In an unfortunate move for the country, CNN’s morning programming reshuffle has meant subjecting their tens of viewers to an hour of Fake News Jim Acosta (as opposed to stashing him for a few hours on weekends).
In turn, we’re stuck with segments like one on Wednesday in which he convened rule of experts fan Tom Nichols (who won’t say whether Taiwan is a country) and cockamamie professor Ruth Ben-Ghiat for what one could only describe as a meeting of the Legion of Dumb to spew apocalyptic bile about Donald Trump.
I know none of you noticed yesterday because no one watches CNN (except CNN staffers and people like us at @theMRC), but Fake News Jim hosted a meeting of the Legion of Stupid (or Dumb, take your pick) yesterday to promote the bloodbath hoax pic.twitter.com/jk9F9NfBQY
— Curtis Houck (@CurtisHouck) March 21, 2024
It all began when Acosta gleefully said it’d be a “terrific conversation we’re going to have” and went first to Nichols to say there’s no doubt Trump said America will be a literal bloodbath “for the country” if he loses in November.
“[H]e has not earned any benefit of the doubt about what his words mean considering that he uses terms like, you know, vermin and other incendiary terms, but the other thing is that whenever he’s trapped are backed up against the wall, he just doubles down,” Nichols replied.
Nichols then tried to argue “no one” really uses the word bloodbath...unless they mean violence.
“[I]f you’re presidential candidate talking about a social bloodbath, these are things that, in a — in a more rational time would have ruled him out of contention for dog catcher,” he huffed.
Acosta went to Ben-Ghiat with both the bloodbath line as well as Trump’s controversial comment that Jewish people who vote Democrat are going against their own interests and identity.
Ben-Ghiat quickly dispensed with the latter to circle back to bloodbath, arguing the “real intent” is for Trump “to get people riled up enough to either commit violence for you — January 6 — or accept your violence” by moving “them into a state of existential fear and dread.”
“With strongmen, it’s always me or the abyss, me or the apocalypse. So, when he’s talking about social slaughter, he’s telling people that they have to defend themselves and he’s done this many times in his rallies and now with his campaign. This is part of his message to keep people,” she added.
Earth to CNN: Aren’t you projecting just a little? Do any of you ninnies here yourselves, warning about democracy being on the ballot or constant hyperbole about America as we know it ending if Republicans win anything?
Acosta and Nichols kept up the rhetoric, proclaiming Trump’s bloodbath line was a call to “riot” and commit “violence” against liberals (click “expand”):
ACOSTA: Yeah, I mean, Tom, he’s — he’s saying the riot part out loud. It seems.
NICHOLS: Of course, and he’s been doing it for awhile. He’s been, I think, preparing his followers for violence. He’s been preparing them not to accept any electoral result that isn’t in his favor or favor of anybody he wants. He does this — and — and Ruth’s point is really important here. He — he gets us used to these words that they become second nature, that the kind of level of violence in that language and the dread in that language just gets woven into your daily life so that, after a while, you just start to accept that violence and, you know, bloodbaths and — it’s just part of the way we talk which was not the way we conducted political debate in American until now, but, you know, this is all about trying to motivate people to fight for him because we have to remember that for him, this is not a political campaign. He is running as hard as he can to get into the Oval Office to try to escape accountability and justice.
ACOSTA: Yeah. And I didn’t want to talk to both of you about Trump and Putin. I mean, he’s — Trump is putting himself on par with Putin, saying go to toe to toe with a dictator, come out on top. I mean, this seems to be a recurring theme in addition to how he shows affection for dictators[.]
Ben-Ghiat then claimed Trump’s positive vibes toward dictators Kim Jong-un is really a four-dimensional chess move in “conditioning Americans” to accept this in our country as well as to believe “that democracy doesn’t work.”
Once again, earth to CNN: Don’t you guys hear yourselves? Isn’t that what you say about our system of government? What a giant billboard-sized case of projection.
The segment wrapped with the comical claim from Acosta that not only would Trump want to emulate Russian dictator Vladimir Putin by killing his opponents, but also rigging elections so he can stay in power indefinitely via sham elections where, like Putin, he wins with a farcical 87 percent (click “expand”):
ACOSTA: [T]he scary thing is, is that we just saw a so-called election in Russia and there was no credible opposition allowed. You know, they were talking about 87 percent support for Vladimir Putin. I mean, that’s — that’s — that’s laughable. You have people like Alexei Navalny killed in prison. It — this, I mean, how, how can you even pretend that that’s a democracy going on in Russia? And if Putist [sic] — if Trump is continuing to speak with admiration and putting himself on an even keel with the likes of Vladimir Putin, I mean, that should be disturbing to — to a lot of folks out there.
NICHOLS: It is disturbing and, you know, the idea that he’s gone toe to toe with dictators, he is absolutely in all of these people. And as we saw in their first meeting years ago at Helsinki, he isn’t going toe-to-toe with them. He is kissing their ring. I mean, he is a — very — a lot of — a lot of what Trump does, I think projects fear and insecurity, which, you know, makes sense in an authoritarian bully, but the idea that somehow, you know, Putin is to be emulated, I mean, it’s almost inconceivable to have an American President and an American presidential candidate — again, talking about how much he admires someone who just had — I have to do the air quotes, “an election”, you know, at 87 percent. But that’s — Trump wants to — you know, we were just talking about the aspirational nature of this. This is Trump’s aspiration, to be someone who has unchallengeable power, huge amounts of wealth, and can do anything he wants and still rig elections to get 87 percent. I mean, that’s — you know — that’s — that’s Trump’s dreamworld: To be the richest man in the world — which Putin is one of the richest and — and to be unaccountable.
Having been wholly satisified and with possible a few white liberal wine moms now hiding under their bedsheets in fear of the Orange Man, Acosta brought the meeting to a close by trumpeting their “great discussion” and “insights” that he hopes “keep[s] the conversation going” elsewhere.
To see the relevant CNN transcript from March 20, click here.
