Friday morning’s CNN Newsroom couldn’t help but be in awe of a handful of female protesters who cornered Republican Senator Jeff Flake (AZ) as he boarded an elevator to attend a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on Supreme Court pick Brett Kavanaugh.
The takes were so hot that senior political analyst David Gergen wondered if Flake’s refusal to change his mind about Kavanaugh signaled that white Republican men truly understand the anguish of sexual misconduct (despite Kavanaugh’s vehement denials).
Co-host Jim Sciutto told fellow co-host Poppy Harlow that “I don't think we have witnessed a moment like that in recent memory” as “a U.S. Senator confronted by two, I believe, two, I believe, women who say they have been raped themselves” and leveled a massive strawman that women will no longer be believed if Kavanaugh ascends to the Court.
Harlow replied that “it is remarkable” and expressed dismay with Flake not being more compassionate toward women besides thanking them and telling them he had to get to the hearing. She then went to senior political reporter Nia-Malika Henderson:
Let's talk about what this means for this country, for America beyond this vote. What we just saw is not isolated to these two women and that one senator. That is emblematic where this country will be left regardless of which way this vote goes, Nia.
Henderson responded that “you could hear the raw emotion,” “anger,” and “anguish...from those two women really pleading with Jeff Flake to do something different, to really send a message, they were saying, to women that he cared, that he cared about their experiences and that they felt like sending someone like Kavanaugh to the Court would send the wrong message to not only women who were victims of sexual assault as Dr. Ford alleges that she is but also young men.”
She added that “[t]his is going to be a very divisive couple of weeks we’re going to have around this conversation and then just beyond” and warning that, concerning “the ripple effects of the Anita Hill hearing,” America is “in it for spades going forward.” Yikes.
Perhaps most insane about this sequence was the inability for anyone at Jeffrey Zucker’s three-ring circus to admit that there’s likely millions of women who side with Kavanaugh.
Alas, Sciutto continued on by opining that, based on two liberal protesters, “that is a measure of exactly how many women view this decision.”
When it comes to liberal punditry disguised as objective analysis, Gergen came through as he always does, wondering if white men will ever understand (read: believe all) women (click “expand”):
We're on the brink of what is likely to be the most divisive vote in our lifetime. This is going to sharply divide the American people. There are millions of millions of women who felt just like those two women there. I think that — and those millions of women felt that Dr. Ford spoke for them and spoke to them and stirred things in their memories in them that we, as white males, don't really fully understand and appreciate and, you know, if you have a group of 11 white men sitting there on the Republican side, you have to ask: Do they get it? Do they understand? Are they of a generation that understands?
To see the relevant transcript from September 28's CNN Newsroom with Poppy Harlow and Jim Sciutto, click “expand.”
CNN Newsroom with Poppy Harlow and Jim Sciutto
September 28, 2018
9:36 p.m. EasternJIM SCIUTTO: Poppy, I don't think –
POPPY HARLOW: I —
SCIUTTO: I don't think we have witnessed a moment like that —
HARLOW: No.
SCIUTTO: — in recent memory. A U.S. Senator confronted by two, I believe, two, I believe, women who say they have been raped themselves. One of them saying to him and I'm quoting here through tears: “Don't look away from me. Look at me and tell me that it doesn't matter what happened to me.” Just remarkable.
HARLOW: It is remarkable. We just witnessed about five minutes of Republican Senator Jeff Flake after he made an incredibly important decision to vote for Judge Brett Kavanaugh after he heard from Dr. Ford and Judge Brett Kavanaugh yesterday, confronted in the elevator by those two women. As you said, Jim, his answers to them, thank you. I need to get to the hearing. You will hear more from me in just a moment. He did not answer their questions. Nia-Malika Henderson, to you. Let's talk about what this means for this country, for America beyond this vote. What we just saw is not isolated to these two women and that one senator. That is emblematic where this country will be left regardless of which way this vote goes, Nia.
NIA-MALIKA HENDERSON: That's right. I mean, you could hear the raw emotion. You could hear the anger. The anguish, really, from those two women really pleading with Jeff Flake to do something different, to really send a message, they were saying, to women that he cared, that he cared about their experiences and that they felt like sending someone like Kavanaugh to the Court would send the wrong message to not only women who were victims of sexual assault as Dr. Ford alleges that she is but also young men. This is going to be a very divisive couple of weeks we’re going to have around this conversation and then just beyond. We talked about the rippling effects of the Anita Hill hearing back in 1991. We're in for it in spades going forward.
SCIUTTO: In fairness to Senator Flake, David Gergen, that was an extremely difficult moment for any sitting politician to face. That said, that is a measure of exactly how many women view this decision.
DAVID GERGEN: I think it's just the beginning. We're on the brink of what is likely to be the most divisive vote in our lifetime. This is going to sharply divide the American people. There are millions of millions of women who felt just like those two women there. I think that — and those millions of women felt that Dr. Ford spoke for them and spoke to them and stirred things in their memories in them that we, as white males, don't really fully understand and appreciate and, you know, if you have a group of 11 white men sitting there on the Republican side, you have to ask: Do they get it? Do they understand? Are they of a generation that understands?
