Jon Stewart Explains the Arrest of Drug Kingpin El Chapo As Only He Can
Last night on The Daily Show, Jon Stewart decided to check in on “our neighbors to the south” – no, not the 51st street food market – Mexico. Over the weekend, infamous drug kingpin Joaquin Guzman, leader of one of the most dangerous and successful cartels in Mexico, was arrested. So Stewart broke down the arrest of the man called El Chapo.
First, some background information: there was a $7 million bounty out for Guzman, nobody knows his real birthday, he previously escaped prison in 2001, and he is "Public Enemy No. 1" according to the Chicago Crime Commission. The cartel he operated, arguably the most powerful in the world, provides roughly 25 percent of the total amount of illegal drugs that make their way into the United States from Mexico. The dude is serious business.
But not so serious is Guzman's nickname. As Stewart points out, "chapo" translates from Spanish to a) a short, stout person or b) corn porridge. "Kind of a weird name for a tough guy ... 'You know me, Corn Porridge, that's Jimmy Oatmeal'," Stewart quipped. And when you consider that by some estimates Guzman is responsible for more American deaths than Osama bin Laden, "Suddenly, Corn Porridge seems like an understated nickname ... It'd be like Hitler's friends called him 'Little Schnitzel'."
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But perhaps the most fun of fun facts about El Chapo is that he was ranked on Forbes' most recent list of the most powerful people in the world. "Really, Forbes? You got to put narcoterrorists on the most powerful people list now? ... Is [El Chapo's] publicist that much of a pain in the ass?" Stewart said.
And where does Guzman rank on Forbes' list? Right under Speaker of the House John Boehner, and just above Jill Abramson, executive editor of The New York Times. Stewart gets right to the absurdity of this ranking, imagining the three of them at a Forbes banquet together:
"Well, pleased to meet you, I'm the head of one of the notorious, corrupt, and vile institutions in all of North America." ... "Oh, well, it's nice to meet you too, I'm El Chapo."
Ya burnt, Boehner.
This article was originally published at http://www.thewire.com/entertainment/2014/02/jon-stewart-explains-arrest-drug-kingpin-el-chapo-only-he-can/358542/
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