Jon Stewart hasn't changed, and that's the problem. As far as his comedy, no notes. He's undeniably funny. But his politics just leave a sour taste. His enlightened centrist voice of reason shtick hits different now.
He's defended people like Rogan and Chapelle. And I get it, they're his buddies. He doesn't see them as public figures, but as flawed individuals. And that's a valid perspective, just a rarefied one.
His first guest upon his return was the editor of The Economist magazine who gushed about Reaganomics and Thatcherism. She framed the rise of right-wing politics in the West as first and foremost a threat to the neoliberal world order as Jon nodded along. And we all know that progressiveism is just the other side of the horseshoe to people who think this way.
I'll be watching Stewart, and I really do admire him. But never meet your heroes I guess.
I think in the age of one-liners (Twitter, tik tok, etc) people have gotten so fucking stupid that they have lost their ability to digest a nuanced take. If it takes more than two sentences for a fox news host to say any liberal position is 100% and perfectly undeniably the worst thing in the world, they're "going woke" (the brain-dead MAGA catch-all for any position they don't like but can't actually articulate why). If a liberal merely explains in good faith a right wing position that they're going to argue against, they're "enlightened centerists" (the brain dead left wing catch-all for any discussion that isn't ** immediately** a shrill cry of fascism)
To be extremely clear, Jon is still the smartest guy in the room, and it's just that you've gotten a lot dumber in the last 10 years on your diet of twitter.
A whole lot of people lack critical thinking skills and only half of them vote GOP.