Jon Stewart Hypocrisy And Fox News

Jon Stewart has been "feuding" with Fox News. Jon Stewart accused Fox News of having a Republican bias. Fox News accused Jon Stewart of having a Democratic bias. (Such "feuds" are usually cheap publicity stunts.)

A more accurate statement is that both have a Statist bias.

Here are two examples of Jon Stewart propaganda, both from this week.

President Obama said, regarding gay marriage, "It isn't any of the Federal government's business. This issue should be left to individual states. Issues of morality should be left to the states." That's close to the correct answer. The correct answer is "Making and enforcing marriage contracts should be none of the government's business." However, Jon Stewart criticized Obama for this. The laugh track even said "Awww!!!" when Obama said this.

On the Colbert Report, Stephen Colbert criticized the Supreme Court, for knocking down the class action lawsuit of women employees vs. WalMart. Both Colbert and the Supreme Court missed the real point. If women are paid less than men on average, that is not proof of unfair discrimination. Are woman paid less because of unfair practices? Are women paid less because they're less productive workers?

In a really free market, if women are underpaid, then some women will get together and start a new business. The current State is a non-free market. Are women paid less because they're less productive workers? Are women paid less because of abusive monopolistic business owners? It's impossible to be sure which is true. In a really free market, a worker's wages would converge towards his fair value.

Such an analysis leads to quotas. "Group X must be paid as much on average as group Y." leads to quotas and "reverse discrimination". Members of protected group X are hired at inflated salaries or inflated job titles, to meet the anti-discrimination quota. (For example, one of the managers at my employer is Hispanic. Is he a manager because he really deserves it? Is he a manager because he helps meet a racial quota?)

Also, quotas are superficially easily enforceable. You look at average salary by group. A quota doesn't address the underlying problem of a non-free market. "It's OK that large corporations and insiders control the economy, as long as the correct number of people from each group get their fair share of the loot!"

Also, in a class action lawsuit, the only people who get rich are the lawyers.

The problem is not a Republican bias or Democratic bias. The real problem is Statist bias. "Democrat" and "Republican" are two slightly different flavors of Statism. They are barely indistinguishable. "Republican vs. Democrat" is a substitute for the real issue, which is "Freedom vs. Statism". On some issues, like gun control, Republicans tend to be pro-freedom. On some issues, like abortion, Democrats tend to be pro-freedom. By splitting the pro-freedom policies among both parties, the slaves are kept distracted and confused.