Here are my initial impressions of the “interview” (I put that word in quotation marks, given the softball nature of “interviewer” Dana Bash’s questioning and the fact that it was taped, thus there is no way to know how much it was edited/revised before being aired) on CNN). (You can read the transcript by clicking here).
-Pleasantly asked questions. Far more friendly/accommodating than inquisitive/professional.
-Virtually no challenges or follow-ups when Harris said things that were palpably untrue (like claiming she never was against fracking and that the Biden administration created 800,000 manufacturing jobs; both demonstrable lies, and not the only ones).
-Inclusion of Tim Walz in what was supposed to be a one on one interview.
-Pitiful non-answers by Walz when asked whether he lied about his military service and about he and his wife’s IVF usage – as if anyone gives a damn. (Incidentally, the word “lie” is mine; it sure as you-know-what wasn’t uttered by Dana Bash). He answered neither question but was, of course, not pressed further on them.
-And not one question for either Harris or Walz about something that absolutely DOES mean something to voters: Walz’s multi-decade love affair with communist China (over 30 trips there, including his honeymoon) and his overt equation of socialism with “neighborliness”. Electing Kamala Harris might put a socialist – even a communist – a heartbeat away from the oval office, and that wasn’t important enough for Bash to ask about.
Overall evaluation: pathetic. And, I am guessing, seriously harmful to Harris/Walz.
Harris’s semi-coherent, platitudinal answers, along with both Harris’s and Walz’s lies, will provide rich material for the Trump campaign.
Doubt me? Let’s watch/listen to how they handle this interview over the next couple of days. That will tell the tale.
