Friday, January 20, 2006
Demand An Apology From Chris Matthews
Last night on Hardball, Tweety Bird Matthews compared Osama Bin Laden to Michael Moore while talking to Senator Joe Biden about the new Bin Laden tape Al Jazeera aired yesterday. Here's the tape, via Crooks and Liars:
I happened to be eating dinner at the time of Matthews' comments and I almost choked on my veggie burger when I heard Tweety compare a left-wing filmmaker to the head of a world-wide terrorist organization who is responsible for the deaths of thousands of innocent people. I immediately sent off an email to MSNBC to denounce the Matthews remarks and to demand an apology from the pandering sonuvabitch
The rest of the blogosphere was just as outraged. Peter Daou on Salon wrote this:
Digby wrote this:
And Democratic Senator John Kerry wrote this:
Yup. Kerry's right, Digby's right, Daou's right and Matthews is wrong.
This equating of liberals with Osama is a coordinated White House policy to make people think only Republicans are tough enough to fight terrorism while deflecting from the fact that they still haven't gotten Bin Laden "Dead or Alive" four and a half years after 9/11.
And why haven't they gotten Bin Laden yet? And why aren't we winning the War on Terror?
The fact is this: the administration has one tool in the War on Terror - military action. Christopher Whitcomb, terrorism expert, just said on Imus in the Morning that this War on Terror is a war against an ideology, not a group of people. As such, you cannot win this war with bombs and bullets alone. You have to use other tools in the war besides force, like diplomacy, economics, and geopolitics.
But the administration would rather drop bombs and "kill all the terrorists" as they did in Pakistan last weekend.
The problem is, as Donald Rumsfeld once acknowledged, sometimes you create as many terrorists as you kill when you spend your time trying to blow up every terrorist in the world.
Here are the contact numbers for MSNBC, via Digby:
Hardball@msnbc.com
MSNBC
www.msnbc.com
world@msnbc.com
One MSNBC Plaza
Secaucus, NJ 07094
Phone: (201) 583-5000
Fax: (201) 583-5453
NBC News
www.nbc.com
30 Rockefeller Plaza
New York, NY 10112
Phone: (212) 664-5900
Fax: (212) 664-2914
Matthews: I mean he sounds like an over the top Michael Moore here, if not a Michael Moore. You think that sells...
I happened to be eating dinner at the time of Matthews' comments and I almost choked on my veggie burger when I heard Tweety compare a left-wing filmmaker to the head of a world-wide terrorist organization who is responsible for the deaths of thousands of innocent people. I immediately sent off an email to MSNBC to denounce the Matthews remarks and to demand an apology from the pandering sonuvabitch
The rest of the blogosphere was just as outraged. Peter Daou on Salon wrote this:
DEMAND AN APOLOGY: "Bin Laden sounds like Clint Eastwood" -- "Bin Laden sounds like Ron Silver" -- "Bin Laden sounds like Rush Limbaugh" -- "Bin Laden sounds like Bill O'Reilly"-- "Bin Laden sounds like Mel Gibson" -- "Bin Laden sounds like Bruce Willis" -- "Bin Laden sounds like Michelle Malkin"... Imagine the outrage on the right and in the press (but I repeat myself) if a major media figure spat out those words. Well, on Hardball, Chris Matthews just blurted out that Bin Laden sounds like Michael Moore. Simple: Matthews should apologize. On the air. This has NOTHING to do with Michael Moore and everything to do with how far media figures can go slandering the left. And last I checked, Michael Moore didn't massacre thousands of innocent Americans.
Digby wrote this:
Come on. This is ridiculous. This man is either working overtime to kiss right wing ass for some reason or he's been paid off to do full-on GOP character assasination. This is exactly what the Republicans did to Tom Daschle and Max Cleland.
This comparing liberals to Osama bin laden has been going on long enough. We don't want to subjugate women and kill gays. We don't want to turn free societies into theocracies and inflict a particular religious doctine on everyone. We don't see geopoliticc through the lens of religious revelation and compel others to act upon it. It is beyond absurd to keep comparing liberals, any of us, to religious fundamentalist terrorists.
And Democratic Senator John Kerry wrote this:
"You'd think the only focus tonight would be on destroying Osama Bin Laden, not comparing him to an American who opposes the war whether you like him or not. You want a real debate that America needs? Here goes: If the administration had done the job right in Tora Bora we might not be having discussions on Hardball about a new Bin Laden tape. How dare Scott McClellan tell America that this Administration puts terrorists out of business when had they put Osama Bin Laden out of business in Afghanistan when our troops wanted to, we wouldn't have to hear this barbarian's voice on tape. That's what we should be talking about in America." -- John Kerry
Yup. Kerry's right, Digby's right, Daou's right and Matthews is wrong.
This equating of liberals with Osama is a coordinated White House policy to make people think only Republicans are tough enough to fight terrorism while deflecting from the fact that they still haven't gotten Bin Laden "Dead or Alive" four and a half years after 9/11.
And why haven't they gotten Bin Laden yet? And why aren't we winning the War on Terror?
The fact is this: the administration has one tool in the War on Terror - military action. Christopher Whitcomb, terrorism expert, just said on Imus in the Morning that this War on Terror is a war against an ideology, not a group of people. As such, you cannot win this war with bombs and bullets alone. You have to use other tools in the war besides force, like diplomacy, economics, and geopolitics.
But the administration would rather drop bombs and "kill all the terrorists" as they did in Pakistan last weekend.
The problem is, as Donald Rumsfeld once acknowledged, sometimes you create as many terrorists as you kill when you spend your time trying to blow up every terrorist in the world.
Here are the contact numbers for MSNBC, via Digby:
Hardball@msnbc.com
MSNBC
www.msnbc.com
world@msnbc.com
One MSNBC Plaza
Secaucus, NJ 07094
Phone: (201) 583-5000
Fax: (201) 583-5453
NBC News
www.nbc.com
30 Rockefeller Plaza
New York, NY 10112
Phone: (212) 664-5900
Fax: (212) 664-2914
