MONDAY, OCTOBER 10, 2016
And no, it wasn't Fox: As always, we were struck by pundit reaction to last night's debate.
This morning, we were struck by Mika's most overwrought meltdown to date. She scolded Republicans who withdrew their support for Trump over the weekend, angrily declaring, again and again, that they were "spineless."
Mika's work is routinely incoherent. This morning, the level of anger at those "spineless" folk combined with the incoherence to create a very strange brew on our strangest "cable news" program.
Last night, we were equally struck by MSNBC's programming post-debate. More specifically, we were struck by the massive amount of time the fiery liberal channel devoted to Trump spokespersons.
The debate ended shortly after 10:30 PM Eastern. At 10:45, Brian and Rachel brought on Trump campaign chairman Kellyanne Fitzpatrick, their first post-debate guest.
Conway was interviewed, without commercial interruption, for the next twenty minutes. Making matters worse, she was interviewed by Chris Matthews, who seemed incapable of challenging her representations in any serious way.
By 10:52, Conway was citing Megan Twohey's appalling "news report" in last Monday's New York Times. We warned you about that report all last week. Career players knew not to do so.
Conway's segment went on and on, and then it went on and on. When her twenty-minute infomercial was finally done, she was thanked by Rachel Maddow for being such a "good sport." Most amazingly, Chuck Todd then offered an unsolicited judgment:
Conway is "a very good person," Todd very weirdly said.
Conway ran nonstop from roughly 10:45 to roughly 11:05. At 11:08, James Carville came on to offer a view of the debate from the Clinton side.
Carville was interviewed for three or four minutes. At 11:15, on came the terminally deranged Rudy Giuliani for six more minutes of pro-Trump pivots and rants.
Matthews' fawning to Conway to the side, the allotment of time was remarkable. We'll assume this was a decision from "corporate," a decision with which all the overpaid children of course complied.
Matthews' obsequious interview of his fellow you-know-what seemed to come from a late-1990s time capsule. At that time, Matthews was the most demagogic of all "cable news" Clinton/Gore/Clinton-haters. In accordance with Hard Corporate Pundit Law, that part of Matthews' history is simply never mentioned at all. Last night, he made us recall his astonishing work from that era, work which cannot be discussed.
(At roughly 12:11, Maddow weirdly asserted that the wondrous Matthews "has always been the same person" down through the years. It was a very strange thing to say about Matthews. We know of no one on "cable news" who has been so thoroughly reinvented over the past twenty years.)
Back to the basic question! What explains the strange distribution of MSNBC's time post-debate? We'll assume the order came from corporate. Tomorrow, we'll try to bring you some transcript excerpts from Matthews' performance with Conway. We'll definitely show you what she said about that ridiculous "news report" in the Times.
Kellyanne is East Coast Irish Catholic from the Philly area too. At one point, she reminded Chris of this tribal fact as her filibuster infomercial ran on, and on and on.
Still coming today about pundit behavior: Yes, Hillary Clinton actually was talking about Spielberg's Lincoln film! Predictably, exactly none of your cable pundits seemed to know that last night.
Also, who is Eric Levitz? And why should this question matter?
Today on both CNN and Sirius POTUS show, they were talking about how credible Juanita Broaddrick's story is. Joseph Cannon says this:
ReplyDelete"Younger folks won't know that her story is not new and that the public rejected Broaddrick's credibility when her claims were first aired. Yes, there is video of her weeping as she describes the horrors allegedly inflicted upon her. Tawana Brawley emitted enough moisture out of her eyes to end the California drought. If you know where to look, you can find video of women weeping as they recount being abducted by the UFO people.
We're all going to have to get over the collective delusion that women never lie and that tears are truth.
For background, you should first turn to the all-important Conason/Lyons book The Hunting of a President; the relevant excerpt should be available to you here." link: https://books.google.com/books?id=tIEqNExC7_4C&pg=PA62&lpg=PA62&dq=hunting+of+a+president+conason+lyons+Juanita+Broaddrick&source=bl&ots=yBLvAVM2HQ&sig=bbaFxYk1bSk-OogaAPyWHcUToJo&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjEgMyNg87PAhWC8z4KHRDJCAAQ6AEIaTAL#v=onepage&q=hunting%20of%20a%20president%20conason%20lyons%20Juanita%20Broaddrick&f=false
No one has mentioned that she refused to repeat her accusations under oath, when questioned by Starr's investigation. In fact, no one ever mentions any of the problems with the various accusers. Just their accusations get reported.
It is nice that people are loathe to hold Hillary responsible for her husband's actions, but it would be better if reporters told the public that many (if not most and possibly all) of those accusations are untrue.
It aides Trump every time a reporter or pundit is mealy mouthed about this.
I don't see the support for your statement that Broaddrick refused to repeat her allegations under oath in the Starr investigation. That's an important point, if true. Where do you get that statement?
DeleteFrom Wikipedia:
Delete"In the fall of 1997, Paula Jones’s private investigators tried to talk to Broaddrick at her home, also secretly taping the conversation.[11] Broaddrick refused to discuss the incident, saying “it was just a horrible horrible thing,” and that she “wouldn’t relive it for anything.”[12] The investigators told her she would likely be subpoenaed if she would not talk to them. Broaddrick said she would deny everything, saying “you can’t get to him, and I’m not going to ruin my good name to do it… there’s just absolutely no way anyone can get to him, he’s just too vicious.”[12] Broaddrick was subpoenaed in the Jones suit soon after and submitted an affidavit denying that Clinton had made “any sexual advances”.[1][2] The recording of Broaddrick’s conversation with the investigators was leaked to the press, but Broaddrick continued to refuse to speak to reporters.[11]"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juanita_Broaddrick
Read down to where it talks about Public Disclosure.
Looks like it was the Paula Jones investigation, not Starr. Later it says Starr looked at the case but decided it was not relevant to his investigation so didn't pursue it.
DeleteI tend to think that the Clintons have been subjected to a lot of BS, but I read the Wikipedia entry as not particularly helpful to Bill Clinton regarding Juanita Broaddrick. It's really much different than Broaddrick refusing to repeat her allegations under oath to the Starr investigators.
DeleteIf someone refuses to repeat their allegations under oath (no matter whose investigation), and flatly says the allegations are false and she will deny them, that makes her unreliable.
DeleteIt doesn't make her more believable to call Clinton names like vicious as an excuse for not being willing to testify. It makes it appear she doesn't want to create a record that she can later be sued or prosecuted for. A person accused has the right to get those accusations on the record and to defend himself. Her implication that she wouldn't testify because he was "vicious" and she feared reprisals doesn't explain why she wouldn't testify when offered immunity, nor is there any evidence he or anyone else was going after such women in any way that would inhibit their testimony.
Being unwilling to testify in the Jones case isn't different than the Starr investigation. But how does it hurt Clinton that Starr considered her testimony irrelevant?
FWIW; http://www.politicususa.com/2016/10/09/sworn-affidavit-juanita-broaddrick-denies-allegations.html
DeleteThat would be the Spielberg who willfully falsified history on Connecticut's 13th Amdt vote. Some "historian."
ReplyDeleteLincoln's public and private opinions on race also differed. That isn't Spielberg's opinion but a conflict between his public statements and his private letters.
DeleteSuch distinctions are beyond this troll's comprehension.
Delete