Tucker Carlson interviewed Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian.
“American citizens have the constitutional right, and the God-given right,” Tucker proclaimed, “to all the information they can gather about matters that affect them.”
Tucker is many things, but he is neither a constitutional scholar nor a theologian.
Or even a journalist.
No tough questions in this love fest. A well-prepared interviewer with probing follow-up to B.S. responses? Forget it. Many of Pezeshkian’s responses were clearly evasive or demonstrably false, but not challenged by Tucker. For the leader of a regime that tried to kill Donald Trump, Tucker the Monetized Podcaster (MP) provided a platform, legitimizing that regime, reaching millions of Americans, not “information” but uncontested propaganda.
How can the MP interview the president of Iran without asking about that nation’s human rights record, or its decades-long support of proxy warfare and terrorism?
“Can you believe everything you hear from the president of Iran?” MP Tucker, last week, promoting the interview, asked, then answered, “Probably not.” Really? That’s why, the MP explains, he avoided questions that the Iranian president could not answer honestly. Presumably, then, the answers given to Tucker’s sanitized questions are… honest?
Vladimir Putin was surprised at Tucker’s softball questions. The MP does not seriously interview; he’s not simply polite, but enabling, giddy. Would the MP have provided a platform for Hitler? Last year, Tucker interviewed Tucker’s favorite “most honest historian,” who said the “chief villain” in World War II was not Hitler, but Winston Churchill, and there was no Holocaust, but that some Jews died in camps because the Germans misjudged food supplies.
It’s not simply that Tucker is a principled non-interventionist who opposes “forever … endless … neocon wars” — his rhetorical straw man. (The related falsehood is that Israel advocated the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, when Israel wanted Iraq to continue as a counter to Iran and hardly favored U.S. “nation building” in Iraq or Afghanistan.) Who supports sending American ground troops to fight a land war in the Middle East? Not Trump. Not Netanyahu. Nobody. (Tucker once did, before he was a born-again isolationist.) Tucker rebuked Trump for his “complicity” with Israel and then predicted Russia, China, North Korea, and other allies would intervene for Iran, thus starting World War III. But Iran is isolated, except for its promiscuous cheerleaders in the U.S. — Tucker and the clueless Koch groupies who are mouthpieces for Iran. Tucker is not humbled; he doubles down..
Many Americans of goodwill and integrity have a variety of viewpoints on foreign policy and on the Middle East and may differ with Israel but have no animus toward Zionists, Israel, or Jews. Tucker repudiates Trump’s “peace through strength”; Trump, in turn, rebukes Tucker for expropriating America First. Tucker regurgitates Putin’s talking points and takes Russia’s side against Ukraine. And when Tucker publicly told Trump, “lose Israel,” he betrayed his agenda. (Is it Candace Owens Lite?)
Tucker and the Trump-hating Left have in common that in the Middle East, Israel is the problem. Forget how the nations in the Middle East treat women or gays, or how Arabs, Muslims, islamists have killed hundreds of thousands of their brothers or the Islamist persecution, rapes, and massacres of Christians.
Ask Tucker who he would support in a war — Israel or Iran?
Ben Shapiro challenged Tucker’s criticism of Trump. Tucker has previously said Shapiro is smart, they agree on things, and he (Tucker) “likes” Israel, he just doesn’t want the U.S. in a Mideast war. But Tucker believes Ben Shapiro (and Mark Levin) are loyal to Israel, not to the United States. Tucker has shown no partiality toward Israel, which — he says — wants the U.S. in an infinite ground war, but on whether Iran seeks a nuclear bomb, he finds Iran’s denial credible.
Disingenuously, Tucker says he wants to interview Bibi Netanyahu. Given Tucker’s public empathy for Iran and public contempt for Israel, do you think Bibi would get softball questions? Bibi could make Tucker look like a fool, but then Tucker would control the editing. Besides, why would Bibi elevate Tucker and effectively concede the moral equivalency of Israel and Iran?
Tucker Carlson has a low opinion of President Donald Trump, evidenced in texts and emails revealed during the Fox News litigation. Tucker insisted Trump lost the 2020 election and said he could not wait for Fox News to start ignoring Trump. He described Trump as “only good at destroying” and his four years in office as a “disaster … too tough to digest”; he called Trump a “disgusting … demonic force” and concluded that he “hates Trump passionately.”
Questions Tucker Could Have Asked…
- Do you still have enriched uranium?
- Why did you enrich uranium beyond what was needed for civilian use?
- Given all the oil you have, why would you pursue nuclear power for limited savings, compared to the vast economic losses from the sanctions against Iran that you triggered because of your nuclear enrichment?
- You’ve said Iran does not intend to develop nuclear weapons, so why did your uranium enrichment program far exceed levels needed for peaceful purposes, and why are you enriching that uranium deep in hidden underground bunkers?
- Do you agree with the Ayatollah when he says, “Death to Israel, Death to America”?
- Do you believe Israel should exist?
- Why do you believe Jews left Iran after the Islamist Revolution?
- Did you support the Hamas October 7 attack on Israel, and if so, why?
- Why do you think that not a single one of your allies — Russia, China, North Korea, and others — gave Iran any military assistance?
- Do you believe that Israel is the Little Satan and the United States is the Big Satan?
- It’s obvious that Israel had recruited many of your citizens to help Mossad. Why do you believe so many of your citizens want to help Israel?
- How could you proclaim victory in the so-called 12-day war, given the obvious infiltration of Israel’s Mossad into Iran, the assassination of your top military leaders and nuclear scientists, damage to your nuclear capability and your missile production, and the fact that your entire country was laid bare to unlimited air assault?
- If the Israelis did not agree to President Trump’s request for a ceasefire, and not a single ally of Iran came forward to help you, wouldn’t your oil exporting capacity be next?
- In order for Iran and Israel to have a permanent peace treaty, what would Israel have to do, and what would Iran have to do?
- Would you like to see the entire world practicing Islam, and what would you like to do to bring that about?
- What were the financial benefits to Iran from the policies of the Biden administration, in terms of returning funds to Iran, relaxing sanctions, or any other way?
- What is your response to the U.S. government’s position that your country plotted the assassination of various U.S. officials, even including President Donald Trump?
- Do you believe in a so-called “two-state solution for the Palestinian issue,” why or why not?
- Don’t you imprison, torture, and even execute your citizens if they are dissenters?
- How many people has the regime hanged in public? What were their crimes?
- What is the current penalty for a woman who, in public, does not wear a head covering?
- There are reports that women who do not wear the hijab are assaulted, beaten, imprisoned, and raped? What is your response?
- In Iran, what is the minimum age for a girl to be married?
- Why does Iran continue to enforce strict laws that restrict women’s freedoms, such as requiring the hijab, and then imprison journalists and bloggers who criticize these polices?
- There are reports that male dissidents are assaulted, beaten, imprisoned, and raped. What is your response?
- Will you stop public executions of homosexual men?
- Do you believe Christianity is a legitimate religion? Do you allow Christians to practice their religion in Iran?
- Do you believe that Christianity succeeded Judaism, and that Islam succeeded Christianity?
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