Classic Flashback: Jon Stewart’s Epic Takedown of “Lying Dynasty” Fox News

In 2011, Jon Stewart did an epic take down of Fox News with 21 PolitiFact citations, including “two “Lie of the Year” awardees, five Pants on Fires and 14 False ratings.” The host finally proclaimed, “Fox News is like a lying dynasty!”

This is classic Stewart and it’s just one of the reasons he will be sorely missed.

Enjoy:

Here’s the list of citations the Daily Show host used, courtesy of PolitiFact, which dedicated a posting to this Daily Show segment:

Glenn Beck: Less than 10 percent of Obama’s Cabinet appointees “have any experience in the private sector.” — False (December 2, 2009)

Steve Doocy: White House Political Director Patrick Gaspard once served as the “right-hand man” for Bertha Lewis, who heads up ACORN. — False (September 30, 2009)

Gretchen Carlson: Says the Texas State Board of Education is considering eliminating references to Christmas and the Constitution in textbooks. — Pants on Fire! (March 12, 2010)

PolitiFact’s Lie of the Year: ‘A government takeover of health care’ (December 16, 2010)

Glenn Beck: The Muslim Brotherhood has “openly stated they want to declare war on Israel.” — False (February 15, 2011)

Karl Rove: “American troops have never been under the formal control of another nation.” — False (March 29, 2011)

Brian Kilmeade: Says Gov. Rick Scott’s approval ratings are up. — False (April 15, 2011)

Laura Ingraham: The Massachusetts health care plan is “wildly unpopular” among state residents. — False (May 16, 2011)

Sarah Palin: “Look at the debt that has been accumulated in the last two years. It’s more debt under this president than all those other presidents combined.” — False (June 1, 2011)

PolitiFact’s Lie of the Year: ‘Death panels’ (December 18, 2009)

Kimberly Guilfoyle: If you log into the government’s Cash for Clunkers Web site (cars.gov) from your home computer, the government can “seize all of your personal and private” information, and track your computer activity.     — False (August 3, 2009)

Sarah Palin: “We’re going to be looking at $8 billion a day that we’re going to be pouring into foreign countries in order to import that make-up fuel that we’re going to need to take the place of what we could have gotten out of the gulf.” — Pants on Fire! (June 3, 2011)

Sarah Palin: “Democrats are poised now to cause this largest tax increase in U.S. history.” — Pants on Fire! (August 4, 2010)

Bill O’Reilly: “Attorney General Eric Holder is involved in the dismissal of the criminal charges” against the New Black Panther Party for voter intimidation  — False  (July 23, 2010)

Sarah Palin: “Barack Obama had 150 days in the U.S. Senate where he was able to vote quite often ‘present.’ ” — False (February 8, 2010)

Glenn Beck: John Holdren, director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, “has proposed forcing abortions and putting sterilants in the drinking water to control population.” — Pants on Fire! (July 29, 2009)

Glenn Beck: Labor union president Andy Stern is “the most frequent visitor” at the White House. — False (December 7, 2009)

Glenn Beck: “Why do we have automatic citizenship upon birth? We’re the only country in the world that has it.” — False (June 19, 2009)

Bill O’Reilly: Says he didn’t call Dr. George Tiller a baby killer, as liberal groups charge, but was merely reporting what “some prolifers branded him.” — False (June 5, 2009)

Bill O’Reilly: When White House communications director Anita Dunn said that Mao Tse-tung was “one of her favorite philosophers, only Fox News picked that up.” — False (October 27, 2009)

Bill O’Reilly: “We researched to find out if anybody on Fox News had ever said you’re going to jail if you don’t buy health insurance. Nobody’s ever said it.” — Pants on Fire! (April 27, 2010)

The rather new PunditFact found that 60% of all the statements they examined from Fox News were mostly false or worse. And here’s a flashback to one of the polls Jon Stewart was probably referring to when he made his original statement about Fox News viewers being the least informed of all viewers: “A poll by Farleigh Dickinson University in New Jersey showed that of all the news channels out there, Fox News viewers are the least informed… Results showed that viewers of Sunday morning news shows were the most informed about current events, while Fox News viewers were the least informed. In fact, FDU poll results showed they were even less informed than those who say they don’t watch any news at all.”

Of course we don’t really need a poll to know that Fox News viewers are not dealing with reality or facts these days. If you’ve had the misfortune to deal with them at all, you are already well aware of the delusions under which they operate. They are often found chanting “Benghazi! IRS!” and asking for the President’s birth certificate while accusing him of being a Muslim (as if this were a bad thing) and railing about something his Reverend said years ago.

Nobody does it like Stewart. He has informed his viewers for years using humor and a light touch to make serious points palatable.

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Sarah Jones

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Sarah has been credentialed to cover President Barack Obama, then VP Joe Biden, 2016 Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, and exclusively interviewed Speaker Nancy Pelosi multiple times and exclusively covered her first home appearance after the first impeachment of then President Donald Trump.

Sarah is two-time Telly award winning video producer and a member of the Society of Professional Journalists.

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