News is what the audience makes it, as well as what the news media wants it to be. Young people are going for news tempered by irony. The Daily Show continues to capture eyeballs.

And a recent Pew Center survey found that one in five young Americans turns to late night comedic programs like "The Daily Show" for campaign news, just behind newspapers. "We talk a lot about young people being disengaged from politics," said Paul Mitchell, 34, political director for EdVoice, a Sacramento-based education advocacy group. "They are tuning in, they're just not using the same tools and means their parents did," he said. "They may not be able to tell the difference between Tom Brokaw and Walter Cronkite, but they have these URLs saved on their computers and they're engaging that way."

From the SacBee