In case you didn’t know, there’s an undeclared war going on between the Daily Show’s Jon Stewart and America’s Business channel CNBC.
Quick summary:Satirical comedian Jon Stewart found Rick Santelli’s little rant about “loser mortgage holders” a little rich in light of the network’s own trumpeting of stock markets straight into the financial crisis, its general array of bad financial advice, and its ignorant and arrogant denial of how bad things were. He invited Santelli to explain himself, but the Chicago Mercantile Exchange floor-reporter cancelled at the last minute. But to prove his point anyway the Daily Show team produced a video montage cherry picking some of the network’s most cringeworthy bad calls. This naturally included the now famous moment when Mad Money host Jim Cramer told viewers ‘Bear Stearns IS fine’, just days before the investment bank went down.
The whole thing took the financial blogosphere by storm. Consequently, and presumably to mitigate some of the bad press, CNBC finally released Jim Cramer onto the show on Thursday night to make his defence.
Considering Cramer’s notorious rant-ability, everyone was prepared for a showdown extraordinaire. What followed, though, was more akin to a public flagellation. Stewart effectively broke Cramer down; transforming him into a pitiful whiny child, desperately but unsuccessfully trying to justify his wrongful actions. It wasn’t an interview, it was a guilt-inducing telling-off. Even his occasional high-pitched scratchy, “it wasn’t my fault, the CEOs lied to me, my friends lied to me” retorts, only seemed to bury the credibility of the network more.
“The CEO of a company lied to you?” - now why would that be so surprising, implied a sombre Jon Stewart trying to make the point the network was, by its nature, in bed with the very CEOs it was trying to cover.
And the thing is, Cramer seemed to know there wasn’t much he could say to make things better — his final hope resting on humility to generate some sort of improved sentiment towards him and the channel, which for a network like CNBC, whose arrogance has previously known no bounds, is quite a capitulation indeed.
And just to make the experience even more painful, Stewart’s research team — as always — dug up a series of gut-wrenching past performances from Cramer, the likes both he and CNBC no doubt would prefer have disappeared. Here are some key moments:
To Cramer’s retorts that he was being manipulated himself:
You’re pretending you’re a doe eyed innocent.
To which he rolls the following clips of Cramer in what appears to be a non-CNBC external video:
A lot of the time, when I was short in my hedge fund I would create a level of activity beforehand that would drive the futures, it doesn’t take much money.
I would encourage anyone who’s in a hedge fund unit to do it, because it’s legal, it’s a very quick way to make money and it’s very satisfying. By the way no one else in the world would ever admit that but I don’t care, as it’s not on TV.
You can’t foment, that’s a violation, you can’t foment you can’t create yourself an impression that a stock’s down, but you do it anyway because the SEC doesn’t understand it.
Apple, it’s very important to spread the rumour that Verizon and AT&T don’t like the phone and it won’t be ready for Macworld.
Jon Stewart’s very articulate on-the-button explanation to Cramer of exactly what was wrong with the CNBC’s coverage:
You knew what the banks were doing and yet were touting it for months and months — the entire network was. And now to pretend that this was some sort of crazy once in a lifetime tsunami that no one saw coming is disingenuous at best, and criminal at worst.
And to Cramer’s incredulous goofball antics on Mad Money — including his ability to promote a stock one day then change his mind the next day while throwing plastic bulls or ringing SELL SELL SELL bells - Stewart makes the salient point:
I understand you want to make finance entertaining, but it’s not a game.
All of which should really be a sobering wake-up call to CNBC.
Of course, whether the network gets it, is another matter. Denial has, after all, been their most preferred pastime.
Related link:
Rick Santelli has had enough - FT Alphaville
Happy Boycott CNBC day! -FT Alphaville
Jon Stewart and Jim Cramer: The Extended Daily Show Interview - The Daily Show
