According to CNN’s Brian Stelter, the reason journalists cover Russia non-stop is because they “love America.” The liberal Reliable Sources anchor battled with Kellyanne Conway about the cable network’s priorities on Sunday. Conway blasted ObamaCare, saying, “You can't sit here, Brian, and deny the fact that 19 of the 23 co-ops under ObamaCare have failed. They're gone.”
Stelter sputtered, “There's plenty of time to cover both. There's plenty of time to cover both.” After the Trump 2016 campaign manager told him, “But you don’t and you know it,” the journalist replied, “Russia is a big story because... journalists love America and America was attacked last year.”
See, it’s simple patriotism?
Stelter then made a conspiratorial prediction about the midterm elections and Russia: “And America's probably going to be attacked again next year around the midterms, when you call it a hoax.”
In the same interview, Stelter told Conway that Trump’s “rhetoric” is a scandal. The Media Research Center’s Brent Baker told the Washington Examiner’s Paul Bedard:
Talk about a lack of self-awareness. CNN, and the MSM, long ago lost the trust of much of the public because they so obviously favored liberals and denigrated conservatives. Trump is not the cause of distrust in the media or a poisoning of discourse, but someone who successfully exploited the table set by too many politically-driven journalists."
This biased CNN segment was brought on to you by Tums and Purina.
A partial transcript follows:
Reliable Sources
7/23/17
11:05amKELLYANNE CONWAY: you and I have health care benefits that are given by our employers. You and I have great jobs and we're safe in our jobs. You and I have disposable income. God bless you and your wife, Jamie, and your new daughter. We are people who are not struggling paycheck to paycheck and not worried about paying the rent or the mortgage or the student loan voucher or the tuition payment this very month. We're not deciding between groceries and health care benefits.
I'm there for those people. And, Brian, if we can rely on your help at CNN, not to do our PR, that's silly. That's nonsense. To connect America with the information they need. If you're going to cover Russia, Russia, Russia, while we're talking about America, America, America, we're always going to be like this. If you actually look at the polls —
STELTER: This country --
CONWAY: — this great polling analysis where they said six percent of Americans, six percent said Russia was the most important issue to them and, yet, the mainstream media has given it 75 percent of coverage. They said 35 percent of —
(CROSSTALK)
STELTER: In that same Bloomberg study -- yes, that's right.
CONWAY: And you're not covering health care.
STELTER: Eleven percent for immigration.
CONWAY: Yes.
STELTER: But that same Bloomberg poll found that only 40 percent of Americans approve of this president. Is your strategy now and Scaramucci's strategy only to play to the base or you try to reach 100 percent of Americans, not just 40?
CONWAY: No. I thank you for putting the poll up because I want your viewers to see, I appreciate that, 35 percent health care. The only coverage CNN really gives health care is whether or not it will pass, whether or not they have the votes, whether or not this will be a colossal legislative failure.
STELTER: And it collapsed this week, a stunning failure, one of the biggest stories of the year.
CONWAY: No, it didn’t. So, there you go, using those words, stunning failure. But, look, if you want it to be a stunning failure or you're going to insist it is a stunning failure, you are denying literally the millions and millions of Americans who were lied to by the last president. “You like your plan, keep your plan. If you like your doctor, keep your doctor.” They don't have health care benefits through their employer like you and I do. They don't have --
STELTER: That was 2009, it's 2017. Let's look forward and not backwards all the time.
CONWAY: We're living with ObamaCare. Yes, let's look forward, let's look forward, and let's look at all the people who did not benefit from ObamaCare. You can't sit here, Brian, and deny the fact that 19 of the 23 co-ops under ObamaCare have failed. They're gone. Eighty- three insurers have pulled out of the exchanges with dozens more promising to do so this year and next year.
We have — if ObamaCare is not repealed by 2018, we will have over 1,300 counties where there is one choice which means there's no choice. Right now, we have 40 bare counties with no choice. Medicaid is unsustainable. We're trying to save it for the future. We're trying to give flexibility to the governors. Help change the accounts.
STELTER: I appreciate that.
CONWAY: Well, but the reason, the only time you're going to cover that because I'm here.
STELTER: There's plenty of time to cover both. There's plenty of time to cover both.
CONWAY: But you don’t and you know it.
STELTER: We're on a 24-hour channel with an infinite Website.
CONWAY: I agree.
STELTER: Russia is a big story because --
CONWAY: Why?
STELTER: — journalists love America and America was attacked last year. And America's probably going to be attacked again next year around the midterms, when you call it a hoax.
CONWAY: And that has what do with our campaign that I managed? I managed the winning campaign. It has what to do with that campaign?
STELTER: That may be because by the time you became campaign manager, the deal was already in. The conversations were already had.
CONWAY: That's just not true.
STELTER: We don't know, Kellyanne, but shouldn't we find out?
CONWAY: Are you actually alleging there was active conversations with Russians trying to change the election results? Because very few people are actually saying that. Are you saying that, or are you just trying to put it out there because you guys are so invested in there being something there?
STELTER: We don't know.
CONWAY: What is there? What constitutional crisis are we facing right now? I tell you what, I tell you what we do know --
STELTER: I'm going to leave that to Jeffrey Toobin and the law expert. But many people are afraid that if this President fires Robert Mueller we will be in a constitutional crisis.
