Download | Play 
Download | Play (h/t BillW)
Tim Russert may think that he keeps his political leanings well hidden (like, say, his penchant for pins under his lapel), but his questioning of presidential contenders Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama during this 20th Democratic debate certainly was less than subtle. Despite the fact the American people (and Iraqi people and American troops, come to that) overwhelmingly support a withdrawal from Iraq, Timmeh can’t help but frame his question as if the White House press office wrote it themselves.
RUSSERT: I want to ask you both a question then, if this scenario plays out, and the Americans get out, in totality, and al Qaeda resurges and Iraq goes to hell, do you hold the right, in your mind as the American president, to reinvade, to go back into Iraq to stabilize it?
CLINTON: You know, Tim, you ask a lot of hypotheticals. And I believe that…
RUSSERT: This is, this is reality…
CLINTON: Well, it isn’t reality. You’re making lots of different hypothetical assessments. I believe that it is in America’s interests and in the interest of the Iraqis for us to have an orderly withdrawal.
Nice, Timmeh. I like the framing of “oh, so you’ll get out of Iraq, but will you be responsible for the hell unleashed by that? Will you go back in and re-invade to secure it?” An attempt to perhaps vindicate your buddy Bush, perhaps?
Russert’s behavior throughout the debate was rather bizarre. He interrupted Clinton constantly and made ridiculously offensive insinuations of anti-Semitism against Obama on the fallacious logic of transitive relationships. (Very reminiscent of how he asked Obama his opinion of an anti-Bush statement made by Harry Belafonte, for no other reason than the shared color of their skin) How considerate of him to help out the GOP by starting his own Republican oppo whisper campaigns against the Democratic candidate right there in the middle of the debate.
No Trackbacks To “Democratic Debate: Tim Russert Frames It For The GOP“
1st
Reality like 24.
Who knew Russia’s new leader’s name?
I didn’t but that was a gotcha question and she got it right.
And is it just me, or did Timmeh look a little rough?
I thought his questioning of the candidates was fair. If they can’t handle these types of questions, they shouldn’t be running. Asking tough questions doesn’t mean he’s adopted the Republican line, it just means being a fairly impartial journalist
Russert wastes the nation’s time asking gotcha questions, as entertainment, not news.
And BTW: Some of us could not watch the debates because MSNBC’s website had Javascript crap that was not fully tested for compatibility on Firefox, Netscape, and Internet Explorer. In effect, the presidential debates have been hijacked by corporate media, and unless you subscribe to cable TV, you are not entitled to be an enlightened voter.
If this has not become a fascist country, I don’t know what it is. But one thing I’d like to say:
Screw MSNBC.
Of course he does. Russett has GOP tattooed on both his, uh . . . - both of them.
*
Iraq hasn’t already gone to hell?
God, no kidding. On the Farrakhan exchange, I half-expected him to just scream out YOU’RE A GODDAMN MUSLIM, AREN’T YOU OBAMA???
Loved when Hillary called him on his version of “reality.”
Russert works for MSNBC, that should explain it. I know the Obama supporters thought that the bias shown against Clinton by the MSNBC staff meant that MSNBC was for Obama. Dream on. They are just manipulating the election so that McCain wins. You know, the same McCain that has Chris Matthews heart. They are not journalists, they are crusaders.
getalife @ 2:
I don’t think Obama knew it either.
One thing you’ll never see is this type of baiting taking place in a wing nut debate. The one good thing is who ever gets the nomination, they will be far more prepared for tough questions then St. John.
Lollimom @ 5:
That assumes you’d be ‘enlightened’ by hearing everything the candidates have to say anyway, which I think is a dubious proposition, since they are all completely fulla crap on the campaign trail, but yes, very anti-democratic for these debates to not be on PUBLIC airwaves. Sheesh, their oughta be a law.
Note to Timmeh: Iraq has already gone to hell. That’s the reality. What a jerkoff!
great answer, Hillary! lies or not she deftly and insistently pointed to russet-potatoe-head that he was making it up!
Richard @ 4:
Really, you think asking Obama to denounce Farrakhan is fair and impartial? How is Obama responsible for Farrakhan? Nice little frame of anti-Semitism to seed in the mind of voters–Republican push polls do that all the time. You think framing the Iraq withdrawal as a “if you do, the ‘terrists’ are gonna git ya” is fair and impartial? You think interrupting a candidate EVERY time you ask for a response is fair and impartial?
With all due respect to you Richard, I am going to have quote The Princess Bride and say “you keep using that word, but I do not think it means what you think it means.”
It appears that the only way to elevate political debate in this country is to put GE’s Butt Plug into traction for a year or two.
I sure hope Americans are not so deluded in their thinking, to actually think ANY new Prez will get the troops out of Iraq. It just isn’t going to happen. All the military leaders are against it. Truth about Iraq? The military put up walls to separate the fighting factions and that is the ONLY reason violence is down in Baghdad. If the military leaves, it starts up again. The “Ceasefire” is fragile at best, and without a sheriff monitoring the kids in the schoolyard, so to speak, the killings would start up again. The Iraqi leadership installed by Bush, is a coalition of the bribed, with no military support of their own. It is the worst planned occupation in history. So if a new Prez withdraws, all hell breaks lose, the military is sent back in, and whoever the new Prez is, gets blamed. The reliance of the Iraqi Puppet Regime on the US military, is total.
That Farrakhan thing was silly too. He denounced Farrakhan’s views. What a candidate supposed to do, reject the support of any American voter that has views the candidate finds offensive? This race is for PRESIDENT of the country and everyone in it, not just people you like.
In the general, I’d like to see McCain asked if he rejects the support of everyone who is supporting him that would never vote for a black person.
Aww poor candidates. If they can’t handle questions from big bad Tim, then they shouldn’t be President.
Christ, it’s kind of sad to see all these people of afraid of Tim Russert. The guy is tough on Repubs and Dems, I love watching reruns of him embarrassing Rudy Giggaliani and Mitt Romney.
russert blusters, “this is reality,” as he conjures up a fictitious scenario…
bwhahahaha!
An aside: Thank HEAVENS the Democrat Congress has heard my pleas! They are now going to have investigations…into whether Clemens lied. They would rather chase he-said-she-said allegations over something that matters so little instead of going after the more important liars who have caused so much death and destruction in terms of our own men and women and treasure lost as well as the hundreds of thousands of Iraqis dead. Way to go Congress. Warm up the fiddle, cuz Rome is a burnin!
If I were Obama or Clinton, I would have interuppted that shithead and said something like,
“You know, one of us IS going to be the next president. No doubt about it. When that happens, the FCC is going to be restored to integrity. Restoring the integrity of the FCC is going to be one of our highest priorities. There is going to be a day of reckoning, and the way the media has manipulated this election cycle is going to be deeply investigated. There are going to be some major changes. You need to think on that before you speak rudely to either of us, before you interupt either of us again“, …..just to send a message to Jeff Immelt, Rupert Murdoch, and the other 3 CEO’s who run the propaganda machine we collectively know as the MSM.
Who are the GOP framing?
Besides Obambam’s church.
Let the Sunni/Saudis, the Shia/Iranis and AL Q fight it out so that Iraq self determines its own fate. If Al Q wins at least then we have a known government to obliterate the next time they pull their shit.
Chris Gamble-Democrat First. @ 18:
They did handle the questions. Your whine is out of place.
Nicole Belle @ 14:
It’s obvious that russet-potatoe-head is teeing up the dems for the coming debate with McAin’t.
“Asking tough questions doesn’t mean he’s adopted the Republican line, it just means being a fairly impartial journalist.”
quoth Robert/
Can I just ask that you help me up off the floor? I’m done laughing hysterically now.
Timmeh certainly is living up to the many, many awards that he so deservedly used to receive from Mediawhoresonline.com. Ah, memories. Punkin’Head Tim is about an UN-impartial imperial journalist as you’re likely to meet. Asking Obama to repudiate things said by other African Americans is indeed racist bullshit.
But Timmeh is the grand old man of media clowning (to paraphrase the incomperable Bob Somerby). See his Libby trial testimony. He’s not a journalist at all: he’s Dick Cheney’s trained attack-weiner-dog. And Chris Matthews is there to scoop the poop.
Lord, these people make me tired.
i would have loved to see him try to pin cheney down while he had the chance instead of being used,after the administartion planted a story w/judy miller in the NYT about the uranium tubes…timmeh your a fucking moron,and the white house knows it to.
both clinton and obama are still laboring under the delushion that the war on terrior is real, both dont intend to withdraw from iraq or afganistan! both but especially wont renounce ameican agesshion against iran, nukes are still on the table! obamers mouth waters at the thought of attacking inside packistan hunting for alkidas and bin laddens ghost, fucking warmongers ! kucinich 08!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Richard @ 25:
Chris Gamble-Democrat First. @ 18:
with your frequent russert-cheerleading you must be running for pres of his fan club…
Samson- @ 19:
Yep, he sounded like an idiot.
I liked Clinton’s answer. Obama’s answer sounded like some triangulation - I think he was playing it safe. We saw Obama campaign from a position of a big advantage in his Senate race; he has to keep the acceleration going, not go into the 4-corners offense.
getalife @ 2:
I did, Dmitry Medvedev
Or as I like to call him Dim Wit Medivac.
Filthy Harry @ 24:
Can you not read my good man?
The campaigns and blogs have been crying about it all night.
Please learn to read.
rip william f buckley
you may not have agreed with his politics, but he elevated political debate and the englsh language to a high level
im sure he was disgusted by the wwe like politicking of recent years
and he was no fan of the chimp
Yeah, I didn’t care for some of the angles he took, but “what if the terrorists take over Iraq?”, is a question that will be considered by a lot of people. It is a little silly, but it gave both Clinton and Obama a chance to address it gracefully. On Obama’s campaign finance pledge and Clinton’s claim that she never said anything nice about NAFTA, they should have been chased around a bit. Clinton was good when she called him on hypotheticals and Obama alertly cut him off before he could start quoting Farrakhan at length. Russert bugs me sometimes but I prefer him to reporters who act as recorders of talking points.
Samson- @ 31:
We can’t all be sheep little guy.
People like Russert, Matthews, that horrific Judy Miller, will always be linked to the Iraq disaster with their vomit inducing cheer leading for Dubyah. Russert is a such a hypocrite.
Why doesn’t Russert just bring his copy of The Drudge Report and ask his questions directly from there?
I thought the role of a moderate was to ask questions and then ( silly me) moderate the answer of those questions between the candidates?
I don’t remember when that role changed to include baiting questions regurgitating already proven falsehoods.
Fuck that pumpkin headed sack of shit , he seems to forget we all know dead eye dick cheny
owns him…. possibly the worst so called debate moderator ever . He acted more like he was
actually in the debate in which case he lost . I’m really sick of these self important pundants
thinking that they are all knowing and we really give a shit. Get rid of all of them now..
Did timmeh ask either if they believe in the theory of cintelligent desingm?
Chris Gamble-Democrat First. @ 37:
Yeah, someone needs to bugger them.
I’m an Obama supporter, but I found it outrageous that they would not let Hillary speak because they “had” to break for commercials! The future of America is being debated here and they can’t muster the cash to broadcast it commercial free!?!?
That’s everything that’s wrong with this country right now.
SHAME ON YOU MSNBC!
I can’t speak for the rest of the interview, in terms of tone or bias, but I think that particular question is a perfectly valid one.
I, too, would like to know what the Democratic candidates would do should there be a crisis in Iraq after a US withdrawal, be it orderly or otherwise.
I think we all deserve to know how the new President would respond to that. And to just lay blame on the Republicans for getting you into Iraq in the first place is a cheap cop out. No, the new President will own whatever mess he or she ends up in, and they need to know how to deal with it, and be able to communicate that to the rest of us.
Russert is a tool.
Mark @ 45:
I thought tools were useful.
Richard @ 25: