By Mark for the TIB Network:
I don't usually watch the Daily Show at all. However, after reading this at OpinionJournal, I had to catch the repeat of Jon Stewart's propaganda show....
Here is the transcript. Check it out. I have highlighted some below, with commentary, of course.
Stewart: But what do you make of--here's my dilemma, if you will. I don't care for the way these guys conduct themselves--and this is just you and I talking, no cameras here [audience laughter]. But boy, when you see the Lebanese take to the streets and all that, and you go, "Oh my God, this is working," and I begin to wonder, is it--is the way that they handled it really--it's sort of like, "Uh, OK, my daddy hits me, but look how tough I'm getting." You know what I mean? Like, you don't like the method, but maybe--wrong analogy, is that, uh--?
Soderberg: Well, I think, you know, as a Democrat, you don't want anything nice to happen to the Republicans, and you don't want them to have progress. But as an American, you hope good things would happen. I think the way to look at it is, they can't credit for every good thing that happens, but they need to be able to manage it. I think what's happening in Lebanon is great, but it's not necessarily directly related to the fact that we went into Iraq militarily.
Stewart: Do you think that the people of Lebanon would have had, sort of, the courage of their conviction, having not seen--not only the invasion but the election which followed? It's almost as though that the Iraqi election has emboldened this crazy--something's going on over there. I'm smelling something.
Soderberg: I think partly what's going on is the country next door, Syria, has been controlling them for decades, and they [the Syrians] were dumb enough to blow up the former prime minister of Lebanon in Beirut, and they're--people are sort of sick of that, and saying, "Wait a minute, that's a stretch too far." So part of what's going on is they're just protesting that. But I think there is a wave of change going on, and if we can help ride it though the second term of the Bush administration, more power to them.
Gee, Ms. Soderberg, I guess you better tell that highlighted statement above to the Lebanese officials who say, quite directly, that the US action in Iraq and the resulting elections HAS caused the changes in Lebanon and the Middle East. For someone who supposedly keeps up on these things, uh....where have you been? Notice here that Stewart actually acquiesces that what is going on is a good thing...He just hates that it is Bush who is involved...Sad, really....But wait, it gets better.
Stewart: Do you think they're the guys to--do they understand what they've unleashed? Because at a certain point, I almost feel like, if they had just come out at the very beginning and said, "Here's my plan: I'm going to invade Iraq. We'll get rid of a bad guy because that will drain the swamp"--if they hadn't done the whole "nuclear cloud," you know, if they hadn't scared the pants off of everybody, and just said straight up, honestly, what was going on, I think I'd almost--I'd have no cognitive dissonance, no mixed feelings.
Soderberg: The truth always helps in these things, I have to say. But I think that there is also going on in the Middle East peace process--they may well have a chance to do a historic deal with the Palestinians and the Israelis. These guys could really pull off a whole--
Stewart: This could be unbelievable!
Soderberg:---series of Nobel Peace Prizes here, which--it may well work. I think that, um, it's--
Stewart: [buries head in hands] Oh my God! [audience laughter] He's got, you know, here's--
Soderberg: It's scary for Democrats, I have to say.
And here I thought peace was a good thing, FOR ANYBODY, especially in the MidEast. See, the truth revealed--what is good for America is bad for Democrats....But wait, it gets better!!!
Stewart: He's gonna be a great--pretty soon, Republicans are gonna be like, "Reagan was nothing compared to this guy." Like, my kid's gonna go to a high school named after him, I just know it.
Soderberg: Well, there's still Iran and North Korea, don't forget. There's hope for the rest of us.
WHAT?!?!? Soderberg is actually rooting for Iran and North Korea. "There's hope?" This is really sick, how far the Dems have fallen, hoping for things to go bad in Iran and North Korea....And remember, this woman worked actively in the Clinton Administration under Maddy Albright (Kim Jong Il's pinup girl) and also worked as a Dem advisor on foreign policy to several candidates....Scary, isn't it?
Stewart: [crossing fingers] Iran and North Korea, that's true, that is true [audience laughter]. No, it's--it is--I absolutely agree with you, this is--this is the most difficult thing for me to--because, I think, I don't care for the tactics, I don't care for this, the weird arrogance, the setting up. But I gotta say, I haven't seen results like this ever in that region.
Soderberg: Well wait. It hasn't actually gotten very far. I mean, we've had--
Stewart: Oh, I'm shallow! I'm very shallow!
Soderberg: There's always hope that this might not work.
Firstly, the audience laughter disturbs me. This woman rooting against us, the audience should have been ticked. However, given the average audience for the Daily, I am not surprised. Secondly, this woman expresses the dominant feelings of her party. Basically, if it is good news for America under Bush, we have to hope something bad happens. She basically hopes that Iran and North Korea flare up. What does she want, a nuclear holocaust? The folks over at Opinion Journal (where this transcript was found and led to my watching the repeat of this) finish with some excellent points, which needs no commentary:
She was supposed to be promoting her book, and instead he got her to spend the entire interview debunking it (at least if we understood the book's thesis correctly from the very brief discussion of it up top).
She also admitted repeatedly that Democrats are hoping for American failure in the Middle East. To be sure, this is not true of all Democrats, Soderberg speaks only for herself, and she says she is ambivalent ("But as an American . . ."). But we do not question her expertise in assessing the prevailing mentality of her own party. No wonder Dems get so defensive about their patriotism.
Interesting too is Stewart's acknowledgment of his own "cognitive dissonance" and "mixed feelings" over the Iraq liberation. It's a version of an argument we've been hearing a lot lately: As our Brendan Miniter puts it, "The president's critics never seem to tire of claiming that the war in Iraq began over weapons of mass destruction and only later morphed into a war of liberation."
Miniter correctly notes that "this criticism isn't entirely right," but for the sake of argument let's assume it is. What does it mean? President Bush has altered his arguments to conform to reality, while his critics remain fixated on obsolete disputes. This would seem utterly to refute the liberal media stereotype. Bush, it turns out, is a supple-minded empiricist, while his opponents are rigid ideologues.
I lied....I have to give some commentary. These guys are dead on. Soderberg's book is called the SuperPower Myth, alluding to the Madeline Albright theology that the US should not be the lone superpower, that we need to cede things to other nations to level the playing field. The SuperPower Myth also addresses that Bush fell prey to thinking America as a SuperPower could change things in the MidEast. Gee, it seems to be, as it did to the OJ folks, that she basically debunked her own book. Good luck with that, Ms. Soderberg!
Also, Their assessment of the arguments over the war are right on. WMD was part of the issue, but it was not the only one. However, it is the only one which has not been totally proven, despite the fact that Saddam did violate UN resolutions according to the ISG reports under David Kay and his successors, and despite the fact Kay said he was GOING TO reconstitute his programs.
I guess the freedom of several million people means nothing before saying, "no missiles. Ha!"
Again, this is another glance at the Democrat party unhinged: What is good for America is bad for Democrats, and conversely, what is bad for America is good for Democrats.
(note: before PK and PvP and any other left leaning person thinks I am painting with a broad brush, let me say this: I know many patriotic democrats who do not think this way, even if they did vote for Kerry....I am mainly speaking about the mainline leaders of the party and the folks in Washington, ie Pelosi, Dean, Reid, et. al.)
By the way, you can watch the Soderberg interview over at The Daily Show website. See the meltdown.
