| The Daily Show With Jon Stewart | Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c | |||
| Exclusive - Tim Pawlenty Extended Interview | ||||
| ||||
Daily Show interviews tend to appear in three broad categories. The first is when Stewart gets a lefty on and pretty much throws softball questions. That can be interesting enough, like when he got the President last year, or interviewed French finance minister Christine Lagard, though I'll admit every interview Obama gives is a pale shadow of his 2006 appearance on Wait Wait Don't Tell Me. The second is when he gets someone from the right who is just not nearly as intelligent as he is and tears them to shreds. That utterly bores me.
Pawlenty's interview is the third type: when Stewart hooks a conservative of wit and intelligence and other virtues. They're clearly operating on the same level here, a sort of collegiate debate that's stifiled by Ivy League emotional baggage (Stewart went to William & Mary, Pawlenty attended the University of Minnesota). Pawlenty calls Stewart on a couple of things and tries to bring down some of his loftier rhetoric and tries to stick to the issues. He's good-humored throughout and not strident or dumb enough to think he's going to find any campaign volunteers in the audience of the Daily Show, but he comes across as someone it would difficult to demagogue or paint as an extremist.
David Axelrod must have breathed a sigh of relief when he found out that no one is asking Tim Pawlenty what he thinks about Tuscon. The White House can wipe the floor with Sarah Palin. Tim Pawlenty would be a much tougher fight.