"Daily Show's" Jon Stewart is a one-man brawl

Whether it's Jim Cramer versus Jon Stewart or Rush Limbaugh versus everybody, media personalities are driving what used to be a quieter debate.

Who needs Sunday-morning roundtables when "The Daily Show" can eviscerate dispensers of bad advice within seconds? Amazing how a single voice can alter the national conversation under the guise of comedy.

In the YouTube age, it's possible for a late- night half-hour to derail an entire financial network, or at least let the hot air out of a gaggle of financial pundits, in the space of a clip.

In Stewart's case, that's an admirable accomplishment. He's been on a roll since CNBC's Rick Santelli backed out of a scheduled "Daily Show" appearance last week.

This week Stewart moved from Santelli to Cramer to Joe Scarborough to the entire NBC family of TV talkers in a scathing debunking of the bullish talking heads. The comic smartly shamed CNBC by calling the money network on its pundits' pro- Wall Street bias and gullibility in advance of the market's crash.

Then, as the feud inevitably got more attention than it deserved, Stewart mocked the "basic cable personality clash" that he'd started. That's typical Stewart: He demolishes his opponent, then mocks his own gamesmanship. Touche.

In the case of Limbaugh, how much publicity does the supposed intellectual leader of the Republican Party need? (Have you seen the cover of Newsweek? Even his fellow conservatives are crying "Enough!")

The media, timid to the point of irrelevancy during the Bush era, seem to be reclaiming their spine. And it's happening on the fringes.

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