Published on June 29, 2024
Jon Stewart weighs in on the first presidential debate, including the media’s countdown to the event, Biden’s senior moments, and Trump’s blatant lies. Michael Kosta handles the release of WikiLeaks’s founder Julian Assange, SCOTUS now being able to accept tips, and Alex Jones losing Infowars.
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We just witnessed a debate between President Joseph Robinette Biden versus former president Donald Robinette Trump. It was a highly anticipated affair according to the network that was running it.
The first Biden-Trump debate, a little over one month away, right here on CNN.
We are less than two weeks away from the first presidential debate.
Just one week from today…
Welcome to the first workday of the most important week of the presidential campaign.
Three days and counting…
Just two days now…
About 30ish hours…
Just over 24 hours…
12 and a half hours…
Say the words:
…it’s debate day in America!
The candidates must have been so excited to know that they haven’t missed it. I imagine old man Biden opening his window and shouting at the street below:
You’re there, boy! What day is today?
Boy: It’s debate day, sir.
Biden: Then there’s still time! Prepare the debate goose!
Prior to the event, what did the political class believe would be the criteria for each candidate to be successful in the debate? First, Donald Trump.
Trump has to show that he’s not going to end democracy.
Don’t respond in a way that the suburban mothers wouldn’t like.
Don’t interrupt Joe Biden.
Don’t take the bait. Don’t look like a bully.
Don’t get angry.
Portray normalness.
Can’t you just pretend to be normal for 90 minutes? How is that advice for a presidential debate and not what you would say to your parents when you bring home a date for the first time? “Can you not talk about January 6 and please don’t do your Asian voice? I really like this girl.” But that’s Trump. Surely the expectations on President Biden will be higher.
He absolutely cannot have a senior moment, a physical or verbal stumble, him forgetting something…
…any of his kind of freezing moments.
Stay alert, stay engaged, and stay awake.
President Biden has to show that he can stand there for an extended period of time…
…and remain upright.
“Remain upright to be president!” You know, I may be mistaken, but I believe those are the same qualifications needed to be a scarecrow. Tonight, the president must show the country that he can keep our corn safe.
But then it was time for the actual debate, and let’s see how it began. Both men came out and… oh yes, okay, both men are ambulatory. They are both upright. Level one cleared. It’s going to be an important discussion between two important men. What are the rules?
You want to share the rules of the debate with the audience at home?
Each candidate will have two minutes to answer a question and one minute each for responses and rebuttals.
What the… you… what can you do in two minutes? I can’t even articulate what’s wrong with your entire setup to this debate. An ad break to watch a Hulu show is three minutes. What can you do in two minutes? But alright, well that’s going to winnow out anything that might be interesting or substantive. But let’s begin. We know the bar that’s been set up for each to pass. Biden has to not look old and not have a senior moment. Go.
Making sure that we’re able to make every single solitary person eligible for what I’ve been able to do with the uh… with… with the co… excuse me, with… um… dealing with everything we have to do with… uh… look, if we finally beat Medicare…
Thank you, President Biden.
Need to call a real estate agent in New Zealand. Okay, a high-pressure situation. A lot of times you can confuse saving Medicare with beating it. I’m sure it’s not something that repeated throughout the debate causing Democrats across the country to either jump out of windows or vomit silently into the nearest recycling bin. Anybody can fuck up talking… How did Biden do not talking…
About how close the police are to him? Almost every police group in the nation from every state and everybody wanted to get it back to the states. Everybody. And China, nothing. And Russia, nothing. And India, nothing. I will have that reporter out. He should have had him out a long time ago because I didn’t have legislation. I said close the border. We had the safest border in history.
Not great, but a lot of people have resting 25th Amendment face.
I’m not a political expert, but while Biden was preparing at Camp David for a week, did anyone mention he would also be on camera? On the split screen? Is there any moment here that can save Biden?
This is the first presidential election since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade.
Oh, we’re back, baby! Abortion. A to the… the B to the O to the O to the D to the… the repeal of Roe v. Wade. That is Trump’s weakest issue.
It’s been a great thing.
Oh, he is… he is… it’s a great thing. Hit him, Joey.
A terrible thing, what you’ve done.
It’s a ter… This is awesome! We are done here. TKO. No, no, no. Joe, Joe, Joe. Don’t say anything else. Joey,
The idea that states are able to do this is a little like saying we’re going to turn civil rights back to the states. Let each state have a different rule. Look, there’s so many young women who have been, including a young woman who just was murdered and he… he went to the funeral and the idea that she was murdered by a… by… by an immigrant coming in, they talk about that.
Did you just… immigration… Abortion? Hey, I know abortion is one of our strongest issues, but let me for a moment talk about immigrants killing and raping people. It’s one of the weakest, folks. I think sportsmanship would insist that an opponent not seize on an opportunity set.
There have been many young women murdered by the same people he allows to come across our border.
So how do we do this now? Do I take his car back to the White House tonight? I mean, come on, we done with this sh*t? Do I just UPS his stuff? I mean, come on, that was crazy what he did just now. So, Biden perhaps not on top of his game. Maybe I will check out this young upstart, Donald Trump. Obviously, the election is a binary choice, so let me see what this Trump fella is about. As we learned earlier, he just had to come in there and not be an a**hole.
He doesn’t care about our veterans. He doesn’t care. He doesn’t like the military at all. Probably the worst administration in history. The worst presidency in the history of our country. This shouldn’t be a debate. He is the worst president. I really don’t know what he said at the end of that sentence. I don’t think he knows what he said either. He challenged me to a golf match. He can’t hit a ball 50 yards.
Does not appear to have passed the a**hole test. See me after debate. Alright, Trumper, what do you got on substance?
We have the greatest economy in the history of our country. A lot of credit for the military and no wars and so many other things. Everything was rocking good, but the thing we never got the credit for, and we should have, is getting us out of that Covid mess. He allowed millions of people to come in here from prisons, jails, and mental institutions. The only jobs he created are for illegal immigrants. We had the lowest taxes ever. I didn’t have sex with a porn star.
“She was a porn character actor in best. I’m not saying she couldn’t open a movie, but…”
So just so we’re all clear, everything that Donald Trump said in that clip is a lie. Blatant and full. And we were tight on time putting this over together. There’s plenty more. Really makes you wonder, what’s RFK Jr. doing tonight? Maybe he’s got some… wait, what’s that? I’m sorry. Oh, vaccines? Oh, mhm, no, I see. That’s… but yeah, sure, there are side effects to… oh, all of them. Okay. And a worm wear. Okay, fair enough. His vice president running mate donated how… okay, anyway.
There was of course a moment where I kind of thought we were getting substantive.
I was recently in France for a D-Day and I spoke to all about those heroes that died. I went to the World War II cemetery, World War I cemetery. He refused to go to. He was standing with his four-star general and he told me, he said, I don’t want to go in there because they’re a bunch of losers and suckers. My son was not a loser. Was not a sucker. You’re the sucker. You’re the loser.
Sh*t just got real. First of all, that was a made-up quote. A made-up quote, which I think in Trump land means that’s a real quote. But this is about our nation’s veterans. Foreign policy. This is important. Biden, come on, brother.
Four-star general standing to your side who was on your staff who said you said it. Period. We’ve done more for veterans than any president has in American history. The only sacred obligation we have as a country is to care for our veterans when they come home and their families and equip them when they go to war. That’s what we’re doing. That’s what the VA is doing now. They’re doing more for veterans than ever before in our history.
Alright, thank you so much.
Let’s move to the topic of foreign policy.
Wait, what? Move on? No, we don’t move. Stay on that topic. Not move on. Dot, no. Don’t go moving on. Who came up with these dumbass rules? And why would any of these people agree to them?
The one thing that we did prove tonight is that the MAGA conspiracy theory about Biden’s upcoming debate performance was nonsense.
A little before debate time, he gets a shot in the ass.
They are giving the president some sort of a stimulant, an ADD drug, Adderall, Ritalin…
New drugs that are out there that are specifically for Alzheimer’s or Parkinson’s.
A lot of caffeine pills…
Debate Viagra.
Well, certainly there are drugs that can be used to energize a person in that state.
I apologize for how fast I’m talking now. I’m on those drugs. Let me just say, after watching tonight’s debate, both of these men should be using performance-enhancing drugs. I’m sorry, as much of it as they can get, as many times a day as their bodies will allow. If performance-enhancing drugs will improve their lucidity, their ability to solve problems, and in one of the candidates’ cases, improve their truthfulness, morality, and malignant narcissism, then suppository away! Guess what, everybody, they should be taking whatever magical drugs can kick their brains into gear. Cuz this ain’t Olympic swimming. You know what I’m saying? “Oh, he solved the Middle East, but he was doping, so it doesn’t count. There’s going to be an asterisk next to his presidency.”
And by the way, if those drugs don’t exist, if there aren’t actually performance-enhancing drugs for these candidates, I could sure f*cking use some recreational ones right now because this cannot be real life. It just can’t. F*ck! We’re America! God!
Let’s kick things off with some big international news about a whistleblower. No, not the Boeing ones. They’ve all suddenly died under completely normal circumstances. I’m talking about one who got some good news:
This morning: Julian Assange, who founded WikiLeaks and rocked governments around the world with it, is set to plead guilty in US federal court to a single felony charge in exchange for his freedom, ending the yearslong legal saga around his explosive publication of US state secrets.
Assange, celebrated by some as a hero, reviled by others as a reckless vandal, published state secrets of country after country, none more damaging than the vast trove of US classified documents WikiLeaks posted online starting in 2010 at the height of US wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
That’s right, WikiLeaks founder and man who looks like he feeds James Bond to sharks, Julian Assange, is out of prison. And like many of you, when I first heard the news, I thought, um, which one is he again? Because I thought he was Edward Snowden. And then someone said, “No, Edward Snowden is Edward Snowden. That’s why they call him that.” And that made sense to me.
Now, Julian Assange is the one who spent a decade on the run for revealing war crimes committed by America in Iraq, even though the people who did those crimes weren’t punished. It’s all thanks to an obscure military doctrine known as “snitches get stitches.” And let’s be honest, a lot of the stuff he leaked we already knew. America was doing bad sh*t in Iraq, the DNC was in cahoots with Hillary’s campaign. It’s like how you kind of already knew that your wife was banging her tennis instructor, but it’s nice to have it confirmed, you know? By the way, in that example, I’m the tennis instructor.
Now, some people think Assange is a villain for revealing state secrets, while others argue that the states shouldn’t have had those secrets in the first place. But what irks me about Assange is that he didn’t reveal any of the secrets I wanted to know. You know, he’s going to dump literally millions of documents, and not a single one was about aliens, or who killed JFK, or why they never made a Forest Gump sequel. I mean, I don’t want 10 Fast & Furious sequels, I want to see Forrest Gump accidentally invent the Macarena, right?
Let’s move on from a character that some love and some hate to a character who’s much easier to judge: Alex Jones. Now, it’s been a year and a half since the Boner Pillsbury Doughboy was ordered to pay $1.5 billion to the Sandy Hook families, and now the repo man is pulling up at the door.
Conspiracy theorist Alex Jones is losing his media empire. Court-appointed trustees laid out plans for shutting down Jones’s InfoWars. The money will go towards the $1.5 billion Jones has been ordered to pay families of the Sandy Hook shooting victims. He pushed the claim that the 2012 massacre wasn’t real. The plan calls for winding down operations and then liquidating inventory.
Oh no, InfoWars is dead, but how will I know which vaccines turn me gay? The good news here is that this shows that if you maliciously lie to the American people, you will be held accountable like 0.3% of the time, and the rest of the time you’ll be elected president. But politics aside, I think we can all agree it’s a great day in America whenever a podcast ends.
So, it’s been a rough final week for Jones, but he spent it doing what he loves.
Jones spouted lies even as he drove to the hearing in Houston.
“It is all a brazen power grab,” he said. Leading up to the hearing, he had been vacillating between tears, more lies:
“It was the FBI and the Justice Department behind all these fake lawsuits against me to get me off the air,”
and naked opportunism, peddling supposed dietary supplements until the last moment:
“If you order any products at InfoWarsStore.com, you will get them before this is shut down.”
It’s crazy that his listeners think the vaccine is going to kill them, but then they spend hundreds of dollars on off-label weight loss supplements. You know, ‘I don’t want anything weird in my body. That’s why I take Bethyl Polyol 15G and Tiger Gut.’ By the way, if you’re sad you can no longer buy pills from the InfoWars store, please consider purchasing Michael Kosta‘s pills for a stronger brain or whatever. Just give me your money, you stupid piece of…
But the biggest politics news of the day didn’t come from the primaries. It came from the Supreme Court, who just made it even easier to bribe elected officials. Oh, sorry, tip elected officials.
Breaking news from Washington: The United States Supreme Court has overturned the high-profile bribery conviction of former Indiana mayor James Snyder.
In a 6-3 opinion, the Court ruled that gifts to public officials can only be considered illegal bribes if they’re given before the official act, not after.
Justice Kavanaugh wrote that it was not a crime for politicians to “accept gratuities that may be given as a token of appreciation after the official act.”
Ah, I see. So, if you give a politician money before they do a favor, it’s a bribe. But if you give it to them after, the Supreme Court says it’s a gratuity, because they think I’m an idiot. I mean, seriously, a gratuity? Tipping culture is already out of control. I gotta tip at the coffee shops, I gotta tip at the dry cleaner, I gotta tip when I get takeout even though I picked it up and I took it out. That’s why they call it takeout. Okay, fine, fine. But if my state senator turns that little screen around on me, I’m going to lose my mind. Alright, I’m still going to give 20%, but I’m going to be pissed about it.
It seems like every few months, the Supreme Court makes it easier and easier to bribe government officials. And I don’t know why they would do that, but as soon as Clarence Thomas gets back from the Maldives, we can ask him.
Let’s move on to the tech world and talk about artificial intelligence. AI is everywhere these days, which is interesting because it also f*cking sucks. You know, it gives me bad Google searches, it gives me fake Amazon products, it keeps generating images of women with six fingers when I very clearly said I wanted six nipples. But the tech companies won’t stop shoving it down our throats because they need something new to sell to us. Because we didn’t go for the metaverse, or self-driving cars, or those weird cyborg helmets. So now I can’t sit on a toilet without it being like, “Hey, let AI flush your poop for you.” I mean, sometimes it shoves the poop back up your butt, but it’s getting better.
And some AI companies are now offering songs made by AI, but now the people who actually make music are fighting back.
The world’s biggest record labels are teaming up to sue two prominent AI music-making companies. Universal Music Group, Sony Music Entertainment, and Warner Music Group are among the companies that filed lawsuits against the AI companies.
The lawsuits accuse the companies of illegally using copyrighted sound recordings to train their AI, raising concerns about the impact on artists’ rights and earnings.
In a statement, Suno’s chief executive defended his company’s product, saying that it’s “designed to generate completely new outputs, not to memorize or regurgitate pre-existing content.”
Oh, alright, well if the chief executive of the AI company said they’re not stealing, that’s good enough for me. You know, if the songs it’s creating are completely new, then we’re good. So let’s move on. You know what, maybe it’s better to listen to one of these songs, just to see.
Lawyers for the record labels wrote the prompt: “60s British rock male voice by a band that rhymes with ‘The Smeedles.’ Since the generators do not allow naming specific artists,” still, the record labels say the AI generator spit out a Beatles song.
I’m easy. “Wow, that was supposed to be a completely new song. Those were the exact words to Imagine. The AI could have at least used a thesaurus, don’t you think? “Envision there’s no heaven, it’s easy if you endeavor to.” Who wants this? Who wants this? ‘I got AI to create a brand new song for me.’ Why? There’s no shortage of music. Did you finish Spotify?
“Oh, but I can make a brand new Taylor Swift song.” She drops a double album every two weeks. We don’t need it. But this song does bring up an important question, which is: should AI be involved in art? And the answer is no, it shouldn’t. We need to decide as a society that AI is not allowed to make art. Okay, it can help make an elevator go faster or analyze medical data, that’s fine. But leave art to human artists because, yeah, human artists have the things that computers will never have: terrible parents. Right, that motivates great art. The bottom line is no matter how good AI gets, it’ll never need to prove that it’s just as deserving of love as its sister who went to medical school.”
