In Case You Missed It: Lesley Stahl v MTG on 60 Minutes
This interview has been bashed and dashed virtually everywhere in the media establishment….
Lesley Stahl wasn’t sharp enough, or quick enough, and certainly didn’t go far enough into her subject to yield or reveal anything we didn’t already know….
She surely didn’t hold MTG to account for any of her utterances or behavior, or cause MTG to experience any cognitive dissonance or undergo any soul searching of herself…
In typical establishment ‘journalist as celebrity’ fashion: she blew it….
04/04/2023 @ 8:01 am
Oh, believe me, I ‘missed it’! Not enough ice cream in the world could have gotten me to watch her. Tom Nichols (writer for The Atlantic) live tweeted while watching this interview so we would not have to watch it. His observations were excellent, and enough for me.
There was good article in WaPo this morning explaining what the right means when they use the terms ‘pedophile’, ‘groomer’, and ‘human trafficking’. Apparently, they don’t interpret the words according to the dictionary definitions, or the law. This confuses Dems, who think they mean what the words mean. What MGT really means is that people who support LGBTQ people and families encourage more LGBTQ people and families, that this support equals ‘grooming’. I had no idea that was their deal until I read this. What do they call real child molesters and human traffickers?
04/04/2023 @ 11:06 am
“Apparently, they don’t interpret the words according to the dictionary definitions, or the law.”
Suzanne;
This is one of the points where Lesley Stahl had the opportunity to push back with the common sense wisdom of Daniel Patrick Moynihan:
“Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not his own facts.”
Stahl was not up to the task of calling MTG out.
Apparently, she and the 60 Minutes producers chose to engage in the process of laundering MTG’s status, reputation, and profile instead of treating her like an existential threat to American Democracy and civil discourse…
04/05/2023 @ 2:12 pm
I watched the interview when it aired, and I have mixed feelings about it. First, I don’t see much value in giving MTG a platform. She is appallingly ignorant and dishonest. On the other hand, that does need to be demonstrated to the wide audience that 60 Minutes has.
Then, while giving her the audience, and exposing her to inspection, Stahl did break from the journalistic decorum that we expect from her. She rolled her eyes, and said things like “oh boy”, and was clearly inappropriate with MTG in a way that I find perfectly appropriate, except for the fact that someone has to demonstrate the proper example.
And that brings the third thing. Having a conversation with an absolute loon who lacks any principles at all is actually quite difficult. Truth, and deference to reason and facts is something that we all owe one another, and when encountered with someone whose main tactic is to tear down all of those social conventions, one can easily lose patience. Leslie Stahl had an unenviable job. A great comparison is Katie Couric’s interview of Sarah Palin. When that occurred, Palin was still deferential to our world of reality and truth. Palin was negotiating from a position within reality. MTG is way outside of that reality based perspective. She’s trying to get Trump’s notice by being as nihilistic as he is.
I’m hesitant to judge Stahl too harshly because I think most don’t realize how difficult it is to talk to someone like MTG. And yes, it was far from her best interview.
04/05/2023 @ 3:08 pm
I think the thinking at CBS was that they wanted to give the woman enough rope to hang herself, but they forgot to open the hatch under her feet.
Every time we give these people the benefit of the doubt, they prove that they aren’t worthy of it.
I believe that the only sane course of action is to simply stop giving Trump and his cohorts BILLIONS of dollars of free publicity.
The media is addicted to Trump. The reality is that Trump is a common criminal and his arraignment did not merit the amount of coverage it received.
The best way to deal with these people is to aggressively ignore them. Don’t talk about them. Talk about your agenda, what you want to do, what you want to accomplish. Unfortunately, I don’t believe that the Democrats know how to frame their agenda.
And, by the by, I don’t believe that MTG is really that stupid. She knows she’s lying. She’s playing a role. Trump, however, actually believes his own bullshit…and that is truly terrifying.
04/05/2023 @ 9:08 pm
I agree with your first statement complete, Alan. I disagree with practically everything else. I think CBS wanted to give her rope…and executed the execution poorly. I agree that giving them a platform just doesn’t work. As a specie we are coded to believe what we want to believe, and the GOP base is entirely belief based.
As for framing their agenda, Democrats have some trouble. Republicans are far worse. They have not had a platform for almost a decade. It is easier to create a platform than it is to frame an agenda, and they can’t even do that. With the internet, and news distribution channels that sell different versions of reality, and agenda is almost an antiquated notion. The two sides just address two different versions of reality, and the people within who subscribe to them. Philosophically/politically we are more segregated than ever before.
And finally, I agree that MTG knows that she is lying, but I sense that she is truly stupid. What does it take to know that the secret police of the Third Reich was called the Gestapo, and cold Spanish soup is Gazpacho? This woman has left her little burgh and completed a bachelor degree at University of Georgia. What does it take to not pick up on those two very different things, only one of which could arguably be called obscure? “Jewish space lasers…”, which are responsible for forest fires…let’s see. If it were possible for such a thing to exist, which it is not, shouldn’t she know that these would be Israeli lasers…and not “Jewish”? If she were merely playing to anti-semites, or people who hate Spain, Spaniards, or soup, she could do it in a much more intelligent way. It is not necessary to pander to bigots with idiocy in that way. The idiocy that she exhibits is genuine. She’s dumb AF.
Oh, and as for attention to Trump’s arraignment, I think they can’t give it enough attention. Whatever happens, this is presidential history. Decades from now, if the country lasts that long, historians and their students will want to know about Trump and how we handled the first president to be indicted. Teddy Roosevelt once commanded a lot of attention too. He formed a new party to run against Republicans. At the time, I’m sure it was a giant pain in the ass, but by the time we were born it was a fascinating piece of American history. Keep in mind, we are writing the book on how democracy works. Trump’s criminal organization/cult is a part of that history, and possibly even an inevitable result of our flawed constitution and caste system.
04/05/2023 @ 5:12 pm
“…I don’t believe that the Democrats know how to frame their agenda.”
Alan;
Republicans have gotten it so wrong that too many Democrats believe that there’s no need to make a real effort to get it, or make it, right.
04/05/2023 @ 5:18 pm
‘Trump, however, actually believes his own bullshit…and that is truly terrifying.”
04/05/2023 @ 5:43 pm
“I’m hesitant to judge Stahl too harshly because I think most don’t realize how difficult it is to talk to someone like MTG. And yes, it was far from her best interview.”
Bitey;
She surely didn’t hold MTG to account for any of her utterances or behavior, or cause MTG to experience any cognitive dissonance or undergo any soul searching of herself…
Lesley Stahl is an experienced and seasoned television journalist. However, she was not up to the task of calling MTG out.
As difficult as it might have been, I fervently believe that you or I could have done a better job than she did…
04/06/2023 @ 11:00 am
1. Lesley Stahl is no Mike Wallace. That’s for sure.
2. Greene mouths ridiculous notions because it earns her more notoriety and that helps to grow her brand. Her use of “Jewish” space lasers rather than “Israeli” space lasers was calculated. The market she’s focused on loves Israel but HATES Jews.
3. The evidence is increasingly clear that Greene’s followers, like Trump’s followers, really are that stupid and catchy lies are far better at capturing that market than the truth, especially when there is no truth which is the condition we’re approaching.
4. I think about George Orwell’s essay on political communications, the root theme of Nineteen Eighty-Four. I think we’re there.
5. CBS is owned by Paramount Global (formerly ViacomCBS) which I believe is still owned by the Sumner Redstone family as majority shareholders. CBS wants clicks and viewers. 60 Minutes is one of their most valuable properties. Putting up an interview with Greene was guaranteed to bring in viewers who normally would not watch 60 Minutes voluntarily, but treating Greene too harshly would have seriously pissed off that tranche of voters with predictably negative consequences for the CBS brand.
6. LIke all on-air reporters, Stahl is a figurehead. The real work is done by the producers and their teams. They are the ones who put the questions together and guide the interviewer by communicating through the earpieces that every on-air reporter wears while doing staged events like studio interviews.
04/06/2023 @ 12:45 pm
I agree with all of that. And, as much as I enjoyed Mike Wallace, I am not sure he’d be the same if he were still in the business. His grumpy, caustic style isn’t seen anywhere on television now.
And, as for intelligence, I think we all need to think of it a little differently. When we think of measuring a child’s intelligence, we are basically looking at his or her ability to absorb concepts, etc. There isn’t a great deal of context involved, and things like honesty aren’t really taken into account at all. It is different for adults in a professional or a social capacity. There is a great deal of overlap, and they are all complicated by context. As adults function in the broader world, ethics play a large part in intelligence, and the soundness of strategy and tactics. With the simplicity of a child’s world, truth and honesty are fairly straightforward. A child’s interaction with the world is more about meeting its immediate needs than protecting the community or the nation broadly. Right and wrong become far more complex for adults. So, when adults make overly simple strategies for self aggrandizement, like quarterly stock prices, and eschew larger/long term concerns like the environment or social stability, a short term profit can easily turn into a long term disaster. Silicon Valley Bank made absurd commitments to long term bonds, while making speculative investments for short term profit. As conditions in the market changed, and they remained committed in bonds which were losing market value, they attempted to make up lost ground by selling out of those long term positions at a loss, thereby creating the impression that they were in worse shape than they were, and sparking a run on their bank. The withdrawals then cemented the bad position into a fatal one. None of that would have happened had they not deviated from certain standards. Their risk management was atrocious.
People like MTG and Trump are day traders on moral and ethical principles, and these trades sell to their selected, small audience, but they have huge detrimental effects on government and society. Things like the debt limit are a good example. The entire controversy being created is disingenuous. It has a certain traction politically, but the harm that the extortive practice would cause far outweighs the gains that can be made by any particular side. The low ethical score of the tactic drags down the efficacy of the tactic. It can work, but it is idiotic. Knowing that you are lying does not ameliorate the low score for intelligence, in my view. The more complex the situation, the more necessary the ethical content.
04/06/2023 @ 12:55 pm
Alan;
1. CBS (regardless of who owns it) made a poor decision to give MTG a creampuff platform and then broadcast it as such…
2. The producers and their production team made poor choices re the interviewer and the thematics of the interrogatories posed. It may have been good entertainment in their minds, but it was far from good journalism.
3 Lesley Stahl was unprepared or she was made to look that way…
She was either unwilling or unable to provide any kind of meaningful pushback on anything MTG had to say, thus depriving the critically discerning segment of the viewing audience a reason to watch the interaction.
There were no substantive exchanges that would highlight or augment the ongoing battle between intelligence and stupidity; civil discourse and vulgar ignorance.
4. In short: THEY ALL BLEW IT!
There’s no way in hell we should treat an existential threat to the Constitution and democracy in any way other than ‘harshly’!
It is quite possible to be ‘harsh’ without being abrasive…
It is possible to be ‘harsh without being disrespectful, or insulting…
It’s possible to be ‘harsh’ without calling names and hurling epithets and invectives…
More often than not, facts can be harsh to a denier of fact and the truth can be cold and hard to those who support and survive on lies…
04/06/2023 @ 1:19 pm
“Knowing that you are lying does not ameliorate the low score for intelligence, in my view. The more complex the situation, the more necessary the ethical content.”.
Bitey;
Well said…
I’m in full agreement…
Those who are offended by the truth can’t do anything but lie.
04/06/2023 @ 2:29 pm
I’ll raise you one (1)
busted down vs.
the ‘rule of 7/8’s’
microlegislation hey-lo;}
can’t take it with you when
you go … Thumb, walk,
WAIT … yes I am
04/07/2023 @ 12:44 pm
Republicans don’t care about getting caught in their lies because they know that the truth will never reach the people who need to hear it the most:
04/10/2023 @ 2:01 am
I learned recently Marjorie Taylor Greene grew up, and continued to live until running for congress, in Cumming, Ga. in Forsyth County, a former sundown county whose white residents violently drove out the entire Black population in 1912, then carried on similarly for decades until 1987 when civil rights protesting a local KKK rally were attacked/injured and so Oprah came to town to interview some of its white residents to find out, as she put it: ″why this community has not allowed black people to live here since 1912.″
Forsyth County is ranked second wealthiest county in Georgia and is just north of Fulton County (part of ever-expanding metro Atlanta) which is ranked first in wealth – also the county currently investigating Trump.
When MTG decided to run for congress in 2020, Forsyth county’s demographics had changed enough, grown more politically diverse, that the House Freedom Caucus convinced MTG not to run in its district as ‘it might get messy’ and instead to run in the heavily rightwing district in far northern Georgia – bordering Tennessee – that she won in.
Once in Congress, *by the end of her first year* in the House, 2021, and as an open QAnon supporter (the House’s first, although she now claims to be backing off of QAnon beliefs), *only 3 of the 212 Republican members* of the House had surpassed MTG in fundraising—even though she did not receive funds from corporate donors. (from britannica dot com)
This last is why she was given time and indulged on 60 Minutes, no doubt.
The danger she brings to our government, plus her ambition going forward, should not be underestimated.
Thought this might be an interesting addition to this thread.
As is said, follow the money.
04/10/2023 @ 4:47 am
Anna,
Thanks for the info and the insight.
Clearly, this should have been brought up and brought out during the ‘interview’.
04/11/2023 @ 8:15 am
Democrat and Republican gen z and millennials have more in common with each other than they do with preceding generations.
They will be 40% of the electorate by 2024….