Greg Gutfeld Takes Leon Panetta’s Comments Out Of Context

Right-wing commentator Greg Gutfeld is coming to the rescue of former vice president Dick Cheney, but stumbled on his way to the battle.

Here is what Gutfeld wrote:

So in the latest New Yorker, CIA Director Leon Panetta says Dick Cheney’s biting criticism of Obama’s enlightened approach to terrorism suggests, “he’s wishing that this country would be attacked again, in order to make his point.”

Now Mr. Panetta is absolutely right about one thing: Cheney has been highly critical of the Obama Administration’s new tact toward terror. But that’s mainly because our new President has been so critical of the previous administration’s strategy, while now pretty much copying most of its key elements.

Here is what Panetta actually said (from Reuters):

“I think he smells some blood in the water on the national security issue,” Panetta said in an interview published in The New Yorker magazine’s June 22 issue.

“It’s almost, a little bit, gallows politics. When you read behind it, it’s almost as if he’s wishing that this country would be attacked again, in order to make his point.”

Gutfeld took Panetta’s comment out of context and tried to portray him in the worst possible light. The word “suggests” helps Gutfeld a little bit (a very little bit). However, he clearly took Panetta’s comments out of context. It looks like someone else can begin to understand what U.S. Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor is going through these days. Gutfeld could have made the same argument and placed Panetta’s comments in a more fair and accurate context.

Big Hollywood:
http://bighollywood.breitbart.com/ggutfeld/2009/06/15/daily-gut-panetta-vs-cheney/

David Letterman Apologizes … AGAIN!

David Letterman issued yet another apology in an effort to appease right wingers wh0 are attempting to score political points off of the comedian’s stupid and inappropriate joke about Bristol Palin, who is a young mother.

“All right, here – I’ve been thinking about this situation with Governor Palin and her family now for about a week – it was a week ago tonight, and maybe you know about it, maybe you don’t know about it. But there was a joke that I told, and I thought I was telling it about the older daughter being at Yankee Stadium. And it was kind of a coarse joke. There’s no getting around it, but I never thought it was anybody other than the older daughter, and before the show, I checked to make sure in fact that she is of legal age, 18. Yeah. But the joke really, in and of itself, can’t be defended. The next day, people are outraged. They’re angry at me because they said, ‘How could you make a lousy joke like that about the 14-year-old girl who was at the ball game?’ And I had, honestly, no idea that the 14-year-old girl, I had no idea that anybody was at the ball game except the Governor and I was told at the time she was there with Rudy Giuliani…And I really should have made the joke about Rudy…” (audience applauds) “But I didn’t, and now people are getting angry and they’re saying, ‘Well, how can you say something like that about a 14-year-old girl, and does that make you feel good to make those horrible jokes about a kid who’s completely innocent, minding her own business,’ and, turns out, she was at the ball game. I had no idea she was there. So she’s now at the ball game and people think that I made the joke about her. And, but still, I’m wondering, ‘Well, what can I do to help people understand that I would never make a joke like this?’ I’ve never made jokes like this as long as we’ve been on the air, 30 long years, and you can’t really be doing jokes like that. And I understand, of course, why people are upset. I would be upset myself.

“And then I was watching the Jim Lehrer ‘Newshour’ – this commentator, the columnist Mark Shields, was talking about how I had made this indefensible joke about the 14-year-old girl, and I thought, ‘Oh, boy, now I’m beginning to understand what the problem is here. It’s the perception rather than the intent.’ It doesn’t make any difference what my intent was, it’s the perception. And, as they say about jokes, if you have to explain the joke, it’s not a very good joke. And I’m certainly – ” (audience applause) “- thank you. Well, my responsibility – I take full blame for that. I told a bad joke. I told a joke that was beyond flawed, and my intent is completely meaningless compared to the perception. And since it was a joke I told, I feel that I need to do the right thing here and apologize for having told that joke. It’s not your fault that it was misunderstood, it’s my fault. That it was misunderstood.” (audience applauds) “Thank you. So I would like to apologize, especially to the two daughters involved, Bristol and Willow, and also to the Governor and her family and everybody else who was outraged by the joke. I’m sorry about it and I’ll try to do better in the future. Thank you very much.” (audience applause)

Personally, I think Letterman is on the verge of going above and beyond the call of duty with apologies.

Huffington Post:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/06/15/letterman-apologizes-to-p_n_215927.html

Bill O’Reilly Still Bashing Dr. George Tiller

It’s a new week, but Bill O’Reilly is picking up where he left off last week: bashing the assassinated Dr. George Tiller. Dr. Tiller, who provided abortions to women (a legal procedure) continues to be trashed in the media by O’Reilly who is exploiting his Fox News platform to continue his crusade against Dr. Tiller. I see now he has yet another segment on where he is continuing to bash Dr. Tiller.