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Marketplace Scratch Pad

Jon Stewart, Take 2

Scott Jagow Mar 10, 2009

The battle of the comedy networks rolls on. On the Daily Show last night, Jon Stewart continued his rant against CNBC. He said no one from CNBC has agreed to come on the show, but Jim Cramer wrote an article claiming Stewart took his comments about Bear Stearns out of context. Mistake.

Here’s what the thin-skinned Cramer wrote for MainStreet.com:

“I did tell an emailer that his deposit in his account at Bear Stearns was safe, but through a clever sound bite, Stewart, and subsequently (New York Times columnist Frank Rich) — neither of whom have bothered to listen to the context of the pulled quote — pass off the notion of account safety as an out-and-out buy recommendation.”

Uh, Stewart bothered to listen. He found a clip from 11 days earlier, where Cramer said he wasn’t quitting on Bear Stearns stock at $69 a share:

“Of course, while Cramer wasn’t giving up on Bear at 69, 11 days later, the stock market was more comfortable with it at two.”

It gets worse, but I’ll just let you watch the clip below. I think this Gawker column has it correct — CNBC would rather be talked about than right.

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