Craig List’s Stewart and Colbert as News Influencers

Can you imagine it? Your daily paper reading more like “Your Moment of Zen”? Or the Op-Ed page resembling “The Word”?

That’s what Craig Newmark, founder of the strangely fascinating Craigslist.com suggested to a group of newspaper publishers. Newmark spoke today at the annual convention of the Newspaper Association of America.

Newmark declared that The Daily Show and The Colbert Report were his two primary sources of news coverage, and lauded Stewart’s ability to juxtapose video clips of lobbyists, public officials, celebrities and the media, with contradicting, or otherwise clouded, talking points.

The response – as reported by the Associated Press – was not warm (I picture a group of J. Jonah Jamesons harrumphing around with shaking fists), though one publisher did admit that newspapers should inject more humor into their coverage, taking a lesson from the Stewarts and Colberts of the world.

Tonight on ‘The Daily Show’;

• Lee Gutkind

Tonight on ‘The Colbert Report’:

• Richard Preston