If you are feeling withdrawal after the first week of Jon Stewart’s two-week break from “The Daily Show,” then consider how you will feel after his run ends on Aug. 6.

As he explained on July 2 before vacation, he is off for two weeks only to come back for a three-week sprint to the finish. Ever since he announced in February that he was stepping down, many of us have wondered how our dysfunctional political and media culture will operate without the hard-hitting satire he has offered us for over 16 years. There is little doubt that Stewart has not just played a role as a powerful public intellectual able to critique the media and politicians when we need it most; he has also redefined satire in an era when most media and politics already seem like a farce.

Of course, not everyone loved Stewart. Obviously those who watch Fox News barely, if ever, did. He also came under fire from those on the left who felt he wasn’t effective enough in his satire, that he pulled punches, or even that he depended on the very system he mocked. According to Steve Almond in an influential essay in the Baffler, Stewart is a parasite of the dysfunction he mocks. But I consider the anti-Stewart crowd to fall largely into two camps: those that hate that he is telling the truth and making them look stupid, and those that hate that he is having fun while doing it.

The thing is, Stewart is stepping down at the top of his game. One could speculate endlessly on why he is deciding to end his era as host: He wants to go out on a high, spend more time with family, explore directing films, and so on. But as appealing as these explanations may be, they aren’t right. Stewart is stepping down because he is sick of following the depressing and dangerous politics of the Tea Party GOPers and he is tired of watching the way that Fox News sustains them.

In a set of interviews with Hadley Freeman for the Guardian in April, Stewart explained that one reason he wanted out was so he did not have to cover another election. He explains, “I’d covered an election four times, and it didn’t appear that there was going to be anything wildly different about this one.”

Well, you are thinking, who could have predicted 14 GOP candidates in the primaries or the fun of Donald Trump? Maybe now, you hope, he will regret leaving. But sadly, the answer is — no, no regrets: He saw this coming and is leaving anyway. He knew well that this election would be a circus. And he knew that if he stayed on as host he would be responsible for bringing a tight satirical edge to the insanity of the day. Most of all, he knew he would have to watch Fox News. And that idea was simply intolerable: “Watching these channels all day is incredibly depressing,” says Stewart. “I live in a constant state of depression. I think of us as turd miners. I put on my helmet, I go and mine turds, hopefully I don’t get turd lung disease.”

Is there any chance he would watch Fox News after stepping down as host? Stewart’s answer is an unequivocal “no way”: “Umm … All right, let’s say that it’s a nuclear winter, and I have been wandering, and there appears to be a flickering light through what appears to be a radioactive cloud and I think that light might be a food source that could help my family. I might glance at it for a moment until I realise, that’s Fox News, and then I shut it off.”

Could Stewart really be giving up his show due to Fox News fatigue? And if that is true, what does this say about political discourse in our nation? Does this mean Fox News won and Stewart gave up? I’d like to stay optimistic, but it’s time to take seriously the idea that Fox News killed the greatest satire show of our nation’s history.

Think about it; since Stewart started hosting his show Fox News has thrived—and it has thrived despite a constant, biting satirical show hosted by Stewart that consistently called out Fox News failures. During the run of Stewart as host of “The Daily Show,” Fox News has spun lies even more than ever. It also has more devout followers that are increasingly distanced from any fact-based reality known to humanity. Polls indicate that Fox News viewers are consistently swinging toward extremism that is hate-based and fact-averse.

Fox News viewers deny climate change, worship Chris Kyle and think the Confederate flag is a symbol of honor. They blame the murders of black youth on black youth rather than the actual people who kill them (but they aren’t racist). They hate immigrants and science and gay couples who want marriage rights. They blame everything on Obama and they are frightened by female sexuality. The only things they love are their guns, their delusions and their fear. Nothing Stewart ever said has made one bit of difference to them.