MSNBC: The Bickersons?

Olbermann on Scarborough’s BS: “Jesus, Joe. Why don’t you get a shovel?”

By: SilentPatriot on Tuesday, August 26th, 2008 at 2:30 PM - PDT

An open mic caught Keith Olbermann last night telling Joe Scarborough to get a shovel and dig himself out of the horse crap he was dropping all over the airwaves about how confident the McCain campaign must feel right now. And thus a classic moment in live political news coverage was born.

Download | Play Download | Play (h/t Heather)

(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. I.U. has no affiliation whatsoever with the originator of this article nor is I.U endorsed or sponsored by the originator.)


The Nazis, Fascists and Communists were political parties before they became enemies of liberty and mass murderers.

Olbermann Slams McCain

Get a load of Olbermann's rant at McCain and his campaign.

Gotta say, we agree.

Just hang onto your hats folks! Much is about to hit the fan with McCain and his mythic story of his military service. He might should have defended John Kerry a little more than he did, when he knew damn well that Kerry was being "swiftboated."

Now the truth of McCain's lies are about to emerge. More than just we hapless independents are beginning to ask some very serious questions. We would not have had to ask those questions had McCain not run for president using this service and stories of his time in the Hanoi Hilton as a platform.


Countdown with Keith Olbermann


(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. I.U. has no affiliation whatsoever with the originator of this article nor is I.U endorsed or sponsored by the originator.)


The Nazis, Fascists and Communists were political parties before they became enemies of liberty and mass murderers.

Bush Committed Treason

Well, Geebus, how many times does this make, now? But I suppose there are different kinds of treason. Admittedly the one told of here is right up there with some of the others articles of impeachment, which have already been drawn up, by citizens.

Mr.Bush! Contrary to popular belief, Israel in not the 51st state. They don't pay taxes. Until they do, they are not a part of the U.S. and no, I would not be willing for my son or daughter to die in the defense of Israel. Let me know when someone attacks Canada or Mexico.

How dare you, idiot Boy, to say that Democrats would be a foreign policy disaster, when your selection as president has led to the current debacle!

As Keith Olbermann put it so well, "Just Shut The Hell Up!"

Thursday, May 15, 2008

President Bush committed political treason today

I've seen a lot of sad things in American politics in my lifetime -- the resignation of a president who became a national disgrace after he oversaw a campaign of break-ins and cover-ups, another who circumvented the Constitution to trade arms for hostages, and yet is now hailed as national hero. And those paled to what we have seen in the last seven years -- flagrant disregard for the Constitution, the launching of a "pre-emptive" war on false pretenses, and discussions about torture and other shocking abuses inside the White House inner sanctum.

But now it's come to this: A new low that I never imagined was even possible.

President Bush went on foreign soil today, and committed what I consider an act of political treason: Comparing the candidate of the U.S. opposition party to appeasers of Nazi Germany -- in the very nation that was carved out from the horrific calamity of the Holocaust. Bush's bizarre and beyond-appropriate detour into American presidential politics took place in the middle of what should have been an occasion for joy: A speech to Israeli's Knesset to honor that nation's 60th birthday.

But here's what he said:

JERUSALEM (CNN) – In a particularly sharp blast from halfway around the world, President Bush suggested Thursday that Sen. Barack Obama and other Democrats are in favor of "appeasement" of terrorists in the same way U.S. leaders appeased Nazis in the run-up to World War II.

"Some seem to believe we should negotiate with terrorists and radicals, as if some ingenious argument will persuade them they have been wrong all along," said Bush, in what White House aides privately acknowledged was a reference to calls by Obama and other Democrats for the U.S. president to sit down for talks with leaders like Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

"We have heard this foolish delusion before," Bush said in remarks to the Israeli Knesset. "As Nazi tanks crossed into Poland in 1939, an American Senator declared: 'Lord, if only I could have talked to Hitler, all of this might have been avoided.' We have an obligation to call this what it is — the false comfort of appeasement, which has been repeatedly discredited by history."

As a believer in free speech, I think Bush has a right to say what he wants, but as a President of the United States who swore to uphold the Constitution, his freedom also carries an awesome and solemn responsibility, and what this president said today is a serious breach of that high moral standard.

Of course, there are differences of opinion on how America should handle Iran, and that's why we're having an election here at home, to sort these issues out -- hopefully with respect and not with emotional and inaccurate appeals. Not only is the president's comment a gross misrepresentation of Barack Obama's stance on the issue, but ironically, it comes just a day after his own Secretary of State, Robert Gates, said of Iran: "We need to figure out a way to develop some leverage . . . and then sit down and talk with them." Is Gates a Nazi appeaser-type, too? And Bush has been hardly consistent on this point, either. Look at his own dealings with oil-rich Libyan dictator Moammar Gadhafi, linked to deadly terror attacks like Pan Am Flight 103.

But what Bush did in Israel this morning goes well beyond the accepted confines of American political debate, When the president speaks to a foreign parliament on behalf of our country, his message needs to be clear and unambiguous. Our democracy may look messy to outsiders, and we may have our disagreements with some sharp elbows thrown around, but at the end of the day we are not Republicans or Democrats or liberals or conservatives.

We are Americans.

And you, Mr. Bush, are the leader of us all. To use a diplomatic setting on foreign soil to score a cheap political point at home is way beneath your office, way beneath your country, and way beneath the people you serve. You have been handed an office once uplifted to great heights by fellow countrymen from Washington to Lincoln to Roosevelt to Eisenhower, and have plunged it so deeply into the Karl-Rove-and-Rush-Limbaugh-fueled world of political destruction and survival of all costs that have lost all perspective -- and all sense of decency. To travel to Israel and to associate a sitting American senator and your possible successor in the Oval Office with those who at one time gave comfort to an enemy of the United States is, in and of itself, an act of political treason.

In another irony, this comes from an administration that has already committed such grave abuses that its former officials are becoming fearful of traveling overseas, lest they be arrested for war crimes. Despite the alleged crimes and misdemeanors of the Bush administration, the Democrats who control the House have until now been restrained in their use of the impeachment process, hoping that the final eight months of our American nightmare can pass by quickly. Indeed, one has to wonder how much of Bush's outrageous statement this morning arose from fear -- fear that a President Obama will go after his wrongdoing in 2009.

Today, it's a whole new ballgame. I believe this treacherous statement by a U.S. president in Israel is a signal to the Democrats in the House in Washington, that it's time to play its Constitutional role in ending this trauma, before even greater acts against the interest of America are wrongly committed in our name.

(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. I.U. has no affiliation whatsoever with the originator of this article nor is I.U endorsed or sponsored by the originator.)


The Nazis, Fascists and Communists were political parties before they became enemies of liberty and mass murderers.

We are become Torture and Death......

In the 1990s, Jonathan Turley, a George Washington University law professor and constitutional expert, was a strong advocate for impeaching Pres. Bill Clinton because Clinton lied about his relationship with Monica Lewinsky while under oath in a deposition for a civil lawsuit.

UPDATE:

• ACLU Calls for Independent Prosecutor in Bush Torture Case

The issue today is far more serious. According to ABC News, starting in 2002, senior Bush officials, including Vice President Cheney and Sec. of State Condoleezza Rice, who was then the national security adviser, were involved, hands-on, in drafting torture guidelines for the CIA. Because torture is illegal under U.S. and international law, Jonathan Turley says he believes the drafting of these guidelines was a war crime.

Late Friday afternoon, George Bush confirmed to ABC News that Cheney, Rice and the other officials — including then Sec. of State Colin Powell, then Attorney Gen. John Ashcroft, then Sec. of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, then CIA Director George Tenet and their aides — were working at his behest.

(Clearly, Bush doesn't give a damn. He knows damn well nothing will happen to him, at least not in the U.S., legally.)

This new development — the president’s admission that he commissioned alleged war crimes — is being ignored in the media today (Saturday). It will be interesting to see if it makes it onto the Sunday political shows, including even ABC’s “This Week with George Stephanopolous.”

The transcript for Turley’s “Countdown” interview follows:

OLBERMANN: What if the step-by-step and case-by-case details of the torture of detainees had been discussed at the highest levels of government, inside the White House? It might prove to be the core to unraveling an entire administration‘s policy on torture. It might even one day find its way into a trial of war criminals. In our third story on the COUNTDOWN, such meetings were regular occurrences in the Bush White House.

The group called itself the National Security Principals Committee. It held dozens of top-secret decisions in the White House. This according to an ABC News investigation, sourced with unnamed, high-ranking officials. The Principals included Vice President Dick Cheney, then National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, then Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, then Secretary of State Colin Powell, also the CIA Director at the time, George Tenet, and then Attorney General John Ashcroft, who according to a top official said, quote, why are we talking about this in the White House? History will not judge this kindly.

The Principals signed off on exactly how the CIA would interrogate supposed top al Qaeda suspects and approved of combined techniques, including, but not limited to, water boarding. A choreography, if you will. Such meetings began in the spring of 2002, according to the ABC report, after the CIA had captured a top al Qaeda operative, Abu Zubaydah, who the CIA has since confirmed was one of the three al Qaeda suspects who were, indeed, water boarded.

All the Principals present approved at each discussion, reportedly, yet the CIA wanted the principals to sign off on each case, each time. When then director George Tenet sometimes made elaborate presentations, and that was even after a so-called golden shield was issued—that was in an August 2002 memo from the Justice Department giving formal legal authority to government interrogators to use enhanced interrogation techniques.

Let‘s turn now to George Washington University law professor Jonathan Turley. Jon, good evening.

JONATHAN TURLEY, GEORGE WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY: Hi, Keith.

OLBERMANN: If this is accurate or nearly accurate, what is the fullest interruption, as you see it, of what went on in those meetings?

TURLEY: This is one meeting of principal. They‘re not talking about the LE kind. What you have are a bunch of people talking about what is something that‘s a crime. For those of us who look at the criminal code and see torture for what it is, this is like a meeting of the Bada Bing club. These people are sitting around regularly talking about something defined as a crime.

Then you have John Ashcroft standing up and saying, maybe we shouldn‘t be talking about this at the White House. Well, obviously, that‘s quite disturbing. It shows that this was a program, not just some incident, not just someone going too far. It was a torture program, implemented by the United States of America and approved as the very highest level. And it goes right to the president‘s desk.

And it‘s notable that this group wanted to get lawyers to sign off on this, and they found those lawyers, people like Jay Buyby (ph), and John Yoo. And those people were handsomely rewarded. In Buyby‘s case, he became a federal judge after signing off on a rather grotesque memo that said that they could do everything short of causing organ failure or death.

OLBERMANN: The point that you made up—mentioned there that Attorney General Ashcroft said, why do this in the White House, why do it at such a high level; between the location and the resumes, you said it goes to President Bush‘s desk here. Is it the smoking gun that President Bush authorized torture by the United States of America?

TURLEY: We really don‘t have much of a question about the president‘s role here. He‘s never denied that he was fully informed of these measures. He, in fact, early on in his presidency—he seemed to brag that they were using harsh and tough methods. And I don‘t think there‘s any doubt that he was aware of this. The doubt is simply whether anybody cares enough to do anything about it.

OLBERMANN: The meetings, obviously, were not conducted to serve the purposes of historians or those of us who analyze this situation. It looks like it was 100 percent CYA. The question I have here, am I reading this right; did the lower-level interrogators, did the lower-level people in that food chain of principals, people like the director of the CIA, come out ranked a lot lower than, say, the vice president of United States in any kind of ceding of cabinet positions—were they there to protect themselves at the cost of the most powerful people in the nation? In other words, did they play these people? Did they—who was being protected here?

TURLEY: Well, you know, as a criminal defense attorney, we call meetings like this meetings of the designated defendant, because they are people who are signing off and will have to bear witness and bear responsibility. And here you have the CIA, which is basically saying, we‘re not going to have a repeat of the 1970s, where you guys have us go exploding cigars and trying to take out leaders and then you say you didn‘t know about it.

So the CIA has learned a lot. So these meetings certainly cover them in that respect. And they establish a rather clear record, that this was a program that was done with intention, knowingly done, and repeatedly a subject for meetings at the White House itself.

OLBERMANN: If there‘s a paper trail regarding this, John, is this—is this a war crimes trial waiting to happen somewhere some day?

TURLEY: It‘s always been a war crimes trial ready to happen. But Congress is like a convention of Claude Raines actors. Everyone‘s saying, we‘re shocked, shocked; there‘s torture being discussed in the White House. But no one is doing anything about it. So what we have is the need for someone to get off the theater and move to the actual in going and trying to investigate these crimes.

OLBERMANN: And all the attorneys talk about movie characters; they‘re all Burt Lancaster, the Ernst Janning character in “Judgment at Nuremberg,” all the people who authorized this. Jonathan Turley of George Washington University I‘ll save you a seat down front if we ever have this trial.

TURLEY: Thank you, Keith.

(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. I.U. has no affiliation whatsoever with the originator of this article nor is I.U endorsed or sponsored by the originator.)


The Nazis, Fascists and Communists were political parties before they became enemies of liberty and mass murderers.

Keith's Scating Comment on Clinton Campaign

Last Night, Keith crystallized our frustration with the low-road tactics and the increasingly desperate aura of this campaign, and what it's doing to the discourse and the Democratic party.

Transcript follows:

Finally, as promised, a Special Comment on the presidential campaign of the Junior Senator from New York.
By way of necessary preface, President and Senator Clinton -- and the Senator's mother, and the Senator's brother -- were of immeasurable support to me at the moments when these very commentaries were the focus of the most surprise, the most uncertainty, and the most anger. My gratitude to them is abiding.
Also, I am not here endorsing Senator Obama's nomination, nor suggesting it is inevitable.
Thus I have fought with myself over whether or not to say anything.
Senator, as it has reached its apex in their tone-deaf, arrogant, and insensitive reaction to the remarks of Geraldine Ferraro... your own advisors are slowly killing your chances to become President.
Senator, their words, and your own, are now slowly killing the chances for any Democrat to become President.
In your tepid response to this Ferraro disaster, you may sincerely think you are disenthralling an enchanted media, and righting an unfair advance bestowed on Senator Obama.
You may think the matter has closed with Representative Ferraro's bitter, almost threatening resignation.
But in fact, Senator, you are now campaigning, as if Barack Obama were the Democrat, and you… were the Republican.
As Shakespeare wrote, Senator -- that way… madness… lies.
You have missed a critical opportunity to do... what was right.
No matter what Ms. Ferraro now claims, no one took her comments out of context.
She had made them on at least three separate occasions, then twice more on television this morning.
Just hours ago, on NBC Nightly News, she denied she had made the remarks in an interview -- only at a paid political speech.
In fact, the first time she spoke them, was ten days before the California newspaper published them... not in a speech, but in a radio interview.
On February 26th, quoting...
"If Barack Obama were a white man, would we be talking about this, as a potential real problem for Hillary? If he were a woman of any color, would he be in this position that he's in? Absolutely not."
The context was inescapable.
Two minutes earlier, a member of Senator Clinton's Finance Committee, one of her "Hill-Raisers," had bemoaned the change in allegiance by Super-Delegate John Lewis from Clinton to Obama, and the endorsement of Obama by Senator Dodd.
"I look at these guys doing it," she had said, "and I have to tell you, it's the guys sticking together."
A minute after the "color" remarks, she was describing herself as having been chosen for the 1984 Democratic ticket, purely as a woman politician, purely to make history.
She was, in turn, making a blind accusation of sexism -- and dismissing Senator Obama's candidacy as nothing more than an Equal Opportunity stunt.
The next day she repeated her comments to a reporter from the newspaper in Torrance, California.
"If Obama was a white man, he would not be in this position. And if he was a woman (of any color) he would not be in this position. He happens to be very lucky to be who he is. And the country is caught up in the concept."
And when this despicable statement -- ugly in its overtones, laughable in its weak grip of facts, and moronic in the historical context -- when it floats outward from the Clinton Campaign like a poison cloud, what do the advisors have their candidate do?
Do they have Senator Clinton herself compare the remark to Al Campanis talking on Nightline... on Jackie Robinson day... about how blacks lacked the necessities to become baseball executives, while she points out that Barock Obama has not gotten his 1600 delegates as part of some kind of Affirmative Action plan?
Do they have Senator Clinton note that her own brief period in elected office, is as irrelevant to the issue of judgment as is Senator Obama's…
…while she points out that FDR had served only six years as a governor and state Senator before he became President?
Or that Teddy Roosevelt had four-and-a-half years before the White House?
Or that Woodrow Wilson had two years and six weeks?
Or Richard Nixon… fourteen... and Calvin Coolidge 25?
Do these advisors have Senator Clinton invoke Samantha Power -- gone by sunrise after she used the word "monster" -- and have Senator Clinton say, "this is how I police my campaign and this is what I stand for," while she fires former Congresswoman Ferraro from any role the campaign?
No.
Somebody tells her that simply disagreeing with and rejecting the remarks is sufficient.
And she should then call, "regrettable", words that should make any Democrat retch.
And that she should then try to twist them, first into some pox-on-both-your-houses plea to 'stick to the issues,' and then to let her campaign manager try to bend them beyond all recognition, into Senator Obama's fault.
And thus these advisers give Congresswoman Ferraro nearly a week in which to send Senator Clinton's campaign back into the vocabulary... of David Duke.
"Any time anybody does anything that in any way pulls this campaign down and says let's address reality and the problems we're facing in this world, you're accused of being racist, so you have to shut up.
"Racism works in two different directions. I really think they're attacking me because I'm white.
"How's that?"
How's that?
Apart from sounding exactly like Rush Limbaugh attacking the black football quarterback Donovan McNabb?
Apart from sounding exactly like what Ms. Ferraro said about another campaign, nearly twenty years ago?
Quote:
"President Reagan suggested Tuesday that people don't ask Jackson tough questions because of his race. And former representative Geraldine A. Ferraro (D-N.Y.) said Wednesday that because of his "radical" views, "if Jesse Jackson were not black, he wouldn't be in the race."
So... apart from sounding like insidious racism that is at least two decades old?
Apart from rendering ridiculous, Senator Clinton's shell-game about choosing Obama as Vice President?
Apart from this evening's resignation letter?
"I am stepping down from your finance committee so I can speak for myself and you can continue to speak for yourself about what is at stake in this campaign.
"The Obama campaign is attacking me to hurt you."
Apart from all that?
Well. It sounds as if those advisors want their campaign to be associated with those words, and the cheap… ignorant… vile… racism that underlies every syllable...
And that Geraldine Ferraro has just gone free-lance.
Senator Clinton:
This is not a campaign strategy.
This is a suicide pact.
This week alone, your so-called strategists have declared that Senator Obama has not yet crossed the "commander-in-chief threshold"…
But -- he might be your choice to be Vice President, even though a quarter of the previous sixteen Vice Presidents have become commander-in-chief during the greatest kind of crisis this nation can face: a mid-term succession.
But you'd only pick him if he crosses that threshold by the time of the convention.
But if he does cross that threshold by the time of the convention, he will only have done so sufficiently enough to become Vice President, not President.

Senator, if the serpentine logic of your so-called advisors were not bad enough...
Now, thanks to Geraldine Ferraro, and your campaign's initial refusal to break with her, and your new relationship with her -- now more disturbing still with her claim that she can now "speak for herself" about her vision of Senator Obama as some kind of embodiment of a quota...
If you were to seek Obama as a Vice President, it would be, to Ms. Ferraro, some kind of social engineering gesture, some kind of racial make-good.
Do you not see, Senator?
To Senator Clinton's supporters, to her admirers, to her friends for whom she is first choice, and her friends for whom she is second choice, she is still letting herself be perceived as standing next to, and standing by, racial divisiveness and blindness…
And worst yet, after what President Clinton said during the South Carolina primary, comparing the Obama and Jesse Jackson campaigns -- a disturbing, but only borderline remark...
After what some in the black community have perceived as a racial undertone to the "3 A-M" ad... a disturbing -- but only borderline interpretation...
And after that moment's hesitation in her own answer on 60 Minutes about Obama's religion -- a disturbing, but only borderline vagueness...
After those precedents, there are those who see a pattern... false, or true.
After those precedents, there are those who see an intent... false, or true.
After those precedents, there are those who see the Clinton campaign's anything-but-benign neglect of this Ferraro catastrophe -- falsely or truly -- as a desire to hear the kind of casual prejudice which still haunts this society voiced... and to not distance the campaign from it.
To not distance you from it, Senator!
To not distance you... from that which you as a woman, and Senator Obama as an African-American, should both know and feel with the deepest of personal pain!
Which you should both fight with all you have!
Which you should both insure, has no place in this contest!

This, Senator Clinton, is your campaign, and it is your name.
Grab the reins back from whoever has led you to this precipice, before it is too late.
Voluntarily or inadvertently, you are still awash in this filth.
Your only reaction has been to disagree, reject, and to call it regrettable.
Her only reaction has been to brand herself as the victim, resign from your committee, and insist she will continue to speak.
Unless you say something definitive, Senator, the former Congresswoman is speaking with your approval.
You must remedy this.
And you must... reject... and denounce... Geraldine Ferraro.
Good night, and good luck.

(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. I.U. has no affiliation whatsoever with the originator of this article nor is I.U endorsed or sponsored by the originator.)


The Nazis, Fascists and Communists were political parties before they became enemies of liberty and mass murderers.

Karl Rove's Racist Attack On Obama

01/11/2008 @ 7:50 am

Filed by David Edwards and Muriel Kane

Keith Olbermann began a segment on the presidential primary campaign with a disclaimer about the irrelevance of endorsements, saying the last time one may have made a decisive difference was when William Jennings Bryan backed Woodrow Wilson in 1912.

Adve

That said, he noted that Barack Obama has been picking up a large number of endorsements this week, the most high-profile coming from Sen. John Kerry, who proclaimed, "The old guard sometimes has a hard time acknowledging an individual who breaks the mold. ... Barack Obama isn't just going to break the mold. Together, we are going to shatter it into a million pieces and rebuild our nation."

"No official endorsements for Senator Clinton today," Olbermann stated, "but it sure appeared as if Karl Rove was back to backing the candidate he'd love to see beaten ... writing an op-ed in the now Murdoch-owned Murdoch Street Journal, in which he explains why Mrs. Clinton won in New Hampshire and otherwise eviscerates Senator Obama, saying of the Illinois Democrat's performance at the debate Saturday, 'His trash talking was an unattractive carryover from his days playing pickup basketball at Harvard, and capped a mediocre night.'"

Political analyst Richard Wolffe joined Olbermann to comment on the Kerry endorsement, which he called "very well timed ... because there is a question of foreign policy experience, of where the establishment of the party is likely to go."

He further explained that the endorsements by Kerry and by a congressman who is extremely close to Nancy Pelosi are not really intended for voters, but should be taken as "important signals to the party that not only can Obama be taken seriously, but they should consider where they put their endorsements."

Of the Rove editorial, Wolffe stated, "Talking to some of Obama's aides, I think they detected a pretty ugly undertone in Rove's op-ed there. The 'trash-talking.' The 'basketball.' The 'lazy' thing. Is he suggesting that there's some sort of color aspect to Barack Obama's behavior that he's getting at? It was uncomfortably close to the edge of being plain-out racist."

"That's Karl," said Olbermann.

The racist slant of Rove's op-ed has already been widely noted among bloggers, with one of the more vehement writing, "When you take into consideration the malevolent genius of Karl Rove - The god damned Johnny Appleseed of fear harvesting - and understand that the higher echelon of the Republican base is being spoon-fed a concoction that consists of a feminist-socialist lesbian wife of a shill president or a lazy, jive-talking, b-ball playing huckster boy politician from Chicago ... Rove's ability to triangulate issues and interweave them with subtle strereotypical imagery would be fun to read if it was fiction. Unfortunately in real life, the fat master has stirred and is testing the waters to see if his style of politics still plays."

(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. I.U. has no affiliation whatsoever with the originator of this article nor is I.U endorsed or sponsored by the originator.)


The Nazis, Fascists and Communists were political parties before they became enemies of liberty and mass murderers.

The Loon of Fox Noise: Is he really crazy?

Probably, but that's no excuse.

Keith Olbermann: Is Bill O'Reilly mentally ill?

09/28/2007 @ 8:22 am

Filed by Nick Langewis and Mike Aivaz

"These people aren't gonna get away with this. I'm gonna go right where they live. Every corrupt media person in this country is on notice right now. I'm coming after you. I'm gonna hunt you down. And I mean it. Smear stops here. You're all on notice out there. I'm comin' for ya."
--Bill O'Reilly, The Radio Factor with Bill O'Reilly

"Tonight," opens MSNBC's Keith Olbermann, "as in the past few days, Bill O'Reilly has devoted large sections of his shows to defending himself against critics who pointed out the racism in his surprise that people in a black-owned restaurant know how to order iced tea without cursing about somebody's mother."

Though "an argument can be made" for a parallel between racism and mental deficiency, says Olbermann, he seeks to take a serious look into the possibility of real psychological problems plaguing the host of Fox News' The O'Reilly Factor in light of recent remarks, construed racist, following a visit to a predominantly black restaurant.

O'Reilly, says Olbermann, is showing signs of paranoia stemming from a disconnect between the outside world "and his own head."

"Americans should be very skeptical of the news media. No longer can it be trusted." --Bill O'Reilly

"We haven't trusted you in ten years," quips Olbermann.

Marvin Kitman, author of The Man Who Would Not Shut Up: The Rise of Bill O'Reilly and self-proclaimed "leading O'Reillyologist," is quoted in his recent Huffington Post blog post:

"When I began studying him he was a semi-demented TV newsman, who rudely interrupted guests in debates, giving them the last word, which he also interrupted, but lately he seems to be losing it."

"He seems more unhinged than usual," says Kitman. "He has two people on debating an issue when we're lucky, but even when somebody is on his side, if they're slightly off--like, one degree--he comes down on them--and he's just about ready to implode, I can see, looking at him."

Kitman sees an air of paranoia around O'Reilly, and a fear that everybody's out to get him, "which I guess is partially true." In O'Reilly's recent "debut as a restaurant critic," he adds, O'Reilly demonstrated his trademark case of "Achilles mouth."

Olbermann wonders out loud if O'Reilly's missed the kind of backlash that disgraced MSNBC host Don Imus received for his "nappy-headed hoes" gaffe due to a lack of expectation, on the part of the public, of common decency due to diminished mental capacity.

"I think he's on the verge of having a breakdown," says Kitman. "I think he needs psychiatric help."

"Having a conversation with O'Reilly is like trying to take a drink of water from an open fire hydrant." --Marvin Kitman, September 25, 2007

(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. I.U. has no affiliation whatsoever with the originator of this article nor is I.U endorsed or sponsored by the originator.)


The Nazis, Fascists and Communists were political parties before they became enemies of liberty and mass murderers.

A Scary Time In Our History, Indeed......

Following up on Monday night’s Nexus of Terror & Politics report, Keith Olbermann talks with Rep. Jane Harman (D-CA) to get more details on the revelation that the Bush Administration used bogus intelligence in order to frighten lawmakers into voting for last August’s expanded FISA bill. Harman says that after much digging she found the classified intelligence document in question and the document clearly stated that the intelligence community did not deem the source to be reliable.

Download (3071) | Play (3026) Download (1346) | Play (1316)

Olbermann: “Nobody doubts the existence of terrorism or terrorists or the need to act on their existence, but at this point, is our freedom beginning to be or even now already at greater risk from terrorism, or from people who are exploiting the fact of terrorism to gain unprecedented and perhaps irreversible rights to spy and detain and rendition and everything else?”

Harman: “Well, I think this is a-a quite a scary period in our history and there are right answers. We can get surveillance right. I think most of us, maybe all of us in the House and in the Senate support surveilling people who are trying to harm us, but we can do that within the careful framework of FISA. FISA is not broken. What’s broken is the view of executive power that some hold in the administration. They claim it trumps all laws and our constitution.”

(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. I.U. has no affiliation whatsoever with the originator of this article nor is I.U endorsed or sponsored by the originator.)


The Nazis, Fascists and Communists were political parties before they became enemies of liberty and mass murderers.

Bush Administration: A Terrorist Organization?

Keith finally says what we have all known for years. Bogus Intel. is being used to frighten the Americans people an Congress whenever it looks like the little emperor won't get his way.

It all began with Anthrax, which as real, and the imploding towers, which were real.

Nothing has been real since. Nothing had to be.

Tuesday 25 September 2007

Keith Olbermann has been tracking the Bush Administration's use of trumped up terror alerts to manipulate the American people for the past two years, but in this latest Nexus of Politics & Terror report on Countdown, it appears the president stooped to a new low by using a bogus terror threat that specifically targeted Capitol Hill to manipulate members of Congress just hours before a crucial vote on the FISA bill last August.

According to Rep. Jane Harman (D-CA), Chairwoman of the House Homeland Security Subcommittee on Terrorism Risk Assessment, the Bush administration knowingly used bogus intelligence to make lawmakers believe there was the chance of an imminent attack on the U.S. Capitol, thus frightening them into passing the temporary expansion of his powers to spy on Americans under the FISA act. Keith talks with former Reagan administration official and chairman of the American Freedom Agenda Bruce Fein, who has called for the impeachment of both Dick Cheney and George Bush about Bush's unconstitutional power grabs and how the Democrats can exert their powers as a co-equal branch of government by refusing to fund any spending mandated in future FISA bills.

(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. I.U. has no affiliation whatsoever with the originator of this article nor is I.U endorsed or sponsored by the originator.)


The Nazis, Fascists and Communists were political parties before they became enemies of liberty and mass murderers.

It is up to the Congress and, ultimately, the People

Published on Wednesday, July 4, 2007 by MSNBC

I Accuse You, Mr. Bush…
by Keith Olbermann

“I didn’t vote for him,” an American once said, “But he’s my president, and I hope he does a good job.”That-on this eve of the 4th of July-is the essence of this democracy, in 17 words. And that is what President Bush threw away yesterday in commuting the sentence of Lewis “Scooter” Libby.

The man who said those 17 words-improbably enough-was the actor John Wayne. And Wayne, an ultra-conservative, said them, when he learned of the hair’s-breadth election of John F. Kennedy instead of his personal favorite, Richard Nixon in 1960.

“I didn’t vote for him but he’s my president, and I hope he does a good job.”

The sentiment was doubtlessly expressed earlier, but there is something especially appropriate about hearing it, now, in Wayne’s voice: The crisp matter-of-fact acknowledgement that we have survived, even though for nearly two centuries now, our Commander-in-Chief has also served, simultaneously, as the head of one political party and often the scourge of all others.

We as citizens must, at some point, ignore a president’s partisanship. Not that we may prosper as a nation, not that we may achieve, not that we may lead the world-but merely that we may function.

But just as essential to the seventeen words of John Wayne, is an implicit trust-a sacred trust: That the president for whom so many did not vote, can in turn suspend his political self long enough, and for matters imperative enough, to conduct himself solely for the benefit of the entire Republic.

Our generation’s willingness to state “we didn’t vote for him, but he’s our president, and we hope he does a good job,” was tested in the crucible of history, and earlier than most.
And in circumstances more tragic and threatening. And we did that with which history tasked us.

We enveloped our President in 2001.And those who did not believe he should have been elected-indeed those who did not believe he had been elected-willingly lowered their voices and assented to the sacred oath of non-partisanship.

And George W. Bush took our assent, and re-configured it, and honed it, and shaped it to a razor-sharp point and stabbed this nation in the back with it.

Were there any remaining lingering doubt otherwise, or any remaining lingering hope, it ended yesterday when Mr. Bush commuted the prison sentence of one of his own staffers.

Did so even before the appeals process was complete; did so without as much as a courtesy consultation with the Department of Justice; did so despite what James Madison-at the Constitutional Convention-said about impeaching any president who pardoned or sheltered those who had committed crimes “advised by” that president; did so without the slightest concern that even the most detached of citizens must look at the chain of events and wonder: To what degree was Mr. Libby told: break the law however you wish-the President will keep you out of prison?

In that moment, Mr. Bush, you broke that fundamental com-pact between yourself and the majority of this nation’s citizens-the ones who did not cast votes for you. In that moment, Mr. Bush, you ceased to be the President of the United States. In that moment, Mr. Bush, you became merely the President of a rabid and irresponsible corner of the Republican Party. And this is too important a time, Sir, to have a commander-in-chief who puts party over nation.

This has been, of course, the gathering legacy of this Administration. Few of its decisions have escaped the stain of politics. The extraordinary Karl Rove has spoken of “a permanent Republican majority,” as if such a thing-or a permanent Democratic majority-is not antithetical to that upon which rests: our country, our history, our revolution, our freedoms.

Yet our Democracy has survived shrewder men than Karl Rove. And it has survived the frequent stain of politics upon the fabric of government. But this administration, with ever-increasing insistence and almost theocratic zealotry, has turned that stain into a massive oil spill.

The protection of the environment is turned over to those of one political party, who will financially benefit from the rape of the environment. The protections of the Constitution are turned over to those of one political party, who believe those protections unnecessary and extravagant and quaint.

The enforcement of the laws is turned over to those of one political party, who will swear beforehand that they will not enforce those laws. The choice between war and peace is turned over to those of one political party, who stand to gain vast wealth by ensuring that there is never peace, but only war.

And now, when just one cooked book gets corrected by an honest auditor, when just one trampling of the inherent and inviolable fairness of government is rejected by an impartial judge, when just one wild-eyed partisan is stopped by the figure of blind justice, this President decides that he, and not the law, must prevail.

I accuse you, Mr. Bush, of lying this country into war.

I accuse you of fabricating in the minds of your own people, a false implied link between Saddam Hussein and 9/11.

I accuse you of firing the generals who told you that the plans for Iraq were disastrously insufficient.

I accuse you of causing in Iraq the needless deaths of 3,586 of our brothers and sons, and sisters and daughters, and friends and neighbors.

I accuse you of subverting the Constitution, not in some misguided but sincerely-motivated struggle to combat terrorists, but to stifle dissent.

I accuse you of fomenting fear among your own people, of creating the very terror you claim to have fought.

I accuse you of exploiting that unreasoning fear, the natural fear of your own people who just want to live their lives in peace, as a political tool to slander your critics and libel your opponents.

I accuse you of handing part of this Republic over to a Vice President who is without conscience, and letting him run roughshod over it.

And I accuse you now, Mr. Bush, of giving, through that Vice President, carte blanche to Mr. Libby, to help defame Ambassador Joseph Wilson by any means necessary, to lie to Grand Juries and Special Counsel and before a court, in order to protect the mechanisms and particulars of that defamation, with your guarantee that Libby would never see prison, and, in so doing, as Ambassador Wilson himself phrased it here last night, of becoming an accessory to the obstruction of justice.

When President Nixon ordered the firing of the Watergate special prosecutor Archibald Cox during the infamous “Saturday Night Massacre” on October 20th, 1973, Cox initially responded tersely, and ominously.

“Whether ours shall be a government of laws and not of men, is now for Congress, and ultimately, the American people.”

President Nixon did not understand how he had crystallized the issue of Watergate for the American people.

It had been about the obscure meaning behind an attempt to break in to a rival party’s headquarters; and the labyrinthine effort to cover-up that break-in and the related crimes.

And in one night, Nixon transformed it.

Watergate-instantaneously-became a simpler issue: a President overruling the inexorable march of the law of insisting-in a way that resonated viscerally with millions who had not previously understood - that he was the law.

Not the Constitution. Not the Congress. Not the Courts. Just him.

Just - Mr. Bush - as you did, yesterday.

The twists and turns of Plame-Gate, of your precise and intricate lies that sent us into this bottomless pit of Iraq; your lies upon the lies to discredit Joe Wilson; your lies upon the lies upon the lies to throw the sand at the “referee” of Prosecutor Fitzgerald’s analogy. These are complex and often painful to follow, and too much, perhaps, for the average citizen.
But when other citizens render a verdict against your man, Mr. Bush-and then you spit in the faces of those jurors and that judge and the judges who were yet to hear the appeal-the average citizen understands that, Sir.

It’s the fixed ballgame and the rigged casino and the pre-arranged lottery all rolled into one-and it stinks. And they know it.

Nixon’s mistake, the last and most fatal of them, the firing of Archibald Cox, was enough to cost him the presidency. And in the end, even Richard Nixon could say he could not put this nation through an impeachment.

It was far too late for it to matter then, but as the decades unfold, that single final gesture of non-partisanship, of acknowledged responsibility not to self, not to party, not to “base,” but to country, echoes loudly into history. Even Richard Nixon knew it was time to resign

Would that you could say that, Mr. Bush. And that you could say it for Mr. Cheney. You both crossed the Rubicon yesterday. Which one of you chose the route, no longer matters. Which is the ventriloquist, and which the dummy, is irrelevant.

But that you have twisted the machinery of government into nothing more than a tawdry machine of politics, is the only fact that remains relevant.

It is nearly July 4th, Mr. Bush, the commemoration of the moment we Americans decided that rather than live under a King who made up the laws, or erased them, or ignored them-or commuted the sentences of those rightly convicted under them-we would force our independence, and regain our sacred freedoms.

We of this time-and our leaders in Congress, of both parties-must now live up to those standards which echo through our history: Pressure, negotiate, impeach-get you, Mr. Bush, and Mr. Cheney, two men who are now perilous to our Democracy, away from its helm.

For you, Mr. Bush, and for Mr. Cheney, there is a lesser task. You need merely achieve a very low threshold indeed. Display just that iota of patriotism which Richard Nixon showed, on August 9th, 1974.

Resign.

And give us someone-anyone-about whom all of us might yet be able to quote John Wayne, and say, “I didn’t vote for him, but he’s my president, and I hope he does a good job.”

© 2007 MSNBC Interactive

(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. I.U. has no affiliation whatsoever with the originator of this article nor is I.U endorsed or sponsored by the originator.)

The Nazis, Fascists and Communists were political parties before they became enemies of liberty and mass murderers.

Olbermann Destroys Giuliani

This is hot stuff. One can practically see the smoke coming out of Keith's ears.

Not only is he laying Rudy out in Lavander, he is calling down the wrath of the body politic on his ass.

I'm gonna go out on a limb here and predict that by the time the real election year rolls around, not only are we all going to be sick and tired of every candidate, from both parties, but 9/11 will not be the ace in the hole that it once was for the Republicans. As a matter of fact, they will all be trying to run from it.

The truth about 9/11 is slowly but surely arising in the consciousness of more and more Americans.

If the whole truth ever comes out, there will be no Republican Party left

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 Sept. 11, 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 potholes, Mr. Giuliani?

Which party wanted what the terrorists wanted — the postponement of 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 counterproductive, 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.


(In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. I.U. has no affiliation whatsoever with the originator of this article nor is I.U endorsed or sponsored by the originator.)


The Nazis, Fascists and Communists were political parties before they became enemies of liberty and mass murderers.