For more than two months, Republicans have mocked Kamala Harris for hiding in the basement and not granting interviews and press conferences, which could give people an idea of how she might handle the presidency. So after she and Tim Walz have engaged in debates, Team Harris decided to book her on a series of softball interviews.

Start with the “Call Her Daddy” sex podcast, which sounds like something that would be easy for conservatives to mock. Sure, it is a massively popular podcast among young women, but it sounds like more of a forum for aspiring Bill Clinton interns than a public policy platform. Naturally, Barbie look-alike podcaster Alex Cooper is “sex-positive,” which also means “abortion-positive.”

Cooper wasn’t going to ask about Harris being “mentored” in her career by powerful San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown when she was his young paramour. She wasn’t going to ask about her husband Doug Emhoff ruining his first marriage by cheating with the nanny and getting her pregnant.

These are also the kind of saucy subjects that the old Howard Stern would want to talk about on the radio. But the new Howard Stern is firmly entrenched on the left, and he was suggesting to Harris that she was in danger if Donald Trump was reelected. “If he wins, God forbid, would you feel safe in this country? Would you stay in this country?”

Remember that old song “Paranoia Will Destroy Ya”? Howard Stern jumped the shark and landed in a crib.

Then there were the liberal ladies of “The View” on ABC. Fox News people joked that would turn out to be more of a “hot stone massage” than an interview. Whoopi Goldberg set the tone by introducing Harris as “the next president of the United States!”

There were moments the news people could underline. Sunny Hostin asked, “Would you have done something differently than President Biden during the past four years?” Harris replied, “There is not a thing that comes to mind.” So much for all her talk of “turning the page.”

The toughest appearance on the list was “60 Minutes” on CBS, but based on the record, that’s not saying much. Bill Clinton tiptoed around Gennifer Flowers on that show. Barack Obama drew a series of worshipful interviews with Steve Kroft, first as a candidate and then as president. More recently, Scott Pelley has contributed several softball sessions with Joe Biden.

So it was surprising and refreshing when CBS correspondent Bill Whitaker challenged Harris with some obvious facts. He asked if it was a mistake to “loosen the immigration policies as much as you did?” When she tried to claim the border was “a long-standing problem,” he followed up: “The numbers did quadruple under your watch.”

Whitaker also noted she flipped positions on a host of issues, from a fracking ban to a socialist “Medicare for All” program. These are simple facts, so why are we amazed when a journalist simply points them out and asks her to explain?

It’s a reflection on how Democrats don’t have a Tim Russert figure in their “mainstream” TV scene that they consider a serious test of their mettle. Today’s TV hosts act like defense lawyers for the Democrats. They don’t seem to have any prosecutorial muscles at all for the candidates they favor. So raise a glass to Bill Whitaker for reminding us what the news used to sound like in the polyester days.

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