CULTURE: Stewart Bids Adieu to Rick Sanchez

Jon Stewart hasn't got Rick Sanchez's Rick's List to poke fun at anymore, but the Daily Show host showed some old clips while bidding the CNN anchor an almost-fond farewell. The host compared Sanchez—fired for calling Stewart a bigot and suggesting Jews control the media—to The Office's attention-seeking Michael Scott. "We weren't making fun of Rick Sanchez because of a slight to ethnicity," Stewart said. "We see him as a complex television character who is flawed but fascinating to watch every week."

As for his comments, "I'm not even sure Sanchez believes what he's saying," Stewart said, playing a couple of clips in which Sanchez denounced bigotry, including one in which he slammed a white supremacist running for office for refusing to talk to the "Jew media." Sanchez should "consider himself un-busted," Stewart said. Meanwhile, Sanchez's wife claimed on her Facebook page that Sanchez called Stewart to apologize and they had "a good talk," during which Stewart called Sanchez "thin-skinned," Gawker reports. She also noted that her hubby "deeply apologizes to anyone who was offended by his unintended comments."