Stewart blasts Fox for cutting off Obama-GOP debate

Comedy Central's Jon Stewart hammered Fox News -- again -- Monday night for cutting off debate between President Barack Obama and House Republicans last week.

"We're going to cut away," Stewart said, mocking Fox, "because this is against the narrative we present."

On Friday, weaving between pleas for bipartisanship and direct criticism of GOP politicking, the president took Republicans to task for voting against last year's stimulus package and then attending "ribbon cuttings" for projects funded by it.

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"A lot of you have gone to ribbon cuttings for the same projects that you voted against," Obama said. "I say all this not to re-litigate the past, but it's simply to state, the component parts of the recovery act are consistent with what many of you say are important things to do."

Obama touched repeatedly on the theme that, in opposing his policies, Republicans at times oppose things that are in line with their ideology. Among those things, Obama argued, are his proposed fee on banks and a freeze on discretionary spending.

"Join me" in passing the spending freeze, Obama asked the GOP, adding there's "nothing in this proposal that runs contrary to the ideological predisposition of this caucus."

On the proposed bank fee, designed to recoup some of the money the US government lost in bailing out the banks in 2008, Obama told House Minority Leader John Boehner: "If you listen to the American people, John, they’ll tell you they want their money back."

And in very frank language, Obama warned the GOP they are painting themselves into a political corner by using strong rhetoric in opposing White House ideas.

"If the way these issues are being presented by the Republicans is that this is some wild-eyed plot to impose huge government in every aspect of our lives, what happens is you guys don't have a lot of room to negotiate with me," the president said. "The fact is that many of you, if you voted with the administration on something, are politically vulnerable with your own base in your own party. You've given yourselves very little room to work in a bipartisan fashion because what you've told your constituents is this guy is doing all kinds of crazy stuff that's gonna destroy America."

Read Raw's coverage of Fox's cut-off here