Say what you want about John Cleese's crazy left-wing politics. In his portrayal of the Black Knight in 1975's Monty Python and the Holy Grail, he at least stood his ground after the fight with King Arthur. Granted, all that was left of him was an armless, legless stump, but remain, the Black Knight did as King Arthur galloped away.
In last night's interview with Bret Baier on Fox News, Kamala Harris displayed every bit of the hubris and delusionment of the Black Knight, and blended it with the courage of Brave Sir Robin, cutting the interview short and running away. Once she was safely back in the motorcade car, fever swamp Twitter/X swooped in to tweet out that the interview was just a scratch.
The boss has an exceptional recap from last night. The interview, born out of desperation and executed in angry and bewildering incompetence, was a 26-minute affair that immediately became an online Rorschach test. To those on the right, seeing Kamala Harris face down a tough, pressing interview for the first time in her political career, one similar to those that Republican politicians face in regime media every single day, was a lot of fun to watch.
As soon as the interview concluded, X became the Spin Room after a presidential debate, especially for Democrats and Never Trumpers. Mark Cuban offered this up.
The beautiful thing about the @BretBaier interview is that @KamalaHarris understood and responded to each question.
— Mark Cuban (@mcuban) October 17, 2024
She used examples of policies. She gave real world context.
When Brett went hard after her. She didn’t call him names. She didn’t quit the interview. She…
Bret Baier didn't go hard after her. He interviewed her. It is perceived as hard by voices on the left, including Never Trumpers, when compared to the tongue baths she's received from MSNBC, CNN and CBS the last few weeks. Former Congressman Max Rose was on CNN and said this afterwards.
🔥🚨DEVELOPING CNN Max Rose said Kamala Harris’ interview on Fox News was a home run. ‘She showed that she will go anywhere at any time and show the courage necessary to speak to every American because that's what a real president does.’ pic.twitter.com/itMWl5a7Tj
— Dom Lucre | Breaker of Narratives (@dom_lucre) October 17, 2024
She wins for participating, I guess. Someone should have given her the ribbon to wear around her neck. Keep in mind that she refused to appear at a debate on Fox News with the same Bret Baier moderating. But the left is satisfied at her clearing that low bar by showing up, even if she showed up late and bailed out early.
From the Never Trump wing, former Bush speechwriter Pete Wehner and former McCain campaign strategist Stuart Stevens are so distorted by their dislike of the former President, no amount of objectivity can penetrate their analysis of the Fox News interview last night.
If not familiar with @Peter_Wehner, he is a former Bush43 speechwriter, Evangelical, true conservative. Unlike so many, he kept the faith and stayed true.
— Stuart Stevens (@stuartpstevens) October 17, 2024
Read him in @TheAtlantic. Beautiful writer. https://t.co/GyrGmQXv0P
The problem with all of this spin, of course, is Kamala Harris was manifestly awful. Here's former Bush Press Secretary Dana Perino.
Scott Jennings, a former senior staffer for Kentucky Senator Mitch McConnell and current token conservative on CNN, had this to say to Wolf Blitzer's panel.
When Jennings says Kamala doesn't have an ounce of humility in her, here's one of several killer clips from her interview with Bret Baier, showing that she cannot show any remorse whatsoever for the victims of her policies on immigration.
On the subject of humility, while Kamala Harris was briefly on Fox News, Donald Trump appeared on Univision for a town hall in front of a mostly Latino audience. He was asked a couple of different questions that begged for an answer that had to be delivered in a humble way with graciousness. Of course, when questions like that are asked to Donald Trump, it's a crap shoot as to whether he'll answer it the right way or the Trump way. Here's one exchange on what he thinks he erred on during his first term.
Trump has been asked this question in a variety of ways for the last four years. A lot of the time, you cringe at his answer, because his ego won't allow him to say he made a mistake on anything he's ever done in his entire life. But his answer here was very thoughtful and sincere. His biggest mistake was in some of the people he appointed to senior positions of his government. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and Attorney General Jeff Sessions come to mind. Trump was a lore more winsome and charming here than Kamala Harris was on Fox News when asked to address the surviving family members of Jocelyn Nungaray and so many others.
Trump was also asked to name three positive attributes about Kamala Harris. Again, to seasoned politicians, this is one of the easier questions to answer. With Trump, his staffers usually have to duck and cover until they see which way he goes.
Back to Black Knight Kamala. She was pressed on her defense and counterattack against Trump on gender reassignment surgeries on minors, and when Baier pointed out what Trump had said earlier in the day, Harris, in a very condescending way, uttered what could soon become the core of several upcoming Donald Trump ads.
"Well, you know what? You've got to take responsible for what happens in your administration." So that's the standard? Taking responsibility for what happens in your administration? You can almost see the ad playing out in your head. It begins with this 4-second clip from Harris, followed by news clipping after news clipping of dozens of rapes and murders of Americans all across the country at the hands of illegal immigrants here only because of this administration's immigration policy resulting in an open Southern border. It can then be quickly followed up with the unvetted illegal Afghani terrorist that was plotting an Election Day attack. The ad can close with her clip once again, followed by, "I'm Donald Trump, and I approve this message."
A second ad can begin the same way, and then be chock full of visuals of gas pump prices, food price hikes, housing and rent charts and graphs spiraling up, before closing with Kamala's clip again. Kamala's tone indicated she believed this was a mic drop line as she was delivering it. The Trump team or one of independent PACs supporting Trump ought to be able to bury her with this clip down the stretch in swing states.
My overarching takeaway from the debate was that the entire purpose of it, according to campaign guru Brian Fallon, was to reach independents and Nikki Haley Republicans not thrilled with the prospects of having to vote for Trump. What did she give them? Nothing of substance. What she offered instead was whataboutism.
Whatever opportunities an interview like this presented to Harris, as my friend Salena Zito told me this morning, those were not taken. Instead, all that remained were the risks inherent with going on a show actually putting her on the hot seat.
There is a scene in 1991's Necessary Roughness, a mostly ridiculous but at times amusing comedy about college football, where Texas State backup quarterback, Papke, takes a snap, runs around in the backfield as the defense is closing in, and hides behind the back judge, screaming, "Blow the whistle! Blow the whistle!
This was Kamala Harris' staff after 20 minutes into a promised 30 for the interview.
Baier lured Harris into the trap of repeating her charge that Donald Trump is not mentally fit for office and is unstable. When she immediately took the bait, Baier then pivoted by asking her when she realized Joe Biden was slipping.
Now go back and watch this clip specifically at the :50 second mark. When Baier is pointing out her inconsistency in having the ability to diagnose mental decline, she gives a very quick side-eye glance to her staff. That was not an accident. That was her signaling to her staff to get her the hell out of this interview. Within a minute, those same staffers were waving their arms over their heads to distract Baier and get him to wrap it up.
Baier pressed through for another question or two, but then yielded to her staff and the clock. He had to give his staff time to turn the interview around for air a few minutes later. But he didn't end it without getting his final digs in.
Baier said that he hoped she got to say what she wanted to say about Donald Trump, but a lot of people wanted to hear more about her and her policies, and that's why he invited Harris on in the first place. Kamala redirected people to her website where they can find 80 pages of nonsensical policy proposals that would be laughed out of student government in college. Baier's last exchange, pushing once again through the word salad, was to note that he wanted this interview to be about who Kamala is now versus what Kamala Harris was about in 2019. He left hanging out there that she's flip-flopped on everything important, and even after this interview still hasn't offered a reasonable explanation as to why.
So why was the interview a disaster? Try to conjure up a Trump voter that was for Trump on Tuesday watching this interview and changing his or her mind. You can't. That voter doesn't exist.
Now try to imagine an undecided voter in one of the seven swing states. They've held out this long, not wanting to commit until they heard Kamala Harris actually grant an interview and offer substantive responses to the questions all undecided voters have. What possible evidence did she offer up to convince those voters to come down off the fence onto her side of the yard? None.
With the righteous indignation she displayed after getting triggered by Baier's pressing, did she gin up her base? Possibly. Did she turn up the intensity to make up for a 20% loss of Black voters, 23% of Hispanic voters, and Teamsters and Firefighter Union members bailing on her? Not bloody likely.
To wrap up by tying this back to Monty Python, we're learning this morning that in all likelihood, an Israeli strike has apparently caused Hamas terrorist leader Yahya Sinwar to cease to be. He's pining for the fjords. He's an ex-parrot. He's bereft of life. He's pushing up the daisies. He's no more. He's gone to meet his Maker. He's a stiff. Remember Kamala Harris saying just a few weeks ago to Benjamin Netanyahu through regime media not to dare go into Rafah? That she's studied the maps? There's only a two-state solution with a ceasefire and a deal, so just do it? Israel has now apparently taken out the leaders and most of the secondary and tertiary leaders of two terrorist groups on their borders. Kamala Harris, in retrospect, looks like an absolute buffoon.
Barring Donald Trump saying or doing something to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory, there's nothing out there to move the needle back in Kamala Harris' direction. She's showing right now why she couldn't close the deal in Iowa in December, 2019. She's woefully out of her depth, she doesn't have the temperament, she is reflexively unserious, and after last night, her joy that we've been led to believe abounds throughout her and her campaign can be triggered in a flash and evaporated.
Kamala is now in the position of needing a string of good days to have a realistic chance in November. Unfortunately, there's nothing positive for her to build on out on the horizon.
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