Republicans Can Thank Sean Hannity for Hillary's Surge

Folks from the Left and the Right spent much of the last few weeks falling over each other trying to praise/blame GOP Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Cal) for admitting that the Benghaaazi! Investigation is a political witch hunt and thus undermining the Republicans' efforts to destroy Hillary Clinton.  After all, the GOP had high hopes that the Benghaaazi!-fueled attacks against the Democratic frontrunner would pay huge dividends.

Well, that whole effort has backfired.  Last week's eleven-hour grilling of Hillary was so bad for the Republicans that Fox News was compelled to cease televised coverage halfway through the proceeding. Even conservative commentators agreed that the GOP's Benghaaazi! fiasco has helped Clinton. This result would no doubt make some Republicans even more angry at Majority Leader McCarthy's gaffe, given that it certainly gave Hillary and her allies on the Benghaaazi! Committee momentum going into last week's hearing and it put Trey Gowdy and the other GOP committee members on the defensive.

But one thing I think is missing from all this finger-pointing is the context in which McCarthy made his gaffe.  Sure, he did it on Fox News, but he didn't make the admissions during a softball interview on Fox & Friends -- he made them during a contentious interview with Sean Hannity.  And why was Hannity conducting a contentious interview of a high-ranking Republican?  Well, it's because the GOP base is angry that its leadership has been unable to destroy Barack Obama and his fascist/socialist/Kenyanist agenda.

You can watch the entire Hannity interview of McCarthy here. Hannity set the tone with his very first question: "Congressman, 60% of Republicans polled this week feel betrayed by the Republican Party in Washington -- are they justified?  I'm one of them."  What then ensued was about ten minutes of Congressman McCarthy trying to defend House GOP leadership from the attacks.  During that period, the following now-infamous exchange occurred:

Hannity: *** "You fund executive amnesty, which you told us, the whole Republican caucus told us they would stop, if we would elect the Senate last year. They funded it. And you're about to fund Planned Parenthood."

McCarthy: "Sean, no, Sean, amnesty is not going on. The courts have stopped that. There's no funding there. And there should not be as we go forward."

Hannity: "But in February didn't you guys end up funding it, you passed the Cromnibus, you gave up your leverage."

McCarthy: "No, no. Sean, no, because the courts had put a stay on that. So there was no funding going towards that. The question I think you really want to ask me is, how am I going to be different?" *** What you're going to see is a conservative speaker that takes a conservative Congress that puts a strategy [in place] to fight and win.

"And let me give you one example. Everybody thought Hillary Clinton was unbeatable, right? But we put together a Benghazi special committee, a select committee. What are her numbers today? Her numbers are dropping. Why? Because she's un-trustable. But no one would have known any of that had happened had we not fought and made that happen. So why don't . . . "

Hannity:  [Trying desperately to interrupt McCarthy] "I agree. I give you credit for that. I give you credit for sequestration, I'll give you credit where credit is due. ***"

Just watch the above-linked video. It is pretty clear at 4:39 that the Idiot Hannity realized he just might have helped give away the Benghaaazi! shop by pushing McCarthy too hard to justify the efforts of GOP leadership.  He interrupted McCarthy and quickly tried to change the subject, but the damage was done.  But why was Hannity being so aggressive with McCarthy in the first place?  Well, it was because he had a bunch of Tea-Baggers from the House on his show the day before and boy were they pissed off at the Republican leadership.

So it turns out that Sean Fucking Hannity -- with a little help from the Bagger Caucus -- are ultimately responsible for the GOP's downward Benghaaazi! spiral and the Hillary Surge that resulted from it.  If that doesn't put a little bit of a smile on your face, then I don't know what could.