JB Pritzker].
In a silly voice he summed up the party’s view as, “It’s all OK if it’s our billionaire.”
Later showed a photo of presidential nominee Kamala Harris and said, “The Democrats had people who prosecuted sexual predators, and ….” Viewers were left to fill in their own words for the photo of Bill Clinton.
Stewart also noted the unmet demand of protesters that a Palestinian American speak on the DNC stage. Showing a collage of diverse convention speakers, he enthused, “They had Black Americans, Hispanic Americans, Asian Americans, gay Americans, Jewish Americans ….
“Palestinian-Amer … oh.” And the box over his shoulder said, “Photo not found.”
“To be fair,” he concluded, “[the convention] was only four nights, eight hours a night.”