Bitches 2 … Starring Fox News’ Griff Jenkins

Every time I think of these Fox News “producers” (stalkers) like Griff Jenkins and Jesse Watters, I think of the Ice-T rap, Bitches 2.

Jenkins and Watters have dubious histories in relation to stalking people who do not fit the conservative ideology of Fox News as an organization that served as the public relations arm of the GOP. When someone crosses Fox News, and in particular big shot Bill O’Reilly, clowns like Jenkins and tough-guy Watters are put on the case in an effort to intimidate and/or shame targets into submission (ideally).

Among the most pathetic examples was the pathetic Jesse Watters stalking 5-foot, 100-pound Amanda Terkel, a popular blogger for Think Progress. Like a predator, Watters followed Terkel around while she was on vacation and then sprung out of nowhere and tried to intimidate her in pure ambush fashion.

Check out Terkel’s account of the ambush as she is interviewed by Keith Olbermann of MSNBC:

Notice in the video how the “fair and balanced” O’Reilly labels Terkel as a “FAR-LEFT BLOGGER” in the screen graphic.

This all brings me back to the Ice-T song, Bitches 2:

I knew this guy
That was never that fly
Couldn’t act cool
Even when he tried
When we played rough
He always cried
When he told stories, he always lied
A Black brother
Who was missin’ the cool part
He had the color
But was missin’ the true heart
When we would fight
He would always go down quick
So he took karate
and he still got his ass kicked
But now he’s married
And he kicks his wife’s ass
Says it comes from problems
That he had in the past
Doesn’t like Blacks
Claims he’s upper class
Joined the police, got himself a badge
Now he rolls the streets
and he’s cut to jack
Doggin’ young brothers
Cause they usually don’t fight back
Got a White partner
And he asked for that
and every night
Another head they crack
So now he’s big man
But he really ain’t shit!

Yo, how did he go out?
He went out like a bitch!
So ladies
We ain’t just talkin’ bout you
Cause some of you niggas
Is bitches too!

It’s hard to think of Bill O’Reilly, Griff Jenkins and Jesse Watters and not think of Bitches 2 as their potential theme music.

News Hounds and Think Progress have documented a recent attempt to interview Jenkins who, as Ice-T would wrap, “went out like a bitch.”

Here is the transcript of the conversation Think Progress attempted to have with Jenkins, who all but went into the fetal position:

JENKINS: I’m just covering CPAC for Greta, but listen, call the media relations people, we can do something about my coverage here, other than that, ask the media relations people.

[crosstalk]

TP: Do you ever extend that courtesy to the people you interview?

JEKINS: I gotta go buddy. [...]

TP: I’m just asking, when you ambush people, do you ever do that? [...]

JENKINS: I appreciate what you’re trying to do, but I’m working here.

TP: Yeah, but sometimes when you ambush people, they’re working too.

Griff Jenkins = Whack.

More Proof That Glenn Beck And Bill O’Reilly Are Nuts

Just when you thought Glenn Beck (pictured) and Bill O’Reilly could not prove to be any nuttier, we have this (from Media Matters for America):

O’REILLY: Why do you think there’s a level of hatred against you and against me that there is? I mean, look, I was kidding about Bill Maher before. I don’t hate Bill Maher. I like –

BECK: I don’t either.

O’REILLY: I mean, he’s not my kind of guy, but I don’t want to hurt him. I don’t, you know — I’ll make fun of him. But these people want to hurt us. They want to hurt us. Why do you think that is?

BECK: I think because that’s the only way you can win the argument. Look, I mean –

O’REILLY: But they can’t win the argument.

BECK: No, I know that. So what do you do? It is — I mean, it’s why Woodrow Wilson put thousands of Americans behind bars. If you can’t win the argument, you have to shout them down, you have to call them racist, you have to call them names. You have to do whatever it is you have to do. If that doesn’t work, the revolutionary way is as Robert Creamer – as I pointed out on the show. Here’s a guy who went to prison for embezzlement — has designed the progressive blueprint that Obama is using. David Axelrod says that. In a newspaper article when I expose him, he says that we must do whatever we have to do, whatever it takes, to shut him down. Well, what do you think that means?

O’REILLY: Yeah. No, OK, I think that’s a good answer. There’s no other reason for it — other than jealousy.

This shows that Glenn Beck is nuts.

This is the same Glenn Beck who called President Obama and U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor “racist” in different rants (which is puzzling since Barack Obama is half white).

This from the same Bill O’Reilly who routinely goes on the air and calls many who disagrees with him “loons,” “pinheads,” “kooks,” etc.

This from the same Bill O’Reilly who has his tough-guy “producer” stalk women like the vacationing Amanda Terkel from Think Progress (and then later crying like  a sissy because people bother poor Sarah Palin when she is on vacation).

This from the same Bill O’Reilly who routinely uses his platform to attack NBC and anything affiliated with it (to satisfy his personal vendetta).

Lou Dobbs’ Negative History With Respect To Hispanics Comes Back To Haunt Him Again

Lou Dobbs made a dubious name for himself during his late days at CNN for endlessly whining about illegal immigration and for displaying hostility toward Hispanics. After Dobbs and CNN parted company, it was rumored that he was being considered for a job at CNBC. That possibility caused those who have been most negatively impacted by Dobbs’ bigotry to step forward and make sure their voices were heard by CNBC and will be heard by any other major media organization that considers hiring Dobbs to sit in an anchor chair and give him a platform to potentially spit out more divisive rhetoric.

This is from a Think Progress story:

This past Wednesday, CNBC dispelled rumors that were circulating throughout the week that former CNN anchor Lou Dobbs would be joining the business network. Meanwhile, Dobbs affirmatively told Fox Business News shock jock Don Imus that he didn’t even talk with CNBC and that he had “no idea where they even got that.” However, National Hispanic Media President Alex Nogales told ThinkProgress today that CNBC was in fact talking with Dobbs and that his hiring was, at least in part, thwarted by the same coalition of Latino, civil rights, and media-watchdog groups that successfully campaigned to get Dobbs off CNN airwaves.

Who knows whether these groups had an impact on Dobbs’ not being hired by CNBC. One thing is for certain, however, the demons of Lou Dobbs’ past (in spite of the fact he has weakly attempted to soften his image among with Latinos since his departure from CNN) will continue to haunt him in the future.

He may find a position (even Don Imus did), but he will be watched and he will be challenged by those he has attacked throughout his career.

Hypocrite Sarah Palin Is Back At It Again … Now Posing As A Birther

Former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin, the darling of the right-wing, is back at it again – this time giving comfort to the nutty birthers who continue to attack President Obama. Governor Palin, who cried about the media and people coming after her as she resigned from her position in governor’s office in Alaska, now is continuing to advance the pathetic mission of the birthers. During a segment on the show of a right-ring radio talker named Rusty Humphries, it was Palin who went out of her way to provide a soothing hand of comfort to the birther morons who just can’t seem to come to grips with the president of the United States of America being a black man. That’s right, I said it. I do believe that this birther movement largely is motivated by a strong prejudice.

As documented by Think Progress:

Yesterday while appearing on the right-wing radio show of Rusty Humphries, former Alaska governor Sarah Palin expressed her allegiance with the birther movement. She asserted that it was a “fair question” to ask whether President Obama was born in the U.S. “I think the public rightfully is still making it an issue,” she said. “I don’t have a problem with that.”

She doesn’t have a problem with it because she is a right-wing extremist, who has a bias against the president and you have to wonder if it is just a political and philosophical bias.

Think Progress then added her response:

After the media picked up her comments, Palin went on her Facebook page at 1:16 a.m. and criticized reporters for calling her a birther and pushing “stupid conspiracies”:

Voters have every right to ask candidates for information if they so choose. I’ve pointed out that it was seemingly fair game during the 2008 election for many on the left to badger my doctor and lawyer for proof that Trig is in fact my child. Conspiracy-minded reporters and voters had a right to ask… which they have repeatedly. But at no point – not during the campaign, and not during recent interviews – have I asked the president to produce his birth certificate or suggested that he was not born in the United States.

And, as Think Progress later pointed out, it was Palin who left the position of governor of Alaska crying about how the media and people were advancing all of these attacks on her. Then, she turns around and helps push an attack on President Obama that was long ago refuted. She cried about how the media, politicians and political operatives were attacking her and making it so difficult for her to conduct business (she was being dogged by allegations of ethics violations). Then she turns around and contributes to the same thing against President Obama.

Sarah Palin feels the “politics of personal destruction” are OK as long as they are directed at President Obama or some other Democrat and not directed at her.

Sarah Palin believes questions  from idiot birthers in regard to where President Obama was born are OK, but questions raised about potential ethics violations against her are part of the “politics of personal destruction.”

Sarah Palin is a hypocrite.

Think Progress:
http://thinkprogress.org/2009/12/04/palin-birthers-conspiracies/

Chris Matthews Apologizes For Irresponsible Comment About President Obama, West Point

MSNBC’s Chris Matthews, who hosts “Hardball” on the network, made what a large number of people considered to be a highly offensive and inexplicable statement about President Obama’s speech at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point. Matthews said that the president went into “the enemy camp” for his speech at West Point. Obviously, you don’t need advanced college degrees to know and see the offensive nature of such a statement. Matthews, rightly, came under fire for those comments.

Here is what Matthews originally said:

MATTHEWS: I didn’t see much excitement. But among the older people there, I saw, if not resentment, skepticism. I didn’t see a lot of warmth in that crowd out there that the President chose to address tonight and I thought that was interesting. He went to maybe the enemy camp tonight to make his case. I mean, that’s where Paul Wolfowitz used to write speeches for, back in the old Bush days. That’s where he went to rabble rouse the ‘we’re going to democratize the world’ campaign back in ‘02. So, I thought it was a strange venue.

That is reprehensible and just plain stupid. At the very least, it was a poor choice of words.

Wednesday night, Matthews was back on the air to issue what could arguably be considered an apology:

MATTHEWS: But first. I’ve gotten some very tough calls from parents of cadets and from former cadets at West Point and about my saying last night that the President going to speak up there to maybe the “enemy camp.” I was talking about the skepticism I saw on the faces in the crowd as President Obama spoke also of course about how West Point was where President Bush went in 2002 to make his most hawkish speech before the Iraq war.

Now I’ve heard too many politicians say things like, “oh that was taken out context” to explain something they wish they hadn’t said let me just say to the cadets, their parents, former cadets and everyone who cares about this country and those who defend it: I used the wrong words and worse than that I said something that is just not right and for that I deeply apologize.

As those who watch me regularly probably got right away, my point was that the military up at West Point was probably a skeptical audience for President Obama given his strong position against the war in Iraq and generally more dovish image. I was wrong to make that conclusion based on the lack of applause or apparent enthusiasm in the ranks of officers and cadets last night. Cadets, one former cadet and a friend of mine just told me, aren’t supposed to show that kind of reaction to a speaker.

He, a former cadet, reminded me that soldiers, including those now in training to face the enemy, want wars to be fought effectively and ended as quickly as possible. I had no reason to assume that the cadets at West Point or their officers who were present last night are more hawkish than the president. People who have watched me over the years know, I think, of my strong devotion to this country and strong gratitude toward those who serve in the military. It’s because our military is so good and true I want the civilians that make the policies and set the missions to get them right, in this country’s best possible interest. And by the way, it’s something we’re allowed to argue about in this country. Whenever I meet someone with a service record I always say, “thank you for your service.” They know I say it, and I hope they know I mean it.

It’s good that Chris Matthews apologized for his comments. He could have done what Bill O’Reilly would do and make excuses, blame the victims and bring on someone like Juan Williams to defend him against a charge. Fortunately, Matthews did not do that and issued a solid apology for his words.

Crybaby Chris Wallace Still Whining Because President Obama Won’t Kiss His Ass

Crybaby Chris Wallace, of the right-wing Fox News and host of the conservative-leaning Fox News Sunday, was back on the air whining like a kindergartener again because President Obama won’t come on his show. Wallace then goes into the usual temper-tantrum stuff of cheap-shotting the president and the White House like we used to do as kids when we were in elementary and middle school and didn’t get our way. This is what Wallace said as the tears started to flow when he found out he would not get a chance to interview the president, “biggest bunch of crybabies I have dealt with” as Obama made the media rounds for Sunday. Wallace then went on to refer to the Obama administration as being petty and childish. The hypocrisy there is nothing short of stunning considering Fox News enjoys popularity due largely to the right-wing people who flock there and get drunk on the old G.O.P.-flavored Kool-Aid.

Wallace, as he mentally talked himself down off the ledge from his on-air fit, finally cried, “What ever happened to reaching out to all Americans?” Maybe Wallace and his Fox cronies should have thought about that when Fox blew off events the president had that were picked up by the other networks and dismissed it to the right-wing Fox News channel (which has been bashing Obama with reckless abandon).

This is from Think Progress, and it is interesting:

But ironically, later during the panel discussion, Wallace cited a recent report showing that Obama has done more one-on-one interviews than both Presidents Clinton and Bush up this point and wondered if Obama is “overexposed” (despite wanting to interview him on his show). In another bit of irony, Wallace, who has been complaining for the past few days about the snub, accused the White House of being thin-skinned:

WALLACE: Every president is thin-skinned but I wonder whether this administration, this White House has a particular problem with criticism. … Not talking about just us but just the attitude of this White House. Whatever happened to reaching out to all Americans?

By the way, media people are way more thin-skinned than presidents (check out the vendettas Bill O’Reilly constantly wages against anyone in the media who has a beef with him or anyone he does not like).

This adminstration doesn’t have a problem with criticism (it seems Wallace is the one who is more thin-skinned and with a problem based on the amount of crying we’ve heard from him and his crew at Fox News). For example, MSNBC has people like Joe Scarborough and Pat Buchanan who regularly bash the president, but the network also has balance with commentators who give a different set of views with respect to the president. CNN has Lou Dobbs who regularly trashes the president, but is a reputable organization because it balances its news and offers balanced opinion (something Fox News rarely attempts to do).

Fox News is free to show clips from the interviews the president conducted with other media outlets.

Also, Think Progress added this:

During one of Wallace’s whining sessions this week, another Fox host complained that Obama is skipping out on “the highly rated Fox News Sunday.” But as Media Matters points out, Fox News Sunday is “in dead last, where it has remained pretty much since its inception.”

If Fox News was the only major news outlet that didn’t get the love then that seems to indicate something about Fox News than about President Obama.

The Nuts Were Out For 9/12 Tea Bagger Protestor Extravaganza

Reading Think Progress this afternoon, I could only shake my head as I began to digest some of the expected garbage from the pitiful tea bagger events on Sept. 12 to exploit the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11 as a way of trying to attack President Obama. This particular exchange I found to be quite interesting because I think it feeds into what a lot of these people quietly think of President Obama (individuals afflicted by the same disease that has turned Glenn Beck into the mess we see and hear from today).

Here is how Think Progress set up what you will see below:

The attendee, like Beck, thought Obama hates whites, but also believed he will oppress the white race with communism. We asked him about the sign he was holding up, which showed Obama riding a white baby…

Now the exchange:

ATTENDEE: Barack was the name of the horse that Mohammed rode to heaven, alright a white horse.

Q: What does the white baby represent?

ATTENDEE: White America, because I do believe our President is a racist [...] But I think it’s mainly communism that he’s going to want to tell us what to wear, what to do, have his little red book like Mao because he really is a communist.

These dummies are so driven by hate of a black president they forget that he is half white. Maybe they feel if he is part black he is all black and can’t be one of them.

Sadly, the disgraceful man you will see in this video hardly seems out of the mainstream of what was on display at these tea bagger events.

These people are tea bagging America.

Here is the Think Progress video:

Same Old Story: Fox News Provides Platform To Rush Limbaugh Who Makes Race-Based Attack On President Obama

Republican leader Rush Limbaugh was interviewed by Greta Van Susteren of Fox News (the network conservatives trust) and, of course, the subject of President Obama came up. Naturally, Limbaugh used this platform to launch another race-based attack on the president. A major part of the reason that Limbaugh attacks the president, using race, is because it pleases his party and strengthens his position in the Republican Party and on the far right of the political spectrum. Limbaugh can say what a lot of people want to say about our first black president, but don’t have the guts to say it. This is why they defend Rush and fear crossing him to the point we’ve seen apology after apology from those who offend Limbaugh.

LIMBAUGH: I think Obama is largely misunderstood by a lot of people. … We’re finding out that this guy’s got a chip on his shoulder. He’s angry at this country. He’s not proud of it. […]

Let’s face it, President Obama’s black, and I think he’s got a chip on his shoulder. I think there are elements in this country he doesn’t like and he never has liked. And he’s using the power of the presidency to remake the country.

Take note of all of the racist stereotypes of black people: angry, chip on his shoulders, angry at his country, not proud of it …

These are all historical racist stereotypes of black people.

Think Progress:
http://thinkprogress.org/2009/07/24/limbaughs-obama-is-black/

Huffington Post Question Story Being Blown Out Of Proportion

Many reporters on the left, and some reporters from the so-called mainstream media, are throwing a it about a question that the Huffington Post’s Nico Pitney was allowed to ask President Obama during a White House press conference. This is another one of those manufactured controversies from individuals on the right wing and from individuals from the mainstream media overcome by a powerful sense of jealousy.

Here is the exchange during the press conference:

OBAMA: Since we’re on Iran, I know Nico Pitney is here from the Huffington Post.

QUESTION: Thank you, Mr. President.

OBAMA: Nico, I know that you and all across the Internet, we’ve been seeing a lot of reports coming directly out of Iran. I know that there may actually be questions from people in Iran who are communicating through the Internet. Do you have a question?

QUESTION: Yes, I did, but I wanted to use this opportunity to ask you a question directly from an Iranian. We solicited questions on tonight from people who are still courageous enough to be communicating online. And one of them wanted to ask you this: Under which conditions would you accept the election of Ahmadinejad? And if you do accept it without any significant changes in the conditions there, isn’t that a betrayal of — of what the demonstrators there are working to achieve?

OBAMA: Well, look, we didn’t have international observers on the ground. We can’t say definitively what exactly happened at polling places throughout the country.

What we know is that a sizable percentage of the Iranian people themselves, spanning Iranian society, consider this election illegitimate. It’s not an isolated instance, a little grumbling here or there. There is significant questions about the legitimacy of the election.

And so, ultimately, the most important thing for the Iranian government to consider is legitimacy in the eyes of its own people, not in the eyes of the United States.

And that’s why I’ve been very clear, ultimately, this is up to the Iranian people to decide who their leadership is going to be and the structure of their government.

What we can do is to say, unequivocally, that there are sets of international norms and principles about violence, about dealing with the peaceful dissent, that — that spans cultures, spans borders.

And what we’ve been seeing over the Internet and what we’ve been seeing in news reports violates those norms and violates those principles.

I think it is not too late for the Iranian government to recognize that — that there is a peaceful path that will lead to stability and legitimacy and prosperity for the Iranian people. We hope they take it.

The White House apparently was following that Nico Pitney was communicating with individuals inside of Iran as that country’s turmoil was all over the media. White House spokesman Bill Burton came out with a response: “We did reach out to (Nico) prior to press conference to tell him that we had been paying attention to what he had been doing on Iran and there was a chance that he’d be called on.”

This is a totally overblown story spun out of very little. There is no evidence that the president knew what the question was going to be (even if he had an idea what the subject matter might be). I could care less if he wanted to take a question about the situation in Iran from a reporter that the White House felt was in contact with people on the ground in Iran.

Pitney asked a question that was a hell of a lot better than others I’ve heard asked at presidential news conferences.

Think Progress:
http://thinkprogress.org/2009/06/23/nicos-question/

POLITICO:
http://www.politico.com/blogs/michaelcalderone/0609/Obama_calls_on_HuffPost_for_Iran_question.html?showall

Daily Kos Calls Out Fox News For Unprecedented … Hypocrisy

It’s hard to believe or take seriously anything coming from Fox News “analyst” Karl Rove (a man with apparently a very short memory or very selective memory), who was President George W. Bush’s right-hand man for so years. Daily Kos has put together a video highlighting Fox News lies and dishonesty in trying to demonize ABC News for having great access to President Obama when Fox News had unprecedented access to President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney.

Daily Kos:
http://www.dailykostv.com/w/001852/

Rupert Murdoch Still Stretching Believability About Fox News

Today, News Corp. CEO Rupert Murdoch, the man who runs the conservative Fox News (among media outlets – almost all of which are ultra conservative) network continues to be dishonest about his baby, Fox News.

MURDOCH: If we weren’t fair and balanced, we wouldn’t have the number one network in news — by a very wide margin. People believe we’re fair and balanced, and they love us.

To the contrary, Fox News is popular because it IS NOT fair and balanced. The network strives to appeal to the far right in our society. These are the same people who push the largely-conservative talk radio industry so far to the extreme right. Fox News took a successful hardcore right-wing perspective from radio and used it in a different medium: television.

All the right-wing nuts know they can cluster around the television for hour after hour of far-right commentary on Fox News.

Think Progress:
http://thinkprogress.org/2009/06/08/murdoch-fair-fox/

Meeting Of The Minds Between Sean Hannity And Sarah Palin Produces Little

Notorious right-wing hater Sean Hannity and Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, those two noted intellectual giants, had a meeting of the minds and left much to be desired.

HANNITY: You know but it goes back – It does go back a little to the campaign. I mean, ‘spread the wealth, patriotic duty…’

PALIN: Kind of a ‘we told ya so’.

HANNITY: Well, is that how you feel?

PALIN: That’s how I feel! … And this many months into the new administration, quite disappointed, quite frustrated with not seeing those actions to rein in spending, slow down the growth of government. Instead Sean it is the complete opposite. It’s expanding at such a large degree that if Americans aren’t paying attention, unfortunately our country could evolve into something that we do not even recognize.

HANNITY: Socialism?

PALIN: Well, that is where we are headed. That is where we have to be blunt enough and candid enough and honest enough with Americans to let them know that if we keep going down these roads… nationalizing many of our services, our projects, our businesses, yes that is where we would head.

Truly, it’s a shame Hannity and Palin have so little faith in the strength of the American people and so little trust of the foundation on which the United States of America is built. This country was around long before them and will be around long after all of us are gone.

I wonder if that lack of faith in the United States qualifies as anti-American.

Why do people like Hannity and Palin continue to attack America?

I think the American people are pleased that Gov. Sarah Palin is not vice president – a heartbeat away from running this country. How might Gov. Palin be qualified to pick a U.S. Supreme Court justice when she had difficulty even naming U.S. Supreme Court cases?

Think Progress:
http://thinkprogress.org/2009/06/08/palin-on-obama-administration-we-told-ya-so/

Oliver Willis:
http://www.oliverwillis.com/2009/06/08/the-moron-sarah-palin-rears-her-head-again/

Sen. Lindsey Graham Falls For The Sexist Stereotyping Of Judge Sonia Sotomayor

Sen. Lindsey Graham, a Republican from South Carolina, is falling for sexist stereotyping of Judge Sonia Sotomayor, President Obama’s nominee for the U.S. Supreme Court. Think of how exceedingly rare it is for men to be criticized as having temperament problems. It’s something you here frequently with women because they are supposed to carry themselves in a more docile and less aggressive fashion. It’s a shame Graham is still living in the gender-role dark ages with this tired stereotype. Graham has been a part of a sizable group of right-wing people running down Judge Sotomayor. He has not trashed her as bad as other right wingers, but it’s safe to question his ability to fairly judge her. All of the criticisms of her are based mostly on out-of-context statements and smears from anonymous sources (talking about her temperament).

GRAHAM: I believe she does have the intellectual capacity, but there is a character problem, there is a temperament problem.

Some Republicans continue to reach hard to blow anything out of proportion to find a way to derail Judge Sotomayor’s candidacy for the U.S. Supreme Court. It’s a shame Sen. Graham seems incapable of judging her by what he has seen with his own eyes and heard with his own ears. Instead, it seems the senator is more interested in anything negative from her – regardless of the source or the motive of the source.

Right wingers are reaching because they have very little real ammunition to use against Judge Sonia Sotomayor, who has a strong record and is a worthy candidate to replace the retiring David Souter on the U.S. Supreme Court.

Think Progress:
http://thinkprogress.org/2009/06/03/graham-sotomayor-character/

Read the Think Progress story closely. At the end, the author posts a video where it seems Sen. Graham may have contradicted himself.

More Right-Wing Attacks On Sonia Sotomayor

Are you ready for some more attacks on Sonia Sotomayor, who has been nominated by President Barack Obama for the U.S. Supreme Court? Next up on the attack (as documented by Think Progress) is right-winger Curt Levey.

Here is what Think Progress has:

This morning on WTOP, Curt Levey, executive director of the right-wing Committee for Justice, compared Sotomayor to Harriet Miers:

I would point you to the Harriet Miers nomination under the second President Bush. She was also many people felt and intellectual lightweight, picked because she was a woman, people felt. And even though Republicans controlled the senate, she ultimately had to withdraw. And that could happen here. This is someone who clearly was picked because she’s a woman and Hispanic, not because she was the best qualified. I could certainly see red and purple state Democrats gawking at it and she may very well have to withdraw her nomination.

So, Sotomayor (implicitly) is being attacked as an intellectual lightweight. Levey is asserting that she essentially has no qualification for the high court beyond the fact that she is a woman and is Hispanic. Wow, you would not want to prejudge someone, huh?

This is typical of the kind of attacks we can expect from the right wing. Sonia Sotomayor seems to be a lot tougher than these right-wingers think.

By the way, did anyone think Clarence Thomas was the most qualified or best pick for the U.S. Supreme Court? I doubt very many people considered Thomas the most qualified.

Think Progress:
http://thinkprogress.org/2009/05/26/sotomayor-lightweight/

Rep. Steve King, Of Iowa, Continues Whining About Hate Crime Legislation

Think Progress has a story quoting far-right extremist Rep. Steve King, of Iowa, who is crying about the hate crime legislation, known as the Matthew Shepard Act. Why did Iowans put this individual in office? Of course, the same could be said about some of the people in Minnesota who helped get Rep. Michele Bachmann, another right-wing nut, reelected. Check out the Think Progress story to see the fit that some on the far right are throwing and all the fear-mongering they’re creating.

KING: If they’re one of God’s children let’s protect them equally and when you go down the path of special protected status, then you end up with the sacred cows walking around the street that have another extra shield around them that actually would put the victimizer’s focus on someone else. I think it’s unequal protection of the law that results from it.

Rep. King seems to be worried that if penalties are too harsh in protecting some people (such as gays and ethnic minorities) then it will lead to attacks on white people. That seems to be his implication. But, if people are specially targeted then why shouldn’t they be specially protected?

Think Progress:
http://thinkprogress.org/2009/05/06/king-sacred-cows/

Joe The Plumber Is A Moron

Joe the Plumber, who became the face of the Republican party during the presidential election of 2008, is opening that cesspool of a mouth of his – again. This time, Joe the Plumber is resorting to gay bashing to appeal to the nuts on the far right of the political spectrum. During an interview with Christianity Today, he said the following:

JOE THE PLUMBER: At a state level, it’s up to them. I don’t want it to be a federal thing. I personally still think it’s wrong. People don’t understand the dictionary—it’s called queer. Queer means strange and unusual. It’s not like a slur, like you would call a white person a honky or something like that. You know, God is pretty explicit in what we’re supposed to do—what man and woman are for. Now, at the same time, we’re supposed to love everybody and accept people, and preach against the sins. I’ve had some friends that are actually homosexual. And, I mean, they know where I stand, and they know that I wouldn’t have them anywhere near my children. But at the same time, they’re people, and they’re going to do their thing.

How disgusting is it for this man to come out and say something like that against gay people? That speaks volumes about how he is raising his kids. What if one of his kids happened to be gay? How much damage might he be doing by exposing his children to this brand of homophobia? Based on statements like this, and others made by this man since he popped onto the national scene, I imagine a lot of people would not want Joe the Plumber around them or their kids … and it has nothing to do with his sexual orientation. It does, however, have plenty to do with his hateful mindset.

Think Progress:
http://thinkprogress.org/2009/05/04/jtp-gay-friends/