Jon Stewart's "Rally to Restore Sanity" took place in Washington, D.C., on Saturday, and although this column was written before the event, it is safe to say that the rally failed to accomplish its purpose: Sanity is far from us, and Americans are missing the joke.

More than 1,000 people applied for press passes to cover the event and its satirical counterdemo, Stewart pal Stephen Colbert's rally to "Keep The Fear Alive." I appreciate the serious message underlying the humor of the events. But satire on a large attention-demanding scale can signal that a culture is nearing the endgame.

In the end, only 400 members of "the press" were credentialed -- still a staggering number for what was, essentially, a fraternity stunt -- but when the dominating news event of the final weekend before a crucial election is staged by Comedy Central, the line between politics and parody has been blurred. A similar blur was in effect for right-wing radio head Glenn Beck's "Restoring Honor" rally in August, where it was difficult to tell whether the oafish Beck was dedicated to rebuilding America or simply engaging in a bit of demagogic audience pandering. A lot of us are having trouble making those distinctions as the 2010 campaign slouches toward Tuesday.

Part of the cognitive dissonance stems from the rapid transformation of the media environment from dominance by the few, the proud and the arrogant -- by which I mean the top dogs of the mainstream media who used to hold sway -- to the swarms of digital diggers seeking a unique close-up view of every event. The crowd that once filled the square has stopped listening to the podium and gone off looking for a brawl. The Big Dogs may offer their own takes on the Stewart/Colbert Carnival, but the ultimate meaning of the event is more likely to be decided by the blogger on the street than the news anchor in the studio (with his or her head in the clouds).

This is why a beleaguered Barack Obama gave Stewart a humor-light interview (seen by almost 3 million) on the eve of an election in which he is likely to lose his remaining clout in Congress. For a liberal president, going on "The Daily Show" is the modern way to take off your tie at the rib joint -- a way of signaling that you may be about to have your agenda shredded but that you still have a common touch. Yes, hope is back. Because after Tuesday, hope may be all that is left. Helping keep comedy alive now, liberal blog queen Arianna Huffington tried to serve as a humor handmaiden to Stewart by chartering 200 buses to yesterday's rally, which aimed to eclipse Beck's attendance numbers and needed a boost from Arianna's Lib Line.

As media influence shifts from the weary Fourth Estate to the freewheeling and feisty "Fifth Estate," as the new, decentralized media world has been dubbed, the public may be informed faster and more fully. But we are in a netherworld at the moment -- not in Walter Cronkite's world anymore, but not fully in Deadspin World.

Deadspin is the charming name of the online site that gave the world pictures -- so it claims -- of one part of Vikings quarterback Brett Favre that has not yet been sprained. The story was an uncomfortable one for the squeamish mainstream, which ignored the nasty details and avoided the risk of enraging a star athlete by asking awkward questions, until a New York City tabloid went rogue and popped the primness bubble. You may argue that the tawdry spectacle was unworthy of being dignified by the press, but the NFL has harassment policies that required the strangely silent Favre to answer questions he has not offered to discuss in public.

How do you ignore that?

If Deadspin had been around, Marilyn Monroe's happy-birthday serenade to John F. Kennedy might have been understood more fully at the time. But you can go too far: Deadspin is owned by Gawker, the gossip site that reported last week that Celebrity Abstainer Christine O'Donnell, the Tea Party Senate candidate from Delaware, had a drunken grope session with an anonymous cad in 2007. The National Organization for Women condemned Gawker's decision to buy the jerk's Chris-and-Tell story, and most media thinkers ripped it, too, with the New York Times' David Carr calling it (on his blog) "one more step down the road to clickable perdition."

"Clickable perdition" may be where we are headed, but not because of naughty gossip. But perhaps because the biggest gathering at a time of national dissension and economic decline is little more than an inside joke staged by cable comedians who command presidential appearances and archly pretend to speak to the nation.

Nothing is very funny about it.

Nick Coleman is at nickcolemanmn@gmail.com.