When did being entertaining become an insult?

Michael Steele was forced last week to apologize for calling Rush Limbaugh an entertainer, after Steele made that comment on an entertainment-news program.  Keith Olbermann, who regularly features Limbaugh as one of his "worst persons in the world," has long referred to him derogatorily as "Comedian Rush Limbaugh."  And now we have Jim Cramer defending himself against an attack from "The Daily Show" by reminding everyone that Jon Stewart is just a comedian.

Fine: Limbaugh probably does strive to entertain his audience, as do Bill O'Reilly and Keith Olbermann -- otherwise they'd all just have news desks and straight-up reports with minimal graphics, and certainly no segments declaring people best or worst.  Jon Stewart has emphasized many, many times that the ultimate goal of "The Daily Show" is to entertain.  So it's certainly fair to call them entertainers.

What's not fair is using the term as an insult, or as a way of implying that what they're saying is less than true.  Making news and political commentary entertaining is not the same as lying.

Now, in Limbaugh's case, I certainly see many ways to argue that the man's information is poor, his research non-existent, his spin overwhelming, his attention to detail shoddy, and his world view terribly flawed.  None of that, however, relates directly to the presentation of his case.  Presentation -- whether through an informative discussion or a blast of angry ranting on the radio -- doesn't change the substance of the argument.  Just because they make their commentary fun doesn't make their commentary untrue.

Jon Stewart and Rush Limbaugh both make their money entertaining people by commenting on current events and politics.  To do this, they're both well-versed in what's happening in Washington and how things work there, and they both have staffs who are pretty good at tracking down specific instances to back up whatever case the boss wants to make that day.  People who attack either one as "just an entertainer" assume that their audience listens only to be entertained.  People who support either one assume that at least part of their audience listens in order to gain information.

Then there are those of us in the middle, who say, yes, they are entertainers, but that doesn't mean they're always wrong -- or at least it's not the reason they're wrong.  Let's take the most recent example.  Here's Stewart's Monday night piece about Cramer and CNBC:

Again, true, Jon Stewart does have a comedy show.  But that doesn't mean he's making things up.  In fact, if Stewart's only goal were to make people laugh, he could find much, much cheaper jokes than this.  For Stewart and staff to compile this clip-fest of Cramer takes time, and for Stewart to go on air and set up the clip also takes time.  Beyond that, it demands audience attention.  To attack Cramer is comedically expensive, because there's a fair amount of Stewart's usual audience who won't know who the guy is, and they all have to be let in on the joke just to get there.  It's far easier for Stewart to just write a quick, cheap piece making fun of, I don't know, did penguins do something funny yesterday?, without even trying to set up the joke with information; it's far cheaper to be solely an entertainer than to bridge the gap between information and comedy as Stewart does.

"The Daily Show" is allowed to make stuff up, but in this case (and many others), they haven't.  But it's more comfortable for someone like Jim Cramer to dismiss Stewart out of hand as an "entertainer," and therefore a liar, than to accept that his commentary is based on truth, and that his report is entertaining because the truth is often funnier than fiction.

Then again, maybe I'm having a hard time taking a dismissal of Jon Stewart's takedown as merely entertainment from a guy who seems to have made his career out of being the most outrageous thing on CNBC, which could be renamed the Circus National Broadcasting Channel without any danger of false advertising.

Have to wrap this up, now: "The Daily Show" is on.