Roughly a minute after the 11-hour Benghazi Committee hearing with Hillary Clinton concluded on Thursday night, CNN’s Anderson Cooper 360 turned to political commentator Carl Bernstein, who drooled over Clinton’s performance while comparing Republicans to Joseph McCarthy and his House Un-American Committee for concocting an “abusive” hearing.
In the next hour on CNN Tonight, Bernstein trotted out the same comparison against “a group of demagogues” while Hillary “did great” in using “the facts at her command.”
As for his time on AC360, Bernstein first remarked that the American people “got a great look at who President Hillary Clinton would be, for the first time really, a kind of competence, a kind of command over the whole scene that she was being asked to testify under.”
Declaring that the “impressive” Clinton “knew the issues” with a “nuance about her positions,” Bernstein lashed about at committee members (read: only Republicans) as he told host Anderson Cooper that “you have to go back to Joe McCarthy, to the House Un-American Committee to find a process as abusive in a congressional hearing as this one was.”
>> Find a few samples of the liberal media trotting out the McCarthy comparison here and here <<
Utterly stunned by Bernstein’s comparison, Cooper gave him the opportunity to clarify his position, but the former Washington Post reporter rejected the chance and instead doubled down: “Yeah, I do. I think this was a reckless and outrageous hearing and the process is.”
Speaking in the 10:00 p.m. Eastern hour with fill-in host Brooke Baldwin, Bernstein trumpeted Clinton as having done “great because she was up against a group of demagogues.” Name dropping one of the liberal media’s favorite boogeymen to attack conservatives, Bernstein spouted off:
You have to go back to Joe McCarthy to see this kind of demagoguery in a congressional hearing and what they is they gave to give her a platform to show her what kind of president of the United States she would be. She has never had that platform or opportunity to before, and she did it, and she was competent. She had the facts at her command. She was nuanced. She did not give an inch. She knew what she was doing. She was theatrical. It was a complete Hillary Clinton such as we’ve never seen before.
The attack on the Benghazi Committee was only Bernstein’s latest slight against the panel investigating the deadly 2012 terror attack. On Sunday’s Reliable Sources, my colleague Jeffrey Meyer wrote about how Bernstein promised that Clinton would “murder” committee members with her performance.
The relevant portions of the transcript from CNN’s Anderson Cooper 360 and CNN Tonight on October 22 can be found below.
CNN’s Anderson Cooper 360
October 22, 2015
9:01 p.m. Eastern
ANDERSON COOPER: Carl, you covered a lot of Hillary Clinton and you've seen a lot of hearings over the years. What do you make of this?
CARL BERNESTEIN: I thought we got a great look at who President Hillary Clinton would be, for the first time really, a kind of competence, a kind of command over the whole scene that she was being asked to testify under. She knew the issues. There was nuance about her positions. It was very impressive, given what she was up against and the other things is I think you have to go back to Joe McCarthy, to the House Un-American Committee to find a process as abusive in a congressional hearing as this one was.
COOPER: You really think? You go back to McCarthy here?
BERNSTEIN: Yeah, I do. I think this was a reckless and outrageous hearing and the process is. That said, she has a problem with stonewalling on the question of these e-mails and her server. The FBI is looking at it and that's probably the appropriate place but, I think, we got a real look at who Hillary Clinton would be as president, how she, her comportment, her composure, the nuance in terms of policy and familiarity with the issues down in the weeds. The fact she had been on the Senate Armed Services Committee and what she knows about the world and policy. I thought we got a look at somebody we never saw before.
(....)
CNN Tonight
October 22, 201510:07 p.m. Eastern
BERNSTEIN: Well, she did great, because she was up against a group of demagogues. You have to go back to Joe McCarthy to see this kind of demagoguery in a congressional hearing and what they is they gave to give her a platform to show her what kind of president of the United States she would be. She has never had that platform or opportunity to before, and she did it, and she was competent. She had the facts at her command. She was nuanced. She did not give an inch. She knew what she was doing. She was theatrical. It was a complete Hillary Clinton such as we’ve never seen before.
