Biggest winner: Me, for doing something other than watching/being on Twitter and missing this entire shitshow https://t.co/Q54jvDcfkO
— Centrism Fan Acct ?? (@Wilson__Valdez) May 11, 2023
Softball questions. Zero pushback. Running gleefully amok. An audience of howling supporters. On national prime time.
CNN wanted to fire the starting pistol for 2024 with a Trump rally in the chamber.
— Peter Wolf (@peterawolf) May 11, 2023
My immediate, parochial impression after reading about CNN’s much-discussed TFG rally ran along the lines of Wow, looks like the DNC made a good decision dumping New Hampshire’s sacred #FirstInTheNation primary status!
It seems like at least *some* New Hampshire political professionals may’ve had the same thought, considering how they scrambled to get their spin out. Per Puck‘s Tara Palmeri, “Inside the Trump-CNN Thunderdome”:
Matthew Bartlett, the man with the best hair in G.O.P. political consulting, was born and raised in New Hampshire. He’s been involved in politics since he worked for Bono’s One campaign, back in 2008, before steadily undergoing Republican conversion therapy: he started by working for Jon Huntsman’s presidential, in 2012, and then for New Hampshire senator Kelly Ayotte from 2013 until January 2017, when she lost by 1,000 votes and Donald Trump won the presidency.
During the Trump administration, he became an appointee at the State Department, where he worked for the President’s Emergency Plan for Aids Relief, reauthorized the Global HIV/AIDS Program, became a communications director for an entire bureau, and traveled the world…
Tara Palmeri: Why were you in the audience last night? I thought those events were for geriatrics while the rest of us just watched on TV…
Matthew Bartlett: That’s the beauty of New Hampshire. You get the opportunity to see politicians up close from both sides of the aisle, people who you really believe could be the next President of the United States. Sometimes they are people you might vehemently disagree with, but it’s a really critical part of democracy to hear from people and to make your own judgment call. We have this unique feature of democracy where the presidential race is not just sound bites. It’s not TV ads. You get to hear things unfiltered—fortunately or unfortunately.
Were there ground rules for the audience?
They did some warm up with the audience ahead of time. One of the questions was, Are there any conditions? And Kaitlan said, No, there are no conditions. And someone asked if [Trump] knew the questions ahead of time and she said he didn’t. I think a lot of people were prepared to ask questions. The floor manager came out ahead of time and said, Please do not boo, please be respectful. You were allowed to applaud. And I think that set the tone where people were going to try their best to keep this between the navigational beacons, and that if they felt compelled to applaud, they would, but they weren’t going to have an outburst or they weren’t going to boo an answer…
What was your takeaway from the whole debate?
There were plenty of people in that room that were ardent supporters of President Trump, and no matter what he said, they were ready to jump out of their seats and applaud. But there were also people that sat there quietly disgusted or bewildered. In a TV setting, you hear the applause, but you don’t see the disgust. So Trump did not have the entire room on his side, make no mistake, even if it certainly came across that way on TV…
But the most telling part of last night was not the town hall, but the focus group that CNN did in the 10:30 p.m. hour. They had eight people that were present at the town hall and they asked if anybody thought that Trump exceeded expectations. Nobody thought he did. They all said, Yeah, this is Trump. This is kind of what we expected. Nothing that we haven’t really heard before. You had a lot of women in that group really express how difficult it was to hear him talk about the terrible judgment and his liability in the E. Jean Carroll case. I thought that was amazing. And then at the end, the moderator said, Who here is ready to vote for Trump in 2024? And only one hand went up. So I think that was the most telling part…
I found CNN’s focus group moderator Gary Tuchman to be very aggressive… It seemed like he wasn’t getting the answers from the focus group that he wanted. It sounded like they really wanted to talk about kitchen table issues, and they didn’t want to spend the entire time litigating the election. Right?
You got that 100 percent correct. They all made it clear… I know for a fact that there were plenty of people in there with questions regarding immigration. Not just broken immigration at the border, but the legal process too. These are people that need workers. Here in New Hampshire we have a very tight labor market, and I think there’s an opportunity to maybe have a legal process to get workers.
There were people that were really disgusted with Trump’s behavior that were ready to confront him about that in the room. Last night, there were people that wanted to talk about school choice. There were people that wanted to talk about a host of issues. I think the back and forth between Kaitlan and Trump took away that opportunity, and maybe took the town hall a little bit off course. What did CNN think? Trump is going to somehow acquiesce? Was this the first time they had met Donald Trump?…
Can you give me an idea of the split in the room? What percentage was pro-Trump? Trump-skeptical? Anti-Trump?
I’m going to guess that there were about 200 to 250 people in the room. My understanding was that it was open to registered Republicans and registered independents. I know that there were people in that room who did not vote for Trump in 2020. I know that for a fact. So when the first applause broke out, I kind of looked around and I would say maybe half the people were applauding and the other half kind of sat there. So how many people were anti-Trump? I don’t know. But there was a heavy deal of skepticism in the audience…
There were supposed to be 400 people in the audience, but maybe CNN had trouble finding enough marks willing participants?
So, to recap: CNN pre-selected a bunch of Republicans (New Hampshire ‘Independent’ voters are even more liable than most to be GOP voters who don’t want to admit it), warned them against doing anything negative, and set a hard-right media spokes-being to interview The Never-Ending Sh*t-Show Also Known As TFG. Is anyone still naive enough to believe they didn’t get exactly what they expected?
i know you do, buddy. that’s why i’m thoroughly dejected. https://t.co/vP4CJgLJsg
— world famous art thief (@famousartthief) May 11, 2023
CNN set aside 90 minutes to stick their collective dicks into a blender, but stopped less than 70 minutes in. https://t.co/DzwwqHaBMv
— Jean-Michel Connard ?? (@torriangray) May 11, 2023
From CNN's own media newsletter… pic.twitter.com/dfm20IeZJD
— Noah Shachtman (@NoahShachtman) May 11, 2023
If Trump's goal was to whip up his shit-brained followers, hd did well. If his goal was to convince prosecutors he wasn't involved in J6, he did poorly.
— Slope Slipperer (@agraybee) May 11, 2023
Addicts. The fucking lot of ya https://t.co/7Vp7oD0r8q
— zeddy (@Zeddary) May 11, 2023
The failure was earlier. In the delusion that by bringing him into your space, you could force him into your world: where there are such things as facts, where verification matters, and the public record speaks. It was a failure to accept how far gone this is, though you knew. https://t.co/5WhK6Qt3U9
— Jay Rosen (@jayrosen_nyu) May 11, 2023
What did we learn last night? We learned that the real ending of “A Face in the Crowd” is that the audience doesn’t turn on Rhodes. They cheer him all the more.
— Patrick Chovanec (@prchovanec) May 11, 2023
I’d save this for the morning post, but you weaklings would whine about seeing TFG over breakfast.
My priorities yesterday were a little different from Donald Trump’s. pic.twitter.com/H5toYPzZs5
— Joe Biden (@JoeBiden) May 11, 2023
Rusty
As a resident of New Hampshire, I can first hand say this place is a poor representation of the rest of the country. Too little diversity and a rabid libertarian crowd that wants to burn it all down. The state legislature has refused to back down on the first in the nation status and on fact passed legislation to even more firmly make it first. It won’t matter this cycle since Biden is the incumbent, but with an open election it will be a mess on the Democratic side. The Republicans of course love the higher percentage of wack jobs that make up the electorate and so will continue to come.
Princess
Very interesting context. Anyway, as Biden said, if you don’t want another four years of what happened in that town hall, you know what to do. Pretty clever of Biden to start making 2024 a referendum on Trump already.
different-church-lady
The thing that pisses me off is the way CNN’s people keep making statements as though they had no idea how this was going to unfold. “We did our best to fact check him live, but it’s impossible!” You knew perfectly well you weren’t going to be able to do that, but you went ahead and gave him a stage for it anyway.
He didn’t say a single thing he hasn’t said already. Stop pretending he’s an unknown quality that needs to be examined and exposed. We already know and you already know. And when you play dumb you’re just insulting us.
Hilbertsubspace
Chris Licht, what an almost perfect name. Licht is German for light, but better still is its similarity to the Latin word Lictor (The “-or” is a male ending so the root word is Lict-) A Lictor was the guy who carried around the Fasces for the dictator. It really is the Chef’s kiss for a shit sunday. A perfect name for someone who carries water for fascism.
David 🌈 ☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch
CNN recently fired three employees, including their long time CEO, for mistreating women.
so naturally they follow up by promoting a candidate who has spent his entire life mistreating and assaulting women.
If Ted Turner was dead he’d be rolling over in his sacouphicous
different-church-lady
@David 🌈 ☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch:
They needed to bring in some fresh rot.
Kay
I understand and agree with the people who say Trump campaign events like this one are bad for the country but I think they’re good for Democrats.
brantl
“Sundae”.
different-church-lady
@Kay: I’m still too traumatized from ’16 to believe the replace-reality-with-shit-field might not work again.
Geminid
@Rusty: Do you think the issue of New Hampshire’s primary will move many voters in your state come November, 2024?
brantl
Lawyers in our midst: can E. Jean Carrol get an injunction against Stumpy saying her name, or speaking about her, after someone has mentioned her name? If not, why not? She can sue him again, or does she even have to, is there any sort of expediting mechanism for repeat offenders?
NotMax
Blech™.
The Thin Black Duke
@Kay: It’s confirmation that there are no “moderate” Republicans anymore. The fence sitters who don’t know this by now never will because they don’t want to know.
Kay
So, so sick of this lecture from them. Dumbasses: no one is obecting to hearing from people “they disagree with”. That’s not the issue. The issue is dumbasses in media promoting people who lie constantly.
No one has some patriotic or First Amendment duty to watch this garbage they churn out.
They’re doing it for their own careers, books sales, ratings, share price and that’s the ONLY reason they’re doing it.
Geminid
The Turkish election is coming down to the wire. Recent polls show President Erdogan with a 4 point lead, challenger Kilicdoraglu with a 5 point lead, or both virtually tied, with all showing significant numbers of undecided.
Mr. Ogan, the third candidate still in the race, is polling around 5% and may hold Sunday’s winner below 50%. In that case there will be a runoff May 28.
Kay
@The Thin Black Duke:
Democrats don’t exist in political media world so our half of the “pick one of two” race is ignored, but Trump front and center might turn out his voters but it also turns out ours. This is a choice between two.
Warblewarble
What next for CNN? Perhaps a town hall with Robert Kennedy jr. with an audience of anti vaxers and conspiracy theorists. Or Marianne woo Williamson with an audience of crystal gazers and assorted cranks. Or perhaps they can find a”perfectly reasonable ” third party candidate who nudge , nudge is not a republican shill.
Kay
I watched part of the Clarence and Ginni Thomas doc on Frontline last night. Ginni Thomas’ parents were Right wing nuts too. Regular Republicans in the town where she grew up called Right wing nuts “black hats” back then. There were Republicans and then there were black hats (Birchers, ect). Love that.
NotMax
Shlock and flaw.
Ceci n est pas mon nym
@brantl: Legal commentary I’m hearing is that there is definitely new actionable defamation from stuff he said, and also great new evidence he provided for a Mar-a-Lago prosecution.
So there’s that.
Kay
@Warblewarble:
Then they can all sanctimoniously lecture us on how we have a patriotic duty to listen to any lying, grifting asshole they’re promoting – you MUST listen to Kennedy’s crackpot medical theories because millions of Americans are also crackpots.
I don’t mind that they churn out low quality garbage I just wish they’d drop the nonsense that is somehow about “serving Americans”. Skip the lectures.
Geminid
@Kay: During the Trump years, Virginia Democrats saw Trump as a strong GOTV force for their side, and objective Republicans conceded this was true. Some political scientists who compared voting rolls in the 2021 election to those of 2020 posited that Trump may have depressed Republican turnout as well.
Shalimar
@Princess: Referendum on Trump. Referendum in Dobbs. Referendum on assault rifles.
Republicans have 3 different massive issues where they are adamantly opposed to the vast majority of Americans. Hang them with all 3 of those millstones. Campaigning on anything else would be malpractice.
Kay
@Geminid:
You have to start with the understanding that political media don’t understand Democrats or the Democratic Party and they have no interest in understanding Democrats or the Democratic Party. They see things from where a Republican is standing because they don’t believe our voters are legitimate – we’re the deviation from the norm to them. The norm is Republicans.
MisterDancer
James Fallows noted a post-Town Hall panel of New Hampshire Trump supports, also one by CNN. They asked the panel did Trump look worse to them, after the Town Hall? No.
Did he look better to them? No.
Then they asked if the panelists think the same about Trump now, as before the Town Hall? There, all of the panelists said yes.
It’s a cult of personality. You’re either in, or you’re out. And there’s too many of my fellow Americans who are just desperate to be part of something, anything, and Trump gives them that, in spades. That it involves harm to so many is a feature, a way to keep them close to him no matter what may come.
For CNN to give it space is horrific. For Anderson Cooper to claim that people like me just “have to get along” with people willing to defame and inflict harm on me — or stand aside as others do the dirty work — for naught but my skin color? Shame on him.
These mostly Male, mostly White people have turned their backs on everything that actually makes America a potentiality great place, in favor of…well, y’all know. I don’t need to rant on that, this fine morning.
I do really recommend the Fallows piece on the Town Hall, though. Really good editorial.
Kay
The family who own the Pittsburgh Post Gazette also own the Toledo Blade so I called to cancel The Blade until the strike is over and told them why and the person who took the call at The Blade said “oh, thank you. I wish we would strike” :)
Just remember your local media (if you still have it) is not multimillionaire cable tv celebrities and NYTimes reporters getting multi million dollar advances for books.
Kay
@MisterDancer:
Anderson Cooper is wrong. You are under no obligation to listen to a 70 minute Trump campaign commercial. If he wants better quality viewers and listeners he should create better quality content. This is junk. I’m under no patriotic obligation to consume it.
mrmoshpotato
LOL! Matthew Dowd is a fundamentally ridiculous person as driftglass likes to say.
Would someone Twitter remind that assclown about the “k’rrupt duopoly” please?
Barbara
Not my circus, etc., but what really takes this event outside the realm of news is that there are actually other candidates. They may be weak but they aren’t Marianne Williamson lightweights. Giving the floor to Trump alone is not normal when there is still an ongoing primary contest.
Geminid
@MisterDancer: Thanks, I will look at that Fallows piece.
My personal observations of the Republican party in my state is that they have been shedding voters in the center for 20 years. Virginia went from red to purple to blue during that time. Demographic change is one reason, but Republican radicalism has also been a big factor, I think.
Virginia seemed to have backslid in the 2021 election, but I think the underlying trend is still towards Democrats. We’ll find out this November, when both General Assembly houses are up for election.
mrmoshpotato
LOL! Some prefer not to puke right before breakfast.
Matt McIrvin
@MisterDancer: The thing that really amazes me is that it sounds like CNN did more than “give it space”–they manipulated the audience to appear as pro-Trump as possible, by admitting only Republicans and Independents (presumably under the rationale that this is a primary-campaign thing) and then cautioning the people they did let in to be respectful and show no displeasure, no matter how disrespectful Trump was. So basically they set up a Trump rally on purpose and now are scolding us to respect what they did in the name of balance.
Evap
@Kay: my local paper – The Atlanta Journal – is pretty good and especially good on local issues. I subscribe and i hope they are able to keep going; I know it’s brutal for newspapers these days.
Matt McIrvin
@Kay: They could get some Democrats killed.
mrmoshpotato
@Rusty:
Rabid bears.
schrodingers_cat
I did not watch Trump when he was on NBC with The Apprentice. Neither did I watch him when he ran in 2016 and 2020. I used to hit the mute button when he was in the news as president. I’m not going to start watching him now.
Geminid
@Matt McIrvin: It was even better for Trump than a typical rally audience because the freaks who travel from rally to rally were culled out by the selection rules.
Kay
@Matt McIrvin:
If another Trump fanatic is going to kill (more) people they will kill people regardless of whether CNN hosts a campaign commercial or not. They don’t even listen to him anymore.
Kay
@Evap:
Agree. I lived in Atlanta for a time and I read it.
Ken
@Ceci n est pas mon nym: Obviously CNN had no interest in reining in Trump, but you’d think at least one of his lawyers would have demanded a shock collar and control of the button for the duration of the program.
Ken
@Barbara: Good point. I wonder what CNN would do, if the Biden or DeSantis campaigns asked for their own rally.
Another Scott
@Matt McIrvin: +1
It was a giant campaign contribution for TFG.
The only saving grace is that the ratings were poor, and it will be forgotten before the month is out.
Cheers,
Scott.
NotMax
An audience intentionally slanted to a previous town hall’s “[Obama’s] an A-rab” lady clones.
Soprano2
I think it’s even narrower than that; to the press, the “normal” voter is a white man, so whoever white men vote for is who they’re going to think is “normal”. That’s why they could never find people who supported Hillary Clinton, those people aren’t “normal” voters to the press. Until this idea is somehow driven from their minds, they’ll continue propping up Republicans as the “norm”.
Soprano2
Who are the people who believe TFG will ever be different than he is now? Geez…..
Soprano2
@Kay: Plus, we already know what TFG is going to say – there’s no reason to listen to a 70-minute TFG commercial on CNN to know that!
MisterDancer
Yep! Like we’re children. And there’s a…long history of that being an excuse for all kinds of prejudice.
Soprano2
@Ken: I’d love to see the Biden people ask for a town hall, and insist on the same rules and format – only Democrats or sympathetic independents, no booing or other unpleasant behaviors, and a former Democratic operative to ask the questions. I doubt they would ever give Biden a forum like that. Of course, Biden doesn’t tell a fire hose of lies, either.
Rusty
@Geminid: I don’t think it will matter in 2024 because there isn’t a meaningful primary for the Democrats (I think the constituency for Kennedy among registered Democrats is very, very small). I do think it will become harmful in 2028. A lot of Democratic legislators voted for the first in the nation primary legislation, this is an issue that cuts across party lines and is closer to a statewide cultural issue. Given we are a close swing state, I do think there is a real risk that enough independents could feel put off by the Democrats to change the election. I don’t have a good answer for what to do.
The Castle
@Rusty:
Sorry, folks, but New Hampshire is a D+0 state — in other words, it’s political leanings most closely match the aggregate of the entire country. Other states that are nearly as close are Minnesota (D+2), Michigan (R+2), Nevada (R+2), and Pennsylvania (R+3). Nowhere on a “close state” list do I see South Carolina (R+19).
Also, the state of New Hampshire had nothing to do with this circus, it was CNN’s choice.
And the crazy Trumpf cultists are everywhere. In New Hampshire, like in much of the West, they run libertarian. In the South and Midwest, they run more toward the Handmaid’s Tale.
Rusty
@mrmoshpotato: We do have a local bear, our neighborhood FB page routinely is updated with sightings. Two years ago a momma bear and her cub climbed the oak trees in our front yard and feasted on acorns while we watched. Thankfully they aren’t rabid, and while they seem generally apolitical the fact that farther north they are harassing libertarians makes them my heroes. We are careful to not post sightings on the broader town page since we don’t want any of the gun nuts showing up in the neighborhood to start blasting away.
Marmot
@Kay:
This is a very interesting perspective. It’s weirdly consistent with the only true principle of conservatives, enforcing the traditional social order.
Anybody who wants any kind of change is by definition outside of the traditional mainstream, and therefore illegitimate.
You’d think political media types would have personal sympathy going the other way, but their incentives are to pander to the crowd, and it’s easiest to pander to a bunch of people who share the same unchanging ideas of what society is about. The people whose self-definition is “true American.”
Idiots, the lot.
Edit: oops block quote
Anyway
@schrodingers_cat:
I switched channels when he showed up on Howard Stern’s pre-Sirius radio show …
The Castle
@Geminid:
I suspect that the loss of the primary will move the needle a little next year. New Hampshire has a lot of independents, and Biden needs a majority of them to win in Nov 2024. It is a slap in the face to the state. And for what advantage? I have yet to hear a coherent argument for moving the 1st primary to SC other than “it’s not representative” – and if that’s your argument, SC is far worse, and ultimately no state will satisfy you.
I agree with Rusty that this will hurt the Dems a lot more in 2028.
And if you think NH does not matter, consider that Al Gore would have been president in 2000 if he had won NH, and he only lost by 1%, despite spending little attention here.
geg6
@different-church-lady:
Same.
twbrandt
@David 🌈 ☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch: I honestly thought Ted Turner was dead. He’s completely dropped out of sight.
Birdie
@The Castle: The problem, as I understand it, is that New Hampshire is very, very white, and therefore quite unrepresentative of the Democratic party base. If elections are won on turnout, then it’s unclear that NH going first would serve to elevate winning candidates. The last competitive Dem primary is a good example of the issue.
Also (and I admit this is petty) the “we’re special and just you watch, we’ll take our ball and go home if you won’t play by our rules” schtick is just off-putting and makes me more glad that the whole First in the Nation thing is going away. I have heard no defensible reason why NH is more important than every other state, and the local Dems don’t do themselves any favors with the rest of the country by making that argument.
A Man for All Seaonings (formerly Geeno)
South Carolina was chosen, because it’s primary electorate more representative of the democratic base, not because it’s more representative of the electorate at large.
Geminid
@The Castle: Well. I certainly know New Hampshire is an important state. Maybe because I’ve lived in one, I look at all purple states that way.
Citizen Alan
@Geminid:@Geminid: Can someone more in tune to Turkish politics tell us who are the good guys and the bad guys? I know that Erdogan has some issues, but I have no idea whether his opponent is a moderate who wants strong ties with NATO and support for Ukraine or whether he’s some crazy RW fundamentalist who wants to destroy secular Turkish democracy and is secretly on Putin’s payroll.
Citizen Alan
@schrodingers_cat:
The only decent thing to ever come out of The Apprentice.
Roberto el oso
Re Anderson Cooper’s soft-scolding of viewers who prefer not to immerse themselves in crap — the most self-righteous response I ever heard was when my father, after many years, canceled his subscription to “Commentary” after one too many issues praising the policies of Likud — he received a letter acknowledging his cancelation which included the observation “Your world is now smaller, you have closed a window on reality” … after his initial fury he laughed and laughed.
Citizen Alan
@twbrandt: Perhaps he’s hiding out of shame and regret that he sold CNN, which at the time he seemed to view almost as a public trust, to a pack of money-grubbing fascist symps.
Ascap_scab
What America witnessed was the death of Ted Turner’s Cable News Network as a News organization.
Corporate “news” – FOX, NBC, CBS, ABC, NYT, WAPO, etc. – has been on a long downhill slide away from journalism and truth for decades.
What the Dominion case exposed with clarity is that corporate “news” is, in fact, entertainment. It is not about truth, not about informing, not about red or blue, it is about $green$.
When Discovery Networks bought Time Warner Media last year, they got CNN, a money losing operation as part of the package. Discovery has no interest in Journalism, their interest is in Green. That “town hall” was no mistake, it generated a 12x spike in viewers for that time slot. The next morning CNN exec Chris Licht called it a screaming success.
Here’s your truth: “CNN” is dead! Discovery Truthiness is taking that spot on the cable dial. With it will be what you saw the other night. The Jerry Springer Show. (rip, Jerry)
In the next slots will be Maury Povich, Sybil The Soothsayer, and the Mao Tse Tung Hour.
Paddy Chayefsky foresaw it all.
crimson pimpernel
I didn’t watch the CNN circus because I am not a masochist, but from what I’ve read it sounds like there was a real “Triumph of the Will” vibe about it. For Anderson Cooper’s information, standing up to the Nazis would have been a far more useful decision than watching “Triumph of the Will”
MinuteMan
So when can I tune in to the CNN Biden town hall? Soon?