Photo Credit:
Anticipating with a sense of outright dread the widely expected Republican gains in this week’s midterm elections, mainstream media types have been busy tarring Tea Party activists and bemoaning an electorate that would dare even entertain the thought of voting for the Grand Old Party and that failed to appreciate the unparalleled virtues of Barack Obama.
As usual, the Media Research Center was busy compiling some of the more outrageous examples of liberal media madness. The monitor’s favorites follow (the first quote is from Hollywood lefty “Meathead” Rob Reiner rather than an actual journalist, but it’s too revealing – and too humorous, in a sad way – to pass up:
● “Hitler, by the way, never got more than 33 percent of the vote ever in Germany…. He wasn’t a majority guy, but he was charismatic, and they were having bad economic times – just like we are now. People were out of work, they needed jobs, and a guy came along and rallied the troops. My fear is that the Tea Party gets a charismatic leader, because all they’re selling is fear and anger and that’s all Hitler sold – ‘I’m angry and I’m frightened and you should hate that guy over there.’ “
– Actor/director/liberal activist Rob Reiner on
HBO’s Real Time with Bill Maher, October 22
● “[The Tea Party-backed Republicans are] a group of unqualified, unstable individuals who will do what they are told, in exchange for money and power, and march this nation as far backward as they can get, backward to Jim Crow, or backward to the breadlines of the ’30s, or backward to hanging union organizers, or backward to the trusts and the robber barons . It is nothing short of an attempted use of democracy to end this democracy, to buy America wholesale and pave over the freedoms and the care we take of one another, which have combined to keep us the envy of the world .”
– MSNBC’s Keith Olbermann in a 21-minute
“Special Comment” on Countdown, October 27
●”We [the press corps] are so eager to promote ourselves with the smartest take on how President Obama and the Democrats got themselves in this pickle that we haven’t done a good job explaining the stakes . A right-wing Republican takeover of Congress and state capitals isn’t something to accept with indifference. Midterms matter, and voters tempted to skip this election should have their heads examined.”
– Newsweek’s Jonathan Alter in the
magazine’s November 1 edition
Advertisement
● “It reminded me of a doctor who has this horrible burn victim come into the hospital, and he saves the guy’s life – this is our economy – saves the guy’s life, but the guy wakes up and he’s got scars all over his face, and that’s all he sees, that’s all anybody sees. The guy’s living, but he looks awful. And how – what’s the doctor supposed to say? And that’s what he’s [Obama is] fighting, he’s fighting an economy that just won’t give him anything…. He cannot get any traction on what he’s accomplished.”
– CBS “60 Minutes” correspondent Lesley Stahl
on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” October 18
● “Nancy Pelosi is considered one of the most effective Speakers in congressional history…. The irresistible force who marshaled House Democrats to pass controversial administration policies – including the stimulus package, Wall Street reform, and health care…. Pelosi’s support for a middle-class tax cut, children’s issues, and education, has made her a hero in some quarters.”
– CBS’s Rita Braver profiling Pelosi for
“Sunday Morning,” October 17
● Anchor Norah O’Donnell: “Sarah Palin is throwing out punches ahead of the midterm elections. During a speech to the conservative Liberty and Freedom Foundation in San Jose last night, the former Alaskan governor took a shot at some comments made by First Lady Michelle Obama.”
[Video clip] Sarah Palin: “You know, when I hear people say, or had said during the campaign, that they had never been proud of America until, until that time, I think, ‘Haven’t they met anybody in uniform yet?’ “O’Donnell: “Of course, Mrs. Obama never said that. She never said that she had not been proud of her country.”
– MSNBC “News Live,” October 15
Actually, Palin was right and O’Donnell was mistaken or just plain untruthful:
“For the first time in my adult life I am proud of my country, because it feels like hope is finally making a comeback.”
– Michelle Obama talking to a crowd in
Milwaukee, Wisconsin, February 18, 2008
Jason Maoz can be reached at [email protected]
Advertisement