Often, the "Daily Show with Jon Stewart" ties in a comedy segment to the guest. Canada was the running theme, but Stewart didn't give it away during the interview.
The show was discussing Israel and Palestine, and in the comedy part, "disclosed" that the true Promised Land was Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. If only.
In the comedy bit, Halifax has plenty of snow on the ground and magically has mountains … in September.
Then again, Halifax may have been chosen because of the H-sound (Challahfax vs. Halalifax) and the irony of Canada being a peaceful nation. "You can't even get along in Nova Scotia; it's the most polite part of Canada," Stewart said to John Oliver (Israel) and Aasif Mandvi (Palestine).
Stewart's interview guest was former Michigan Governor Jennifer Granholm, who is Canadian-born. Granholm was born in Vancouver and her family moved to California when she was 4.
Canada was not mentioned in the interview portion that aired on Comedy Central. You can check out the full interview online.
Late in the third and last segment, Gov. Granholm discusses why more cars are built in Ontario, Canada than Michigan, and cites significantly lower health care costs and that businesses don't have to worry about them. She didn't tie-in her one-time Canadian roots, and honestly has more of an impression of this battle from being Michigan's governor.
In addition to airing on Comedy Central in the United States, the "Daily Show with Jon Stewart" airs at 11 pm Eastern on the Comedy Channel and Midnight local time on CTV (12:30 am in Newfoundland and Labrador).
Last night's Daily Show had a spot of fun with gay marriage, now that gays and lesbians can get married in New York. The married duo of Samantha Bee and Jason Jones interviewed brand new married couples and pointed out the stereotypical bad elements that straight people have had to deal with in marriage. Of course, Bee and Jones are Canadian, which got us to thinking about how the growing ability for American gays and lesbians to get married at home will affect Canada.
Turns out some Canadians are concerned as well, since American couples were traveling to Canada to get married. And now more of them don't need a passport to get married. CBC Radio's "The World This Weekend" reported on Montréal's desire to get the couples to honeymoon in Montréal even if they don't have the ceremony up north.
If you are going to honeymoon in a place where the marriage is legal, Canada is still an awesome place to go. Very tolerant, cosmopolitan in places such as Montréal and Toronto, but also with plenty of wilderness if that is your desire.
Having more states embrace gay marriage is going to reduce the desire to travel to Canada for the ceremony and honeymoon. But few states in the Western U.S. allow gay marriage, so Vancouver, Victoria, Calgary, Edmonton, and much more offer close-to-home options for those who want to get married. And even if Canada loses in the exchange, we all win.
After having attended a lecture this week on the significance of Canada being the #1 supplier of oil to the United States, imagine the lovely coincidence of the Daily Show taking on that same topic.
Reporter Wyatt Cenac went to Alberta, treating the oil-rich country as if it belonged in the Middle East.
Trusting his "reporter" instincts, Cenac went to the one true place to get reaction to his "theory" that Canadians hate Americans: the parking lot of a Tim Horton's.
The answers as to why Canadians "hate" Americans centered mostly around hockey, and how American cities stole NHL teams from Canada.
A Leafs fan asks Cenac if he was a hockey fan. Cenac said, "No, I'm an American."
Cenac interviewed two Canadian refugees, who turned out to be Jason Jones and Samantha Bee, reporters on The Daily Show. They slipped in shy, awkward Canadians from Toronto, acting as if they had barely heard of The Daily Show. Jones muttered "Go Leafs Go" in his best Toronto accent.
As we noted earlier this year, when gas prices were climbing, "Canada exports 2.5 million barrels per day to the United States — more gas than any other country that supplies the U.S." True, Saudi Arabia is #2 but Canada is still top of the list.
And as I learned this week, the United States is the logical beneficiary of the oil sands (tar sands to some) in Alberta. It's easier and cheaper for Canada to have pipelines that take the oil into its own country as well as the U.S.
Cenac finishes his "tribute" to Canadian stereotypes by sort of singing "O Canada" while driving a Zamboni.
The Daily Show with Jon Stewart airs Monday-Thursday on the Comedy Channel and CTV in Canada and Comedy Central in the United States.
The Daily Show (and the Colbert Report) didn't report on Canada's election, but The Daily Show did talk about a dark, unpopular element of the Canadian economy.
Aasif Mandvi reported from a small Quebec town just north and east of Montréal and its struggles to continue to export a product synonymous with the name of the town: Asbestos.
The town wants to expand an underground mine to extract more asbestos. Now in the United States, you might be asking why there would be a market for asbestos. The workers at Ground Zero after 9/11 were subject to asbestos exposure. And asbestos is strongly linked to mesothelioma and lung cancer.
Mandvi, who was born in India, gets to the "punch line": India is buying that asbestos. The show also played a clip from a CBC documentary "Asbestos: Canada's Ugly Secret" showing Indian workers wearing bandannas over their noses and mouths while working with asbestos.
There isn't a whole lot of humor in the story: asbestos is a difficult subject to find humor. The story made a strong connection between 1st World countries exporting dangerous materials to other parts of the world. And this isn't just about asbestos and Canada. The United States exports a lot of cigarettes to the rest of the world.
The Quebec economy is not in great shape, but this doesn't give them the right to deal in this substance. Yet, as long as places such as India think it's okay, Quebec's argument is that some place will produce the asbestos, and why not Quebec.
So it took all the way to Thursday before Jon Stewart even mentioned that Canada's government had fallen. And it took the presence of a Canadian to bring the subject into the light.
Norm McDonald was on the program on Thursday to promote his new program "Sports Show with Norm McDonald." The conversation wasn't serious, but McDonald summed it up that in the U.S., it matters who you vote for because the president blow things up and has a red phone. In Canada, people vote for based on building bridges.
The discussion got a little silly, and it wasn't filled with Canadian stereotypes.
McDonald grew up as an anglophone in Quebec City.
"The Daily Show with Jon Stewart" airs in Canada weeknights at 11p on Comedy Channel and midnight on CTV.
A Canadian got to sit in Jon Stewart's chair of "The Daily Show" last night.
Was it Samantha Bee? Jason Jones? The ghost of Peter Jennings?
No, the lucky person in the chair that kicked off Thursday's Daily Show was 16-year-old Justin Bieber, of the pop singer Justin Bieber. Bieber was born in London, Ontario and grew up in Stratford, Ontario.
Stewart and Bieber had a parody of the "Freaky Friday" type movies where they switch bodies. So Bieber did the intro, then Stewart came out (as Bieber). Shortly thereafter, Stewart regained the host chair.
You could tell that Stewart was someone else because he had a New York Yankees hat on when regular viewers know Stewart is a Mets fan.
While Bieber spent the most time of any Canadian in the host chair, technically, he was the second Canadian ever to sit in that chair.
On October 1, 2008, Kristen Schaal, Samantha Bee, and Stewart played off a marvelous setup that mocked the John McCain/Sarah Palin/Hillary Clinton saga in the 2008 campaign. Along with Foreign Affairs' Gideon Rose, they had a lovely time focusing on who would be hosting the show paralleling the political moment of the time.
At the end of the segment, Bee — a Canadian — ends up in the chair, but not for long.
There have been a few times in the 12 years where there was a pinch-hitter for Stewart: Stephen Colbert (before he got the Colbert Report) and Rob Corddry (both Americans). But no Canadian has still held the chair for longer than a couple of minutes.
The current mark goes to Bieber, who was 4 when Stewart took over for Craig Kilborn in 1999.
The Daily Show with Jon Stewart airs in Canada on the Comedy Channel at 11 pm Eastern and on CTV at 12:05 am local time.
Anchor babies — seems an odd name for what is supposed to be illegal immigrants giving birth to children in the United States.
The right-wing faction's proposed repeal of the 14th Amendment — one that says if you're born in the United States, you're an American citizen — is meant to deal with this situation.
Of course, the implication is centered on Mexico and people of Mexican descent. But as the "Daily Show" notes, this could also apply to Canadians.
Jon Stewart sent Jason Jones down to Chula Vista, CA on the U.S.-Mexico border to report on this story. In the story, Jones talks about how it's horrible that these people come to the U.S. and have children.
Stewart points out that Jones and his wife, Samantha Bee (also a TDS correspondent) are Canadian, and they are about to have their third child, all born in the United States.
"It's a giant scheme. Me, [expletive] Rick Moranis, Marty Short, we're all spitting out Canadian terror babies like watermelon seeds. So in 20 years, they can overthrow America and make it, I don't know, more polite."
The Daily Show deals in such irony all the time. Nice to see Canada gets a nod in the immigration debate, similar to our take on SB1070, even if it relies on the stereotypes on how friendly Canadians are.
"My offspring will bury you, Stewart, with kindness and respect," Jones says to Stewart.
The Daily Show with Jon Stewart airs Monday-Thursday nights on Comedy Central in the United States and the Comedy Channel and CTV in Canada.
Wrapping up the G20 coverage from Toronto requires a look back to see how others reacted as well. The Daily Show's take agreed with our impressions that deficit-cutting, while noble, seems hasty given the economic situations in the major world powers, especially the United States.
The Daily Show was critical of the protests without spotlighting the innocent victims as this video (below) notes.
This looks bad. Yet how many MSM outlets will talk about this side of the G20 protests?
One souvenir, besides a lot of amazing memories, from the 2010 Vancouver Olympics is a pair of red mittens. The official Vancouver Olympics mittens are quite a nice item. I personally have seen two different pairs of mittens in person.
So if you are inspired to buy a pair of these mittens, you would think it would be pretty easy to get a pair. But apparently, having the Olympics to inspire you to get a pair means it's just about too late. Well, at least to get them at $10.
If you were smart enough to buy them before hand, you could have bought a bunch of them, again for $10. Now, well, that is a different story.
This link is from the official site where you can buy the mittens. Except that you can't buy them anymore.
People who have been watching the Olympics, who would grab the opportunity to get them, are out of luck.
This Google search for shopping for the red mittens shows a number of them available on eBay. You can even buy used mittens for $15 or $25.
Still, it would have been nice to have them legitimately available through the whole Olympic Games.
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A few people have asked me which country I was rooting for in the men's hockey gold medal game — Canada or the United States.
Nobody asked me about the countless other sports in the Olympics, not even women's hockey where the U.S. team was expected to be in the gold medal game. Only men's hockey counted in their minds.
I noted the classic sports phrase, "There's no cheering in the press box."
You could argue that journalists root for a good story, and a 14th gold medal for Canada, and a win on its home soil in the most important sport in the country is a good story.
But figure it this way: if the United States had won, sure there would have been a celebration of some merit. The celebration might have even lasted a few days, but shortly after the winning goal was scored, most Americans would have forgotten there even was a gold medal game until 2014, and hardly even then.
As Canada won, the celebration was visible in Vancouver and not as visible across the country. This is a victory that will be remembered by most Canadians until they die.
No matter which country anyone rooted for, the game was still decided on the ice. And Sidney Crosby, who hadn't scored a point for Canada since the Germany game, had the only shootout goal against Switzerland, and the game winner in the gold medal game against the United States.
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Vancouver celebrated the end of the Olympics, and of course, the gold medal men's hockey win for Canada. But in true Canadian fashion, they handled it well. They were out en masse in the crowd, but they were reasonably well-behaved.
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There were a lot of eyeballs tuning into the men's hockey gold medal game. In the United States, the game was the most watched hockey game in 30 years, drawing 27.6 million viewers. In Canada, with 1/10th the population of the U.S., the TV audience averaged 16.6 million viewers, 26.5 million Canadians watched at least part of the game.
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NBC took a lot of criticism for its decision to dump out of the Closing Ceremony to show a new program and the local news. Paying for the right to carry the Olympics allows for certain privileges, but there should be certain responsibilities. NBC wouldn't dump out of a NFL game with a hour to go, and say we'll carry the rest of it later.
The criticism would have been lighter if the network made it clear what it was doing. All you saw were updates on the screen that a show was coming up. No major announcement, and no expectation that they were going to leave before the show was over.
My beef was that they should have covered the entire ceremony (including the Martin Short part), and not talked over parts of it, (like the Alanis Morissette song). If you have to run the whole thing in the middle of the night, so be it. If NBC can't cover the whole ceremony, then let someone do so.
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Stephen Colbert took one more look at Canada, Vancouver, and the Winter Olympics on Monday. Colbert had a brief interview with his Quebecois persona Stephane Colbert, mocked the Closing Ceremony part where they reinforced the stereotypes the world knows of Canada, e.g., giant inflatable beavers.
Then, we literally went back out to Vancouver where Colbert interviewed Vancouver native Michael Bublé. In the interview, Colbert asked Bublé about why Canada is significant.
Bublé got in some good digs defending his native country: "We're a wonderful distinct nation of people from all different cultures. We're humble, we have a great self-depreciating sense of humor, and we're sexy, as you can see (playing to the crowd)."
Colbert wanted to know why Americans need Canada. "You need our flag to tape on your suitcase when you travel."
Colbert mocked Canadian contribution to music as Men without Hats and Corey Hart, who sang "Sunglasses at Night."
Colbert and Bublé finished with a singing duet of the words to O Canada to the tune of the Star Spangled Banner.
Jon Stewart made a final joke on "The Daily Show" relating to the bets between politicians. Stewart joked that he had made a bet with Vancouver mayor Gregor Robertson over the men's hockey gold medal game. The joke was that if the U.S. won, Robertson would ship a case of maple syrup to Stewart. If Canada won, Stewart would send Robertson "a hundred million dollars." But as Stewart joked, the joke was on Robertson because that would be American dollars.
The Daily Show with Jon Stewart airs in Canada on the Comedy Channel at 11 pm Eastern and CTV at midnight. Colbert Report airs 30 minutes later on both outlets.
Canada just had its best medal day so far in the 2010 Winter Olympics. The latest gold and silver went to women's bobsleigh teams. Kaillie Humphries and Heather Moyse won gold with a total time of 3:32.28. Coming in .85 seconds later was Helen Upperton and Shelley-Ann Brown at 3:33.13.
The Canadian women's 3000 meters skating relay team won a silver medal with a time of 4:09.137. China set a world record at 4:06.610.
The ladies who brought silver to Team Canada were Jessica Gregg, Kalyna Roberge, Marianne St. Gelais, and Tania Vicent. St. Gelais' name should be familiar because she already won a silver medal in the 500 meters in Short Track Speed Skating.
Clara Hughes won bronze in the women's 5000 meters skating with a time of 6:55.73, just 4.82 seconds from gold. Hughes finished 2.91 seconds ahead of fourth place.
Canada is resting comfortably in fourth place in the overall standings with 15 medals, 7 gold. And we still have curling and hockey medals to come.
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Canada vs. U.S. — all the hype went to Sunday's preliminary in men's hockey. But it should have been in women's hockey as the two neighboring countries battle for gold this afternoon at Canada Hockey Place. They have been drawing consistently over 16,000 at the NHL arena to see the Canadian women. And there should be a fever pitch for this game. If I were in Vancouver, I would want to be at this game.
The absolute best in the world playing for gold — just as it should be. CTV should be bringing the game in Canada while the American viewer gets to settle for MSNBC, available in most places only in SD. Game gets underway at 6:30 pm Eastern/3:30 pm in Vancouver.
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Do you believe in non-miraculous comebacks that don't pertain to 1980? Perhaps. Canada snaps a 50-year string in beating Russia in Olympic hockey, crushing the Russians 7-3 in quarterfinal action. This was the second major 50-year string broken in this tournament — you may recall that the U.S. snapped a 50-year streak in edging out Canada.
That loss to the United States may be what the Canadian men needed to get them to refocus. Everything came together for Team Canada last night. Corey Perry (Anaheim Ducks) had two second period goals. But what really shined was the production of lesser known but still good hockey players. Dan Boyle (San Jose Sharks) had a goal, two assists, and a nice skirmish at the end of the game with Russia's Alexander Semin.
Semin had come after Boyle with a cheap shot toward the end of the game, and Boyle took him down right afterwards. Canada proved it would be just as physical as Russia was.
Brenden Morrow (Dallas Stars) capped off the first period scoring with a persistent goal, his first goal of the tournament. Morrow countered Russia's first goal and retained the three-goal lead at the end of the first period.
I haven't mentioned the names Sidney Crosby and Alex Ovechkin. The only mention on the scoresheet was Ovechkin serving a too many men penalty on Russia. Russia needed Ovechkin more than Canada needs Crosby. And Crosby helped out his teammates, though he had a 0 mark, while Ovechkin had a -2 (you get a point in this system if you are on the ice when your team scores. Boyle and Perry had +3 on the night.).
Canada came together as a team and played its best game of the tournament at just the right time. Roberto Luongo stopped 25 of 28 shots. Canada outshot Russia 42-28.
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The final four in men's hockey: United States (1), Finland (4), Canada (6), and Slovakia (7). The top seeds won in the U.S.-Finland bracket, the bottom seeds won in the other bracket. Switzerland, Czech Republic, Russia, and Sweden are all very good teams, but none of them will play for a medal in 2010.
The winners will play for gold on Sunday at 3:15 pm. Losers play for bronze on Saturday at 10 pm.
NBC actually carried the entire U.S.-Switzerland game on the over-the-air network, alas but still tape-delayed it for Mountain and Pacific time zone viewers (as well as Alaska and Hawai'i). Hard to believe that in 2010 that you would have to carry the Olympics that way. This is way Canadian TV does it so much better.
NBC has vowed to carry the U.S.-Finland game live on Friday to all time zones. MSNBC, in boring SD, carries the bronze game while NBC carries the gold medal game. If Canada and the U.S. play for gold, look for a lot of hype.
It has also been fun to see how the U.S. and Canada's presence has affected television. The two countries' success has steered when they will play, within the actual times. The United States-Finland game airs at 3 pm, while Canada-Slovakia airs at 9:30 pm.
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The last two games have seen four men's hockey games as that sport heats up. CTV and TSN has been able to cover each game. But despite the fact that NBC paid hundreds of millions for covering the Olympics, they couldn't quite carry all the games.
So the last two nights, the one game from UBC Thunderbird Arena has had CTV/TSN announcers Peter Loubardias and Ray Ferraro on NBC. If you wondered why there was numerous gaps of silence going in and coming out, it's a matter of synchronization of the two feeds.
Loubardias and Ferraro likely knew the teams better, and did back-to-back games with the Czech Republic — in a win over Latvia and a loss to Finland. Canada has a better sense of Europe than the United States does, especially from a TV standpoint.
Loubardias normally broadcasts Calgary Flames games; Ferraro, a former NHL star, works for TSN, usually with Chris Cuthbert.
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Day 3 of Vancouverage of the "Colbert Report" focused on Colbert being the assistant sports psychologist for the speedskating team, which is how Colbert got into Vancouver in the first place.
In the outdoor segments, Colbert asked Mike Eruzione one question and also interviewed aerial skiers Jeret "Speedy" Peterson and Ryan St. Onge.
The show got incredibly sunny weather for the segments, belying Vancouver's cloudy and rainy reputation. The outdoor segments might be the best publicity for Vancouver the city receives in the 16-day period.
The sister show, "The Daily Show with Jon Stewart," touched on the "problems" with the Vancouver Olympics in its second segment last night. John Hodgman did a piece on changes to make, though the changes had little to do with what happened in Vancouver.
