Hugh Hewitt Demolishes Jonathan Chait

On Monday, talk show host Hugh Hewitt (perm) did another of his in-depth interviews of an MSM chappie, this time Jonathan Chait, who had run a piece in the LA Times denying that Hillary Clinton was angry. (He’s probably right. She isn’t angry; she just sounds angry.)

But Hewitt did another forensic interview job, as he did with Joel Stein recently. At the end of the interview, Chait sounded like a insufferably pompous MSM liberal. Which is what he is.

Hugh Hewitt is emerging as one of the best interviewers in the United States. And you can see why. He is a lawyer, and when he interviews he sounds just like a lawyer examining an unfriendly witness. First he sets his witness up, and then he sets about exposing him as uncooperative and evasive. Not the sort of witness that a jury of American voters would want to believe.

Hewitt understands, instinctively, that there are certain things that an MSM liberal doesn’t want to admit. Number One is that the news media puts out a biased news product. Number Two is that Democrats are not noble and lofty, but angry and ruthless.

Think about it. The MSM talks a lot about “objective” news reporters. They have to. Given that the MSM folk are overwhelmingly liberal, they have to insist that they can put all that aside and deliver an unbiased product. If they admitted they had a problem, then they would have to do something about it. They might have to hire conservatives.

The rise of the new media has put them in a box. The new media is frankly partisan. Conservative pundits are frankly conservative, and liberal pundits are frankly liberal. But the news product of the MSM is slowly getting unmasked as partisan, especially as the advance of conservative speech in the media and the difficulties of the Democrats makes the liberal MSMers more and more protective of their liberal friends.

Thus when Jonathan Chait comes on Hugh Hewitt’s radio show he is trapped into defending the indefensible. He has to admit that the MSMers are all liberal, but insists that their news product is moderate. Hillary Clinton is not angry, but Bush Haters like himself are angry, well sort of. They are angry, but in a formal, rational way, because they rationally disapprove of the president’s policies.

MSMers have an image of themselves as being superior, rational, above the lower orders. But actually, of course, they are just as committed as any other participant in the political square.

Hugh Hewitt understands all this, and so, with his lawyerly wiles, knows how to examine his liberal interview subjects and mercilessly discredit them in the eyes of the jury.