Wednesday, March 11, 2009

The Cramer V. Stewart Battle Continues

After Jon Stewart had dropped the F-Bomb on Jim Cramer for a second time on Monday night, Cramer decided to respond the next morning. He complained to the Today Show, Mornin' Joe and had MSNBC reporting on it to show Stewart as picking on poor, defenseless Cramer. The synergistic retaliation was something that the NBC empire was able to pull off for one of their own. Of course, Stewart loves the attention, and continued the feud last night.

From The Hartford Courant:

Yet another night on "The Daily Show" Tuesday was focused on what CNBC's Cramer said in his defense, this time on a variety of NBC related properties, from NBC's "Today" show to MSNBC's "Morning Joe."

And Stewart fired back by using some of the other Viacom properties -- appearing to talk about his situation on shows from Nickelodeon's "Dora the Explorer" to MTV's "The Hills."

It was just the kind of clips that the NBC shows will pick up one more time and try to get some kind of reaction from Cramer, who might as well admit that on more than one occasion, he may have been a little too bullish on Bear Stearns in the weeks before its collapse.

Stewart says he doesn't know much about what the market will do either, but at least he doesn't promote himself as all-knowing, as Cramer often is on CNBC, where one promo subs him in for God, declaring "In Cramer We Trust."

Stewart destroyed Cramer yet again, and added Scarborough in for his pithy pejorative attacks. Comedians are supposed to entertain and sometimes enlighten through their humor. Stewart does that with his eyes closed and hands tied behind his back. Now this is great for NBC and Viacom, as a feud always attracts more viewers for both sides, especially when Cramer goes on the Daily Show tomorrow night. While their ad revenues may spike, I hope that what comes out of that is a rise in awareness among the people that CNBC is full of useless hacks.