Trump attorney van der Veen reads the riot act to a CBS interviewer
One of the things that endeared Trump to his legion of supporters is the fact that he would not let leftists in the media set the narrative. He refused to accept the biased premises underlying their questions and assertions, thereby breaking with decades of conservative behavior. That same fire burned through Michael van der Veen, one of the attorneys who helped achieve Trump's acquittal when CBS's Lana Zak implied that it was just a little thing when House impeachment managers falsified evidence.
For decades, when the media interviewed Republicans, it posed questions that were the equivalent of the infamous "When did you stop beating your wife?" question. That question assumes that the person being interrogated did, in fact, beat his wife. And for as many decades, Republicans never forcefully pushed back against the false premise inherent in the question.
That is, Republicans never forcefully pushed back until Trump came along. In 2017, Evan Sayet summed up what Trump's supporters loved (and still love) about him: "he fights."
As Sayet explained, for decades the left has been engaged in a brutal, scorched-earth war against America and, specifically, against conservatives. Conservatives, however, kept playing by the rules. They'd get kneecapped and apologize for leaving their knees in the way of the left's jackboots:
With Donald Trump, this all has come to an end. Donald Trump is America's first wartime president in the Culture War.
Trump is fighting. And what's particularly delicious is that, like Patton standing over the battlefield as his tanks obliterated Rommel's, he's shouting, "You magnificent bastards, I read your book!" That is just the icing on the cake, but it's wonderful to see that not only is Trump fighting, he's defeating the Left using their own tactics.
That book is Saul Alinsky's Rules for Radicals. And the unwritten rule in that book is "don't take it; give it."
Giving it is exactly what van der Veen did when Lana Zak belittled the fact that the Democrat House impeachment managers altered evidence in the (faux) impeachment against a former president of the United States. Van der Veen explained just how appalling this conduct was:
[P]rosecutors in this case doctored evidence. [snip] It was absolutely shocking, I think, when we discovered it. [snip] The American people should not be putting up with this. They need to look at who these House Managers were and look to see whether these are the folks they want representing them. It was shocking to me. [snip] They didn't deny it.
Zak, rather than responding to the substantive point — Democrats engaged in the incredibly unethical behavior of altering evidence in what was, essentially, a judicial proceeding — tried to play down what had happened by nitpicking the little things that the House managers had done:
To be clear to our viewers. What you're talking about now is a checkmark that's a verification on Twitter, that did not exist on that particular tweet; a 2020 that should have actually have read 2021; and the selective editing, you say, of the tapes. Is that the doctored evidence of what you're speaking?
And that's when van der Veen went ballistic. It obviously seemed to him that Zak was belittling the nature of the fraud. He felt that her question should have been about corrupt behavior in the trial of a former American president and, instead, she was trying to nail down checkmarks:
Listen, what has to happen... (cross talk as Zak interrupted) The media has to start telling the right story in this country. The media is trying to divide this country. You are bloodthirsty for ratings!... I can't believe that you would ask me question indicating that it's alright just to doctor a little bit of evidence. There's more stuff that we uncovered that they doctored to be frank with you. And perhaps that will come out one day. But we won this case... And someone should look at the conduct of these House managers. It's unconscionable!... Your coverage is so slanted it's got to stop.
And then van der Veen ripped off his mic and walked away. That van der Veen was operating on a hair trigger is unsurprising. The "tolerant" left has sent him almost 100 death threats and backed it up by physically attacking his office and, even more frighteningly, his home.
Everything van der Veen said about the media is correct. Will this change any leftist minds? No. But ordinary Americans, those who have started to realize that the media is not reporting facts, but is pushing an agenda, may see in van der Veen's words a legitimate statement about the media's responsibility for tearing America apart.
Image: Michael van der Veen attacks the corrupt media. YouTube screen grab.