As you may well be sick of seeing me assert here, I think the smartest, cleverest show currently on television is The Daily Show With Jon Stewart. In the past, I have directed many of you to the Comedy Central website to view clips from the show…which I do despite the fact that said site is difficult to navigate and filled with banner ads that try to leave invasive cookies on your computer. It's also not easy to link to specific clips. When the site was shut for a while the other day, I hoped they were installing a new, more user-friendly layout but it was not to be. The main change they made seems to have been to switch most of their online videos from Real Player format to Windows Media Files…and it's still awkward to get to a clip and hard for me to send you directly there.
Nonetheless, I recommend making the effort for several clips from The Daily Show and its show-within-a-show election coverage, which they call "Indecision 2004." Many of the segments featured on this page are "web only" features, including a couple of pretty funny Lewis Black tirades you'll see nowhere else. A lot of so-called "real" news people seem to be increasingly uncomfy with the sentiment that a satire/spoof news show does a better job of covering things than they do. But in some ways, it's true.
Speaking of Lewis Black…one of the funniest things I've seen on TV in the last few weeks was his diatribe against government officials who want to criminalize the use of "certain words" on the airwaves. I can't figure out an easy way to link directly to it so go to this page and view the clip entitled "F.C.C. Crackdown." It's worth the trip.