If Our Savior is Jon Stewart, We Are Screwed

The New York Times describes how Jon Stewart pretty much single handedly saved the Zagoda from a Republican filibuster:

Did the bill pledging federal funds for the health care of 9/11 responders become law in the waning hours of the 111th Congress only because a comedian took it up as a personal cause?

And does that make that comedian, Jon Stewart — despite all his protestations that what he does has nothing to do with journalism — the modern-day equivalent of Edward R. Murrow?

Simply put, the policy here, medical care for 911 first responders, and the politics here, blocking medical care for 911 first responders would be seen unequivocally evil by the bulk of the American electorate, but somehow or other, the Democrats could not be bothered to hammer the Republicans with this, because, I guess, little Barry Obama doesn't want Republicans to think that he's mean.

This is something that Bill Clinton would have hammered every single day.

I do understand that it's tough to get the attention of the press on this, what with, as Stewart observes, "it’s not every day that Beatles songs come to iTunes," but this is absolutely pathetic.