On Friday, The 11th Hour guest host Alicia Menendez and Matthew Dowd took time to talk about the real takeaways from the Afghanistan withdrawal: that Republicans don't care about the Constitution and that President Biden is doing yeoman's work.
Early on during the show Menendez with a decade-old analogy, "Coming up... the end of the mission in Afghanistan may mark the beginning of Benghazi-like investigations here at home, we’ll get into that part of this still developing story."
This sounds like MSNBC-speak for "partisan Republican probes of Democrat security failures." We'll guess there weren't any "Benghazi-like investigations" by Democrats in the last four years...or that the the Select Committee on the January 6 riots isn't "Benghazi-like."
But let's recall Democrats are also calling for hearings in the Biden administration's withdrawal. Take Sen. Robert Menendez. It's not like Alicia Menendez isn't familiar with his work. He's her dad.
Of course, Democrats want answers too, but acknowledging the bipartisan condemnation of the withdrawal would not have allowed Menendez to later ask Dowd, "Republicans wasted no time coming down on Biden for the exit from Afghanistan. Critique, accountability, those come with the job, but floating ways to punish the president seems counterproductive to the immediate mission at hand, no?"
Dowd agreed with the hardline partisan boilerplate: "Well, they've never let facts get in the way of anything they've said, or the principles of the Constitution or what we’re supposed to stand for as values of our country. None of that gets in the way of what they do."
Referring to a clip Menendez played at the beginning of the segment, Dowd found a way to make the situation about former President Trump's poll numbers, "So, I find it amazing that Kevin McCarthy talked about a president can't govern if they don't have the faith, trust, and confidence of the American people. He served a president for four years that never, not even one day, had the faith, confidence, and trust of the majority of the American public."
Trump was narrowly elected, even if the media constantly treated him like he wasn't legitimate, and constantly worked for his impeachment.
While Biden's ratings are sliding downward, Dowd claimed we need to step above partisan politics, "I just think, this is again, this is not a time where we're supposed to be scoring political points in the midst of this. We just lost 13 service members in the midst, and we've evacuated 110,000 people."
And then he tried to score political points. He claimed that is "double what people said Biden couldn’t do. I think as of right now, President Biden has done yeoman's work in the midst of this, at a time of immense discussion and dissension. He’s done pretty good work in the midst of this."
Dowd's claim that Biden is doing "yeoman's work" is the exact same partisan claim he made on CNN on Tuesday.
This segment was sponsored by Applebee's.
Here is a transcript for the August 27 show:
MSNBC
The 11th Hour with Brian Williams
11:15 PM ET
ALICIA MENENDEZ: Coming up, we'll get an update the potentially powerful Hurricane Ida. Then the end of the mission in Afghanistan may mark the beginning of Benghazi-like investigations here at home, we’ll get into that part of this still developing story.
…
11:28
MENENDEZ: Republicans wasted no time coming down on Biden for the exit from Afghanistan. Critique, accountability, those come with the job, but floating ways to punish the president seems counterproductive to the immediate mission at hand, no?
MATTHEW DOWD: Well, they've never let facts get in the way of anything they've said, or the principles of the Constitution or what we’re supposed to stand for as values of our country. None of that gets in the way of what they do. So, I find it amazing that Kevin McCarthy talked about a president can't govern if they don't have the faith, trust, and confidence of the American people. He served a president for four years that never, not even one day, had the faith, confidence, and trust of the majority of the American public. I just think, this is again, this is not a time where we're supposed to be scoring political points in the midst of this. We just lost 13 service members in the midst, and we've evacuated 110,000 people, double what people said that Biden couldn't do, double what people said Biden couldn’t do. I think as of right now, President Biden has done yeoman's work in the midst of this, at a time of immense discussion and dissension. He’s done pretty good work in the midst of this.
