Commentary Magazine


Topic: Anderson Cooper

Anderson Cooper Demolishes DWS Abortion Claim

This hasn’t been the best month for Debbie Wasserman Schultz. Last week, Wolf Blitzer called her out for misleading comments on Paul Ryan’s Medicare plan, and last night Anderson Cooper tore apart her allegations about Mitt Romney’s abortion position (via Allahpundit):

As usual, Wasserman Schultz refused to back down, but since she’s defending a completely indefensible and obviously false claim there’s only so much she can say. When Cooper reads her the Los Angeles Times article that she completely took out of context in a fundraising email, it’s pretty much game over.

Does this mean the Democratic National Committee will stop sending out breathless, over-the-top fundraising emails about how the Romney campaign wants to send women back to the dark ages? Somehow, I doubt it.

Message Discipline Ad Absurdum

Anderson Cooper’s interview with Obama campaign spokesman Ben LaBolt is fantastically ineffective. CNN’s Cooper asks LaBolt questions about the hypocrisy of Obama’s attack on Bain Capital. LaBolt refuses to answer them, choosing instead to simply repeat his talking points. This isn’t unheard of in American politics, of course. But LaBolt’s mechanical, rigid, and robotic style — his refusal even to acknowledge Cooper’s question if only to pivot off of it — is beyond parody. It is message discipline ad absurdum.

It’s impossible to know why the Obama campaign would think there is any up-side to putting someone like LaBolt on the air. Anyone even remotely objective would come away from this interview less impressed with the president’s position, correctly assuming that LaBolt’s inability to address the questions directed at him means he has no counter-argument to offer.

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