Keith Olbermann

Transparent Lies

This has been a week of blatant, transparent lies.

First, on Monday, Newcastle United terminated Chris Hughton for lack of "managerial experience."

Later that same day, Barack Obama announced that a "deal" had been reached with the Republicans over the expiring 2003 top bracket income tax cuts. The fact it was called a "deal" was itself a lie. Heck, the 2003 tax cuts were passed under the ridiculous name, "Jobs and Growth Tax Relief Reconciliation Act." How were the twenty-hundreds to you and your family? If you were an average American, you probably didn't get a pay raise while working the same job. However the big lie was delivered by the President himself:

I have argued that we can't afford [to extend the top bracket tax cuts] right now. But what I've also said, we have to find consensus here because a middle-class tax hike would be very tough not only on working families, it would also be a drag on our economy at this moment.

That's a complete lie. There is no reason to link the expiration of tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans with a tax hike for the middle class. None. They should be separate issues. In fact, the president should have had the upper hand here. He should have gone into these talks with the intent of letting the clock run out, and allowing all tax cuts to expire, not to work out some sort of "deal" with Republicans.

The president's logic seems to be that he was boxed into renewing the Bush tax cuts because the 2009 middle class tax cuts were given the same expiration date (12/31/2010). The talking point from the president's advisors is, "not all the tax cuts were Bush's." Okay. But the unfortunate decision to have the middle class tax cuts expire at the same time as the top tier tax cuts is the fault of the Democrats. But as president, Obama could very easily let it all expire.  He could ask Congress to send him a bill to reinstate tax cuts for the middle class (which he won't get). But he would have plenty of political cover because he wouldn't ask for an extension of the top bracket cuts, nor would he have to sign such a bill if it reached his desk. He has the upper hand, and apparently doesn't understand it.

Extending the top bracket tax cuts only increases the chances of them becoming permanent under the next Republican president. In my lifetime, we've gone from a 50 percent tax rate to a 35 percent tax rate for individuals netting more than $300,000 (net, mind you, after all charitable donations designed to help affluent people avoid the highest tax rate). Amazing. Where's the 15 percent decrease for New Yorkers paying income taxes to three governments, and whose water bills have risen over 10 percent each year for the last three years?

But instead of letting the clock run out, the president is promoting a Republican-led bill that would extend the top tier tax cuts another 24 months, presumably when another president and congress will have to sort it out.

And then it got worse. On Wednesday, the President doubled-down, saying that if the drafted bipartisan bill was not passed, the country might slip into another recession. Fortunately, over 50 House Democrats called bullshit and have pledged to vote against the bill.

This latest failure of the President to battle the Republicans opens the door to a question that a lot of Liberals have been asking lately - does Barack Obama even want to be president? This immediate capitulation, when all he had to do was run out the clock and veto tax cut bills in 2011, is the clearest evidence yet that the president either does not know his job or doesn't want it. Does he already want to pack up and go home to Chicago? Why did he betray a major campaign promise so quickly?

In my opinion, Obama is a very tired man. He realizes now that his great charm and intellect will not win him political battles. And since he is not a fighter, he is simply going to avoid battles altogether. He just wants to go back to Chicago. He's as discouraged and deflated as the rest of us. However, he gets to go home. We're left still needing a strong, progressive leader. He'll be left with free healthcare, paid speeches, and personal security for life. That's not a victory. That's a tragedy. After years of advancement, hard work, and success, Barack Obama finally stalled and failed when his country needed him most.

The president is well read.  Did he ever read this quote by Mahatma Gandhi?

All compromise is based on give and take, but there can be no give and take on fundamentals. Any compromise on mere fundamentals is a surrender. For it is all give and no take.

And Keith Olbermann makes what should be one of his final Special Comments about this president. There really isn't much more to be said with 22 months remaining. Here's Keith on December 7th, explaining in 12 minutes, how Obama officially betrayed his base, once and for all:

Catching Up With TIVO

Oddball, as seen on Countdown, September 15th, 2008. Keith Olbermann takes a a jab at the Mets and a laugh at an unlucky groundhog:

Bill Maher, opening monologue, September 12th, 2008. It includes the rarely-seen alternate angle of Sarah Palin's response to the 'Bush Doctrine' question:

Bill Maher interviews Paul Begala, September 12th, 2008:

Bill Maher, New Rules, September 12th, 2008:

Copyright 2008 NBC Universal and Time Warner / HBO.

Senator Clinton's Inexcusable RFK Remark


Surely all of us know by know what happened Friday afternoon. Hillary Clinton repeated a comment she made in March regarding how anything could happen in the month of June that would remove Obama from the Democratic nomination contest. The example she used then and yesterday was the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy in June 1968. She made the comment during a private interview with the Argus Leader newspaper in Sioux Falls, North Dakota.

I let the comment go when I first read it at CNN/Time in March, assuming that she would quickly regret it. Also, I assumed that she would quickly realize the incredible implications of such a remark. It is unthinkable that a Democratic candidate for President of the United States would publicly comment that a possible route to the nomination would be the death (or murder!) of her opponent. It's the kind of comment that suggests that Clinton has spent a little time thinking or wondering about it. I dare not say she fantasized or hoped for it. She has not and will not.

We live in a nation that enjoys a high degree of freedom of expression. Surely, Hillary Clinton has the right to talk about RFK's assassination, and how it derailed a charismatic, star candidate, who looked poised to win the nomination and excite the nation. She herself is in a desperate, must-win situation. She must somehow derail a similar candidate, who has more momentum, more campaign cash, and more votes than RFK ever did, in a 50-state primary system (which didn't exist in 1968).

However, presidential candidates do not have the luxury of being able to say whatever they want in public. And the potential assassination of an American political candidate or elected official is one of them. Imagine if a Senator or Congressman had made such a comment about George W. Bush. She or he could have said, "He's in the final days of his second term. He's probably home free. But anything can happen between now and January 20th. He wouldn't be the first president to assume he was going to live-out his tenure. Lincoln was assassinated early in his second term. So was McKinley. We could have a late second-term event. It's not impossible." I would assume that hypothetical politician would be censured for such a remark.

There are certain topics that American politicians cannot touch. One of them is the assassination of a rival or colleague. It just cannot be touched, ever.

But why is that? After all, Hillary Clinton was only repeating a historical fact. Hillary was only stating the truth. And the truth is that the only way she can win the Democratic nomination is if Obama becomes seriously ill, dies, or quits the race. That's the truth. And besides, she was talking about RFK, not Obama. Right?

Wrong. It's all about context. Clinton was being asked why she was being hounded by party insiders and Obama supporters to quit the race. She was asked why people are trying to push her out. Her response was that it made no sense, especially when other races were not resolved at this point on the calendar. She raised two examples. First, she said that her husband didn't secure the nomination in 1992 until the California primary in June. (Her interviewer seemed to verify that answer, but it is in fact inaccurate. While Jerry Brown did not drop-out of the race until June, Bill Clinton secured the 1992 Democratic nomination in April.) Second, she brought up the 1968 race, which was just heating-up in June when New York Senator Bobby Kennedy won California.

And she could have said just that, and it would have been fine. But no. She said something else:

We all remember Bobby Kennedy was assassinated in June in California.

When I first saw this, I froze as soon as the words "Bobby Kennedy" left her mouth. I thought, 'where on earth is she going with this?' I still don't know. She had nothing to gain by mentioning it. And I don't think she was trying to impress the interviewer with her knowledge of 20th Century US history.

I will say again, she wasn't openly expressing a wish to see Obama die. I do think she is wishing Obama to quit or otherwise go away. But the way it came out. Why? Why, when there are so many other historic examples to draw from? The 1984 Democratic nomination was very close. The 1988 race wasn't settled until July 4th, when Jackson and Dukhakis brokered a deal to make nice. The 1976 race was extremely close as well. Why 1968? Why 'assassination'? Why?

She said something no American politician should ever talk about, unless it is a remembrance, an anniversary, or a part of a history lecture. Surely there will be members of Congress who will mark the 40th anniversary of Robert Kennedy's death with a few words on the Senate or House floor. But in the context of a political race, the mentioning of an assassination as an example of how the race can dramatically change late in the calendar, is completely unacceptable. This is because political assassination is one of this nation's darkest and most traumatic legacies (along with the Civil War, reconstruction, racism, and our involvement in Vietnam). Speaking about an American assassination as if it were a possibility to level a political contest is totally beyond the pale. It has no place in our national discourse, particularly among the candidates involved in the political race in question. And that's because any of the three candidates in the race could themselves become a victim of an assassin's bullet. It's a possibility we don't treat lightly and don't talk about in public. Rational Americans don't wish it on even their most hated politicians or political enemies. Most Americans don't even think about it.

And yet, there was Hillary Clinton, speculating why she was being pressured to leave the race. And in her verbal thoughts, she mentioned the assassination of RFK as an example of why she should remain in this race. Because, who knows, something awful could happen to Senator Obama. It was a cold, brutal, and utterly disgusting moment. It is right here:

And then there is Keith Olbermann's passionate, and very angry response less than 5 hours later. Perhaps this was a bit too harsh. But I trust Keith to be a rational man. And as this Saturday rolled on, I found myself becoming just as angry as Keith did Friday night. Here's Keith telling his viewers, "This, Senator, is TOO MUCH."


Asked if her continuing fight for the nomination against Senator Obama hurts the Democratic party, Sen. Hillary Clinton replied, "I don't. Because again, I've been around long enough. You know, my husband did not wrap up the nomination in 1992 until he won the California primary somewhere in the middle of June, right? We all remember Bobby Kennedy was assassinated in June in California. You know, I just don't understand it. You know, there's lots of speculation about why it is. “

The comments were recorded and we showed them to you earlier and they are online as we speak.

She actually said those words.

Those words, Senator?

You actually invoked the nightmare of political assassination.

You actually invoked the specter of an inspirational leader, at the seeming moment of triumph, for himself and a battered nation yearning to breathe free, silenced forever.

You actually used the word "assassination" in the middle of a campaign with a loud undertone of racial hatred - and gender hatred - and political hatred.

You actually used the word "assassination" in a time when there is a fear, unspoken but vivid and terrible, that our again-troubled land and fractured political landscape might target a black man running for president.

Or a white man.

Or a white woman!

You actually used those words, in this America, Senator, while running against an African-American against whom the death threats started the moment he declared his campaign?

You actually used those words, in this America, Senator, while running to break your "greatest glass ceiling" and claiming there are people who would do anything to stop you?

You!

Senator - never mind the implications of using the word "assassination" in any connection to Senator Obama...

What about you?

You cannot say this!

The references, said her spokesperson, were not, in any way, weighted.

The allusions, said Mo Uh-leathee, are, "...historical examples of the nominating process going well into the summer and any reading into it beyond that would be inaccurate and outrageous."

I'm sorry.

There is no inaccuracy.

Not for a moment does any rational person believe Senator Clinton is actually hoping for the worst of all political calamities.

Yet the outrage belongs, not to Senator Clinton or her supporters, but to every other American.

Firstly, she has previously bordered on the remarks she made today...

Then swerved back from them and the awful skid they represented.

She said, in an off-camera interview with Time on March 6, "Primary contests used to last a lot longer. We all remember the great tragedy of Bobby Kennedy being assassinated in June in L.A. My husband didn't wrap up the nomination in 1992 until June, also in California. Having a primary contest go through June is nothing particularly unusual. We will see how it unfolds as we go forward over the next three to four months."

In retrospect, we failed her when we did not call her out, for that remark, dry and only disturbing, in a magazine's pages. But somebody obviously warned her of the danger of that rhetoric:

After the Indiana primary, on May 7, she told supporters at a Washington hotel:

"Sometimes you gotta calm people down a little bit. But if you look at successful presidential campaigns, my husband did not get the nomination until June of 1992. I remember tragically when Senator Kennedy won California near the end of that process."

And at Shepherdstown, West Virginia, on the same day, she referenced it again:

"You know, I remember very well what happened in the California primary in 1968 as, you know, Senator Kennedy won that primary."

On March 6th she had said "assassinated."

By May 7 she had avoided it. Today... she went back to an awful well. There is no good time to recall the awful events of June 5th, 1968, of Senator Bobby Kennedy, happy and alive - perhaps, for the first time since his own brother's death in Dallas in 1963... Galvanized to try to lead this nation back from one of its darkest eras... Only to fall victim to the same surge that took that brother, and Martin Luther King... There is no good time to recall this. But certainly to invoke it, two weeks before the exact 40th anniversary of the assassination, is an insensitive and heartless thing.

And certainly to invoke it, three days after the awful diagnosis, and heart-breaking prognosis, for Senator Ted Kennedy, is just as insensitive, and just as heartless. And both actions, open a door wide into the soul of somebody who seeks the highest office in this country, and through that door shows something not merely troubling, but frightening. And politically inexplicable.

What, Senator, do you suppose would happen if you withdrew from the campaign, and Senator Obama formally became the presumptive nominee, and then suddenly left the scene? It doesn't even have to be the “dark curse upon the land” you mentioned today, Senator. Nor even an issue of health. He could simply change his mind... Or there could unfold that perfect-storm scandal your people have often referenced, even predicted. Maybe he could get a better offer from some other, wiser, country. What happens then, Senator? You are not allowed back into the race? Your delegates and your support vanish? The Democrats don't run anybody for President?

What happens, of course, is what happened when the Democrats' vice presidential choice, Senator Thomas Eagleton of Missouri, had to withdraw from the ticket, in 1972 after it proved he had not been forthcoming about previous mental health treatments. George McGovern simply got another vice president.

Senator, as late as the late summer of 1864 the Republicans were talking about having a second convention, to withdraw Abraham Lincoln's re-nomination and choose somebody else because until Sherman took Atlanta in September it looked like Lincoln was going to lose to George McClellan.

You could theoretically suspend your campaign, Senator.

There's plenty of time and plenty of historical precedent, Senator, in case you want to come back in, if something bad should happen to Senator Obama. Nothing serious, mind you.

It's just like you said, "We all remember Bobby Kennedy was assassinated in June in California."

Since those awful words in Sioux Falls, and after the condescending, buck-passing statement from her spokesperson, Senator Clinton has made something akin to an apology, without any evident recognition of the true trauma she has inflicted.

"I was discussing the Democratic primary history, and in the course of that discussion mentioned the campaigns both my husband and Senator Kennedy waged California in June in 1992 and 1968," she said in Brandon, South Dakota. "I was referencing those to make the point that we have had nomination primary contests that go into June. That's a historic fact.

"The Kennedys have been much on my mind the last days because of Senator Kennedy. I regret that if my referencing that moment of trauma for our entire nation, particularly for the Kennedy family was in any way offensive, I certainly had no intention of that whatsoever."

"My view is that we have to look to the past and to our leaders who have inspired us and give us a lot to live up to and I'm honored to hold Senator Kennedy's seat in the United States Senate in the state of New York and have the highest regard for the entire Kennedy family. Thanks. Not a word about the inappropriateness of referencing assassination.

Not a word about the inappropriateness of implying - whether it was intended or not - that she was hanging around waiting for somebody to try something terrible.

Not a word about Senator Obama.

Not a word about Senator McCain.

Not: I'm sorry...

Not: I apologize...

Not: I blew it...

Not: please forgive me.

God knows, Senator, in this campaign, this nation has had to forgive you, early and often...

And despite your now traditional position of the offended victim, the nation has forgiven you.

We have forgiven you your insistence that there have been widespread calls for you to end your campaign, when such calls had been few. We have forgiven you your misspeaking about Martin Luther King's relative importance to the Civil Rights movement.

We have forgiven you your misspeaking about your under-fire landing in Bosnia.

We have forgiven you insisting Michigan's vote wouldn't count and then claiming those who would not count it were Un-Democratic.

We have forgiven you pledging to not campaign in Florida and thus disenfranchise voters there, and then claim those who stuck to those rules were as wrong as those who defended slavery or denied women the vote.

We have forgiven you the photos of Osama Bin Laden in an anti-Obama ad...

We have forgiven you fawning over the fairness of Fox News while they were still calling you a murderer.

We have forgiven you accepting Richard Mellon Scaife's endorsement and then laughing as you described his "deathbed conversion."

We have forgiven you quoting the electoral predictions of Boss Karl Rove.

We have forgiven you the 3 a.m. Phone Call commercial.

We have forgiven you President Clinton's disparaging comparison of the Obama candidacy to Jesse Jackson's.

We have forgiven you Geraldine Ferraro's national radio interview suggesting Obama would not still be in the race had he been a white man.

We have forgiven you the dozen changing metrics and the endless self-contradictions of your insistence that your nomination is mathematically probable rather than a statistical impossibility.

We have forgiven you your declaration of some primary states as counting and some as not.

We have forgiven you exploiting Jeremiah Wright in front of the editorial board of the lunatic-fringe Pittsburgh Tribune-Review.

We have forgiven you exploiting William Ayers in front of the debate on ABC.

We have forgiven you for boasting of your "support among working, hard-working Americans, white Americans"...

We have even forgiven you repeatedly praising Senator McCain at Senator Obama's expense, and your own expense, and the Democratic ticket's expense.

But Senator, we cannot forgive you this.

"You know, my husband did not wrap up the nomination in 1992 until he won the California primary somewhere in the middle of June, right? We all remember Bobby Kennedy was assassinated in June in California."

We cannot forgive you this -- not because it is crass and low and unfeeling and brutal.

This is unforgivable, because this nation's deepest shame, its most enduring horror, its most terrifying legacy, is political assassination.

Lincoln.

Garfield.

McKinley.

Kennedy.

Martin Luther King.

Robert Kennedy.

And, but for the grace of the universe or the luck of the draw, Reagan, Ford, Truman, Nixon, Andrew Jackson, both Roosevelts, even George Wallace.

The politics of this nation is steeped enough in blood, Senator Clinton, you cannot and must not invoke that imagery! Anywhere! At any time!

And to not appreciate, immediately - to still not appreciate tonight - just what you have done... is to reveal an incomprehension of the America you seek to lead.

This, Senator, is too much.

Because a senator - a politician - a person - who can let hang in mid-air the prospect that she might just be sticking around in part, just in case the other guy gets shot - has no business being, and no capacity to be, the President of the United States.

Good night and good luck.


© 2008 MSNBC Interactive

URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/24797758/

Complete Keith Olbermann Special Comment, May 14 2008

Twelve unforgettable minutes (and 2,000 words) of American television news. It is my hope that this is remembered by historians and media scholars as one of the most important and visceral TV news moments of this decade. Time will tell.


President Bush has resorted anew to the sleaziest fear-mongering and mass manipulation of an administration and public life dedicated to realizing the lowest of our expectations. And he has now applied these poisons to the 2008 presidential election, on behalf of the party at whose center he and John McCain lurk.

Mr. Bush has predicted that the election of a Democratic president could "eventually lead to another attack on the United States." This ludicrous, infuriating, holier-than-thou and most importantly bone-headedly wrong statement came during a May 13 interview with Politico.com and online users of Yahoo.

The question was phrased as follows: "If we were to pull out of Iraq next year, what's the worst that could happen, what's the doomsday scenario?"

The president replied: "Doomsday scenario of course is that extremists throughout the Middle East would be emboldened, which would eventually lead to another attack on the United States. The biggest issue we face is, it's bigger than Iraq, it's this ideological struggle against cold-blooded killers who will kill people to achieve their political objectives."

Mr. Bush, at long last, has it not dawned on you that the America you have now created, includes "cold-blooded killers who will kill people to achieve their political objectives?" They are those in — or formerly in — your employ, who may yet be charged some day with war crimes.

Through your haze of self-congratulation and self-pity, do you still have no earthly clue that this nation has laid waste to Iraq to achieve your political objectives? "This ideological struggle," Mr. Bush, is taking place within this country.

It is a struggle between Americans who cherish freedom, ours and everybody else's, and Americans like you, sir, to whom freedom is just a brand name, just like "Patriot Act" is a brand name or "Protect America" is a brand name.

But wait, there's more: You also said "Iraq is the place where al-Qaida and other extremists have made their stand and they will be defeated." They made no "stand" in Iraq, sir, you allowed them to assemble there!

As certainly as if that were the plan, the borders were left wide open by your government's farcical post-invasion strategy of "they'll greet us as liberators." And as certainly as if that were the plan, the inspiration for another generation of terrorists in another country was provided by your government's farcical post-invasion strategy of letting the societal infra-structure of Iraq dissolve, to be replaced by an American viceroy, enforced by merciless mercenaries who shoot unarmed Iraqis and then evade prosecution in any country by hiding behind your skirts, sir.

Terrorism inside Iraq is your creation, Mr. Bush!

***

It was a Yahoo user who brought up the second topic upon whose introduction Mr. Bush should have passed, or punted, or gotten up and left the room claiming he heard Dick Cheney calling him.

"Do you feel," asked an ordinary American, "that you were misled on Iraq?"

"I feel like — I felt like, there were weapons of mass destruction," the president said. "You know, 'mislead' is a strong word, it almost connotes some kind of intentional — I don't think so, I think there was a — not only our intelligence community, but intelligence communities all across the world shared the same assessment. And so I was disappointed to see how flawed our intelligence was."

Flawed.

You, Mr. Bush, and your tragically know-it-all minions, threw out every piece of intelligence that suggested there were no such weapons.

You, Mr. Bush, threw out every person who suggested that the sober, contradictory, reality-based intelligence needed to be listened to, and fast.

You, Mr. Bush, are responsible for how "intelligence communities all across the world shared the same assessment."

You and the sycophants you dredged up and put behind the most important steering wheel in the world propagated palpable nonsense and shoved it down the throat of every intelligence community across the world and punished anybody who didn't agree it was really chicken salad.

And you, Mr. Bush, threw under the bus, all of the subsequent critics who bravely stepped forward later to point out just how much of a self-fulfilling prophecy you had embraced, and adopted as this country's policy in lieu of, say, common sense.

The fiasco of pre-war intelligence, sir, is your fiasco.

You should build a great statue of yourself turning a deaf ear to the warnings of realists, while you are shown embracing the three-card monte dealers like Richard Perle and Donald Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney.

That would be a far more fitting tribute to your legacy, Mr. Bush, than this presidential library you are constructing as a giant fable about your presidency, an edifice you might as well claim was built from "Iraqi weapons of mass destruction" because there will be just as many of those inside your presidential library as there were inside Saddam Hussein's Iraq.

***

Of course if there is one overriding theme to this president's administration it is the utter, always-failing, inability to know when to quit when it is behind. And so Mr. Bush answered yet another question about this layered, nuanced, wheels-within-wheels garbage heap that constituted his excuse for war.

"And so you feel that you didn't have all the information you should have or the right spin on that information?"

"No, no," replied the President. "I was told by people, that they had weapons of mass destruction …"

People? What people? The insane informant "Curveball?" The Iraqi snake-oil salesman Ahmed Chalabi? The American snake-oil salesman Dick Cheney?

"I was told by people that they had weapons of mass destruction, as were members of Congress, who voted for the resolution to get rid of Saddam Hussein.

"And of course, the political heat gets on and they start to run and try to hide from their votes."

Mr. Bush, you destroyed the evidence that contradicted the resolution you jammed down the Congress's throat, the way you jammed it down the nation's throat. When required by law to verify that your evidence was accurate, you simply resubmitted it, with phrases amounting to "See, I done proved it" virtually written in the margins in crayon.

You defied patriotic Americans to say "The Emperor Has No Clothes," only with the stakes — as you and the mental dwarves in your employ put it — being a "mushroom cloud over an American city."

And as a final crash of self-indulgent nonsense, when the incontrovertible truth of your panoramic and murderous deceit has even begun to cost your political party seemingly perpetual congressional seats in places like North Carolina and Mississippi, you can actually say with a straight face, sir, that for members of Congress "the political heat gets on and they start to run and try to hide from their votes" — while you greet the political heat and try to run and hide from your presidency, and your legacy — 4,000 of the Americans you were supposed to protect — dead in Iraq, with your only feeble, pathetic answer being, "I was told by people that they had weapons of mass destruction."

***

Then came Mr. Bush's final blow to our nation's solar plexus, his last reopening of our common wounds, his last remark that makes the rest of us question not merely his leadership or his judgment but his very suitably to remain in office.

"Mr. President," he was asked, "you haven't been golfing in recent years. Is that related to Iraq?"

"Yes," began perhaps the most startling reply of this nightmarish blight on our lives as Americans on our history. "It really is. I don't want some mom whose son may have recently died to see the Commander in Chief playing golf. I feel I owe it to the families to be as — to be in solidarity as best as I can with them. And I think playing golf during a war just sends the wrong signal."

Golf, sir? Golf sends the wrong signal to the grieving families of our men and women butchered in Iraq? Do you think these families, Mr. Bush, their lives blighted forever, care about you playing golf? Do you think, sir, they care about you?

You, Mr. Bush, let their sons and daughters be killed. Sir, to show your solidarity with them you gave up golf? Sir, to show your solidarity with them you didn't give up your pursuit of this insurance-scam, profiteering, morally and financially bankrupting war.

Sir, to show your solidarity with them you didn't even give up talking about Iraq, a subject about which you have incessantly proved without pause or backwards glance, that you may literally be the least informed person in the world?

Sir, to show your solidarity with them, you didn't give up your presidency? In your own words "solidarity as best as I can" is to stop a game? That is the "best" you can do?

Four thousand Americans give up their lives and your sacrifice was to give up golf! Golf. Not "Gulf" — golf.

And still it gets worse. Because it proves that the president's unendurable sacrifice, his unbearable pain, the suspension of getting to hit a ball with a stick, was not even his own damned idea.

"Mr. President, was there a particular moment or incident that brought you to that decision, or how did you come to that?"

"I remember when [diplomat Sergio Vieira] de Mello, who was at the U.N., got killed in Baghdad as a result of these murderers taking this good man's life. And I was playing golf, I think I was in central Texas, and they pulled me off the golf course and I said, it's just not worth it any more to do."

Your one, tone-deaf, arrogant, pathetic, embarrassing gesture, and you didn't even think of it yourself? The great Bushian sacrifice — an Army private loses a leg, a Marine loses half his skull, 4,000 of their brothers and sisters lose their lives — and you lose golf, and they have to pull you off the golf course to get you to just do that?

If it's even true.

Apart from your medical files, which dutifully record your torn calf muscle and the knee pain which forced you to give up running at the same time — coincidence, no doubt — the bombing in Baghdad which killed Sergio Vieira de Mello of the U.N. and interrupted your round of golf was on Aug. 19, 2003.

Yet CBS News has records of you playing golf as late as Oct. 13 of that year, nearly two months later.

Mr. Bush, I hate to break it to you 6 1/2 years after you yoked this nation and your place in history to the wrong war, in the wrong place, against the wrong people, but the war in Iraq is not about you.

It is not, Mr. Bush, about your grief when American after American comes home in a box.

It is not, Mr. Bush, about what your addled brain has produced in the way of paranoid delusions of risks that do not exist, ready to be activated if some Democrat, and not your twin Mr. McCain, succeeds you.

The war in Iraq, your war, Mr. Bush, is about how you accomplished the derangement of two nations, and how you helped funnel billions of taxpayer dollars to lascivious and perennially thirsty corporations like Halliburton and Blackwater, and how you sent 4,000 Americans to their deaths for nothing.

It is not, Mr. Bush, about your golf game! And, sir, if you have any hopes that next Jan. 20 will not be celebrated as a day of soul-wrenching, heart-felt thanksgiving, because your faithless stewardship of this presidency will have finally come to a merciful end, this last piece of advice:

When somebody asks you, sir, about Democrats who must now pull this country back from the abyss you have placed us at ...

When somebody asks you, sir, about the cooked books and faked threats you foisted on a sincere and frightened nation …

When somebody asks you, sir, about your gallant, noble, self-abnegating sacrifice of your golf game so as to soothe the families of the war dead.

This advice, Mr. Bush: Shut the hell up!

Monday Workplace Blow-Ups (A.K.A. 'WE'LL DO IT LIVE!!!')

Oh my, Keith Olbermann is going to have a field day with this. Many thanks to Crooks and Liars and YouTube user, OllieZiggy, for making this go viral.

This is an early 1990's video of Bill O'Rielly blowing-up on the set of Inside Edition. He yells at a poor kid on the set for a poorly-written script on the teleprompter. On one hand, I have to point out that although Bill is a misogynist, pill-popping (or cocaine-snorting) asshole of the first order, he does a pretty good job re-wording the gibberish that was given to him. On the other hand, how has he been able to last in this businesses? And was this the audition tape he used for The Factor?

Bill-O: "FUCKING THING SUCKS!!!"

UPDATE: Of course CBS had the video removed from YouTube. But it has been duplicated enough. Expect Keith to do something with it this week. He can't resist. You can download the QuickTime / MP4 version here, thanks to Crooks And Liars. Over 400,000 people watched the video on YouTube before it was taken down after just a few hours this morning.

Commenters at C&L noticed how this could be the best viral tirade video since David O' Russell blew-up at Lilly Tomlin on the set of I Heart Huckabees. It is known that Lilly Tomlin has a strong personality (Brooklyn!) and is not the easiest person to work with. But she's no Joe Pesci. She finally made David O' Russell snap after probably more than a day of exchanges like this. But it reveals who the asshole is, and he is not liked within the industry, despite making one of the greatest films of the 1990's. As the NY Times pointed out in a long behind-the-scenes story, Russell put fellow auteur Christopher Nolan in a headlock over losing Jude Law from the set of Huckabees. Back in 2003, there was no YouTube. But now, this set rehersal video is just as famous as the movie.

Welcome to bigger movies, Mr. Schwartzman. Get your foot off that desk, and get away from Mr. Director. The girl cowering on the far right reveals a lot. Surely she had seen this behaviour before.


Worse than Johnny Mac

I think George Clooney explained Russell best. It isn't worth working with him or others like him at your workplace.


PLAYBOY: What made you want to do [Three Kings]?

CLOONEY: David Russell wrote as good a script as I've ever read. I fought to get it. He wanted a lot of other actors before me. They went to Mel and to Nic Cage. I wanted to work on this movie. David is in many ways a genius, though I learned that he's not a genius when it comes to people skills.

PLAYBOY: Did you learn about that the hard way?

CLOONEY: I did. He yelled and screamed at people all day, from day one.

PLAYBOY: Did he yell at you?

CLOONEY: At me often --- and at someone daily. He'd throw off his headset and scream, "Today the sound department fucked me!" For me, it came to a head a couple of times. Once, he went after a camera-car driver who I knew from high school. I had nothing to do with his getting his job, but David began yelling and screaming at him and embarrassing him in front of everybody. I told him, "You can yell and scream and even fire him, but what you can't do is humiliate him in front of people. Not on my set, if I have any say about it." Another time he screamed at the script supervisor and made her cry. I wrote him a letter and said, "Look, I don't know why you do this. You've written a brilliant script, and I think you're a good director. Let's not have a set like this. I don't like it and I don't work well like this." I'm not one of those actors who likes things in disarray. He read the letter and we started all over again. But later, we were three weeks behind schedule, which puts some pressure on you, and he was in a bad mood. These army kids, who were working as extras, were supposed to tackle us. There were three helicopters in the air and 300 extras on the set. It was a tense time, and a little dangerous, too. David wanted one of the extras to grab me and throw me down. This kid was a little nervous about it, and David walked up to him and grabbed him. He pushed him onto the ground. He kicked him and screamed, "Do you want to be in this fucking movie? Then throw him to the fucking ground!" The second assistant director came up and said, "You don't do that, David. You want them to do something, you tell me." David grabbed his walkie-talkie and threw it on the ground. He screamed, "Shut the fuck up! Fuck you," and the AD goes, "Fuck you! I quit." He walked off.

It was a dangerous time. I'd sent him this letter. I was trying to make things work, so I went over and put my arm around him. I said, "David, it's a big day. But you can't shove, push or humiliate people who aren't allowed to defend themselves." He turned on me and said, "Why don't you just worry about your fucking act? You're being a dick. You want to hit me? You want to hit me? Come on, pussy, hit me." I'm looking at him like he's out of his mind. Then he started banging me on the head with his head. He goes, "Hit me, you pussy. Hit me." Then he got me by the throat and I went nuts. Waldo, my buddy, one of the boys, grabbed me by the waist to get me to let go of him. I had him by the throat. I was going to kill him. Kill him. Finally, he apologized, but I walked away. By then the Warner Bros. guys were freaking out. David sort of pouted through the rest of the shoot and we finished the movie, but it was truly, without exception, the worst experience of my life.

PLAYBOY: Did you resolve things? Would you ever work with him again?

CLOONEY: Life's too short.

Because This Must All End

Keith Olbermann has done something incredible. He has made it OK to not only speak of George Walker Bush as the worst president in history, but also given us the green light to speak of Bush as no longer relevant, finished. Bush has reached the end of his effective presidency with over 500 days remaining in his term. He did it in several ways, such as not listening to his generals or the American people.

If I can indulge in my love for the Godfather Part II for a bit -

This presidency is an abortion. Just like our nation is an abortion. We had to kill this presidency, Because This Must All End. I know now that it's over. I knew it then. There would be no way...no way you could ever forgive me, not with this Neocon Thing that's been going on for 16 years.

I'll let Keith spell it out. This is brilliant. It will go down as Keith's boldest and best Special Comment ever broadcast.


Bravo, sir. You rock. Now what are the rest of us going to do? There are over 500 days left to this term. Can we abort it? Can we make it end sooner? We ought to.
Not today, but this weekend, we should be yelling in the streets. And on Sunday, there is a tiny effort to encourage us do just that.

Olbermann: Who Will Stop This War?



The entire government has failed us on Iraq

For the president, and the majority leaders and candidates and rank-and-file Congressmen and Senators of either party—there is only blame for this shameful, and bi-partisan, betrayal

SPECIAL COMMENT

By Keith Olbermann

Countdown
May 23, 2007

A Special Comment about the Democrats’ deal with President Bush to continue financing this unspeakable war in Iraq—and to do so on his terms:

This is, in fact, a comment about… betrayal.

Few men or women elected in our history—whether executive or legislative, state or national—have been sent into office with a mandate more obvious, nor instructions more clear:

Get us out of Iraq.

Yet after six months of preparation and execution—half a year gathering the strands of public support; translating into action, the collective will of the nearly 70 percent of Americans who reject this War of Lies, the Democrats have managed only this:

The Democratic leadership has surrendered to a president—if not the worst president, then easily the most selfish, in our history—who happily blackmails his own people, and uses his own military personnel as hostages to his asinine demand, that the Democrats “give the troops their money”;
The Democratic leadership has agreed to finance the deaths of Americans in a war that has only reduced the security of Americans;
The Democratic leadership has given Mr. Bush all that he wanted, with the only caveat being, not merely meaningless symbolism about benchmarks for the Iraqi government, but optional meaningless symbolism about benchmarks for the Iraqi government.

The Democratic leadership has, in sum, claimed a compromise with the Administration, in which the only things truly compromised, are the trust of the voters, the ethics of the Democrats, and the lives of our brave, and doomed, friends, and family, in Iraq.

You, the men and women elected with the simplest of directions—Stop The War—have traded your strength, your bargaining position, and the uniform support of those who elected you… for a handful of magic beans.

You may trot out every political cliché from the soft-soap, inside-the-beltway dictionary of boilerplate sound bites, about how this is the “beginning of the end” of Mr. Bush’s “carte blanche” in Iraq, about how this is a “first step.”
Well, Senator Reid, the only end at its beginning... is our collective hope that you and your colleagues would do what is right, what is essential, what you were each elected and re-elected to do.

Because this “first step”… is a step right off a cliff.

And this President!
How shameful it would be to watch an adult... hold his breath, and threaten to continue to do so, until he turned blue.

But how horrifying it is… to watch a President hold his breath and threaten to continue to do so, until innocent and patriotic Americans in harm’s way, are bled white.

You lead this country, sir?
You claim to defend it?

And yet when faced with the prospect of someone calling you on your stubbornness—your stubbornness which has cost 3,431 Americans their lives and thousands more their limbs—you, Mr. Bush, imply that if the Democrats don’t give you the money and give it to you entirely on your terms, the troops in Iraq will be stranded, or forced to serve longer, or have to throw bullets at the enemy with their bare hands.
How transcendentally, how historically, pathetic.

Any other president from any other moment in the panorama of our history would have, at the outset of this tawdry game of political chicken, declared that no matter what the other political side did, he would insure personally—first, last and always—that the troops would not suffer.

A President, Mr. Bush, uses the carte blanche he has already, not to manipulate an overlap of arriving and departing Brigades into a ‘second surge,’ but to say in unequivocal terms that if it takes every last dime of the monies already allocated, if it takes reneging on government contracts with Halliburton, he will make sure the troops are safe—even if the only safety to be found, is in getting them the hell out of there.

Well, any true President would have done that, Sir.

You instead, used our troops as political pawns, then blamed the Democrats when you did so.

Not that these Democrats, who had this country’s support and sympathy up until 48 hours ago, have not since earned all the blame they can carry home.

“We seem to be very near the bleak choice between war and shame,” Winston Churchill wrote to Lord Moyne in the days after the British signed the Munich accords with Germany in 1938. “My feeling is that we shall choose shame, and then have war thrown in, a little later…”

That’s what this is for the Democrats, isn’t it?

Their “Neville Chamberlain moment” before the Second World War.
All that’s missing is the landing at the airport, with the blinkered leader waving a piece of paper which he naively thought would guarantee “peace in our time,” but which his opponent would ignore with deceit.

The Democrats have merely streamlined the process.

Their piece of paper already says Mr. Bush can ignore it, with impugnity.

And where are the Democratic presidential hopefuls this evening?
See they not, that to which the Senate and House leadership has blinded itself?

Judging these candidates based on how they voted on the original Iraq authorization, or waiting for apologies for those votes, is ancient history now.

The Democratic nomination is likely to be decided... tomorrow.

The talk of practical politics, the buying into of the President’s dishonest construction “fund-the-troops-or-they-will-be-in-jeopardy,” the promise of tougher action in September, is falling not on deaf ears, but rather falling on Americans who already told you what to do, and now perceive your ears as closed to practical politics.

Those who seek the Democratic nomination need to—for their own political futures and, with a thousand times more solemnity and importance, for the individual futures of our troops—denounce this betrayal, vote against it, and, if need be, unseat Majority Leader Reid and Speaker Pelosi if they continue down this path of guilty, fatal acquiescence to the tragically misguided will of a monomaniacal president.

For, ultimately, at this hour, the entire government has failed us.

Mr. Reid, Mr. Hoyer, and the other Democrats... have failed us.
They negotiated away that which they did not own, but had only been entrusted by us to protect: our collective will as the citizens of this country, that this brazen War of Lies be ended as rapidly and safely as possible.

Mr. Bush and his government... have failed us.

They have behaved venomously and without dignity—of course.
That is all at which Mr. Bush is gifted.

We are the ones providing any element of surprise or shock here.
With the exception of Senator Dodd and Senator Edwards, the Democratic presidential candidates have (so far at least) failed us.

They must now speak, and make plain how they view what has been given away to Mr. Bush, and what is yet to be given away tomorrow, and in the thousand tomorrows to come.

Because for the next fourteen months, the Democratic nominating process—indeed the whole of our political discourse until further notice—has, with the stroke of a cursed pen, become about one thing, and one thing alone.

The electorate figured this out, six months ago.

The President and the Republicans have not—doubtless will not.

The Democrats will figure it out, during the Memorial Day recess, when they go home and many of those who elected them will politely suggest they stay there—and permanently.

Because, on the subject of Iraq...
The people have been ahead of the media....
Ahead of the government...
Ahead of the politicians...
For the last year, or two years, or maybe three.

Our politics... is now about the answer to one briefly-worded question.
Mr. Bush has failed.
Mr. Warner has failed.
Mr. Reid has failed.

So.
Who among us will stop this war—this War of Lies?
To he or she, fall the figurative keys to the nation.
To all the others—presidents and majority leaders and candidates and rank-and-file Congressmen and Senators of either party—there is only blame… for this shameful, and bi-partisan, betrayal.

© 2007 MSNBC Interactive

Is Bush Still a Real Man?


Four years later, I am still stunned by conservative talk show host Laura Ingraham's words.

Sunday May 4th, 2003 on CNN's Reliable Sources:

"Speaking as a woman, and listening to the women who called into my radio show, seeing President Bush get out of that plane, carrying his helmet, he is a real man. He stands by his word. That was a very powerful moment."


And while that is an infuriating remark, and I am very tempted to shoot back with something about how Bush doesn't have a dick worth anything, or how Ingraham should put her foot in her mouth, I can't. Because Ingraham was right about one thing - women would decide the 2004 election. Indeed. And they went for the jerk over the Bostonian with no swagger. And that, in retrospect, shouldn't have surprised anyone. It didn't surprise this Bostonian.

When I think of the term 'real man,' I think of iconic movie stars (yes, I know they are not real, but they simulate real men). I think of stars who were a 'man's man.' I think of American stars like Washington, Bogart, Clooney, Lancaster, DaFoe, Poitier, Peck, Braugher, and Penn. But they have nothing on an asshole from Texas with a rich daddy.

If only Howard Dean had won the 2004 nomination. If only the media didn't destroy his campaign. If only Dean had whipped Bush in those debates. He damn would have, if he was given that chance.

If only...

I cannot wait for Olbermann to speak tonight.

UPDATE: I had forgotten how the President was fetishized by his PR stunt. We need to remind people of the codpiece. His crotch seemed well stuffed.

I wonder how my fellow U Mass alum, Bill Pullman felt about his Independence Day character being the inspiration for Bush's carrier landing.

And why didn't he go all the way and ride an F-18? Too risky? How much more risky than a trainer? It would have been more bad-ass.

And irony is not dead. Because he didn't take-off or land the plane, but rather steered the plane during flight, Bush mimicked some of the actions of the 9/11 hijackers. Welcome to the club, Dubya.

Olbermann to Rudy: Drop Dead

Only he said it in about 1,300 words. And what wonderful words they were last night. This was Keith's first great special comment in 2007. It was worth waiting for:

Finally tonight, a Special Comment about Rudolf Giuliani's remarks at a Lincoln Day Dinner in New Hampshire last night.

Since some indeterminable hour between the final dousing of the pyre at The World Trade Center, and the breaking of what Senator Obama has aptly termed "9/11 Fever," it has been profoundly and disturbingly evident that we are at the center of one of history's great ironies.

Only in this America of the early 21st Century could it be true, that the man who was president during the worst attack on our nation, and the man who was the mayor of the city in which that attack principally unfolded, would not only be absolved of any and all blame for the unreadiness of their own governments, but, more over, would thereafter be branded heroes of those attacks.

And now, that Mayor - whose most profound municipal act in the wake of that nightmare was to suggest the postponement of the election to select his own successor - has gone even a step beyond these M.C. Escher constructions of history.

"If any Republican is elected president - and I think obviously I would be best at this - we will remain on offense and will anticipate what (the terrorists) will do and try to stop them before they do it. "

Insisting that the election of any Democrat would mean the country was "back… on defense," Mr. Giuliani continued:
"But the question is how long will it take and how many casualties will we have. If we are on defense, we will have more losses and it will go on longer."

He said this with no sense of irony, no sense of any personal shortcomings, no sense whatsoever.

And if you somehow missed what he was really saying, somehow didn't hear the none-too-subtle subtext of 'vote Democratic and die,' Mr. Giuliani then stripped away any barrier of courtesy, telling Roger Simon of Politico.Com, quote…

"America will be safer with a Republican president."

At least that Republican President under which we have not been safer… has, even at his worst, maintained some microscopic distance between himself, and a campaign platform that blithely threatened the American people with "casualties" if they, next year, elect a Democratic president - or, inferring from Mr. Giuliani's flights of grandeur in New Hampshire - even if they elect a different Republican.

How dare you, sir?

"How many casualties will we have?" - this is the language of Bin Laden.

Yours, Mr. Giuliani, is the same chilling nonchalance of the madman, of the proselytizer who has moved even from some crude framework of politics and society, into a virtual Roman Colosseum of carnage, and a conceit over your own ability — and worthiness — to decide, who lives and who dies.

Rather than a reasoned discussion — rather than a political campaign advocating your own causes and extolling your own qualifications — you have bypassed all the intermediate steps, and moved directly to trying to terrorize the electorate into viewing a vote for a Democrat, not as a reasonable alternative and an inalienable right… but as an act of suicide.

This is not the mere politicizing of Iraq, nor the vague mumbled epithets about Democratic 'softness' from a delusional Vice President.

This is casualties on a partisan basis — of the naked assertion that Mr. Giuliani's party knows all and will save those who have voted for it — and to hell with everybody else.

And that he, with no foreign policy experience whatsoever, is somehow the Messiah-of-the-moment.

Even to grant that that formula - whether posed by Republican or Democrat - is somehow not the most base, the most indefensible, the most Un-American electioneering in our history - even if it is somehow acceptable to assign "casualties" to one party and 'safety' to the other - even if we have become so profane in our thinking that it is part of our political vocabulary to view counter-terror as one party's property and the other's liability… on what imaginary track record does Mr. Giuliani base his boast?

Which party held the presidency on September 11th, 2001, Mr. Giuliani?

Which party held the mayoralty of New York on that date, Mr. Giuliani?

Which party assured New Yorkers that the air was safe, and the remains of the dead, recovered - and not being used to fill pot-holes, Mr. Giuliani?

Which party wanted what the terrorists wanted - the postponement elections - and to whose personal advantage would that have redounded, Mr. Giuliani?

Which mayor of New York was elected eight months after the first attack on the World Trade Center, yet did not emphasize counter-terror in the same city for the next eight years, Mr. Giuliani?

Which party had proposed to turn over the Department of Homeland Security to Bernard Kerik, Mr. Giuliani?

Who wanted to ignore and hide Kerik's Organized Crime allegations, Mr. Giuliani?

Who personally argued to the White House that Kerik need not be vetted, Mr. Giuliani?

Which party rode roughshod over Americans' rights while braying that it was actually protecting them, Mr. Giuliani?

Which party took this country into the most utterly backwards, utterly counter-productive, utterly ruinous war in our history, Mr. Giuliani?

Which party has been in office as more Americans were killed in the pointless fields of Iraq, than were killed in the consuming nightmare of 9/11, Mr. Giuliani?

Drop this argument, sir. You will lose it.

"The Democrats do not understand the full nature and scope of the terrorist war against us," Mr. Giuliani continued to the Rockingham County Lincoln Day Dinner last night. "Never, ever again will this country be on defense waiting for (terrorists) to attack us, if I have anything to say about it. And make no mistake, the Democrats want to put us back on defense."

There is no room for this.

This is terrorism itself, dressed up as counter-terrorism.

It is not warning, but bullying - substituted for the political discourse now absolutely essential to this country's survival and the freedom of its people.

No Democrat has said words like these. None has ever campaigned on the Republicans' flat-footedness of September 11th, 2001. None has the requisite, irresponsible, all-consuming, ambition. None is willing to say "I Accuse," rather than recognize that, to some degree, all of us share responsibility for our collective stupor.

And if it is somehow insufficient, that this is morally, spiritually, and politically wrong, to screech as Mr. Giuliani has screeched… there is also this: that gaping hole in Mr. Giuliani's argument of 'Republicans equal life; Democrats equal death.'

Not only have the Republicans not lived up to their babbling on this subject, but last fall the electorate called them on it.

As doubtless they would call you on it, Mr. Giuliani.

Repeat, go beyond Mr. Bush's rhetorical calamities of 2006.

Call attention to the casualties on your watch, and your long, waking slumber in the years between the two attacks on the World Trade Center.

Become the candidate who runs on the Vote-For-Me-Or-Die platform.

Do a Joe McCarthy, a Lyndon Johnson, a Robespierre.

Only, if you choose so to do, do not come back surprised nor remorseful if the voters remind you that "terror" is not just a matter of "casualties." It is, just as surely, a matter of the promulgation of fear.

Claim a difference between the parties on the voters' chances of survival — and you do Osama Bin Laden's work for him.

And we — Democrats and Republicans alike, and every variation in between — We — Americans — are sick to death, of you and the other terror-mongers, trying to frighten us into submission, into the surrender of our rights and our reason, into this betrayal of that for which this country has always stood.

Franklin Roosevelt's words ring true again tonight.

And, clarified and amplified, they are just as current now, as they were when first he spoke them, 74 years ago.

"We have nothing to fear but fear itself" — and those who would exploit our fear, for power, and for their own personal, selfish, cynical, gain.

Good night, and good luck.

Bill-O's Head Almost Blew Off This Time

Linked from Oliver Willis:

As Oliver Willis explains on his blog, "A young girl was tragically killed by a drunk driver. But this was not enough for O'Reilly. Instead, because the criminal was an illegal alien he added this incident to his ongoing crusade against the brown people. Luckily Geraldo was on the show and he - to his credit - called out O'Reilly's xenophobia for exactly what it was. This drove Bill O'Reilly insane. I was almost certain he was going to reach across the table and hit Geraldo."

This was, as Keith Olbermann calls it, a Bill-O 'event.' The last time there was an event with Geraldo in the room (worthy of mention) was last August. Here's Geraldo playing the role of subservient sidekick, while Bill-O attacks Keith's network without mentioning Keith's network: