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Tim Russert of NBC’s “Meet the Press” has earned respect for his straightforward interview style and blunt questions, and yesterday he got his latest shot at presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Sen. John Kerry. So Saturday night we drank our milk and ate our cookies and eagerly set our alarm clocks for the crack of dawn — i.e., 10:30 Sunday morning. (Hey, this is New York.)
Russert started off well, pressing Kerry on the differences (and similarities) between his policies regarding Iraq and those of President Bush, as well as what Kerry sees as an acceptable form of democratic governance in that country. But quicker than we could shake the sleep from our eyes, Russert veered into irrelevance, beginning with an examination of Kerry’s words in a 1970 interview with the Harvard Crimson in which he said U.S. troops should be “dispersed through the world only at the directive of the United Nations.” This interview was first exhumed from its moldy grave more than two months ago, and was addressed by the Kerry camp the next day. Since Kerry has repeatedly assured anyone who asks that a few of his beliefs have actually changed since he was 27 years old, this issue died soon after it was reborn in early February. So, we wondered, why is Russert drudging it up now? Especially since the campaign press is generally given to handing candidates a free pass for youthful indiscretions (just ask President Bush). Slow day for the campaign researchers at NBC?
Not long afterward, Russert moved onto Kerry’s vote against an $87 billion appropriations bill to fund post-invasion operations in Iraq. Kerry explained, as he has before, that he had favored a version of the bill with an amendment requiring Bush to pay for the Iraq tab by rolling back part of his tax cut — again, old news. Yet Russert persisted, creating a hypothetical of the sort no savvy candidate would fall for: “If there’s another bill to provide money for the troops, you’ll vote against it again?” Kerry explained, of course, that it would depend entirely on what the situation is.
Next on Russert’s list of stale issues was the now-infamous March 8 statement in which Kerry suggested that foreign leaders had told him that he’s “gotta beat” Bush in November. Like legions before him, Russert pressed Kerry to specifically identify which foreign leaders he had met with, and also cited the Washington Times in making a case against Kerry. But that paper’s coverage of the story, as we have noted before, was riddled with inaccuracies . The Times’ inability to get even the simple facts of this story straight makes them a less than ideal source for Russert to rely on in crafting credible questions for Kerry.
Next, Russert executed a u-turn and returned to 1971:
But Senator, when you testified before the Senate, you talked about some of the hearings you had observed at the winter soldiers meeting and you said that people had personally raped, cut off ears, cut off heads, taped wires from portable telephones to human genitals and on and on. A lot of those stories have been discredited …
This question appears to come directly from a January 27, 2004 National Review piece authored by Mackubin Thomas Owens, which sparked questions when it was published — twelve weeks ago. Kerry addressed his testimony repeatedly in February (including an interview in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette on February 12), but Russert was all too happy to reach back into the fridge for this particular leftover.
Next, Russert leaped forward 37 years to … well, to 2008. Noting that Kerry has promised to create ten million jobs and cut the deficit in half in his first four years as president, Russert asked, “If you do not achieve those goals, would you pledge that you would not seek reelection?” Russert is not a gullible man; surely he must realize that any candidate worth the name wouldn’t go near such a question.
Moving on, he asked about the March 10 tape in which Kerry, speaking to a citizen, referred offhandedly to “crooked” and “lying” Republicans, a controversy that faded at least five news cycles ago. He then turned to Kerry and Bush’s mutual membership in the secret Yale society “Skull & Bones,” as if that might reveal anything new to the viewer — or of use to a curious electorate.
The sad thing about all this is that there are plenty of meaty questions for an enterprising journalist with a huge audience and a captive subject to ask of John Kerry. Campaign Desk, for one, kept waiting for Russert to ask about Kerry’s announced plans for national service, health care, tax incentives, education, and any number of specific economic policies.
We’re still waiting. Unfortunately, so are the millions who watched yesterday’s “Meet The Press.”
–Brian Montopoli and Thomas Lang
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