The Daily Show has unwittingly sparked the War On "The Battle For The War On Women" with that recent segment, in which it pointed out the hypocrisy of the Fox News Channel’s apparent refusal to recognize the Republican Party’s increasingly aggressive lady-parts lawmaking with the same alarmist zeal it's displayed while declaring lesser “wars” like those on Christmas. And as The Hollywood Reporter notes, some conservatives have once again sidestepped that issue completely to declare that Jon Stewart has declared war on Christianity by suggesting that women should get Fox’s attention by protecting “their reproductive organs from unwanted medical intrusions with vagina mangers,” all because the show illustrated that satirical premise with a photo of a nude woman with a small Nativity scene blocking her genitals. Not surprisingly, the very hint of mockery of a religious symbol became all that said conservative groups could focus on, a twist that would be ironic were it not well established that “irony” is nothing but a smart-assed liberal invention.


Among those who became enraged because that is their sole purpose: Brent Bozell of the Media Research Center and Catholic League president Bill Donohue, whose history of taking combined offense at even the slightest implication of Comedy Central mocking Christianity includes calling for a boycott of the network’s Jesus cartoon JC, which had not even aired at the time, and, in fact, didn’t make it past the pilot stage. Bozell and Donohue have both now called for a similar boycott of The Daily Show’s sponsors while also calling Stewart a “bigot” and “an outright coward,” the latter for not being “equally brave to offend Muslims and Jews.” This is because neither Bozell nor Donohue have seen the many episodes where jokes were made about Jews and Muslims, because their TiVos are only set to record programs with the keyword “Potential for Christian Outrage.”


But their outrage over the show not fostering equal-opportunity outrage—which is itself beside the segment’s point—is beside the point. Bozell and Donohue have threatened to “spend the money it takes to make this a nationwide issue,” while not only demanding that Stewart apologize for airing the photo, but challenging him with “If he’s such a daring political comedian, he should demonstrate his boldness by performing the same routine, but this time with a Koran and the Torah. Otherwise he is not only a bigot but also an outright coward.” Also, he'd be a shitty comedian, as not only would it be a lame callback, it wouldn’t have anything to do with the point he was making. And completely missing the point and not understanding how satire works is already Bozell and Donohue’s job.