Cult satirist Stewart retires from 'Daily Show'

Not even Barack Obama wants to see him go. But after informing and entertaining American viewers for 16 years, Jon Stewart will present his final episode of "The Daily Show" on August 6.

The content and guests on the last program on Comedy Central are a closely guarded secret, but it is scheduled to last an hour, twice as long as normal.
 
"Let me make something clear, I'm not dying," joked Stewart last week as fans wondered how they could follow a new presidential race without him slamming the candidates four nights a week.
 
The native New Yorker, 52, funny, pitiless and firmly left of center, is a unique voice in American broadcasting, and one that intersects politics, journalism and entertainment.
 
"The Daily Show" rakes over the day's news, political headlines and oddities to poke fun and make serious points, often mocking the sensationalist coverage of television networks, such as Fox News and CNN. Guests are normally submitted to a barrage of questions.
 
It is watched by around 1.3 million Americans a day, and hundreds of thousands of others watch online, particularly the young who are disenchanted with politics and don't watch TV news.    

Some see Stewart as a rock in times of crisis. "The comic who became a conscience," wrote the Daily News on Monday. "Why John Stewart might be irreplaceable," headlined Variety magazine.
 
He was there after the September 11, 2001 attacks, incapable of holding back tears and asking viewers: "Are you OK?"  

When George W. Bush was first elected president in 2000, he renamed the controversial recount in Florida, "Indecision 2000."  

His criticism of the war in Iraq -- almost alone in the media at the time -- fanned doubts about the 2003...