ATW September 20, 2024
The Blood of the Apparent Martyrs
by
Matt Taibbi and Walter Kirn
America This Week (September 20, 2024)

Matt Taibbi: All right, welcome to America This Week. I’m Matt Taibbi.

Walter Kirn: And I’m Walter Kirn.

Matt Taibbi: Walter, how are you doing

Walter Kirn: I’m cold. And that’s because in Montana, where it gets winter after August is over, I have no heat. There was a transformer fire in my alley. If you’ve ever seen one of those, it’s when one of the transformers on the power lines catches fire and then sprays burning oil on everything. And the fire-

Matt Taibbi: Awesome.

Walter Kirn: Yeah. The fire department, bless their hearts, didn’t seem to be properly trained for the transformer fire, and they made the rookie mistake of spraying water on the transformer. As anyone who’s tried to put out a grease fire with water in their kitchen knows that only spreads it. So we had this disaster, and it was actually a few weeks ago. And the surge involved with the fire blew out the circuit boards on a lot of my appliances, but I didn’t know it blew out my furnace too until I tried to turn my furnace on in a little bit of a cold snap, the last few days, and-

Matt Taibbi: Oh, no.

Walter Kirn: Yeah, so now it’s very catch-as-catch-can around here, there are space heaters from the hardware store blowing on my legs, and in certain rooms. We’re hoping to get back to civilization soon, but...

Matt Taibbi: Oh, that’s good. Okay. All right. Yeah, you can’t be in Montana without heat. Well, not for long anyway.

Walter Kirn: No. No. I might not be here next week.

Matt Taibbi: You’re going to end up the center of Iceman II? Remember that movie where they found the guy underneath the Antarctica or wherever it was? Okay. So crazy weekend news. We did a last room on Monday and we were curious to see how the backlash would play out after attempted... Assassination attempt. Apparent assassination attempt.

Walter Kirn: It’s strange that they have backlash now to assassination attempts, but they do.

Matt Taibbi: Yeah, no, folks are angry about it, and no one was angrier about it than the White House Press Secretary. And maybe it’s the media person in me, but I thought this was a profoundly weird exchange that took place in the September 18th White House press briefing. And what we’re about to watch is an exchange between Karine Jean-Pierre and Peter Doocy of Fox News. But we’re going to actually start it a little earlier with a question from Danny Kemp of, I think it’s AFP is who he works for. And he’s asking something kind of... It’s an offhand follow-up question, but you can tell it bothers Jean-Pierre quite a bit, and I think that impacts what happens afterward. But here we go.

09/17/24: Press Briefing by Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre

https://youtu.be/RbBkTiHTs-E

Danny Kemp: The other day, President Biden gave the thumbs-up when I asked him if he was going to be traveling to Angola, as our friend at Reuters reported. Do you have any more details on that? Can you confirm any details?

Karine Jean-Pierre: You asked the questions and your friends at Reuters reported it. Is that what you’re saying?

No, I don’t have anything. We don’t have anything at this time to share on any travel for the president, so stick there. Okay.

Matt Taibbi: All right. So okay, just to pause for a moment. So what he’s asking is, that the AFP guy is saying, I asked President Biden if he’s going to Angola and he gave me a thumbs-up. And the perfectly logical question by AFP is, he going to Angola? What’s going on there? And you can see, she does kind of the joke, that’s not really a joke or not really funny, laughs a little bit too long, doesn’t answer the question and moves on quickly. And I think this is ringing in her head before she even starts the Doocy thing that-

Walter Kirn: Well, because she realizes that he has no intention of going to Angola. He didn’t understand the question. He gave a thumbs up for some habitual reason as a response that was meant to end the conversation because he didn’t comprehend it. And now-

Matt Taibbi: Right. Hey, Mr. Biden. Nice pants.

Walter Kirn: Exactly. Suck on these nuts. Yeah.

Matt Taibbi: Exactly.

Walter Kirn: And now she’s stuck. Though I think that a president, once he’s made a contract before, the people should have to keep it. And the idea that Biden as one of his last acts as president will make a trip to Angola is just fantastic.

Matt Taibbi: And they should just turn him in a direction and have him walk in a certain way, say, “Just keep going. It’ll all work out well.” Okay, so that happens. She doesn’t want to answer the question about the president’s schedule because how many of these things am I going to have to do still, right? So then she turns... And this is sort of towards the end of the presser, and she knows Peter Doocy of Fox News, who’s kind of the consistent pain in the in these briefings for her.

Walter Kirn: He’s the Jim Acosta of the right.

Matt Taibbi: Right, exactly. And to Doocy’s credit, his demeanor is firm but not obnoxious, I would say. He’s good at this. I mean, there are a lot of people in the White House Press Corps who are good at what they do, because the whole game is about getting them to actually give you an answer. So you have to be subtle in how you present your questions and everything. And he’s a survivor. He is been doing this for a while. So anyway, he asked this.

Peter Doocy: And only two days since somebody allegedly tried to kill Donald Trump again. And you’re here at the podium in the White House briefing room, calling him a threat. How many more assassination attempts on Donald Trump until the president and the vice president, and you, pick a different word to describe Trump other than threat?

Karine Jean-Pierre: Peter, if anything from this administration-

Matt Taibbi: If you’re listening to this, there’s nothing you can do. But if you’re watching the translation of the sign language translator is an interesting counterpart to all this because sometimes there’s an effort to relay the emotion of the speaker, which is interesting. But anyway, let’s go on.

Karine Jean-Pierre: ... completely disagree with the premise of your question. The question that you’re asking, it is also incredibly dangerous in the way that you’re asking it because American people are watching. And to say that from an administration who has consistently condemned political violence, from an administration where the president called the former president and was thankful, grateful that he was okay, from an administration who has called out January 6th, called out the attack of Paul Pelosi, called out and said, we need to lower the temperature after the Butler incident...

Matt Taibbi: The incident.

Karine Jean-Pierre: ... and now for you to make that kind of comment in your question, because your question involved the comment and a statement, that is also incredibly dangerous, when we have been very clear in condemning political violence from here, what I have said about the former president about January 6th is facts. You all have reported. It is fact. When you have a former president who basically says that the election wasn’t the-

Matt Taibbi: Okay, let me stop just for a second here. So she’s treading water here. You can tell she hasn’t actually gotten to what the point is, and she’s buying time. And what’s going to happen is she’s going to try to dismount and end the whole deal, but he’s going to follow up, which really pisses her off. And then let’s see what happens from there.

Karine Jean-Pierre: When dozens of... More than 60 Republican judges said that it was a free and fair election. More than 60 said it was indeed a free and fair election. You had more than 2,000 people who were told to go to the capitol. It was one of the darkest days of our democracy. One of the darkest days. There were people, law enforcement officers who died because of what happened at the Capitol, and they were there because the former president told them to go there. I don’t know, if that’s not a threat in our democracy when it was one of the darkest days of our democracy January 6th, one of the darkest days.

Peter Doocy: To your point-

Matt Taibbi: Here we go.

Karine Jean-Pierre: And so we have been very clear from here. Now we can have a disagreement on policies, we can on issues. That is what we should do. It is important to have those disagreements. It is welcome to have those disagreements, on the economy, on healthcare.

Matt Taibbi: Hold on a second. It’s funny, Walter, you’re doing exactly, I think what Doocy is doing. You are already... The contradiction in what she’s saying is so apparent that it’s trying to leap out of your face, and that’s what’s happening with Doocy, I think. There’s no two-shot here. You can’t see what’s going on with him, but I’m pretty sure that’s what’s happening because it comes out in a second.

Karine Jean-Pierre: But when you start bringing political rhetoric, that is not okay. And that’s what you’ve heard from us too. You’ve heard of differences on policies.

Peter Doocy: But to your point, there are people watching at home, who might miss the part where you say, let’s lower the temperature, and there are mentally unstable people who are attempting to kill political candidates, attempting to kill Donald Trump, and they are still hearing this White House referred to him as a threat. Is there no concern that people are taking that literally?

Karine Jean-Pierre: We’re using examples. We’re not just saying that just to say it. January 6th, Peter. January 6th. Wait, January 6th. How many times do we have... January 6th, 2021. That is a fact, what was reported that happened on that day by some of your colleagues. And we have at the same time, denounced political violence over and over, political rhetoric, over and over again. Over and over again. But I know your focus has to be on this side of the house. It can’t be on your side of the house. I get that. I get that. But we also have to be careful on how you’re asking me these questions.

People are watching and is what you are saying about us raising political violence, however you just formulated it, this is an administration that has denounced and condemned any me type of political rhetoric or violence. It is the reason why this president decided to run in 2020. That is why the president decided to come back. He believed that it is important to save the soul of America, of our nation, and he believed it was important that we continue to fight for our democracy, fight for our freedom. That’s what you see from this administration.

Matt Taibbi: Okay, all right. I don’t know how many presidents... I’ve never seen anything like that in a presser, but Walter, I have some thoughts, but do you?

Walter Kirn: He ran in 2020, in the most politically violent summer that I’ve ever seen. I mean, there were some in my youth around Vietnam, but in my adult life. Well, she had a strategy that she was planning to use if asked about this, obviously. It’s probably a party-wide strategy, and she tested it, which is to react as if you are being attacked when talk comes to him being attacked. You know what I mean? She said it was dangerous, what they were saying as though it was going to lead to some attack on Biden, or as if talking about what’s happened to Trump is some sort of mirror attack on them. It was an inversion strategy that she wasn’t prepared to work out in detail. So she started with the offense, “How dare you say that our rhetoric is heated?” And she didn’t know where to go with it, so she just floundered around with January 6th, which is their kind of...

Matt Taibbi: January 6th. January 6th. January 6th.

Walter Kirn: Well, it’s like a teddy bear. She just kept hugging it. It’s the security bear. But it showed, I think, that we’re living in a time of almost infallibly incomprehensible conflict because no one will even admit to reality at this point. I mean, to say that there has not been the highest level of Trump demonization for ages, a lot of it not having to do with January 6th, is just to deny what’s going on.

Matt Taibbi: So I was really fascinated by the moment where he does the follow-up question. He says, “To your point, you’re saying all these things about lowering the temperature and political rhetoric and yet...”

Walter Kirn: “You’re not doing it.”

Matt Taibbi: Yeah. This thing about the threat is exactly what you’re talking about. That’s what he meant by “to your point.” And her reaction, however you phrase that, whatever you said, because she clearly hears the question in a certain way, and how she hears it is it’s not what I said, basically. So what I say is that our administration condemns violence and anybody else’s use of political rhetoric is wrong.

Walter Kirn: She used the term political rhetoric as though it’s something you just wouldn’t be caught dead using yourself if you’re a White House press secretary, or...

Matt Taibbi: As if all they do all day long isn’t repeating taglines. And that’s true of both parties. Let’s be clear about it. Right? Oh my God, I just did it. Let me be clear.

Walter Kirn: Right. Okay. Yeah.

Matt Taibbi: But what’s so interesting is the mask kind of comes off in that second response. Because what she says is, “I’ve told you what the line is. The party line is we oppose political violence, we’ve condemned political violence. January 6th happened.”

18:00 ... 28:00 “Who will rid me of this troublesome priest?”

. . . 29:05 Walter Kirn: “It’s not quite working in assassination attempts to blame the target. . . . “Will no one rid me of this troublesome priest? [from A Man for All Seasons]”

Matt Taibbi: “Existential Threat” is a term that they throw out all the time. Our very existence is on the line”

. . . 30:55