While bemoaning during Friday’s Deadline: White House about the lack of decency and civility in light of White House staffer Kelly Sadler’s ugly comment about Republican Senator John McCain (AZ), MSNBC host Nicolle Wallace joked to White House correspondent Kristen Welker about choking White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders.
If that wasn’t enough, MSNBC contributor John Heilemann hailed White House reporters for doing “valiant work” in press briefings exposing the White House’s lies and Wallace’s fellow McCain/Palin campaign aide Steve Schmidt ruled that Sanders is worse than Baghdad Bob.
Going to Welker on the topic of Sanders ducking questions about Sadler suggesting McCain’s take on Gina Haspel’s CIA nomination didn’t matter because he’s “dying anyway,” Wallace quipped: “Kristen Welker, how do you resist the temptation to run up and wring her neck? Why can't she just say if a staffer said that, we're going to get to the bottom of it and she'll be fired?”
After the show, Wallace apologized in a tweet:
Welker didn’t address Wallace’s jest, but instead explaining how reporters expected Sanders to say something about Sadler during the briefing only for that to have never happened.
“But, Nicolle, as you've been discussing, it does shine a light on the tone and culture within this White House, within Washington right now and within our politics more broadly I think, Nicolle,” Welker later added.
After Wallace laughed at First Lady Melania Trump’s “Be Best” initiative as “a joke” considering comments like Sadler’s, the former Bush White House aide admitted that she can’t tell “the difference any more between Baghdad Bob and Sarah Sanders.”
Like a good liberal reporter, Heilemann decided to throw a pity party for the media (click “expand” to read more):
HEILEMANN: Nor do I. I don't know the difference and I think the motivation -- I don't want to try to — I would never want to in any way disparage our colleagues who have to live through that horror show every day.
WALLACE: Well, Kristen had the most questions today. I mean, Kristen made the toughest run at Sarah on these questions.
HEILEMANN: And they do — they do valiant work every day trying to get some — some semblance of truth or to at least expose the hypocrisy and the lies, the Baghdad Bob-ness of it from the podium. But if you're asking me how they tolerate it, how they live with it, like, why? They have more fortitude than I have. I could not go down there and do what Kristen Welker — I could not. I would slit my throat after about maybe two of those briefings if I had to sit in that room every day.
Schmidt finally spoke again after an uninterrupted, four-minute-and-31-second tirade earlier in the show about Sadler’s smear of McCain, so he used the chance to show how little he himself cares about civility (for a few past examples, see here, here, here, here, and here).
“[I]f Baghdad Bob didn't say what Saddam Hussein wanted him to say, Baghdad Bob would be shot. Sarah Sanders is lying of her own volition. She stands up there every day as a willful participant. Baghdad Bob was a hostage. Sarah Sanders is an accomplice, as is the entirety of the political operation of the White House,” opined Schmidt.
(h/t: Washington Examiner’s Eddie Scarry)
To see the full transcript from MSNBC’s Deadline: White House on May 11, click “expand.”
MSNBC’s Deadline: White House
May 11, 2018
4:09 p.m. Eastern
NICOLLE WALLACE: Kristen Welker, how do you resist the temptation to run up and wring her neck? Why can't she just say if a staffer said that, we're going to get to the bottom of it and she'll be fired?
KRISTEN WELKER: Well, I think a lot of people were surprised, Nicolle, because there was an anticipation that she would have something to say. There have now been so many reports, including ours confirming the account. Reporters, including myself who have spoken to people who heard Kelly Sadler make these remarks, and so I think there was an anticipation that the White House would at least have comments similar to at least the statement that they put out overnight when they praised John McCain. Instead, Sarah Sanders sort of took a step back from that and said she wasn't going to comment on this situation at all and so you saw the attempts there to sort of try to get at it from a much broader perspective and then to try to nail down the facts of what actually happened, I asked her repeatedly if our sources are lying to us. She ignored that question outright. So, it is a very striking tactic that the White House is taking. They clearly are hoping this will help turn the page, will help it to go away. But, Nicolle, as you've been discussing, it does shine a light on the tone and culture within this White House, within Washington right now and within our politics more broadly I think, Nicolle.
(....)
4:13 p.m. Eastern
WALLACE: Kristen Welker, we covered the First Lady's, I don't know, Go Good, Be Good, Be whatever her thing was called.
WALLACE: Be Best.
WALLACE: Be Best. I mean, how does this — how does this comport with that?
WALLACE: It's a great point, Nicolle. In fact, we went back, we looked up some of the quotes from that day, the First Lady calling for a high moral ethical standard. Thinking before you speak —
WALLACE: What a joke.
WELKER: — and —
WALLACE: What are we all doing? I mean, why?
WELKER: By the way, those were some of the questions we did also want to ask Sarah Sanders today. You know, how does this comport with the First Lady's message? And I do think it complicates her message. It makes it tougher for her to go out and make that argument when you do have these types of stories that are festering.
WALLACE: What is the motivation for anyone in Kristen's role, I won't want to put Kristen on the spot, but to sit in that room and take this. I mean, I don't know the difference any more between Baghdad Bob and Sarah Sanders.
JOHN HEILEMANN: Nor do I. I don't know the difference and I think the motivation -- I don't want to try to — I would never want to in any way disparage our colleagues who have to live through that horror show every day.
WALLACE: Well, Kristen had the most questions today. I mean, Kristen made the toughest run at Sarah on these questions.
HEILEMANN: And they do — they do valiant work every day trying to get some — some semblance of truth or to at least expose the hypocrisy and the lies, the Baghdad Bob-ness of it from the podium. But if you're asking me how they tolerate it, how they live with it, like, why? They have more fortitude than I have. I could not go down there and do what Kristen Welker — I could not. I would slit my throat after about maybe two of those briefings if I had to sit in that room every day.
WALLCE: Steve, let me let you back in. I think I heard you try to say something.
STEVE SCHMDIT: Well, I'll tell you the difference between Sarah Sanders and Baghdad Bob is that if Baghdad Bob didn't say what Saddam Hussein wanted him to say, Baghdad Bob would be shot. Sarah Sanders is lying of her own volition. She stands up there every day as a willful participant. Baghdad Bob was a hostage. Sarah Sanders is an accomplice, as is the entirety of the political operation of the White House. They're all in it together. They serve in a debased administration that's dividing the country, hurting America, pitting Americans against each other because obviously that's what they believe is the right thing to do, for them to maintain the prerequisites and perks of their powerful positions. That's what the difference is.
WALLACE: Kristen Welker, we applaud, I watched the whole briefing. We applaud your valiant efforts today and —
WELKER: Thanks, Nicolle.
WALLACE: — we appreciate that you spent some time with us.
