Shame on the Republican Party! That was the message from Washington Week with The Atlantic panelist (and PBS NewsHour co-anchor) Amna Nawaz on Friday’s show. Nawaz, who doesn’t exactly hide her liberal leanings as anchor, was even more freewheeling from her novel perch around public television’s weekly political roundtable, using as anti-Republican ammunition the words of…Poland’s prime minister?
Moderator Jeffrey Goldberg: Amna, let me ask you about one of the -- I mean, obviously one of the most serious consequences of this ‘Houseification’ or this politicization of everything, and let me start by showing you a tweet from the prime minister of Poland, Donald Tusk, who wrote earlier this week:
‘Dear Republican senators of America, Ronald Reagan, who helped millions of us to win back our freedom and independence, must be turning in his grave today. Shame on you.’
I mean, what he`s noticing is a new prime minister of Poland, obviously very, very geared, as Poland is a frontline state, very, very geared to aiding Ukraine, which is running low, and among other things, just basic ammunition.
Amna Nawaz: Yeah.
Goldberg: He’s basically saying, you are abdicating your responsibility that you, America, took on in 1945 to help democracies sustain themselves against autocracy. Talk about the consequences of this, not just for Ukraine, but across the board.
No one focused on how all these pro-Ukraine Democrats were all about submission and detente with Russia for decades, including while Reagan was president. They thought his free-the-Soviet-bloc talk was dangerous, even unglued.
But Nawaz responded eagerly to the chance to excoriate the GOP for not funding Ukraine's war with Russia.
Nawaz: I’m so glad you showed that, because what a tweet.
Goldberg: It’s amazing.
Nawaz: You have a foreign leader scolding one of our two major parties for their failure to act and saying, shame on you. And shame is the key word here, because I just think there is no bar for shame anymore. As you said, it is naked political ambition that’s out there right now. We are not going to move forward on a bill that we know would benefit the system at the southern border that has been badly in need of repair for over decades now. We are not going to move forward on a bill that we know will provide critical assistance to Ukraine as they try to fight off a Russian offensive. And that is now out there. This is not reading between the lines in any way. But I do think it also points out the other key fact here, which is that the world is watching. This came from the leader of another western nation.
Apparently even liberal reporters agree that the United States must be the world's policeman...and Washington fails to reach across the aisle for a compromise.
Every nation right now is looking to see what happens in the United States, whether the U.S. can manage to actually work through congressional gridlock, pass anything, make anything happen, what happens in the next election. Will America even remain the same sort of level of leader after this election? I think that remains to be seen. The consequences really could not be greater.
What would these PBS pundits know about reaching across the aisle? Does the PBS NewsHour offer a welcoming hug to Republicans on its program? No. Would Washington Week allow a Fox News reporter on the set? God forbid! PBS folks are allergic to opposing views. They don't have gridlock. They just enforce unanimity.
