Jon Stewart calls out Senator for CIA hacking hypocrisy

The moment that a notoriously pro-surveillance member of Congress spent nearly an hour excoriating the CIA for breaking into Senate computers, a Daily Show sketch became inevitable. Jon Stewart doesn’t disappoint. On Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), chair of the Intelligence Committee:

“What’s extraordinary about these accusations is they’re not coming from Senator Ron ‘ooh, privacy is important’ Wyden or Senator Rand ‘aah, don’t kill me with a flying robot’ Paul. They’re coming from Dianne ‘so, the NSA is looking at your data’ Feinstein.”

And on CIA director John Brennan’s pained protest that hacking Senate computers was “beyond the scope of reason”:

“Maybe you stole Congress’ computer files, maybe you didn’t. But ‘beyond the scope of reason?’ You all overthrew Iran and Chile, orchestrated the assassination of the first democratically elected prime minister of the Congo, wiretapped journalists and anti-war activists, carried out a mind-control experiment with LSD on prisoners, and then on Tuesday, you... I guess what I’m saying is, you’re very busy doing a lot of things, so maybe you didn’t steal the files because you were busy. And that’s what interns are for.”

The best reason to watch it, though, is that it’s actually a fantastic rundown of the whole story, from Bush-era torture practices to the CIA “assassinating data” and then blaming IT administrators. If you’re looking to chew through Feinstein’s long, dense presentation, it’s the best appetizer you could possibly get.