Originally Posted by Baraka_Guru

It's important to remember that John Stewart isn't just a comedian, he's a satirist. We tend to forget that he isn't merely criticizing politics with his humour, he's doing it while maintaining an elaborate parody of television news "infotainment."

I think one reason why he keeps reminding guests, critics, and viewers of this is because once we start looking at his show as a legitimate political entity—once we start taking it seriously—the satire will have failed and the show would lose its power to target television news media (and politics to a degree). Instead, it would become a part of that machine.