Jon Stewart compares the Atlanta teacher cheating scandal to Wall Street, and isn't impressed

Jon Stewart isn&#039;t duly impressed with the Atlanta teacher cheating flap — (Image credit: The Daily Show)

Last week, a handful of teachers and school administrators in Atlanta were handed jail terms of up to seven years for fudging standardized test scores to improve their own numbers and thus their paychecks. The judge, Jerry Baxter, called the cheating scandal "like the sickest thing that's ever happened to this town." On Wednesday night's Daily Show, Jon Stewart is about as impressed with the crackdown as The Week's Scott Lemieux — which is to say not very.

Stewart compared the test cheating to the fraud in the mortgage sector that "nearly broke the earth" in 2008, and he found a lot of similarities — and one big difference: The eight former Atlanta educators are going to jail for changing test answers, and how many Wall Street bankers and mortgage officers are headed to prison? One. If that doesn't strike you as a bit unfair and possibly dangerous to America's financial health, watch Stewart try to convince you otherwise. —Peter Weber

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Peter has worked as a news and culture writer and editor at The Week since the site's launch in 2008. He covers politics, world affairs, religion and cultural currents. His journalism career began as a copy editor at a financial newswire and has included editorial positions at The New York Times Magazine, Facts on File, and Oregon State University.