Mehdi Hasan: We looked at your social media, and you haven’t done that many posts specifically calling out Russian attacks on civilian areas. You haven’t called Vladimir Putin a war criminal, but you have called Benjamin Netanyahu a war criminal.
Jill Stein: No, actually, we did. Yeah. In my very first remarks about the Ukraine war, we condemned —
Mehdi Hasan: Vladimir Putin is a war criminal?
Jill Stein: Yes, we did condemn —
Mehdi Hasan: And Bashar al-Assad is a war criminal?
Jill Stein: Yes, in so many words, yes, we have said as much.
Mehdi Hasan: So you called Netanyahu one, which I think he is.
Jill Stein: Oh, absolutely.
Mehdi Hasan: Is Putin a war criminal?
Jill Stein: So what we said about Putin was that his invasion of Ukraine is a criminal and murderous war.
Mehdi Hasan: And he’s a war criminal who should be on trial?
Jill Stein: Well, by implication.
Mehdi Hasan: You’re struggling here to say something very simple. This is why people have their doubts about you with Russia. Why is Benjamin Netanyahu a war criminal but not Vladimir Putin?
Jill Stein: Well, as John F. Kennedy said, “We must not negotiate out of fear and we must not fear to negotiate.” So if you want to be an effective world leader, you don’t start by name calling and hurling out that.
Mehdi Hasan: So how will President Stein negotiate with Israel then, if you’ve called Netanyahu a war criminal?
Jill Stein: Well, because he very clearly is a war criminal.
Mehdi Hasan: Oh, so Putin clearly isn’t a war criminal?
Jill Stein: Well, we don’t have a decision, put it this way, by the International Criminal Court.
Mehdi Hasan: Yes, we do. Yes, actually, actually, you’re wrong. There’s an arrest warrant for Putin and there isn’t an arrest warrant for Netanyahu, so why is Putin not a war criminal, but Netanyahu is?
Jill Stein: Yeah. Well, let me say this. We are sponsoring that war. We are sponsoring Netanyahu. He is our dog in this fight. That is why we have a responsibility to pull him back.
Mehdi Hasan: No disagreement from me at all. It still doesn’t answer my question. Whether we sponsor them or not is irrelevant.
Jill Stein: With Russia it’s far more complicated.
Mehdi Hasan: Either you’re a war criminal or you’re not. Is Vladimir Putin a war criminal?
Jill Stein: In so many words, yes he is.
Mehdi Hasan: I don’t know “what so many words” — Butch [Ware, Stein’s running mate], is Vladimir Putin a war criminal?
Jill Stein: Let me say that whatever you think he is —
Mehdi Hasan: It’s not about what I think. I’m asking you. You’re running for President.
Jill Stein: If you want to pull him back, if you are a world leader, you don’t begin your conversation by calling someone a war criminal unless you have a…
Mehdi Hasan: So why have you called Biden and Netanyahu war criminals?
Jill Stein: Because we have a clear strategy and we have very strong support across the world.
How is it more complicated, Jill? The lady doth protest too much
Why was the reporter asking her tough follow up questions? It doesn’t match what I usually see. Is Jill Stein bad because she can’t afford to pay for easier interviews? For real though, I wish every “big name” was treated this way.
I’m no fan of Stein. I was years ago, but not anymore. But she seems very clear in the beginning, then equivocates in the middle then clarifies (kinda) towards the end— but the way the interviewer goes after her seems like she’s being evasive in a way that doesn’t come across in the textual reading.
Is there an audio and/or video clip of this interview?
Also— I don’t read her as being so much pro-putin as she is trying to be “stateswoman” and also being terribly unprepared. Just a total flop. She seemed like she was trying to be very reasonable, and she was just destroyed by the interviewer who was unrelenting on a single question that she was not prepared to answer.
I’m not apologizing for her. It was probably the one and only question she should have been prepared to answer right off the bat. And how she fumbled it was extremely damaging to her.
She did answer, but her answer got lost in the mess of it all. And that interviewer was being a very aggressive.
He wasn’t being a dick. He was doing what journalists should do. If she answers with an extremely simple, “yes” every single time Netanyahu and Biden come up but literally every single time he asks about Putin she can’t just say, “yes.” Every single time she qualifies a yes or hedges without a yes. She doesn’t with the others.
Well, sure. I only wanted to hear all of this in context— and it doesn’t really help her position IMO.
It really shouldn’t be so hard to very clearly denounce Putin. She makes it seem like a real chore. Like, she has to be squeezed into saying it, and even then, it’s still a little unclear.
I think, to some degree, she’s trying to be diplomatic, but more importantly, she’s coming off as weak to international powers that she should be standing up to. Even if she isn’t some Russian shill, she should be standing up to Putin in a resolute manner that she is failing to do here, and kind of always.
In a very kind reading of Jill Stein, if she wants to take a more diplomatic approach to eastern powers, she needs to learn how to stand up to them. She’s a poor choice just because of how incredibly weak she is in her positions and diplomacy.
I still think it’s a nothing burger. It a type of political schadenfreude that always happens. Here the UK you’d get MPs unable to condemn Trump because there’s a chance that they’ll have a Foreign Office role while he’s potentially in power. It comes across as weak but they have to play their cards close to be effective in that role.
With Stein it seems like she hadden’t evolved her message on Putin to respond to questions that are current about her party’s funding. It’s just disappointing, not particularly damning.
Wow, Jill comes off like a jackass in that interview. Shouldn’t be surprised I guess the Greens have become useful idiots for those trying to manipulate the election.
Jill Stein: So what we said about Putin was that his invasion of Ukraine is a criminal and murderous war.
Mehdi Hasan: And he’s a war criminal who should be on trial?
Jill Stein: Well, by implication.
Mehdi Hasan: You’re struggling here to say something very simple. This is why people have their doubts about you with Russia. Why is Benjamin Netanyahu a war criminal but not Vladimir Putin?
???
What does “by implication” mean to Hasan?
Jill Stein: Yeah. Well, let me say this. We are sponsoring that war. We are sponsoring Netanyahu. He is our dog in this fight. That is why we have a responsibility to pull him back.
Mehdi Hasan: No disagreement from me at all. It still doesn’t answer my question. Whether we sponsor them or not is irrelevant.
Jill Stein: With Russia it’s far more complicated.
Mehdi Hasan: Either you’re a war criminal or you’re not. Is Vladimir Putin a war criminal?
Jill Stein: In so many words, yes he is.
So they’re in agreement. Right?
Mehdi Hasan: I don’t know “what so many words” — Butch [Ware, Stein’s running mate], is Vladimir Putin a war criminal?
Jill Stein: Let me say that whatever you think he is —
Mehdi Hasan: It’s not about what I think. I’m asking you. You’re running for President.
Jill Stein: If you want to pull him back, if you are a world leader, you don’t begin your conversation by calling someone a war criminal unless you have a…
Mehdi Hasan: So why have you called Biden and Netanyahu war criminals?
Jill Stein: Because we have a clear strategy and we have very strong support across the world.
Is Hasan trying to defend Biden and Netanyahu?
Because Jill Stein repeatedly agreed with Hasan on Putin being a war criminal. But Hasan keeps doubling back and trying to defend the American President and his Israeli ally from the accusation.
The problem is this: regarding Netanyahu she says “Well he is very clearly a war criminal.” Regarding Putin she says “With Russia it’s far more complicated” and “In so many words, yes.” She’s hedging out of calling Putin a war criminal directly so she can plausibly deny it. She will agree with general statements saying he could be a war criminal under those circumstances but she won’t say it directly so she can go “Oh no, Hasan called him a war criminal, I didn’t, I just agreed that if all of those things were true then he could be considered a war criminal!”
I think her point is moreso that we’re actively funding and giving arms to Isreal to carry out these crimes, therefore we have more power to state things in that way from a geopolitical standpoint.
Hasan won’t take “yes” for an answer. Which is a weird thing to do, given that he keeps looping back around to attack her for her condemnation of Biden and Netanyahu.
She will agree with general statements saying he could be a war criminal under those circumstances
Under what circumstances is Hasan conceding that Netanyahu is a war criminal? All he does is deflect blame for war crimes away from Netanyahu, which is a really weird thing to do across multiple interview questions.
she won’t say it directly
She will and she did. Of course, Hasan keeps cutting her responses off to interject with new defenses of Netanyahu. Which is, again, a very weird way to establish Jill as a Putin-defender. It seems more like Hasan is hedging on Netanyahu and trying to back Jill into recanting her views on Israel.
I think it’d be easier to take yes for an answer if she said the word yes. And frankly I question why someone can’t use the word yes if it’s such a clear yes
Eh, the OP asking the question is operating in bad faith. They are most likely some disinformation shill or useful idiot who just espouses 3rd party or bust vibes every time I see them. You’re going to have as much luck getting through to them as Hasan had of getting Stein to say “yes.” with no qualifiers attached.
If she’s not a defender of Putin, it should be as easy to say a flat, unequivocated, non-politicked yes as she did with Netenyahu. The fact that she won’t do it is deserving of suspicion and critique.
A simple example of similar behavior would be if someone asked Biden or Trump or any other candidate, “Will you work to build better infrastructure in the country?” And they replied, “Well…in so many words, yes.”
It’s a non answer. It lacks commitment to the affirmation. If your first language is english and you aren’t autistic this kind of hedging behavior is very apparent. They are giving you the answer you are looking for but they are also trying to hide that they are not being 100% truthful in their assertion. It is a very common tactic in English used in lieu of an outright lie in order to generate a gap of potential misunderstanding that can be later abused to twist the narrative.
In the above example at the end of their term when somone presses them about their inaction on infrastructure development and says, “You said you would.” They can warp it around with, “I never directly said i would do anything.” Or they might have done some entirely symbolic effort that had an obvious zero chance of being effective and then immediately gave up because they had no intention of a true effort, no true commitment.
It’s the type of shitty behavior that disillusions people to politics. It’s half-truths and an unmitigated lack of candor and blatantly obvious obfuscation. Every politician does it. Most people do it to some degree. It’s very easy to read through though and that’s why the interviewer was so persistent in seeking a direct answer.
Mehdi Hasan: So you called Netanyahu one, which I think he is.
Unlike Jill Stein, he has no problem calling a war criminal a war criminal. But I am sure that, unlike Putin, Jill Stein would have no problem calling Joe Biden a war criminal immediately.
That’s what Mehdi Hasan is asserting, which is weird when you consider how Netanyahu and Putin are allies.
Why keep putting up this defense of Netanyahu if you’re so focused on getting Jill to denounce Putin? Why does Israel become this backdoor by which you can tacitly trade weapons and fossil fuels internationally?
If you had read the interview, you would have known that.
Have you read the interview? You don’t seem to want to acknowledge anything Hasan has actually said.
The exchange:
How is it more complicated, Jill? The lady doth protest too much
another Green voter got very agitated when called out for pushing only Russia’s talking points in this debate:
https://www.youtube.com/live/wR4l5BWWzCQ?t=5010
Can I get a timestamp?
Edit: my bad, embedded browser didn’t preserve the url timestamp. 1:23:30
didn’t realise these 2 had history, lol
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5l203PI-SXc
lol she was squirming
This has strong “the front fell off” vibes.
Why was the reporter asking her tough follow up questions? It doesn’t match what I usually see. Is Jill Stein bad because she can’t afford to pay for easier interviews? For real though, I wish every “big name” was treated this way.
Agreed. Politicians are so insulated now from actual tough interviews
I’m no fan of Stein. I was years ago, but not anymore. But she seems very clear in the beginning, then equivocates in the middle then clarifies (kinda) towards the end— but the way the interviewer goes after her seems like she’s being evasive in a way that doesn’t come across in the textual reading.
Is there an audio and/or video clip of this interview?
If you don’t mind Twitter, yes.
https://x.com/mehdirhasan/status/1835761859838038350
Thanks for the link, but I deleted my account years ago. No worky for me.
If anyone could link something else, I’d be quite grateful. 👍
Edit: here’s a link:
https://xcancel.com/mehdirhasan/status/1835761859838038350
Also— I don’t read her as being so much pro-putin as she is trying to be “stateswoman” and also being terribly unprepared. Just a total flop. She seemed like she was trying to be very reasonable, and she was just destroyed by the interviewer who was unrelenting on a single question that she was not prepared to answer.
I’m not apologizing for her. It was probably the one and only question she should have been prepared to answer right off the bat. And how she fumbled it was extremely damaging to her.
She did answer, but her answer got lost in the mess of it all. And that interviewer was being a very aggressive.
He wasn’t being a dick. He was doing what journalists should do. If she answers with an extremely simple, “yes” every single time Netanyahu and Biden come up but literally every single time he asks about Putin she can’t just say, “yes.” Every single time she qualifies a yes or hedges without a yes. She doesn’t with the others.
I misspoke. He was just being aggressive
I edited my comment
She had no problem with Biden and Netanyahu, but avoids a direct answer over Putin. It is painfully obvious
I agree that she’s being evasive
Thank you for being reasonable
Well, sure. I only wanted to hear all of this in context— and it doesn’t really help her position IMO.
It really shouldn’t be so hard to very clearly denounce Putin. She makes it seem like a real chore. Like, she has to be squeezed into saying it, and even then, it’s still a little unclear.
I think, to some degree, she’s trying to be diplomatic, but more importantly, she’s coming off as weak to international powers that she should be standing up to. Even if she isn’t some Russian shill, she should be standing up to Putin in a resolute manner that she is failing to do here, and kind of always.
In a very kind reading of Jill Stein, if she wants to take a more diplomatic approach to eastern powers, she needs to learn how to stand up to them. She’s a poor choice just because of how incredibly weak she is in her positions and diplomacy.
While we may not agree on her trying to be diplomatic, this is very well said
I still think it’s a nothing burger. It a type of political schadenfreude that always happens. Here the UK you’d get MPs unable to condemn Trump because there’s a chance that they’ll have a Foreign Office role while he’s potentially in power. It comes across as weak but they have to play their cards close to be effective in that role.
With Stein it seems like she hadden’t evolved her message on Putin to respond to questions that are current about her party’s funding. It’s just disappointing, not particularly damning.
if you don’t mind commentary and a higher speed its captured on Destiny’s Youtube channel. https://youtu.be/ekZ53AF8tOM?t=140
Wow, Jill comes off like a jackass in that interview. Shouldn’t be surprised I guess the Greens have become useful idiots for those trying to manipulate the election.
???
What does “by implication” mean to Hasan?
So they’re in agreement. Right?
Is Hasan trying to defend Biden and Netanyahu?
Because Jill Stein repeatedly agreed with Hasan on Putin being a war criminal. But Hasan keeps doubling back and trying to defend the American President and his Israeli ally from the accusation.
The problem is this: regarding Netanyahu she says “Well he is very clearly a war criminal.” Regarding Putin she says “With Russia it’s far more complicated” and “In so many words, yes.” She’s hedging out of calling Putin a war criminal directly so she can plausibly deny it. She will agree with general statements saying he could be a war criminal under those circumstances but she won’t say it directly so she can go “Oh no, Hasan called him a war criminal, I didn’t, I just agreed that if all of those things were true then he could be considered a war criminal!”
I think her point is moreso that we’re actively funding and giving arms to Isreal to carry out these crimes, therefore we have more power to state things in that way from a geopolitical standpoint.
Hasan won’t take “yes” for an answer. Which is a weird thing to do, given that he keeps looping back around to attack her for her condemnation of Biden and Netanyahu.
Under what circumstances is Hasan conceding that Netanyahu is a war criminal? All he does is deflect blame for war crimes away from Netanyahu, which is a really weird thing to do across multiple interview questions.
She will and she did. Of course, Hasan keeps cutting her responses off to interject with new defenses of Netanyahu. Which is, again, a very weird way to establish Jill as a Putin-defender. It seems more like Hasan is hedging on Netanyahu and trying to back Jill into recanting her views on Israel.
I think it’d be easier to take yes for an answer if she said the word yes. And frankly I question why someone can’t use the word yes if it’s such a clear yes
She said the word yes.
How come she can give a clear yes for Biden but Putis it has to be surrounded by a million qualifiers? Multiple times.
We all watched the interview. What are you trying to prove.
Eh, the OP asking the question is operating in bad faith. They are most likely some disinformation shill or useful idiot who just espouses 3rd party or bust vibes every time I see them. You’re going to have as much luck getting through to them as Hasan had of getting Stein to say “yes.” with no qualifiers attached.
Say weird some more. We aren’t going to be desensitized to it. The right will still be fucking weird
It looks like you’re being forced to notice the contradictions at last.
Oooooooh got 'imm!!!1!
If she’s not a defender of Putin, it should be as easy to say a flat, unequivocated, non-politicked yes as she did with Netenyahu. The fact that she won’t do it is deserving of suspicion and critique.
A simple example of similar behavior would be if someone asked Biden or Trump or any other candidate, “Will you work to build better infrastructure in the country?” And they replied, “Well…in so many words, yes.”
It’s a non answer. It lacks commitment to the affirmation. If your first language is english and you aren’t autistic this kind of hedging behavior is very apparent. They are giving you the answer you are looking for but they are also trying to hide that they are not being 100% truthful in their assertion. It is a very common tactic in English used in lieu of an outright lie in order to generate a gap of potential misunderstanding that can be later abused to twist the narrative.
In the above example at the end of their term when somone presses them about their inaction on infrastructure development and says, “You said you would.” They can warp it around with, “I never directly said i would do anything.” Or they might have done some entirely symbolic effort that had an obvious zero chance of being effective and then immediately gave up because they had no intention of a true effort, no true commitment.
It’s the type of shitty behavior that disillusions people to politics. It’s half-truths and an unmitigated lack of candor and blatantly obvious obfuscation. Every politician does it. Most people do it to some degree. It’s very easy to read through though and that’s why the interviewer was so persistent in seeking a direct answer.
Almost the very beginning of the interview:
Unlike Jill Stein, he has no problem calling a war criminal a war criminal. But I am sure that, unlike Putin, Jill Stein would have no problem calling Joe Biden a war criminal immediately.
Who does he call a war criminal in the interview?
You asked if he was trying to defend Netanyahu.
I literally quoted him calling Netanyahu a war criminal. At the beginning of the interview you apparently didn’t read.
And now you’re doubling down on it? Really?
Why keep raising this question? Why not focus on Putin alone? Why does Hasan need to inject Biden into this conversation?
I’m asking questions. You don’t seem comfortable thinking about the answers?
Irrelevant. You asked if he was trying to defend Netanyahu and he literally called him a war criminal at the top.
If you had read the interview, you would have known that. So either you didn’t read it or you were being dishonest.
That’s what Mehdi Hasan is asserting, which is weird when you consider how Netanyahu and Putin are allies.
Why keep putting up this defense of Netanyahu if you’re so focused on getting Jill to denounce Putin? Why does Israel become this backdoor by which you can tacitly trade weapons and fossil fuels internationally?
Have you read the interview? You don’t seem to want to acknowledge anything Hasan has actually said.
You:
Hasan:
This can’t be clearer. Just stop.
The things you yourself quoted show he is not trying to defend biden and netanyahu.