The broadcast network blackout [1] of Hillary Clinton telling an audience that corporations and businesses don’t create jobs ended on Thursday night as the CBS Evening News with Scott Pelley brought it up during a segment that continued the liberal media’s hammering of New Jersey Republican Governor Chris Christie for confronting a heckler at an event on Wednesday.
While CBS deserves some credit for finally mentioning this, they just as easily lost it when anchor Scott Pelley and CBS News political director John Dickerson rationalized away what she said as an attempt to please the Democratic base. [MP3 audio here [2]; Video below]
After discussing Christie, the program first played a portion of the soundbite from Clinton, who said at an event for Massachusetts Democratic gubernatorial candidate Martha Coakley that: “Don't let anybody tell you that, you know, it's corporations and businesses that create jobs.”
Afterward, Pelley and Dickerson both emphasized that Clinton clarified her statements and Pelley asked if this was her being “rusty.” Dickerson responded by chalking it up to her:
[T]rying to speak to those Democratic voters who think that corporations and the wealthy have benefited from a rigged economic system and some of those voters think that if she's President she's not going to fix that imbalance. So, she was trying to speak to them and she just overshot and she later said, yes, corporations and entrepreneurs do create jobs.
For the roughly 90 seconds prior in the segment, Pelley and Dickerson dug into Christie with Pelley saying that “New Jersey may be the Garden State, but it’s Governor is no shrinking violet” and posed to Dickerson whether “Christie's style and his combativeness” could impact the 2016 presidential campaign if he runs.
Dickerson replied that “this is part of his image of himself” and seen by many until the Bridgegate scandal occurred, at which point “this Chris Christie went into hiberation,” but now has returned. He pointed out that “some voters like that” in an elected official, especially those that “look at government, they see it can’t do anything” and “[t]hey want somebody who can whip it into shape.”
For Christie to run for President, Dickerson raised some concerns and looked to throw some cold water on the subject, wondering Christie’s personality would “play outside of New Jersey” and whether “a hot confrontation like that match with what people think of as the presidency, which is a job that requires you to be cool under pressure.”
The complete transcript of the segment that aired on the CBS Evening News with Scott Pelley on October 30 is transcribed below.
CBS Evening News with Scott Pelley
October 30, 2014
6:35 p.m. Eastern[ON-SCREEN HEADLINE: Confrontation]
SCOTT PELLEY: New Jersey may be the Garden State, but its Governor is no shrinking violet. Here was Republican Chris Christie at an appearance yesterday taking on a man who interrupted him to criticize his response to Superstorm Sandy.
NEW JERSEY REPUBLICAN GOVERNOR CHRIS CHRISTIE: But all you've been doing is flapping your mouth and not doing anything. So listen, you want to have the conversation later, I'm happy to have it, buddy, but until that time, sit down and shut up.
PELLEY: That was not Christie's first loud confrontation with a member of the public, and if you think he thought better of it, well, here's what he had to say today:
CHRISTIE: I don’t look forward to doing that stuff, but won't shrink away from it either. It's just another day at the ranch with Rancho Christie. So we'll just keep doing our jobs.
[ON-SCREEN HEADLINE: Christie]
PELLEY: But Christie has his eye on another job, and that is President of the United States. John Dickerson, our CBS News political director is with us right now. John, how could Christie's style and his combativeness affect that race in two years?
JOHN DICKERSON: Well, this is part of his image of himself. For the first term as governor, his supporters used to send out videos of these kinds of clash, but then we had the George Washington Bridge episode when a staffer, allegedly, as political retribution, shut down some of the lanes on that bridge, and then this Chris Christie went into hibernation, but now Rancho Christie rides again and some voters like that. They see this, they look at government, they see it can't do anything. They want somebody who can whip it into shape. The question for presidential candidate Christie is two things: One, how does this play outside of New Jersey? And does a hot confrontation like that match with what people think of as the presidency, which is a job that requires you to be cool under pressure.
PELLEY: Now, on the Democratic side, let's look at some comments that Hillary Clinton made that got her in hot water last week.
HILLARY CLINTON: Don't let anybody tell you that, you know, it's corporations and businesses that create jobs.
PELLEY: Don't let anybody tell you corporations create jobs. Well, she clarified her remarks the next day, but are these candidates rusty?
DICKERSON: They are and what Hillary Clinton’s trying to do is she's trying to speak to those Democratic voters who think that corporations and the wealthy have benefited from a rigged economic system and some of those voters think that if she's President she's not going to fix that imbalance. So, she was trying to speak to them and she just overshot and she later said, yes, corporations and entrepreneurs do create jobs. For the candidates right now, it's the preseason, but for Hillary Clinton and for Chris Christie, the preseason still takes place in a big arena when everyone is watching.
PELLEY: John Dickerson, thanks very much.
— Curtis Houck is News Analyst at the Media Research Center. Follow Curtis Houck on Twitter. [3]