On Sunday night I was feeling pretty good when I talked to my mom around 9:30, and she told me the James Comey interview was on ABC at 10pm. So I watched it, and here’s my take.
Comey came across as very charismatic, dynamic, sharp, intelligent, self-aware, socially progressive, and virtually morally infallible. Still, I couldn’t quite reconcile this kinder gentler Comey with the man who reopened the Clinton email investigation just ten days before the 2016 election and indisputably threw the election to Trump.
At times during the hourloung interview, which was aired on ABC’s “20/20” news program, Comey came across as a dedicated public servant, whose singular focus was to seek the highest truth and to serve the American public in the most noble way possible.
But there was also an element of self-promotion laying just beneath the surface. Comey is known as a man with a large ego, and he certainly looked at ease being interviewed at his home in upstate New York while swathed in a herringbone blue blazer and khaki pants. The power broker at ease in his rural New York hamlet.
George Stephanopoulos, the ABC interviewer, was similarly at ease, striking a constant repose of power and elegance. Over and over again, Stephanopoulos asked Comey whether he erred in pledging “honest loyalty” to President Trump. He also asked how Comey could defend himself against accusations he threw the election to Trump.
Stephanopoulos was wearing a well-tailored dark suit, and his perfectly quaffed $500 haircut accentuated his 50-something boyish good looks.
Comey’s repeated assertions that he was acting in the best interests of the country seemed fairly hollow to me, because I’ve had to live with The Donald as President of the USA every day now for over 400 days now.
But at the same time, Comey truly does seem like a man of integrity, and I believe him when he says he did what he thought was right.
All in all, it was a masterful broadcast by ABC. It had just the right amount of gravitas, star power, glamour, levity, and topicality to keep viewers hooked for a full hour. This was a master class in broadcast journalism.
