I’m going to post the key bit from the movie but you’ll have to visit the Free Beacon to listen to the audio of how the exchange really went down, since this is their scoop. Charles Cooke notes that the predictable excuse to come, that the clip was edited this way due to time constraints, makes no sense. If they were editing for length, they would have clipped the question too, not just the answer. What they were actually up to here is something “The Daily Show” has been accused of for years, truncating long exchanges from interviews to make it seem as though the subject is an imbecile who hasn’t anticipated the most basic challenges to his position. “The Daily Show” does it for laughs and to make its smug liberal audience feel intellectually superior to conservative yokels. Katie and her crew did it, apparently, for the smug factor alone. But then, maybe this is what you’re left with when mountains of propaganda have failed to move public opinion towards your position in any durable way. If you can’t convince your opponent to take your side, you might as well sneer at him. That’s what 99 percent of political media is all about, isn’t it?

By the way: Guess where Katie was last night to promote this hatchet job. Right.

Update: The producers have responded to the Beacon. They don’t deny the charge. They just don’t care.

Nora Ryan, the chief of staff for EPIX, the cable channel that is airing the documentary, told the Free Beacon in an email, “Under the Gun is a critically-acclaimed documentary that looks at the polarizing and politicized issue of gun violence, a subject that elicits strong reactions from people on both sides. EPIX stands behind Katie Couric, director Stephanie Soechtig, and their creative and editorial judgment. We encourage people to watch the film and decide for themselves.”