Maybe you remember SNL’s “Weekend Update” segment “ReallyI?!” with Seth (Meyer) and Amy (Poehler).
Well. “Really”, Should President Joe Biden invite former President Donald Trump to join the official U.S. delegation to Queen Elizabeth II’s funeral? That was actually the topic of a panel discussion on the new CNN.
On Friday, Jake Tapper, host of “The Lead,” asked whether Biden will invite Trump to join other former presidents on the U.S. delegation.
CNN correspondent Jeff Zeleny responded by noting that President Barack Obama had invited former Presidents George W. Bush, Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter to join him on the delegation to South African leader Nelson Mandela’s funeral.
And then Zeleny began sounding like he belonged on a news parody like “Weekend Update.”
“Maybe in the spirit of forgiving and giving, President Biden will invite the Donald Trump on the Air Force I. I doubt that will happen, but I do expect some type of a bipartisan delegation.”
Really!?!
And then Tapper jumped in and said:
“I think the clever move is to invite him — and see if he goes. I don’t think President Trump, former President Trump, would want to be subordinate on Air Force I. And I think, probably, he prefers his own plane anyway.”
Really1?!
Of course, it didn’t take long for the Twitterverse to point out just how ridiculous CNN looked for even raising the topic.
It’s not surprising why calls for boycotting CNN are growing since the cable news network was taken over by Warner Bros Discovery. In recent weeks the network has lost such high-profile contributors as John Harwood, Brian Stelter and Jeffrey Toobin.
The Washington Post wrote about the changes at CNN since Chris Licht took over as the network’s chairman and CEO.:
Several current and former CNN employees who spoke with The Washington Post — most of whom spoke on the condition of anonymity to speak candidly — are interpreting the sudden exodus as evidence that Licht, who joined the network as chairman and CEO in May, is starting his tenure by casting out voices that had often been critical of former president Donald Trump and his allies, in an effort to present a new, more ideologically neutral CNN. That aligns with a vision repeatedly expressed by David Zaslav, the chief executive of Warner Bros. Discovery.
Billionaire media mogul John Malone, whose political views have been described as conservative/libertarian, is a major shareholder in Warner Bros. Discovery. Zaslav is his protege. Malone has said he wants CNN to be “more centrist.”
In his final appearance on CNN on Sept. 2, Harwood reported on Biden’s speech the previous night in Philadelphia in which the president said that Trump and his supporters pose a threat to democracy. Harwood commented that what Biden said “is true.”
Harwood then added that traditional journalism doesn’t work when one party is under the control of a “dishonest demagogue.”
“We are brought up to believe there’s two different political parties with different points of view and we don’t take sides in honest disagreements between them,” he said. “But that’s not what we’re talking about. These are not honest disagreements.”