Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent Embarasses George Stephanolopous But Stephanopoolous Filibusters and Talks Over Him and Ends the Interview

George Stephanolpolous -- or Slopadopolous, as Trump calls him* -- tried to lecture Scott Bessent that Republicans should give in to Democrats shutdown demands.

Bessent reminded the former (and current) Democrat spokesman and spinner that he had previously called Republicans "terrorists" for shutting down the government in 1995.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent confronted ABC News anchor George Stephanopoulos on Sunday for calling Republicans "terrorists" during the 1995 government shutdown.

Stephanopoulos asked Bessent on Sunday's "This Week" about the Trump administration's plan to end the ongoing government shutdown. Bessent reminded Stephanopoulos about his own experience handling a government shutdown when he served as an advisor to former President Bill Clinton.

"The best way to do it -- and look, you were involved in a lot of these in the '90s," Bessent said. "And, you know, you basically called the Republicans terrorists and, you know, you said that it is not the responsible party that keeps the government closed. And so, what we need is five brave, moderate Democratic senators to cross the aisle, because right now it is 52--3, 52--3. Five Democrats can cross the aisle and reopen the government. That's the best way to do it, George."

"I can disagree with you about the history there, but we don't have a history lesson right now," Stephanopoulos responded.

"No, no, no. George, George, George," Bessent interrupted. "If you want, I've got all your quotes here. I got all your quotes here, George."

Stephanopoulos claimed that Bessent's comments were a "mischaracterization of history" and then repeated his original question.

In a 2000 PBS interview, Stephanopoulos described how there were concerns over whether the Democrats or Republicans would be blamed more for the government shutdown that occurred in late 1995 and early 1996. He said the Democratic Party's strategy relied on accusing Republicans of "blackmailing the country" for shutting down the government.

"Our strategy was very simple. We couldn't buckle, and we had to say that they were blackmailing the country to get their way. In order to get their tax cut, they were willing to shut down the government, throw the country into default for the first time in its history and cut Medicare, Social Security, education and the environment just so they could get their way. And we were trying to say that they were basically terrorists, and it worked," Stephanopoulos said.

Below, you can see Slopadopolous repeatedly talk over Bessent to keep his viewers in the dark about his prior statements.

* Quick aside, if can be PC:

I get annoyed when people in the media pretend to not know how to pronounce fairly common Greek names ending in -opolous. Greek names can be a mouthful, but the -opolous ending is so, so common that, come on, everyone should now get -opolous names, unless you are living somewhere with no Greeks and no Greek diners.

Where I grew up, you weren't even allowed to own a diner unless you had a slight Greek accent, if I may coin an sentence from the dipshit dementia patient Joe Biden.

I do hear commentators saying "Paaa-whatever" instead of Papadopolous. Come on, it's just -oplous with a PapaD in front of it. This isn't too hard.

I don't mean to be Joe Politically Correct but come on, let's not otherize people by pretending you don't recognize easily-pronounced names. (Or fairly easily pronounced, at least.)

That said, I do not mind Trump's nickname of "Slopadoplous" because 1, it's funny as heck, and 2, this twinkle-eyed trans-trending malignant dwarf does nothing but shovel leftwing Marxist slop at us.

posted by Ace at 03:39 PM

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