The Daily - Monday, Feb. 26, 2018

Episode Date: February 26, 2018

At the Conservative Political Action Conference this weekend, one thing was clear: President Trump has taken over the conservative movement. His vision dominated, and, as one woman learned, there was little room for alternative views. Guest: Mona Charen, a conservative columnist who was booed while speaking on a panel at the conference. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.

From The New York Times, I'm Michael Barbaro. This is The Daily Watch. Today, this weekend at CPAC, one thing became clear. President Trump has taken over the conservative movement. His vision of conservatism dominated. And as one woman learned, there was little room for alternative views. It's Monday, February 26th. Welcome. Thank you so much for being here. We're delighted to be with you. So we're going to be talking about

hashtag us too, left out by the left, or as we like to call it, how conservative women can retake the leadership role with women across the country in a hashtag me too environment. Let me do some quick introductions and then we're going to dive right in because we have a lot to cover. Down at the end, we've got Mona Sharon, as you know, a syndicated columnist, a best-selling author, best-selling Regnery author, may I add, senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center. Mona, can you give a little context for how you wound up on stage at CPAC this weekend? Give us a little background on what you were doing there. Well, it wasn't my first CPAC experience.

I'm a lifelong conservative. My first job out of college was at William F. Buckley's National Review. I had been a speechwriter for Nancy Reagan and for Congressman Jack Kemp. I was a conservative columnist at the age of 30. So CPAC is a natural, or had been, a very natural environment for me. And I certainly am no stranger to conservative gatherings. Right. I mean, Buckley, Reagan, Kemp, you're kind of conservative royalty. Well, thank you for saying that. So, welcome, Mona. Thank you for joining us. And what was this panel that you were invited to speak on? What was its focus? women would discuss the phenomenon of the Me Too movement and give a conservative point

of view on issues of men and women and sexual behavior and sexual harassment and so forth. I think for our panel, one of the really important questions is, what has caused this sudden sort of explosion of all of these scandals? And has it been good for women? all of these scandals? And has it been good for women? And what, in short, is the conservative point of view on Me Too? Well, it would be too simple to say there is a conservative point of view about this. But I think that one area of agreement, I would say, among the panelists was that it's important to make distinctions, that while sexual harassment is a real thing and is a problem,

that it's very important not to lump all kinds of behavior into the category of assault. The feminists who are really leading, the establishment liberal feminists who are leading Me Too need to stop equating and conflating sexual harassment with sexual assault. Those are two very different things. And it's even expanded to catcalls. And the more they do that, the more they drive conservative women away.

And I think this is an issue that we all can and should support. Would it be fair to say that the women on this panel believe that Me Too has at times, and in some cases, gone too far? Yes, I think there was definitely that feeling. I agree. I mean, I think also one of the things that doesn't get talked about is how this whole hashtag MeToo is increasingly driving men and women apart.

It's not good for women, it's not good for men, and it's not good for women. It's not good for men. And it's not good for our society because it's driving a wedge between us. So I watched the full panel discussion, and I was struck by the very first question you were all asked. Do you consider yourself a feminist? Can you tell me about your response to that question? I said it very much depends on how you define feminist. So this issue gets young women so confused. They've been told that to be a feminist is to be pro-woman and to want what is best for women. And if you define it that way, I think we

would all say, yes, we are feminists. But I added that over the last 50 years, feminism has accrued a number of other meanings. It has meant the complete adoption of an absolutist position on abortion. It has meant the denigration of family life and motherhood. an insistence on denying the science of sex differences and diminishing the importance of those things and insisting that everything is socially constructed. And so when we're asked, are you a feminist? I would say I'm pro-woman, but not that kind of feminist. It distresses me the degree to which feminists have been shooing women away from the best parts of life and saying, you really belong in the workplace all the time,

and that that's the only way to have a fulfilling and rewarding life. And I think that we need to search much more for a balance. And so we have to ratify women's choices when they say, you know, I'm going to cut back at work. I'm going to take care of my kids more. And we have to push back against the Sheryl Sandberg message, which is, don't do that. She wrote a bestseller called Lean In. As somebody who leaned out to raise three sons over the period of about 25 years, I am so glad I did. I have no regrets. And other women in my position feel the same way.

So watching the panel on video, I noticed that you're being applauded for everything that you're saying on stage. You're espousing pretty conservative viewpoints about feminism. You talk about leaning out yourself as a mom, raising three boys rather than leaning in. I'm sure you noticed this as well. You were getting good feedback from the audience. Mm-hmm. You know, I think they agreed

with all of that and they knew who I was and perhaps. And so, yeah, so we were in a groove. So then what happens? Tell us about this final question that the moderator asks. She asked, what drives you crazy about modern feminism? When you think of the feminist movement today, what really makes your blood boil? blood boil. One of my fellow panelists mentioned that the abortion issue was so front and center and so defining for modern feminists. In today's society, to be considered an empowered woman, it's that you have to be a card-carrying supporter of Planned Parenthood, or you are somehow a disappointment to women. That's what gets my blood boiling. Because nothing has been worse for women than abortion.

No entity, no company has done more to profit off of women's suffering and to lie to women and to deceive women than Planned Parenthood. Mona, what gets you riled up? So I agree with everything my fellow panelists have said. And then it was my turn. But I'm actually going to twist this around a bit and say that I'm disappointed in people on our side for being hypocrites about sexual harassers and abusers of women who are in our party, who are sitting in the White House, who brag about their extramarital affairs,

who brag about mistreating women. And because he happens to have an R after his name, we look the other way, we don't complain. Were you nervous, Mona, as you started to make these comments? I was, I'll confess. I'm not one who enjoys confrontation, but I felt it was really important. Look, you know, here we are at CPAC, which has been a festival in celebration of Donald Trump and the Trump administration, and to begin to discuss feminism and Me Too and sexual discrimination and sexual harassment without acknowledging Donald Trump is hypocritical for us, and not only Donald Trump. This is a party that was ready to endorse, the Republican Party endorsed Roy Moore

for the Senate in the state of Alabama, even though he was a credibly accused child molester. The eyes of the women on the panel widened. They were a little stunned. And the audience took a beat or two and then began to change gears. You cannot claim that you stand for women and put up with that.

So I persisted. Well, that's right. You can't talk about the good guys all the time. You've got to talk about the good guys all the time. And the good guys, right? Well, that's right. Actually, guys, right. Speaking of and that's speaking of bad guys, there was quite an interesting person. There was quite an interesting person who was on this stage the other day. Her name is Marion Le Pen.

Another thing about the CPAC conference that had really alarmed and offended me was that they had issued an invitation to Marion Le Pen. Now, why was she here? Why was she here? She's a young, no longer in office politician from France. I think the only reason she was here is because she's named Le Pen. The granddaughter of Jean-Marie Le Pen and the niece of Marine Le Pen. And the Le Pen name is a disgrace. Her grandfather is a racist and a Nazi.

She claims that she stands for him. And the fact that CPAC invited her is a disgrace. This is flirting with fascism. And it's not a joke. It's not let's troll the left and make their heads explode. This is serious business. So the fact that she would be issued an invitation by a leading conservative group in the United States was an outrage and a disgrace. It's hard for me to imagine that CPAC would host a panel

about Me Too with four females on stage and that the topic of sexual harassment within the Republican Party would never come up. But it seems that many attendees feel that it shouldn't have come up. And you know what they would say? What they would say, and they have a point here, is that, look, Bill Clinton got away with this, John F. Kennedy, and so on and so forth. Why should we hold ourselves to a higher standard? Their side always gets away with it. And they're resentful of me for saying, I do want to hold our

side responsible for its bad conduct, because they think that we would then be the only ones playing by the rules and the other side wouldn't. That's what they would say. And what do you make of that argument? I think it's very important for civic hygiene that both sides police themselves more aggressively than the other side. It's all too easy to blame the other side or to call out the other side, but it's much harder to call out your own side. And until everyone does that, we won't make any progress. Also, Democrats in this moment do seem to be self-policing pretty effectively. Al Franken, a liberal lion, is gone from the Senate. Harvey Weinstein was a

major donor to democratic and liberal causes. He is finished. That is right. And in fact, I had an exchange with somebody on Twitter about the Al Franken thing because they said, oh, you know, the Democrats are trying to get rid of Al Franken so they can clear the decks and have the moral high ground. And I said, okay. What's wrong with that? So you showed up at CPAC knowing that you were going to make a statement. Why did you decide to bring this controversy on yourself? Because there are millions of conservatives like me who have watched what's happened to the conservative movement and the Republican Party over the last two years and have become

ever more withdrawn and depressed and cowed and just watched it all with dismay but have not spoken. And the more we sit silently, the more that others think, well, I guess everyone's going along. I guess this is the new reality. And I know for myself, when I see just one person And I know for myself, when I see just one person stand up on their hind legs and say no, and say, I object, or I stand for this or that principle, it always is very inspiriting and inspiring. And I just felt, you know what, I am nervous, I am uncomfortable about this, but I want to do this for others. And I also wanted to do it for myself. You know, perhaps they are going to win. Perhaps they are going to transform conservatism into something ugly and intolerant. The speech that the president gave had some truly despicable elements. And except for one senator who came into

a room at three o'clock in the morning and went like that, we would have had health care, too. We would have had health care, too. Think of that. He invited the audience and they cooperated to boo John McCain, a man who gave more for his country than Trump could even envision and who is now fighting a vicious, possibly fatal form of cancer. One person walked into a room when he was supposed to go this way, and he said he was going this way, and he walked in and he went this way, and everyone said, what happened? What was that all about? Boy, oh boy. Who was that? I don't know. I don't know.

I don't know. I don't want to be controversial, so I won't use his name, okay? What a mess. To lead the audience in booing of this man, and he also recycled that story, little poem that he read on the campaign trail called The Snake. This is called The Snake, and think of it in terms of immigration, and you may love it or you may say, isn't that terrible, okay? And if you say, isn't that terrible, who cares? Because the way they treat me, that's peanuts compared to the way they treat me. Immigration.

On her way to work one morning down the path along the lake a tender-hearted woman saw a poor half-hearted frozen snake but he explicitly tied it to immigration, saying these immigrants, these terrible immigrants who are streaming across our borders. She stroked his pretty skin again and kissed and held him tight. But instead of saying thank you, that snake gave her a vicious bite. Take me in, O tender woman.

Take me in for heaven's sake. Take me in, O tender woman, sighed the vicious snake. I saved you, cried the woman, and you've bitten me, heaven's why. You know your bite is poisonous and now I'm going to die oh shut up silly woman said the reptile with a grin you knew damn well I was a snake before you took me in. To use that kind of tactic and to encourage the audience in its resent Donald Trump skipped CPAC out of what he understood to be a concern that you're basically the only person in this conference who was prepared to break from that vision. That's true. But you know, you live long enough

and you see that things can change very rapidly. And as you say, two years ago, CPAC wanted no part of Trump. Now they're in his pocket. Who knows what might be the case in a year or two or three. could be drawn about conservatives based on what happened to you on stage, that there's not much room for anything that breaks from a very narrow view of the Republican Party right now, and that that view is built around President Trump. It's poisonous and destructive, and I hate to see it happening. And boy, that tribalism, that sort of totalitarian impulse to control your own troops and force people to say only the approved things has infected the left, in my opinion, for a very long time, and has certainly become viral on the right as well. All right. Well, I want to thank you all very much.

I want to thank my panelists for a lively exchange. And what happens after your comments? Did you stick around to hear from people, or what happened? Yeah, we exited the stage, and I was immediately surrounded by a phalanx of security. Did you ask for security? No. And I thought it was a joke, but they weren't acting as if it was a joke. They were saying, ma'am, did you have plans to leave here? And I said, well, I was just going to call an Uber.

And they said, have you called the Uber? Please do that right now. You know, it's that sort of tone. And then I said, well, I left my coat in the green room. And they were kind of talking into their sleeves saying she left her coat in the green room. And this caused a bit of a discussion about how this was to be handled. It was really quite remarkable. So we successfully extricated my coat from the green room. I was not accosted by anyone. And then we had to walk around quite a bit of the Gaylord Convention Center because the Uber car actually went to the wrong entrance. So we, you know, were marching around a bit. And I would say two or three people

in the lobby who were wearing CPAC lanyards around their necks, gave me thumbs-up signs. No one approached me in any sort of hostile way at all. But as I was about to get into the car, a woman called out my name and ran over, and she said, that was really brave. And it turned out she was one of my fellow panelists. So this was a fellow panelist who found you right before you got into that Uber and said that she found it courageous

that you said what you said. Yes. It's interesting that she chose to say that to you privately, but not on stage in front of that CPAC crowd. Right. Well, I'm glad she said it,

but I'll just leave it at that. So now it's been a couple of days since your remarks at CPAC. What are you thinking about with just a little bit of perspective on this now? And how are you feeling? Well, it may surprise you, but I'm feeling pretty good because the response on social media has just been fantastic. There are so, so many people who've gotten in touch and just thanked me and said they feel the same way. And in that sense, it's been tremendously gratifying. And also, as I said in the piece that I wrote for the New York Times,

it just is liberating to speak the truth for its own sake. And even if nothing else comes of it, it just feels good to tell the truth as you see it. Well, since you brought it up, you chose to write about this, as you just said, in the New York Times opinion section about this experience of being on stage at CPAC and saying what you said and being glad you were booed. That could be seen as another deliberately provocative move by some conservatives. So why did you write it? Well, I have changed in the last few years because of the whole Trump phenomenon and what's happening to the Republican Party. I really have become much more open and desirous of dialogue with the left. I want to build bridges and see if we can find

common ground about basic principles of decency and so forth. In all honesty, I've found new friends on the left. I'm not becoming a leftist, as a lot of my fans are going to worry about that. But I do feel very strongly that we need to build bridges. I know that sounds very, it sounds very cliched, but there's so much unnecessary bitterness and vitriol that has infected our civic life. And I hate it. And I don't think it's at all necessary. I think our country is actually not in such terrible shape and we should be able to solve our problems with a little bit of goodwill and a little bit of generosity of spirit. Thank you very much, Mona.

I really appreciate you taking time to talk to us. My pleasure. This weekend at CPAC, a poll was taken of the attendees showing that more than nine out of 10 approve of the president's job performance. We'll be right back. Here's what else you need to know today. So I'm not surprised the president doesn't like it,

but it's important for the public to see the facts that the FBI acted appropriately in seeking a warrant on Carter Page. They're not part of some deep state, as the president apparently would like the public to believe. On Saturday, Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee released their own memo, intended to be a point-by-point rebuttal to the Republican memo that the committee released earlier this month, claiming that top FBI and Justice Department officials had abused their powers in spying on a Trump campaign aide with ties to Russia. The president had tried to block the release of a Democratic memo, which undermined several of his claims about the Russia investigation

being biased against him. And joining me now by phone, the president of the United States, Donald Trump. Good evening, Mr. President. Good evening. But over the weekend, after it was released in redacted form, he went on Fox News to say that it actually confirmed the Republican version of events. That was nothing but a confirmation. And a lot of bad things happened on the other side. Not on this side, but on the other side. And you know what's interesting? And somebody should look into it, because what they did is really fraudulent.

And somebody should be looking into that. And by somebody, I'm talking about you know who. I have a feeling I know who it is, Mr. President. The president seemed to be referring to Jeff Sessions, his attorney general, who he has criticized in recent days for failing to open an investigation into unspecified crimes by his Democratic opponents. And China's Communist Party has announced that it plans to abolish term limits on the presidency, clearing the way for President Xi Jinping to stay in power indefinitely. The announcement is a momentous break with decades-old rules in China, meant to prevent the country from returning to the days when Chairman Mao was shown cult-like levels of obedience.

That's it for The Daily. I'm Michael Barbaro. See you tomorrow.