Jon Stewart to Meet The Press? If NBC News President Deborah Turness had her way, it would have happened.
According to New York Magazine, The NBC News executive held negotiations with The Daily Show host to make him, and not current moderator Chuck Todd, the successor to David Gregory on the Sunday affairs show.
Todd, who’s hosted the show for one month this coming Sunday, was named the host after Gregory’s dismal tenure as host of the Sunday political show, which bottomed out as they fell behind both ABC’s “This Week” and CBS’s “Face The Nation” in the ratings.
One New York Magazine source tells them NBC was ready and willing to offer Stewart virtually “anything” to take over as the show’s host.
While Stewart is not the traditional journalist in the sense Todd or Tim Russert were, Stewart has made himself known to be quite an effective interrogator, making the likes of Kathleen Sebelius and Nancy Pelosi look foolish in sit-downs on the Comedy Central show. (RELATED: Jon Stewart accuses Kathleen Sebelius of lying to him about Obamacare)
As noted by many media critics, Gregory was not nearly as effective an interviewer as Russert, who rarely gave his interviewees a pass in the hot seat during his 17-year tenure as host of the then-king of the Sunday morning affairs shows. (RELATED: Pelosi acts as if she is powerless in disaster ‘Daily Show’ appearance)
Earlier this year, Stewart’s fellow Comedy Central host and former Daily Show correspondent Stephen Colbert was named David Letterman’s successor, and is set to take over the CBS “Late Show” in 2015.