Colbert v. Stewart: The Celebrity Death Match Over School Reform
Comedy Central's fake newscasters have an outsized influence on public opinion and seemingly different takes on hotly-debated topics like teacher tenure laws and the Common Core standards
When Stephen Colbert invited newcaster-turned-education-reformer Campbell Brown onhis show last night, he unwittingly unleashed a firestorm of controversy and, some say, distanced him from his liberal brother-in-fake-news, and fellow Viacom employee, Jon Stewart.
Several hundred of Colbert’s leftwing fans protested outside of his Manhattan studio before the taping, and thousands more took to the blogosphere, decrying Brown as an elitist union-buster and accusing Colbert of being “a sell out like the rest of them.”
In an era where liberals find themselves at each other’s throats over nearly every issue related to school reform—from charter schools to teacher tenure laws to the roll-out of the Common Core reading and math standards adopted by most states—advocates on both sides of the debate have been paying close attention to people like Colbert and Stewart, who have an outsized influence on liberal public opinion.“Maybe Colbert ought to watch the Jon Stewart show to learn about education issues!” wrote one commenter. “How idiotic of Colbert – IDIOTIC.”
The otherwise dry policy debate has also drawn an unusual amount of star power. In May, the comedian Louis CK panned Common Core while the actress Eva Longoria and singer John Legend have come out in its defense.
Some have suggested that Colbert, who has been an outspoken proponent of other controversial school reform initiatives, like thecharter school movement, seemed to be signaling his sympathies by inviting Brown as his guest. Brown has been at the center of a recent storm of litigation designed to overturn states’ teacher tenure laws, job protections that are held dear by teachers unions. Brown argues that such laws make it nearly impossible to fire incompetent teachers—a crucial step to making schools better.
While growing armies of liberal reformers, including the Obama administration, have backed Brown, her position remains wildly unpopular among traditional liberals who see such lawsuits as an attack on both teachers and their unions.
On these issues, Comedy Central’s other epicenter of fake-news, “The Daily Show With Jon Stewart,” has generally stuck closer to the liberal party line. Stewart, who hails from union-friendly New Jersey and whose mother was a public school teacher, has hosted Diane Ravitch, one of the teachers unions’ most outspoken defenders and a staunch critic of charter schools, three times, most recently in Colbert v. Stewart: The Celebrity Death Match Over School Reform | TIME: