Rachel Maddow leveled conservative media darling Hugh Hewitt with facts while demonstrating why she should be hosting Meet The Press instead of Chuck Todd.
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Transcript via Meet The Press:
HUGH HEWITT: Well, to quote Dr. Kissinger, it has the additional benefit of being true. Like what he had as an objection to this week, is there were four scandals, but only two were reported. Marco Rubio does not have a scandal. Ben Carson does not have a scandal. Hillary, however, had her non-disclosure agreement revealed by Lachlan Markay, Washington Free Beacon.
And Reuters obtained a letter from the Teneo Group refusing to answer any questions about Hillary Clinton. So there were four scandals, two of them were real, involving Hillary Clinton. They were not reported. One, about Ben Carson, West Point, not a scandal, heavily media. And the one about Marco Rubio was all puff.
RACHEL MADDOW: Why is it not a scandal?
HUGH HEWITT: Because it–
RACHEL MADDOW: From the West Point, “I got a full scholarship to West Point.”
HUGH HEWITT: Because direct admission, it was actually fairly common in the ’70s, I have no doubt that someone at the ROTC said to Ben Carson, “We’ll get you in. Come to West Point.” I have no doubt because it was fairly common in the ’70s and the ’80s. So I do not believe you have to prove a negative.
RACHEL MADDOW: But obviously he’s a very distinguished retired surgeon. Since retiring as a surgeon, he’s basically a professional autobiographer. And that’s what he does. He sells and sells and sells and sells his autobiography. There are a lot of things. The most dramatic things in his autobiography, all of which are favorable to him, all of which have helped sell himself as this amazing person who ought to be president, which cannot be corroborated, including the factual statement that you can get a full scholarship to West Point. It doesn’t even work that way.
HUGH HEWITT: Yes it does. Direct admissions are a full scholarships. That’s just vernacular.
RACHEL MADDOW: Nobody pays.
HUGH HEWITT: Nobody pays.
RACHEL MADDOW: Right.
HUGH HEWITT: So everyone’s on a scholarship.
RACHEL MADDOW: So nobody gets a scholarship.
HUGH HEWITT: But here’s a question.
RACHEL MADDOW: It’s not like he got offered to West Point and didn’t have to pay when other people would have to.
HUGH HEWITT: If you get him to–
RACHEL MADDOW: That’s the impression he gave the way he told his own story.
HUGH HEWITT: Here’s my question. If you get into Yale and you are an ROTC student, you really doubt that someone came to him and said, “You need to go to West Point, we will get you in by direct admi– you don’t have the pay.” You really doubt that happened?
RACHEL MADDOW: But what I doubt is a person ought to be president on the basis of their autobiography. When they sell that to the country as, “I was offered a full scholarship to West Point and I turned it down because I didn’t need it.” You weren’t offered a full scholarship to West Point–
HUGH HEWITT: Yes he was.
RACHEL MADDOW: you didn’t apply to West Point, nobody gets a full scholarship to West Point and if you’re selling yourself, you’re not selling it truthfully.
That was Hugh Hewitt, who the Republican Party requested moderate their debate on CNN, getting his head handed to him by Rachel Maddow. Hewitt tried to sell media bias as the media not reporting some bogus cooked up right-wing attacks on Hillary Clinton while raising real questions about Marco Rubio and Ben Carson.
Maddow came back at Hewitt with facts and reminded the conservative that facts are important especially for a candidate who is selling himself based on his own autobiography.
Rachel Maddow brought up a point that nobody else in the media is discussing. Ben Carson created his own myth. If Carson’s telling of events can’t be confirmed independently, his credibility as a candidate comes under question.
NBC News promoted Joe Scarborough to a position on Meet The Press but passed over Maddow because the network feels that she is “too partisan” for Meet The Press. Rachel Maddow was passed over to be the next host of Meet The Press because Republicans are afraid to come on her show.
Chuck Todd admitted that he allows Republicans to lie on Meet The Press because if he is too tough on them, they will stop coming on his show. Todd’s willingness to play ball with Republicans is why he should not be hosting Meet The Press.
If NBC News wanted to return Meet The Press to its former position of glory, they would have Rachel Maddow hosting the show. Meet The Press needs a host who will not accommodate guests to maintain access. Accommodation for access is common in the corporate media where the threat of Republicans hanging out only on Fox News is a daily occurrence.
Rachel Maddow’s loyalty to facts is why she should be hosting Meet The Press. Maddow’s demand for truth is also the biggest reason NBC News is too terrified to get her the platform that she deserves.
Jason is the managing editor. He is also a White House Press Pool and a Congressional correspondent for PoliticusUSA. Jason has a Bachelor’s Degree in Political Science. His graduate work focused on public policy, with a specialization in social reform movements.
Awards and Professional Memberships
Member of the Society of Professional Journalists and The American Political Science Association
