If there’s anything more nauseating than “news” host Ainsley Earhardt exploiting the tragic death of young Otto Warmbier, it’s her use of that tragedy to baselessly smear former President Barack Obama – and having Donald Trump join in on the attack.
In the middle of a cheerleading session for Fox News’ Laura Ingraham to become White House press secretary, Fox & Friends host Brian Kilmeade asked Ingraham what the “appropriate response” should be to Warmbier's death. Warmbier, as you probably know, died yesterday a week after being released, in a coma, from detainment in North Korea.
Ingraham had no real answer. “This is not new, this is what they do,” she said. But she also said, “There’s a lot of evil in the world. The question is, what is America’s role in advancing our interests, our allies’ interests and also remaining that beacon of freedom for the rest of the world?”
“Donald Trump ran on a non-interventionist foreign policy and sometimes we do have to intervene but you have to be very careful how you do it,” Ingraham continued. “We have a very dangerous situation now in Syria and we could start World War if we don’t watch how we handle that situation with the Russian planes.”
Apparently, that wasn’t enough praise of Glorious Trump for sycophant Ainsley Earhardt. But she couched her exploitation by feigning compassion:
EARHARDT: We do have a big responsibility. When you started the interview, when you talked about your birthday, I couldn’t help but think you’re celebrating with your family because we live in this great country and we can do that. Meanwhile, we have this – this young man who is dying, taking his last breath yesterday because of what happened in another country, a communist country and what is our role in this?
We have our president now, our current president, President Trump intervened and he brings him home. The family – we interviewed them here on Fox & Friends and they said that President Obama told the family, “You need to keep a low profile.”
Do you think things would be different if President Obama had intervened earlier and had not told the family that? Would we even be discussing this this morning?
To her credit, Ingraham refused the bait.
INGRAHAM: I don’t know. I’m not gonna pronounce that it would have been different if Obama had handled it differently. That’s just sheer speculation. I have no idea. I think it’s very difficult to game out what North Korea’s going to do on any given day.
But Trump, who seems to consider Fox & Friends trusted advisors on foreign policy, echoed Earhardt just a few hours later. Crooks and Liars caught Trump’s slime:
"[F]rankly, if he were brought home sooner I think the result would have been a lot different. He should have been brought home that same day and the result would have been different, but what happened to Otto was a disgrace."
I wish someone would ask Trump what has been done in the past to bring Warmbier home and what his administration has done differently because I’ll bet any amount Trump could not answer the question.
But it's not as though Obama did nothing to free Warmbier. Today, Deadline reported:
“During the course of the Obama Administration, we had no higher priority than securing the release of Americans detained overseas,” Obama spokesman Ned Price said in the statement. “Their tireless efforts resulted in the release of at least 10 Americans from North Korean custody during the course of the Obama administration.”
Added Price, who was National Security Counsel spokesperson during Obama’s administration: “It is painful that Mr. Warmbier was not among them, but our efforts on his behalf never ceased, even in the waning days of the administration. Our thoughts and prayers are with Mr. Warmbier’s family and all who had the blessing of knowing him.”
Price made a similar statement last week upon Warmbier’s release. Yet, Earhardt didn’t seem to have done a lick of research into what efforts the Obama administration had done before jumping to her smear.
No wonder Roger Ailes has praised her “congeniality” and called her “a superb team player” when she was chosen to replace Gretchen Carlson as a cohost of Fox & Friends. Because we all know what team Ailes wanted her to play on.
Watch Earhardt prove just how low she’ll go in service to Trump below, from the June 20, 2017 Fox & Friends. Watch Trump adopt the same disgraceful rhetoric below, via Crooks and Liars.
I think we also need to keep in mind what really happened with Otto Warmbier. His death was a horrible tragedy that could have been avoided, but there wasn’t a whole lot that the Obama Administration could do at the time he was convicted and sentenced. Particularly with the GOP repeatedly trying to undercut them on every single move they made – including sending contradictory letters to Iran to try to stop that (soon to be cancelled) treaty from happening.
And this conviction happened under fairly embarrassing circumstances for Warmbier. I don’t believe most of his public statement, as he was clearly under pressure to say whatever they wanted him to – but there was never a thought that he was inaccurately charged. The issue was that he was wildly overprosecuted and oversentenced. The North Koreans clearly wanted to make an example of him – telling Americans if you come to their country and disrespect the place, there will be a terrible penalty. It is tragic that he suffered the brain injury, and the indications are that once this injury occurred, it was pretty much over for him. I wish they would have returned his body earlier, but it’s not hard to understand why they didn’t.
Either way, this didn’t happen because Barack Obama was President when Warmbier was arrested.