How mad was Jon Stewart last night about the madness of DOGE?
He was mug-smashing mad. He was bleed-all-over-his-desk mad. He was play-the-whole- second-half one-handed mad.
Yes, some of Stewart’s long-time viewers have felt uneasy recently with what they’ve perceived as a lack of appropriate outrage from a man they hoped would be a champion of the Trump “Resistance.”
They wanted more fire and brimstone comedy. Well, last night they got a real dose of fire and shattered glazed-ceramic comedy, along with some peak, laugh-out-loud, double-your-entendre filled comedy.
In other words, an utterly smashing show.
After a little dive into the US selling out Ukraine in the UN by siding with North Korea and Russia, Stewart moved on to DOGE, and he sounded like he might be saluting that Musky organization at the start (progressive alarm meters neared the red zone), but only in terms of the theory that our government does legitimately waste money.
In practice, Stewart noted, under the MAGA siege now targeting everything from medical research to veterans’ issues, the attack is both unrestrained (chainsaw massacred) and fraudulent, as Stewart explained in several references to grossly exaggerated dollar figures and wildly virulent slurs against federal employees: “swamp creatures,” “parasites,” “saboteurs,” “dead-enders,” fraudsters,” “liars,” “cheaters,” and “globalists.”
He saved an especially deft zinger for Republican Congressman from Tennessee, Tim Burchett, who mocked the federal-worker “gravy train” with crazy food metaphors involving biscuits for wheels.
No way is that how this guy really speaks, Stewart said. He didn’t “spring fully-formed from a primordial cracker barrel.”
He mocked Fox News host Jesse Watters for saying workers were getting a spanking from Daddy Day Care, suggesting there were no spanking scenes in that movie and maybe Watters meant a gay S+M movie of the same name.
Stewart had enormous, heavily pointed fun with the often-absurd citations the MAGA crowd has made about idiotic government-funded research, especially one claim that nearly a million dollars had been spent trying to learn if cocaine made the Japanese quail more sexually promiscuous.
Stewart was certain about that one had to be true. “If you are a Japanese quail with an 8-ball, you are getting your cloaca sucked.”
Very few recent late-night lines have landed with laughs as long as that one. (Stewart even suggested it might be “the most favorite thing I’ve ever said on the show.”)
But the lines kept coming. DOGE claims of $16 billion saved, which turned out to be only $2.6 billion “Who among us hasn’t lied saying something is 16, when it’s really 2 and a half?”
About Trump’s preposterous claims that some people maybe as old as 200 were still collecting Social Security. “Even if there was 200-year-old man walking around, he wouldn’t need Social Security. He’d still be in Congress.” (Photos of McConnell, Pelosi, Grassley and Schumer.)
Stewart decided to go full DOGE to find where the real money was being wasted. That meant bringing out an eyeshade, green banker’s lamp, adding machine, and mug reading “World’s Most Dad.”
Beginning with oil and gas subsidies, the carried-interest loophole on hedge funds, and 2 trillion spent on a fighter “that blows,” Stewart cited big waste, fraud and abuse. He was so proud of saving billions in 11 seconds, he thought he had earned the nickname “Big Balls.” Except of course that’s already DOGE-appropriated.
The host’s real fury was saved for the pharma industry, which he said manages to get massive subsidies and:
“What do we the people get for it? The highest drug prices in the Western Hemisphere. And for some reason, the possibility of an infection in our perineum.” (And, he couldn’t help wondering, “Why are they telling us about it during dinnertime?”)
The whole drug thing was not just for laughs because it clearly got Stewart worked up. Biden had celebrated a deal that reduced prices on a measly 10 drugs. And that was supposed to satisfy Americans.
“It would be embarrassing if that was a small drop in the bucket and the American people didn’t expect that we should negotiate for all their f…ing drugs, because WE’VE ALREADY PAID FOR IT WITH OUR SUBSIDIES!”
Lift mug, smash mug on desk.
“COME ON!”
Yes, it was clearly a breakaway mug (you could just about see the break-through lines on it pre-smashing), but broken hunks of ceramic or porcelain or whatever it was made of, can have sharp edges, as Stewart realized immediately.
He didn’t acknowledge any pain, just checked his right hand and saw blood (and joked he would be going to the hospital.) Then he decided to conceal the wound by dropping his bloody paw behind the desk as he carried on.
Which Stewart did, admirably, because he had points he still wanted to make–and jokes he still wanted to land. “Capitalism is by definition exploitative.” And: “government’s role should be to ease negative effects.” And: “Not subsidize that treachery with our money.”
And (here comes the joke): “We’re getting f…ed at a Diddy dinner party, and they’re making us buy the baby oil.” Laughter AND clapter.
The closing argument was truly impassioned, including denunciation of exploitation of the needy and the hungry, which drew so much applause it was interrupting Jon’s righteous oratory, so he cried out (in a nice way): “I’m not done! Ya bastards!”
That led him to finally pull up that concealed fist, so blood-splattered it elicited gasps.
Jon Stewart injured his hand on The Daily Show Monday night after smashing a mug on his desk. #DOGE #thedailyshow pic.twitter.com/5bQV1mMnYP
— LateNighter (@latenightercom) February 25, 2025
But Stewart had more: a prescription for what the Democrats should be doing: Appearing every day at 5 pm, live on Facebook with “The People’s Audit.”
But only if voiced by a younger congress member, “Anybody that doesn’t sound like they’re complaining why there’s no more frozen yogurt at the cafeteria in The Villages.” (Another photo of Chuck Schumer.)
Stewart literally put himself in the middle of this cause, framing it as needing something “to anchor our hopes.” It just needed a new acronym for a new age.
He spelled it out M-A-N-G-I-O-N…
“Ah, no vigilantes!” he pleaded.
This was obviously a show Jon Stewart really cared about, it was extra long, 43 minutes, and the guest was a woman he much admires, Rupa Bhattacharyya, who administered funds appropriated for victims of the 9/11 attacks, and who could speak to the folly of indiscriminately firing important federal employees.
Stewart clearly poured his heart into this one, as well as several vials worth of blood.
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