\n<\/p>\n
They, however, have developed different expectations since 2015. During Stewart\u2019s years, some comedians dinged \u201cThe Daily Show\u201d for relying on \u201cclapter,\u201d<\/a> the dutiful response to a joke that is more virtuous than funny. But since then late-night has become a clapter factory, especially over the Trump era, when sharing political takedowns became treated as an act of resistance.<\/p>\n In the George W. Bush era, Stewart stood out from late-night hosts like Jay Leno, who labored never to take political sides. Now he might stand out from people like his friend and colleague Stephen Colbert, whose audience never has to doubt<\/a> which side he\u2019s on. Late-night comedy audiences are increasingly used to being told what they want to hear, which is to say, what they believe other <\/em>people need <\/em>to hear.<\/p>\n Viewers accustomed to clapter may not find Stewart\u2019s digs at President Biden much to claugh at. Even if they believe the age issue is a political problem, they may adopt the social-media stance that pointing it out \u201cis [clap emoji] not [clap emoji] helping.\u201d<\/p>\n But Stewart\u2019s stance is not surprising if you\u2019ve watched him over his years away from the Comedy Central chair. He appeared on Colbert\u2019s return to the studio after its pandemic absence and raised the lab-leak theory<\/a> of Covid, an uncomfortable subject for liberal-leaning viewers who associated it with former President Trump\u2019s demagoguing. And while he has no love lost for Donald Trump \u2014 who once tweeted<\/a> the Jewish Stewart\u2019s birth name at him, saying, \u201cHe should be proud of his heritage!\u201d \u2014 he also pushed against<\/a> accusations that Trump supporters were universally racist.<\/p>\n If Stewart is an old-school American liberal (as opposed to \u201cleft\u201d or \u201cprogressive\u201d), he\u2019s also vulnerable to the old-school critique of liberals: that he\u2019s too broad-minded to take his own side in an argument. He seems uncomfortable with the idea of apocalyptic political stakes, as when Minton Beddoes worried about President Biden being \u201cthe only person between us and the return of Donald Trump.\u201d \u201cYou said that like \u2018Voldemort,\u2019\u201d Stewart joked.<\/p>\n Of course, the nine months until the election is, as Stewart pointed out, a very, very long time. Presumably he can\u2019t fill it all with \u201cThe candidates are so old that\u201d jokes. In his first show, he established that he didn\u2019t want to be captive to his most vehement viewers\u2019 expectations of what he should say. We\u2019ll see going forward if he\u2019s willing to tell them what he really thinks, even at the risk that they might agree with him.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n