NRO Newsletters . . . Morning Jolt . . . with Jim Geraghty
September 24, 2012
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| Here's your Monday Morning Jolt. Enjoy! |
| 1. Should the Public Be Hearing about the Diary Contents of a Slain Ambassador? CNN obtained a personal journal that belonged to the slain American ambassador to Libya, Christopher Stevens, and broadcast reports based on its contents against the wishes of the Stevens family, according to relatives and State Department officials who were asked to intervene by the family. CNN obtained the journal in Benghazi, where Mr. Stevens and three other Americans were killed in an attack by militants on the American consulate in the city on Sept. 11. It wasn't clear exactly how CNN obtained the ambassador's writings. By finding and using Mr. Stevens's personal handwritten thoughts, CNN provoked an unusually sharp condemnation from top officials at the State Department, who called the network's conduct "disgusting." "Not a proud moment in CNN's history," said Philippe Reines, senior adviser to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. A CNN representative said in a statement issued late Saturday in response to the criticism that the news organization did not initially report on the existence of a journal "out of respect for the family, but we felt there were issues raised in the journal which required full reporting." Ann Althouse wonders if the family is being used by the State Department to help keep damaging information out of the public's eye: I'm glad CNN did this. The State Department -- it's obvious, isn't it? -- wanted to suppress this information, and CNN got it out. This is a major international event, and I don't accept privatizing it. Yes, there is a grieving family, but the State Department, which calls CNN "disgusting," is hiding behind that family. That's disgusting. But at Hot Air, Jazz Shaw disagrees: If there were information in there critical to national security and of value to the public, the proper route would have been to simply allow State to handle the pages and determine how much to give out at a press briefing, hopefully respecting the wishes of the family. In this case, I think there is still a line of decency which professional journalists should observe. And in this case, it was crossed. Here's the crux of the issue: At least one part of the ambassador's diary entry strikes me as extremely newsworthy: "In that broadcast on Wednesday, Mr. Cooper said the ambassador was worried about security threats in Benghazi and said he believed he was on an al Qaeda hit list. As the Wall Street Journal notes, "Mr. Stevens's purported concerns about his safety came as questions were raised by the Obama administration's congressional critics and others about the adequacy of security in the area." The line from the government was that the security was sufficient, or that no one could have foreseen an attack at a relatively lightly-guarded consulate on September 11. The diary of Stevens proves otherwise. |
2. Media Starting to Notice that Obama Loves Those Fluff Interviews "Meet The Press" host David Gregory turned his bully pulpit on President Barack Obama this morning, reminding viewers that the president has yet to take him up on a "longstanding invitation" for an interview, two weeks after Mitt Romney sat down with Gregory at campaign headquarters in Boston. Sunday show hosts put this kind of pressure on Mitt Romney earlier in the campaign cycle. Fox News Sunday's Chris Wallace would even count the days since Romney's last appearance. But he also put pressure on Obama today, admonishing the president for appearing on The View while not meeting with world leaders. "He has time for Whoopi Goldberg, but he doesn't have time for world leaders?" Wallace asked. It's the sort of mounting pressure that, depending on how the campaign plays out, could force Obama to make a Sunday show appearance before the election -- though not necessarily with Gregory or Wallace. Wallace's question went to former White House press secretary Robert Gibbs, who . . . well, take a look at how he handled the exchange: He tried to turn the tables on Wallace, saying that if Obama was doing an interview with him instead of the ladies of "The View," Wallace would "probably have no problem with that." (Wallace used that opportunity to point out that the President hasn't even done an interview with him, "but that's not the point.") The former Obama administration official said that he has "no problem" with the President's decision not to meet with foreign leaders in lieu of appearing on "The View" because he will still be "actively involved" in the conference. By actively involved, Gibbs means the President will merely be giving a speech during the international affair, Wallace pointed out. Gibbs explained that even though the President himself would not be meeting with world leaders, other qualified administration officials would be taking meetings on his behalf. "Well, look Chris, I think that we have schedules, leaders have schedules, and in many cases those schedules aren't going to overlap," Gibbs claimed. "But understand that Ambassador Rice will be seeing many people and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will be seeing people." He also tried to put the incident in a broader context, saying that, "This isn't just about one meeting on one particular day in New York. The President's actively involved and engaged in the most dangerous place in the world every single day of the week." Awkward phrasing there, since it makes it sound like Obama is in "the most dangerous place in the world every single day of the week." And if he really is that actively involved and engaged, it apparently isn't with an in-person intelligence briefing. Maybe he feels like he's heard it all before; as Michael Lewis wrote in his "Obama's Way" profile in Vanity Fair: "After a quick breakfast and a glance at the newspapers -- most of which he's already read on his iPad -- he reviews his daily security briefing. When he first became president he often was surprised by the secret news; now he seldom is. 'Maybe once a month.'" |
3. The Pre-Debate Spin: Our Guy Can Barely Speak, Their Guy Is the Reincarnation of Cicero
The first debate is October 3, and you know what that means: It's time for each side to hype up the skills of the opposition and downplay their own guy's skills, in an attempt to manage expectations.
Thankfully, Robert Gibbs is about as believable in this role as he was in his last role, as White House press secretary. A senior Obama campaign adviser said Mitt Romney has a leg up on President Barack Obama in the upcoming presidential debates. "Mitt Romney I think has an advantage, because he's been through 20 of these debates in the primaries over the last year," Gibbs said Sunday on Fox News. "Having been through this much more recently than President Obama, I think he starts with an advantage," Gibbs said. On Air Force One on Monday, Obama campaign press secretary Jen Psaki claimed Romney was doing more preparation for the debates "than any candidate in modern history." "They've made clear that his performing well is a make-or-break piece for their campaign," Psaki said of the Romney team's efforts. The blogger Scared Monkeys can't take it anymore: "Gibbs actually said with a straight face that Romney has the advantage over Obama in the debates because he had previously participated in many debates in the GOP primary. The Political Wire has called it the quote of the day. Please, spare us the BS. Obama is a master campaigner and BS'er. Also, how can anyone be considered a favorite when they will have the liberal corrupt MSM complex moderator against them?" Here's what Obama does well: He connects with audiences emotionally and his body language is reassuring. As we've mentioned, his message -- government will do X, Y, and Z for you -- is an easier sell. I still remember pundits doing cartwheels over his statement that health care was a "right," not a "privilege." Of course, nobody pays for your other rights. You don't get a government-provided printing press, television state, firearm, or house to refuse to quarter troops in, etc. It's one of those lines that sounds delightful to the low-information voters who don't want to think too hard about how you pay for it, or even how that care can be provided in a country already facing a worsening doctor shortage. When Obama gets cornered on an issue where the facts are tough for him, he just lies, i.e., "'Fast and Furious' didn't start on my watch," "All you've done is send China our jobs," etc. If there's anything we've learned this cycle, it's that nobody cares what the fact-checkers write in their columns a day later. Obama probably has a slight edge in the debates, but I wouldn't be surprised to see Romney do well. The GOP nominee really excels when he does his homework, like when he pointed out that Gingrich has the same investments in Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac that were the centerpiece of his attacks on Romney. (Thus, all of the lengthy preparation. Maybe he's hoping to be his own fact-checker, correcting Obama's lies in real-time.) And he attacks well, as Gingrich noted recently: Newt Gingrich on Friday urged Mitt Romney to go after President Barack Obama in next month's debates with a gusto the former House speaker knows well. "When he walks in to debate Obama, he's got to be as tough with Obama as he was with me in Florida," Gingrich said in an interview on CNN's "Piers Morgan Tonight." After all, Gingrich said, Romney "is not in a competition to be likeable." "He's in a competition to be capable," Gingrich said. "We need somebody who can turn America around. We need him to convince us that a Romney recovery is better than an Obama stagnation. Unless he can do that, I don't care how much effort they spend trying to make him likeable -- it won't work. |
4. Addendum
I admire the honesty in CNN's Jim Acosta as he contemplates his Redskins' loss: "Not that I'm making excuses, but the Skins were without [receiver Pierre] Garcon and [linebacker Brian] Orakpo . . . two key playmakers . . . Okay, I'm making excuses." |
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