On Monday’s episode of “The Andrew Klavan Show,” Klavan talks about Fox News anchor Chris Wallace’s comment about Marie Yovanovitch’s testimony last Friday. Video and partial transcript below:
Fox News interviewer Chris Wallace made a truly disturbing comment after Friday’s impeachment kabuki. Former Ukrainian ambassador Marie Yovanovitch had been testifying how she felt her tenure was ended by a White House whispering campaign against her. Here was Wallace’s comment:
WALLACE: I think that if you are not moved, and we’ll have to wait and see what happens in the cross-examination, but if you are not moved by the testimony of Marie Yovanovitch today, you don’t have a pulse.
So what bothered me about this is that Wallace, a respected journalist, seemed to be submerging himself in the Democrat idea that these hearings are essentially a show or a movie — a story that will change voters’ minds, as stories change minds, with appealing characters and emotional moments governing where our sympathies lie. We know the Democrats are counting on this … a correspondent from the Democrat program, PBS NewsHour said, “I will say that Democrats are very focused on how to tell the story this week. And I’m told from Democrat aides that they wanted Marie Yovanovitch there because I’m told she cried in her testimony. This was her testimony behind closed doors, and they essentially want someone who’s going to be emotional to say, ‘I was a victim of the president.'”
Now, there’s nothing unexpected about scurvy Democrat politicians, who take our money and do absolutely nothing in return, staging what is essentially a campaign event paid for with public funds. That’s who they [are], that’s how they do. But there’s something absolutely irresponsible about a journalist of Wallace’s stature, essentially judging them by their own standards — reviewing their movie, as it were, instead of reporting the facts. After all, the Democrats are trying to impeach a duly elected president and have been hinting at doing that literally since before he was even elected. It’s not a show, it’s not a story, it’s a political power play that endangers our votes and therefore our freedom. Who cares if you’re moved, Chris? Really, who cares?
Democrats play this game all the time. The candidates dance, and drink beer, and skateboard and have dental work in public to show what great, regular folks they are, as if it were that and not their policies that mattered. Okay, it’s cheap politics. That’s fair enough, it’s like kissing babies. But is it our journalist’s job to watch them kiss babies and then report on how cute it is? I don’t think so.
This is not showbiz, this is real life. We’re not an audience; we’re voters. Show some respect for us and for you for the job you’re supposed to be doing. Stand above the Democrats’ storytelling and give us the news. Chris Wallace made his comment before Yovanovitch’s cross examination by Republican Chris Stewart of Utah. Stewart asked … Yovanovitch if she had any information regarding criminal activity by the president. She said no.
Next witness, hold the tears.
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