On MSNBC's Morning Joe, liberal co-host Mika Brzezinski had an interesting reaction to a correspondent's report regarding the ongoing war of words between President Trump and Hillary Clinton. The NBC News reporter played audio of Mrs. Clinton attacking Trump as a sexual predator, then quoted from the president's tweet firing back at his defeated opponent's conspiratorial sore-loserdom. Brzezinski marveled at Clinton's self-unawareness, apologizing -- then instantly withdrawing the apology -- as she urged the former first lady to "stop talking about this topic unless Bill Clinton wants to come forward and apologize." Watch:
“I think the hold that the Clintons had on the Democratic is over,” she said. “I think people are feeling like they finally can speak their minds about it all, but they didn’t for a long time.” Well yeah, but the idea is that they only feel free to 'speak their minds' now because the Clinton era is over, and there's very little to lose at this point. Brzezinski also went after New York Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, one of the elected Democrats who have abruptly decided -- years after the fact, and long after she needed to feel "honored" by his support -- that Bill Clinton's multiple accusers deserve to be believed: "One of the reasons why we, and I mean me and Kirsten Gillibrand, Democrats, lost is because Bill Clinton’s behavior was accepted. It was pushed under the rug and even women defended him...I know but he continues to flourish today and his wife ran for president even though these women who accused him were attacked in the media, were maligned or settled. That’s a different standard than we’re holding other people who were accused of the same behavior or less today. And this is why we have Trump. It’s all connected."
I somehow doubt a mere apology would suffice for someone like Juanita Broaddrick, but an acknowledgement that Bill's rampant predations were not fever dream hallucinations of the "vast right-wing conspiracy" would be a constructive step toward rooting out normalized sexual harassment and endless partisan hypocrisy (which, of course, is not confined to the Left). I do, however, want to revisit a point I made yesterday about the Left's adulation of Ted Kennedy, despite his indefensible act and cover-up at Chappaquiddick -- and in spite of well-known rumors and reports of his extraordinary mistreatment of women. I tweeted an except from a 1990 GQ story, which described the time that Kennedy and fellow Senate Democrat Chris Dodd brazenly assaulted a waitress at a DC restaurant:
The details in this piece are surreal; hadn't read it in a few years. Ted Kennedy's legacy was celebrated during the 2012 DNC, which also relentlessly attacked GOP's supposed "war on women." #Flashback #LionOfTheSenate #WaitressSandwich pic.twitter.com/nfHMnvjIqh
— Guy Benson (@guypbenson) November 20, 2017
There were many other anecdotes and vignettes in that piece. Here's another:
In a downtown office, a former congressional page tells of her surprise meeting with Kennedy three years ago. She was 16 then. It was evening and she and her 16-year-old page, an attractive blonde, were walking down the Capitol steps on their way home from work when Kennedy's limo pulled up and the senator opened the door. In the backseat stood a bottle of wine on ice. Leaning his graying head out the door, the senator popped the question: Would one of the girls care to join him for dinner? No. How about the other? The girls said no thanks and the senator zoomed off. Kennedy, the formal page said, made no overt sexual overtures and was "very careful to make it seem like nothing out of the ordinary." It is possible that Kennedy did not know that the girls were underage or that they were pages and, as such, were under the protection of Congress, which serves in loco parentis. Nevertheless, the former page said she did find Kennedy's invitation surprising. "He didn't even know me," she says. "I knew this kind of stuff happened, but I didn't expect it to happen to me."...A former mid-level Kennedy staffer, bitterly disillusioned, recalls with disgust one (now ex-) high-ranking aide as "a pimp…whose real position was to procure women for Kennedy." The fellow did have a legitimate job, she says, but also openly bragged of his prowess at getting attractive and beddable dates for his boss.
After I sent the message embedded above, Katie tweeted a reminder of just how extravagant the 2012 DNC's celebration of toward Kennedy's memory was:
The DNC played a seven minute long tribute video for him in which they sprawled "Women's Rights Champion" across the screen https://t.co/ZtPYypBUCX
— Katie Pavlich (@KatiePavlich) November 20, 2017
Fact check: True. This clip played to rapturous applause at Barack Obama's second nominating convention, a major theme of which was Mitt Romney's supposed 'hostility' toward women. The punchline comes at the 40-second mark:
If you're wondering why so many conservatives are skeptical of Democrats' newfound disapproval of misconduct from powerful liberal men within their ranks, this could be exhibit A. I'll leave you with this insanity:
This is impressive commitment to the brand by one @matthewjdowd, my goodness.https://t.co/jsCX2sfnJH
— David Rutz (@DavidRutz) November 20, 2017
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