Tucker substitute host David Shuster confronts Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) about the blatant hypocrisy of the Republican party when he asks about Rush Limbaugh's Senator Betrayus smear against Senator Chuck Hagel and all Blackburn wants to do is rehash tired slams against the New York Times over the MoveOn ad.
As Blackburn prattles on about the NYT betraying the public trust and making sweetheart deals, Shuster turns the tables on her and asks her to name the last soldier from her district who was killed in Iraq -- and what do you know? She had no idea what his name was, or even why she didn't know. Watch Blackburn stutter and get backed into a corner, with Shuster proving she cared more about making partisan hits than she did about the dead soldiers from her own district.
MSNBC, get that man his own show!
Shuster: "Let's talk about the public trust. You represent, of course, a district in western Tennessee. What was the name of the last solider from your district who was killed in Iraq?"
Blackburn:"The name of the last soldier killed in Iraq uh - from my district I - I do not know his name -"
Shuster: "Ok, his name was Jeremy Bohannon, he was killed August the 9th, 2007. How come you didn't know the name?"
Blackburn: "I - I, you know, I - I do not know why I did not know the name..." [Snip]
Shuster: "But you weren't appreciative enough to know the name of this young man, he was 18 years old who was killed, and yet you can say chapter and verse about what's going on with the New York Times and Move On.org." [Snip]
Shuster: "But don't you understand, the problems that a lot of people would have, that you're so focused on an ad -- when was the last time a New York Times ad ever killed somebody? I mean, here we have a war that took the life of an 18 year old kid, Jeremy Bohannon from your district, and you didn't even know his name."
UPDATED: On Wednesday's "Tucker," David Shuster apologized for naming Jeremy Bohanan as the soldier from her district that was killed. He was actually from Bon Acqua, TN.
On Monday evening while guest-hosting the 6 p.m. evening hour, I conducted an interview with Tennessee Republican Marsha Blackburn. The congresswoman spoke at length about a newspaper ad that criticized General Petraeus. In what I believed was an effort to examine Representative Blackburn's priorities, I then asked her to name the last soldier from her congressional district killed in Iraq.
After that response, I identified who I believed to be that fallen soldier, a Tennessean killed in Iraq last month. But according to Pentagon documents, that young man came from a town inside a neighboring congressional district, not from Representative Blackburn's, and for that, I apologize for that mistake.