Liberal journalist Carl Bernstein escalated his war on former President Donald Trump, Republican voters, and Fox News on Tuesday, arguing their impact has pushed democracy to the edge of failure.
“We may be — particularly with Trump, and if you look at how large his movement [is] or those who are willing to embrace it and the big lie, etc., etc., how big this change in our culture is — I think there’s real reason to fear that with the genie out of the bottle to the extent that it is that we may never be able to — possibly, we may never be able to regain who we are as a democratic nation, and as a prevailing democratic notion,” he said during a Washington Post live session for subscribers.
Bernstein, talking with Post reporter Carol Leonnig remotely about his new autobiography, decried everything associated with Trump, conservative media, and Republicans in general. His interviewer seemed to agree, calling Fox News “propaganda” and Trump’s words “snake oil.”
At one point, Bernstein ripped Republican leaders for not standing up to Trump, calling the GOP during Watergate “responsible” for doubting then-President Richard Nixon.
One of my top career moments came when critics called me and partner @PhilipRucker “the new @realBobWoodward & @carlbernstein”.
Today I’ll interview one of those icons at 12 noon on @PostLive .@washingtonpost subscribers get the inside scoop https://t.co/yYY9KpWWHg— Carol Leonnig (@CarolLeonnig) January 18, 2022
“You have nothing like that today. In fact, what you have is a Republican Party that has now thrown itself wholly into the agenda of an authoritarian criminal president of the United States, a seditious president of the United States, such as we’ve never had in our history,” said the famed half of the Post’s Watergate investigative team.
Leonnig responded, “Carl, what’s interesting about that is that party that has completely yoked itself to the big lie that the election was rigged and that Jan. 6 was a group of nice people, just tourists, you know, visiting D.C. and trying to support their president. That big lie is magnified by places like Fox News and all sorts of even more permeating talk radio. What are your ideas on how to effectively counter that propaganda machine, that disinformation media?”
Bernstein’s answer was for reporters to get out of the newsroom and spread their version of the truth to the public, which he conceded many don’t want to hear.
“Look, 50% — just about — of the people in this country, maybe even more, are going along with this authoritarianism,” he said. “[They] have embraced Trump, have embraced Republicans who are so craven about slavishly following this authoritarian path. So, all we can do is our reporting. You know, our job is to get the information out there. It’s not to bring about a desired political result. At the same time, you would hope and think that if, as we have done, we present the facts about Trump, about the big lie, etc., etc., you would hope that the message of the truth would reach our readers, viewers, citizens in this country. That’s not happening.”
