Jon Stewart: 'Any idiot' could have seen Armstrong was lying

Jon Stewart: ‘Any idiot’ could have seen Armstrong was lying

By Meredith Blake

Jan. 16, 2013 12 AM PT

While the nation (or at least the news media) continues to reel from the news of Lance Armstrong’s confession to Oprah Winfrey, Jon Stewart thinks we’re all idiots for believing the cyclist’s claims in the first place – himself included.

On Tuesday’s installment of “The Daily Show,” Stewart raked the disgraced former Tour De France champion over the coals. He began by expressing his outrage over the dollar he spent on a rubber “Livestrong” bracelet that is now “somewhere in his house.” “Well, I think we all owe cancer an apology. Or is that not the lesson in all this?” he joked.

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Stewart also wondered what made Armstrong, who’s denied doping allegations for more than a decade, even in sworn depositions, finally come clean: “What entity is more powerful than Lady Justice?”

As we all know, the answer to that question is Oprah Winfrey, whose seemingly preternatural ability to wring the truth out of her guests forced Stewart to make a few embarrassing confessions of his own (“My iPod is only boy bands”).

With the benefit of hindsight, Stewart says Armstrong’s deception seems almost painfully obvious. “You can beat testicular cancer, you can win the Tour de France, but you can’t win the Tour de France seven times after beating testicular cancer,” he said, likening Armstrong to the Tooth Fairy – a myth that, in retrospect, makes very little sense.

“Frankly any idiot with half a brain should have been able to see Armstrong was lying,” Stewart declared, just before cutting to footage of him sympathetically interviewing the cyclist back in 2006.

“As good at interviewing as I am, I would not be surprised if Armstrong was also [sleeping with] David Petraeus,” he joked, a self-deprecating reference to his famously oblivious conversation with Paula Broadwell.

Stewart wrapped up with a look forward: How will Armstrong get his way back into the good graces of the nation? One thing he shouldn’t do, according to Stewart, is testify against other dopers. “America doesn’t really like liars, but they love a snitch,” he said.

ALSO:

Oprah says she’s “satisfied” with Armstrong’s answers

Lance Armstrong picks wrong way to come clean

Jon Stewart on Paula Broadwell interview: “I’m the worst journalist”

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