Jon Stewart’s ‘Daily Show’ held a special place for Canadian viewers

Earlier this week, when Jon Stewart announced he was stepping down as host of “The Daily Show,” the news seemed to hit Canadians particularly hard.

Stewart’s “The Daily Show” has been Canada’s late night comedy of choice for many years. While it lags well behind its broadcast competitors in the U.S., it regularly outdraws “The Tonight Show” and every other late night talk show nationally in Canada by a wide margin.

Years ago, when Mike Bullard took his Canadian-made late night talk show from CTV to Global, CTV punished him by scheduling “The Daily Show” opposite. The import, which had an all-important five-minute head start, chased Bullard off the air in just over a month.

Even though he was reporting from New York, Stewart seemed to be aiming his humour across the border on many nights.

Canadian viewers loved when Rick Mercer would go “Talking to Americans,” exposing how little the average U.S. citizen knows “aboot” our country. Stewart’s nightly rants and reactions to the U.S. political scene stoked that same sense of smug superiority. We could laugh freely at Sarah Palin, for example, because she’d never be our leader.

Stewart had a savvy sense of his audience when he would perform in Canada.

“You’ll have to excuse my ignorance,” he said at a Massey Hall show in Toronto several years ago, “because I’m an American, and, as you know, ignorance is our game.”

He’d sometimes congratulate us on “Happy Thanksgiving, or whatever it is you are celebrating.”

When Stewart would mug outrageously in mock horror at America, we got it. So what if former U.S. president George W. Bush, in searching for weapons of mass destruction, invaded Iraq instead of Iran. “He was only one letter off,” said Stewart.

American imperialism and aggression won’t end there, he warned.

“You may be next. One day we might think Tim Horton is a terrorist and you’re done.”

Stewart’s keen sense of the ridiculous extended to Canada, especially when a target such as former Toronto mayor Rob Ford was placed in front of him. He knew an American-sized joke when he saw one.

With word of Stewart’s impending departure, Canadians anxiously await news of his successor. There can be, of course, only one logical replacement: a Canadian.

Toronto-born Samantha Bee has been with the show since 2003 and is its longest-serving “special correspondent.” Since anyone who follows Stewart would have big shoes to fill, pairing Bee with her husband and fellow “Daily Show” sniper Jason Jones as a new co-anchor duo makes a lot of sense.

The important thing is she already speaks Canadian.

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Bill Brioux is a freelance TV columnist based in Brampton, Ont.