Context: "The man filmed casually eating a salad as everyone else ducked for cover after shots rang out at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner is speaking out. CAA Agent Michael Glantz told TMZ that he never felt unsafe at the event, and remained seated and eating because he wanted to see how law enforcement responded. 'Not every day you see something like that go down,' he said. Glantz was at the dinner because he is CNN anchor Wolf Blitzer’s agent."
I love that his name sounds like it means a quick look — glance — but he's the one who wanted to maintain a steady gaze.
I do think this posting should say that this interview took place last July. Posting it relates to the shooting of Renee Good, but when Blitzer and Jeffries spoke, the incident had not yet occurred:
Democrats were told to be "willing to get shot" to obstruct President Trump, and instead of condemning it, they incited it further.
"You just can't... tell me that you sitting down with Elon Musk for 3 hours and then compare that to like Wolf Blitzer with all his graphics behind him talking for 30 seconds before he goes to a pharmaceutical commercial and then coming back and having the dumbest left winger yell at the dumbest right winger. Really? And you guys are going to act like you're the grownups in the room? It's just, it's too ridiculous.... So the entire young generation has, they've all turned that off.... None of them are getting their news from from CNN anymore. And look man, that's I think the most beautiful part of this election
is that mainstream media's dead.... I don't think [CNN has] a show that regularly cracks a million views....."
Said Dave Smith to Joe Rogan (actually the words "mainstream media's dead" are inserted by Joe):
"The news media in the eyes of many Americans is discredited. More than half the country have tuned out the mainstream media. We are now in little information silos, so it's almost impossible to overstate how much Donald Trump has defeated the system and how favorable the current composition of the system is for Donald Trump."
Did Swan even consider that mainstream media could be the "little information silos" and people are breaking out?
I'm not recommending that you read that article. I'm just showing you what's out there — the idea that a person with a great reputation must abandon Trump. The target of such a message is buttered up — what a great reputation you have — for the purpose of delivering the message that he's going to lose it if he doesn't quit his job. The reader isn't supposed to think about whether the author ever admired the target or would give a damn about him if he abandoned Trump. One suspects that if Huntsman quit at this point, the new message wouldn't be anything positive about Huntsman, but gloating about how no one wants to be associated with Trump and Trump is so despicable that he's nearly entirely isolated now and ought to resign or be impeached.
But I just want to show you what Jon Huntsman said in the GOP debate on September 12, 2011. This is something I ran across yesterday as I was surveying the use of the word "treason" in public discourse over the last 13 years (searching my own archive). The moderator, Wolf Blitzer, had already already asked Governor Rick Perry if he'd stand by something he'd said about the Chairman of the Federal Reserve, Ben Bernanke. Perry — who'd said that it was "almost treacherous – or treasonous" to do quantitative easing in the run-up to the election — answered, "if you are allowing the Federal Reserve to be used for political purposes, that it would be almost treasonous." So the word "treason" was already in the discourse of the debate.
Blitzer then got the audience to boo by making Perry affirm that he has supported in-state college tuition for people in the country illegally. Blitzer then brought in Huntsman, reminding him that he'd supported "driving privileges to illegal immigrants." Huntsman answered:
Well, first of all, let me say for Rick to say that you can't secure the border I think is pretty much a treasonous comment.
Perry hadn't said we can't secure the border. He'd only said that building a wall across the southern border was "just not reality." Perry said the answer was more law enforcement personnel but Huntsman jumped at the opportunity to make Perry look as though he didn't believe the border could be secured, and then, later in the debate, when the question was how to treat people who'd made it across the border, Huntsman returned to the issue of Perry and border security and lobbed the word "treasonous."
The top of the page says "March 21, 2003," and CNN says "'Shock and Awe' under way." I transcribe Wolf Blitzer saying "In 30 years, I've never seen anything like this on live television." (Click images — twice — to enlarge.)
On Fox News, Jim Angle says "someone is going to get hurt" — the hope was it would be Saddam Hussein:
Shep Smith waxed poetic about "white flashes... peppering the night air" (because pepper is white):
"And I think the first indication [of the reaction in the room] was the Wolf Blitzer joke, which to me was more tongue in cheek than anything else, you know? I think it came off harsher than how I had initially intended it. It seemed like a hard comment, but I really meant it more roasty. Because I saw all of this as a roast, really. Like, in other words, I have nothing against Wolf Blitzer. He’s a nice guy. I’m just giving my observation on that. And just trying to be snarky about it, but it came across pretty cold-blooded."
More at the link, including discussion of why he addressed President Obama with the n-word: "Usually that’s something we only do behind closed doors. But to do it in public, I thought, would be a strong way to end. And I knew it would be controversial and I was ready to accept the fallout from it."
ADDED: The bit about Wolf Blitzer was: "Speaking of drones, how is Wolf Blitzer still on television? Ask a follow-up question. Hey, Wolf, I’m ready to project tonight’s winner: Anyone that isn’t watching 'The Situation Room.'"
Blitzer didn't think up the term on his own. He had a tweet from Rupert Murdoch: "Ben and Candy Carson terrific. What about a real black President who can properly address the racial divide?"
How did Carson do? Of course, he maintained his utterly unchangeable calm demeanor. Carson's answers included: 1. Murdoch is entitled to his opinion, 2. I don't want to talk about it, 3. It's just "semantics," 4. I don't like political correctness, 5. Obama is the president and he is black, and 6. Murdock was trying to say that a "real black President" would be someone who "really elevated the black community," and Obama hasn't done that.
#6 is the substantive answer, but it's carefully attributed to Murdock. Blitzer, for all his dogged re-questioning, failed to ask the substantive question. I think Blitzer was focused on trying to trap Carson into embracing the concept that of being a "real" black and denying Obama that status (which harkens back to the old "Is Obama black enough?" debate of the 2008 campaign).
Blitzer could have taken the inquiry in a more substantive direction and asked: Do you think that people voted for Obama because they were inspired by the idea of having a black President and that idea meant something important about what would happen as a result of having a black President, something that has not occurred? If yes, do you think that idea still has meaning and that the effect could occur if we had a different black President or do you think it was delusional and people should get beyond attributing meaning to the race of the President?
BLITZER: Back in the '80s... you voted for legislation that had a pathway to citizenship for illegal immigrants... Some called it amnesty then; they still call it amnesty now. What would you do if you were President of the United States, with these millions of illegal immigrants, many of whom have been in this country for a long time?
GINGRICH: Let me start and just say I think that we ought to have an H-1 visa that goes with every graduate degree in math, science and engineering so that people stay here. You know, about five blocks down the street, you'll see a statue of Einstein. Einstein came here as an immigrant. So let's be clear how much the United States has drawn upon the world to be richer, better and more inclusive.
I did vote for the Simpson-Mazzoli Act. Ronald Reagan, in his diary, says he signed it -- and we were supposed to have 300,000 people get amnesty. There were 3 million. But he signed it because we were going to get two things in return. We were going to get control of the border and we were going to get a guest worker program with employer enforcement.
We got neither. So I think you've got to deal with this as a comprehensive approach that starts with controlling the border.... I believe ultimately you have to find some system -- once you've put every piece in place, which includes the guest worker program, you need something like a World War II Selective Service Board that, frankly, reviews the people who are here.
If you're here -- if you've come here recently, you have no ties to this country, you ought to go home. period. If you've been here 25 years and you got three kids and two grandkids, you've been paying taxes and obeying the law, you belong to a local church, I don't think we're going to separate you from your family, uproot you forcefully and kick you out.
The Creeble Foundation is a very good red card program that says you get to be legal, but you don't get a pass to citizenship. And so there's a way to ultimately end up with a country where there's no more illegality, but you haven't automatically given amnesty to anyone.
Bachmann is called upon to respond. (Blitzer did a great job last night of creating mini-one-on-one debates within the debate.) She said it was amnesty and she worried about the vast numbers of people who would be able to take advantage of the program. Gingrich then got the floor again:
GINGRICH: Well, I mean, two things, first of all, in the DREAM Act, the one part that I like is the one which allows people who came here with their parents to join the U.S. military, which they could have done if they were back home, and if they serve on it with the U.S. military to acquire citizenship, which is something any foreigner can do.
And I don't see any reason to punish somebody who came here at three years of age, but who wants to serve the United States of America. I specifically did not say we'd make the 11 million people legal.
I do suggest if you go back to your district, and you find people who have been here 25 years and have two generations of family and have been paying taxes and are in a local church, as somebody who believes strongly in family, you'll have a hard time explaining why that particular subset is being broken up and forced to leave, given the fact that they've been law-abiding citizens for 25 years.
Blitzer then called on Bachmann, who, despite what Gingrich just said he "specifically did not say," says "I think the speaker just said that that would make 11 people -- 11 million people who are here illegally now legal." That one-on-one really highlighted Gingrich's superior intelligence and sophistication. Clearly, Gingrich has the ability to reach out to many Americans who feel empathy toward the people who are in the county illegally and to take a middle position that balances a large set of interests. I like that, but obviously the red-meat fans have something to complain about. He put some vegetables on their dish.
Paul's 2008 campaign manager, Kent Snyder, went through a strikingly similar experience to Blitzer's hypothetical one, dying of complications from viral pneumonia just two weeks after Paul ended his presidential bid. Snyder was uninsured, so family and friends were forced to raise funds to cover his $400,000 in medical bills. Their efforts included setting up a website soliciting contributions from Paul supporters.
The episode reflects what Paul himself argued should be the free-market ideal for health insurance policy. During Monday night's GOP primary debate, the libertarian Republican made the case that health insurance coverage was a choice. If one decided to forgo it, he ran the risk of mounting bills. If a patient was on his deathbed, it wasn't the taxpayers' responsibility to pick up that tab.
"I practiced medicine before we had Medicaid in the early 1960s when I got out of medical school. I practiced at Santa Rosa hospital in San Antonia, and the churches took care of them," Paul said. "We never turned anybody away from the hospital. And we've given up on this whole concept that we might take care of ourselves and assume responsibility for ourselves, our neighbors, our friends, our churches would do it. This whole idea -- that's the reason the cost is so high. The cost is so high because they dump it on the government, it becomes a bureaucracy."
As Stein notes, people have been paying way more attention to the unseen idiots in the audience who shouted "yes" when Blitzer asked if we should let that guy die than to Paul's answer. And the fact is, Paul's answer is brilliantly stated. I'm not saying I agree with Paul, but what an articulate response!
Blitzer's question was designed to make Paul look heartless and extreme and unrealistic, and Paul flipped it, perfectly. Which is, I think, why the media would like to pay more attention to the yes-shouting jerks in the audience.
1. If the president is reelected, do you want to serve a second term as secretary of state?
2. Would you like to serve as secretary of defense?
3. Would you like to be vice president of the United States?
4. Would you like to be president of the United States?
Expanding on the 4th option, I will fictionally channel the mind of Hillary Clinton with respect to the interesting question, question 4, as she justifies answering "no" if in fact she does plan to run:
You know, this question of wanting or liking to be President... I don't think one should ever want such an awesome responsibility. One always hopes that there is some far greater, far more experienced woman or man who will take on the overwhelming responsibilities of the presidency. It's not about liking to be President. The Presidency is a profound duty, never to be undertaken for personal satisfaction. What I would like would be for Barack Obama to measure up to the trust the American people have put in him. That is what I want. But if, for whatever reason, the American people desire a change — and Wolf, it is what the American people want that is essential here — and if the American people turn to me, because I am the most able, best experienced person to move into the role of President, I would not turn away from them. By the grace of God, I would endeavor to serve them.
The Nobel Prize reference is to Paul Krugman. If you want something about the Obama Nobel Prize, there's this:
Obama won the Nobel Peace Prize. A lot of his critics didn't think he deserved to win the Nobel Peace Prize, but he's got a shot now at showing the world he does deserve it by what he could be doing in the Middle East and North Africa. Is he on a track to winning the Nobel Peace Prize again...? What do you think?
Again? These guys are taking bets on whether Obama is gearing up to win the Nobel Peace Prize again? I mean you can arguably say that the world's imploding because of Obama. The stabilizing force of the world has always been the United States of America, but nobody fears us. There's no respect or fear of the United States, and he doesn't project any abject respect and love for this country. These guys are speculating on whether he's qualified to win a second one?
3. "I'm more comfortable with Fox," say I, after watching CNN for a while and then switching.
4. Oh, CNN is better. Better graphics. Lots of people saying things. Annoying much of the time, but more detail. Mary Matalin enthusing about Portman winning in Ohio, a state Obama won.
9. It's so sad for the Democrats. They gave us so many things. Gifts. Expensive gifts. That we didn't want. That they bought with our money.
10. Tim Kaine blabs on and on, making a happy face. Eventually, Wolf Blitzer cuts hims off with "It's going to be a long night for you.
11. CNN's music for tonight is the same (or just close) to what was used in the HBO John Adams series. It's about the Framers, no? As the Tea Party clinches it.
12. Drudge says: "REPUBLICANS WIN SENATE SEATS: AL, FL, GA, IN, OH, KY, MO, NH, SC... DEMS WIN: CT, DE, MD... TOO CLOSE TO CALL: PA, IL..." Hey, what happened to California? Earlier he was calling it for Boxer.
13. Manchin. "Huge win" for the Democrats, says Wolf Blitzer, about the hot West Virginia race.
14. The GOP takes the House. It's outside of the margin of error, says NBC. Pelosi is gone. Ding dong. [UPDATE: Now MSNBC is calling that "a mistake." MSNBC is awful.]
15. NBC says Wisconsin is "too close to call," as the polls close.
16. Rand Paul victory speech: "I have a message! A message from the people of Kentucky! A message that is loud and clear and does not mince words! We've come to take our government back!"
17. MSNBC is hilarious. They're near meltdown. Rand Paul will destroy America. The Republicans "salivate at the thought" of worldwide economic collapse.
18. O'Donnell conceding. Very cheerful. Chirpy. I listened to Marco Rubio's victory speech a few minutes ago, which was, by contrast, very mellow.
19. Scott Walker has, it seems, won the Governorship here in Wisconsin. That's supposed to mean — that must mean — no to the high-speed train boondoggle. Also in Wisconsin, Russ Feingold is way behind.
20. Feingold has lost, quite decisively. I'm sorry to see him go. He's a good man. But I should admit that I voted against him. I had to vote for the Party of No.
21. Geraldine Ferraro and Sarah Palin appear side-by-side on Fox News, analyzing the elections, denouncing sexism, and then ending on this adorable, ultra-girlie note:
22. Screen shot:
23. I just thought that was amusing, the way YouTube inserted my face into the Fox News. By the way, did you notice, at the end of the clip, when Geraldine said she wanted to go on "Dancing with the Stars," Sarah said "I'll hook you up"?
24. John Boehner tears up talking about American values, which he's chased all his life. Then, talking about his business, he sobs. Keep it together, Boehnsy!
25. That got a little... weird. I hope Boehnsy is ready to lead. Anyway, here in Dane County, Feingold's campaign manager George Aldrich is not giving up: "Russ is down by 80,000 votes, but...up to 1.4 million votes haven’t been counted." None of the Madison votes were in when he said that: "We are confident that this race is going to tighten, it is going to tighten quickly, and we may be in for a long night here."
26. Charles Krauthammer on Fox News: "The Obama agenda is dead." The Democrats have retained the Senate, apparently, but, looking forward to 2012, they will, self-defensively, distance themselves from Obama — says the Kraut.
Quoting Bob Dylan, he said, "My heart is not weary, it's light and free, and I've got nothing but affection for those who have sailed with me."
It is not clear what he will do next, but Mr. Feingold, 57, told the crowd: "It's on to the next fight, it's on to the next battle, it's on to 2012 and it is on to our next adventure, forward." He raised his fist in the air and left the stage.
The Times misses that "Forward" is the state motto. And maybe that "fist in the air" was posing as the Wisconsin "Forward" statue.
28. Karl Rove exclaims that he's "exhausted." I was just saying he looked tired.
29. Speaking of tired, it's interesting that Harry Reid will be sticking around. There's something so dreary about him. Does his victory cheer Democrats? Or would they have had more fun kicking Sharron Angle around?
AND: You can really feel the disrespect for O'Donnell in that clip. Whether it's because she's a woman or not, I think it stirs something instinctive in many women. It's dangerous for men even to seem to give off the vibe that they're really saying: You don't really belong here, little lady. Hillary has often tried to get us to feel that vibe, and it's worked for her quite few times.
Here's the transcript of last night's show. Sample line: "If it looks like manure and smells like manure, it's either Wolf Blitzer or manure." Dad's a right-winger.
Oh, let's see what CNN thought about the show that called Wolf shit:
Through an unlikely combination of elements -- a popular Twitter site; CBS trying to be "hip" about social networking; the chance to work with "Will & Grace" producers David Kohan and Matt Mutchnick; William Shatner wanting to try something new -- "$#*! My Dad Says" boasts the new season's most annoying title and the sight of a wasted resource in Shatner.
He plays Ed, a grumpy coot who complains about anything and everything....
Shatner knows how to spoof himself, and in interviews, he's clever and self-aware. Exactly none of these qualities are in evidence on "$#*! My Dad Says." Ed is some combination of the too-clever-to-be-believed grousing father from Justin Halpern's Twitter feed plus Archie Bunker -- i.e., the sort of character that CBS' older demo won't find too frightening because he's a familiar type.
CBS' older demo... Is network loyalty still a concept? I've been hearing since the 1970s that older people watched CBS. But back then there were only 3 networks and lots of us didn't have remote controls. I would have thought that by now people knew how to change channels and find stuff — $#*! — they like and that they wouldn't even bother noticing what network it was.
AXELROD: Well, that's not -- that's not exactly what happened. The fact is that there was recruitment on the Harvard campus at the time that she was there. She maintained the policy that existed before she came there -- not allowing the career placement office ts -- to -- to host that. Because there was a policy relative to discrimination. When the law was passed and upheld banning that, then she changed the policy.
So she -- she tried to conform to the policy of the school, and the law. And yes, she expressed herself on the law. But she's always been very hospitable to military recruitment and to young people campus who wanted to serve their country. In fact, the irony of this discussion, Wolf, is her objection to the Don't Ask/Don't Tell law was she wanted everyone who wanted to serve their country -- every young person -- every young person who wants to serve the country to have that opportunity.
BLITZER: Because Jeff Sessions, the ranking Republican on the Judiciary Committee -- he's concerned. He says this is a significant issue he wants to discuss with her -- especially her -- her comments back in 2003 that the Pentagon's policy, in her words, was "A profound wrong. A moral injustice of the first order."
AXELROD: Well, again, I think her concern was that every young American who wants to serve their country should have that opportunity. But Senator Sessions should and will have that opportunity to discuss it with her. And I hope that he also talks to the young men and women from Harvard who have served in the military who -- who -- who came into contact with -- with Dean Kagan when she was there, and who got her full support. Because she is -- she -- she was very close to veterans on campus. And they were very supportive of her.
"That is not endemic to the kind of reforms that we are proposing... We're not into symbolic expedition here."
That really jumped out at me, from an interview with Wolf Blitzer, who asked Axelrod to explain why health care reform can't permit private insurers to sell their policies across state lines:
AXELROD: Because we are trying to do this in a way that advances the interests of consumers without creating such disruption that it makes it difficult to --
BLITZER: Why would that be disruptive if Blue Cross and Blue Shield or United Health Care or all these big insurance companies, they don't have to worry about just working in a state, they could just have the opportunity to compete in all 50 states.
AXELROD: But insurance is regulated at this time --
BLITZER: But you could change that --
AXELROD: State by state.
BLITZER: The president could propose a law changing that.
AXELROD: That is not endemic to the kind of reforms that we are proposing or that --
BLITZER: Why not, why not?
AXELROD: We're proposing a package that we believe will bring that stability and security to people, will help people get insurance, and will lower the cost impact and pass the Congress. And that has to be the test. We're not into symbolic expedition here.
What a strange way to talk. And what a good question from Blitzer.
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