Jon Stewart Talks About Eric Garner

Jon Stewart always knows the best thing to say even when he doesn't know what to say. Speaking about the Staten Island grand jury decided not to indict the police officer in the case of Eric Garner, an unarmed black man who was choked to death, Stewart is lost for words, but eloquent all the same. He admits that he doesn't know what to say, but then goes on to say exactly what we're all thinking, articulated just perfectly. He gives voice to the frustration we're all feeling right now, still in the wake of Ferguson, about what feels like the repetition of an action that seems entirely unjust in a system that feels inherently broken.

Stewart also gives credence to the one difference between the Ferguson disaster and Garner's case: that there is no ambiguity in what happened to Garner, as the entire incident was filmed (whereas, in the Ferguson case, there were conflicting eyewitness reports and debatable forensic evidence). Here are the best quotes from Jon Stewart's talk on Eric Garner:

1. "If comedy is tragedy plus time, I need more f***ing time."

2. "I think what is so utterly depressing is that none of the ambiguities that existed in the Ferguson case exist in the Staten Island case and yet the outcome is exactly the same. No crime, no trial; all harm, no foul."

3. "[Eric Garner was] not acting threatening and we know that, not through witness testimony or unreliable testimony, but because we are f***ing watching it. Someone taped it."

4. "We are definitely not living in a post-racial society and I can imagine there are a lot of people out there wondering how much of a society we're living in at all."

5. "ARGGGHHHHHH [BEEEEEEEPPPPPPP]!!!!!!"

Watch the whole thing below.