February 7, 2017

Jake Tapper wasted no time getting to brass tacks with Kellyanne Conway this afternoon over the current kerfuffle around Trump's latest attack on the press and his claim that they just don't report on terrorist attacks around the world.

"In Quebec City last week, a white right wing terrorist opened fire on a mosque filled with men, women and children. President Trump hasn't tweeted one thing about this," Tapper observed. "Why hasn't he offered sympathy to the neighbors in the north?"

The word salad response was as good as any Sarah Palin ever offered. Maybe the one thing that made sense was when she said, "He doesn't tweet about everything." The rest of it was just gobbledegook stirred in with some standard talking points.

Tapper was undeterred. "He tweeted when there was an attack at the Louvre museum when nobody was killed," he reminded her. "I don't understand why he wouldn't tweet when six Canadian citizens were murdered except for the fact that the undercover document that the white house distributed the other day -- last night, rather -- also did not mention any attacks other than those committed by Muslim terrorists and obviously radical Islamic terrorism is a big problem, but there are all sorts of kinds of horrific terrorism that takes place."

Pointedly, he asked, "We saw some of that in South Carolina recently, and I guess the question is are these victims any less dead than the ones killed by Islamic radical terrorists?

A meek Conway answered, "No, not at all. And, of course, Jake, you're right."

She didn't stop there, but I did. Because that's all we need to know right there. Donald Trump deliberately omitted any attacks committed by radical white homegrown terrorists to demonize Muslims, and Kellyanne Conway admitted it.

There is certainly a discussion to be had about why CNN couldn't last more than two days before inviting Conway back onto their airwaves, but for this moment, at least, Jake Tapper had her right where any decent journalist wants her to be -- on the defense and owning it.

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