On Thursday morning, before he had a chance to drink too much, Defense Secretary Pete Hogsbreath Hegseth gave a scathing press conference that he used to attack the press for, y;know, reporting the news, even if it didn’t fit the Whtie House’s template. It was just one long whinefest.
I’m sure the whining is about to get a lot worse. CNN’s Anderson Cooper put together a compilation of clips showing Cooper reporting the very same things that Hegseth was falsely claiming hadn’t been reported, except that Cooper’s reports were hours or days before Hegseth’s tantrum:
In one instance, Hegseth said the media had given “fawning coverage” to the initial damage assessment report without caveat. Cooper then showed a video of him discussing the report with an expert and describing it as “very preliminary” and that a “deeper assessment is being done.”
Hegseth also claimed that media outlets were not using the term “destroyed” when referring to the damage done by the bombing campaign. Cooper played multiple clips of CNN’s segments where that exact term was used.
In one clip, Cooper and Hegseth read the same statement issued by CIA Director John Ratcliffe about the efficacy of the bombs dropped in Iran. Cooper read the statement on Wednesday evening. Hegseth read it during his briefing a day later.
