Jeremy Wilson Hershenberg Government 2301 9 September 2012 Jon Stewart Jonathan Stewart Leibowits was born in Trenton, New Jersey on November 28, 2012, son of a Physicist and a teacher of gifted students. “I was the wise guy of the family” (Stewart), he had only one brother to compete with. Stewart’s parents got a divorce when he was only a teenager, thereafter he and his brother lived with their mom. While in high school, Stewart was voted best sense of humor when he a senior.
After he graduated from high school, Stewart went to Virginia’s William and Mary College, he study psychology and chemistry and play soccer for the school where he rose to an award that still gets preventative to this very day: The Leibo, it’s awarded to the clown of the soccer team every year. “My college career was waking up late, memorizing someone else’s notes, doing bong hits, and going to soccer practice” (Stewart). After college, Stewart felt lost, realizing that he did not want to be anything he went to Virginia’s William and Mary College for.
He moved back home for awhile, picking up weird jobs such as running a puppet show that gifted children. It was long until he was sick of living at home so Stewart decided to move to New York City, he took a job as a van driver for a food company, at the same time he was working some comic routines making his debut in a New York City comic club only a year after moving to the city. This is when Comic clubs started to pronounce his name wrong, leaving no choice but to change his name, which is now known by everyone as Jon Stewart. He debut convinced him that he could have some kind of career working as a Stand-Up Comedian.
As time went on Stewart worked his way through highly known comic clubs until he reached a gig at Caesar’s Palace. Stewart found his way to the television in the early parts of 1990s, working as a host for Comedy Central and working on sets for MTV. In 1993, Stewart was a runner up to take over David Letterman on NBC, but he ended up losing to Conan O’Brian. Luckily with O’Brian winning the gig, Stewart ended up with his own show, The Jon Stewart Show which aired on MTV. Stewart wasn’t just a host or an actor, he was also an author. He wrote Naked Pictures of Famous People in 1998.
His booked was a collection of short stories and essays of political figures and political subjects. It won New York Times best seller, people mainly knew for its political satire. Some of the “chapters” include “Breakfast at Kennedy’s” which was a nonfictional journal of a man’s relationship with the Kennedy’s, another one is “Pen Pals”, which are written letters from Princess Diana to Mother Teresa. These chapters go from Martha Stewart, Bill Gates, Hitler and Larry King all the way down to the Taco Bell Chihuahua and Jon Stewart himself imaging him as a cult leader.
Stewart released another book in 2004 along with the writing staff of The Daily Show called America: Citizen’s Guide to Democracy Inaction, which is basically a mock High School textbook. Earth: a Visitors Guide to the Human Race was written and released in September of 2010 by Stewart and once again some of the writers from Stewarts show, The Daily Show. Writing, hosting and acting aren’t even it, in 2005 Stewart has even provided the voice of President James A. Garfield for a audio book of Sara Vowell’s, Assassination Vacation and two years later in 2007, Stewart voiced a character from Steven Colbert’s, I Am America (And So Can You! . Stewart’s role was a Communist and a TV comedy character. Now that the Jon Stewart Show got cancelled on MTV, Comedy Central picked him up for another hosting job, The Daily Show. Stewarts show is widely regarded as fresh, current, very funny, and smart. The four night weekly show is essential to watching for liberals, watchers, political insiders and the young. With his brilliant humor, Stewart gives a voice to all of today’s politicians and political climates, and the U. S. frustration over presidential and congressional missteps and hypocrisies. Now the real question is, has Stewart always been political?
Well to be honest, I think everyone is political in a way, even if they do not know it but as for Stewart I could say for myself that he hasn’t always been extremely political until he started on with Comedy Central for the Daily Show, I still believe he was political before he started the show only because I do not believe you can be as political as Stewart is today without out being a little political before your big break. No one really knows if Stewart is a Democrat or a Republican, people even call him a libertarian but many believe he is more Democrat just because his use of satire on the Republicans during The Daily Show.
In October of 2010, Stewart had a national rally called Rally to Restore Sanity, which was held in the mall of Washington D. C. , more than 215,000 people attended the rally. Along with political comedian icon, Stephen Colbert, Stewart and Colbert had this rally to provide a purpose for people to be heard above what Stewart said was extreme and vocal, twenty percent of Americans who say they control the conversation of politics, really this rally was just a spoof of Al Sharptons Reclaim the Dream Rally and Glenn Becks Restoring Honor Rally.
Stewart is so political; he even had his own debate with Bill O’Reilly for the 2012 Presidential Election. In this debate Commentator O’Reilly and Liberal Stewart had a debate that was nothing like an actual presidential debate. There was even a prize for whoever won the debate, which was a wrestling belt. The debate focused on political views asked by moderator and questions from the audience. To show how humorous this debate was meant to be the moderator asked O’Reilly, “What do you think is the most fundamental problem with the public political discourse? and O’Reilly responded with “Stewart” sending the moderator and the crowd into a roar. Stewart can be serious about politics too, not just funny. In December of 2010, Stewart had one of his shows that month devoted to the 9/11 Responders Health bill. The bill was to provide free medical care for people who responded to the World Trade Centers that day on September 11, 2001. The bill was passed late that December.
The reason this was so big for Stewart is because Stewart moved to New York when he was starting his comic career and still lived in a building about 10 blocks away from the Trade Center, Stewart saw everything that happened that day, planes crashing to people dying. It was a serious time in his life. In the course of Stewart’s career, Stewart himself and the people of his shows have won over 15 awards, from Emmys to Grammys to awards that no one has even heard of. Without Jon Stewart how would we have any humor in politics today?
