Tapper to Jay Carney: The Good Wife Had More Obama Officials Than Paris Rally

CNN anchor Jake Tapper continued his prosecution of the Obama administration for not sending a high-level official to the Paris Unity Rally yesterday. He lit into former White House Press Secretary Jay Carney, now a CNN contributor, on Monday, asking what the administration was thinking in skipping the rally.

Carney argued the security challenges of a president in an open rally would have distracted from the rally’s Franco-centric message.

“I take your point on the president,” Tapper responded. “But Joe Biden, Bill Clinton, somebody else from the administration? Chuck Hagel?”

RELATED: Zakaria on U.S.’s Absence from Paris Rally: Why God Invented Vice Presidents

“Certainly you’ll grant the point that there’s something wrong when this season’s The Good Wife had higher Obama representation, with a cameo from Valerie Jarrett, than this very important rally,” Tapper charged, “perhaps the most important rally in Europe in a generation.”

Carney countered that if anyone but the president had been sent the critics would have howled anyway, and that the symbolism of attendance did nothing to deter the substance of the U.S.-France relationship. He added that outside of political commentators, people were a lot more concerned about the economy than optics.

“There’s that pivot to the economy,” Tapper replied sarcastically. “I know it very well.”

Watch the clip below, via CNN:

[Image via screengrab]

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