Tag Archives: Rachel Maddow

At Least Some On The Right Have Started Facing The Fear-Mongering.

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While many respected journalists and researchers have shot down the claims of birthers (written about here and here) and deathers (here), most in the right have ignored or encouraged such fear-mongering rumors for political purposes.  These have been damaging to our country and for civilized debate. Jon Henke has recently come out against these rumors, and the spreader of many of these myths, World Net Daily (no, I won't link to them).
he certainly made some waves last week when -- clearly, and appropriately, disgusted by Jerome Corsi's bizarre piece in WorldNetDaily suggesting that President Obama was preparing concentration camps to round up and imprison his conservative critics -- Henke urged his fellow conservatives to disassociate themselves from WND in every way possible.
He's also asked the Republican National Committee to reject WND and it's contacts as well.
That claim, of course, was massively undercut by Terry Krepel's follow-up reporting for Media Matters, which noted that "one of the organizations that has rented WND's mailing list is ... the Republican National Committee." With full screen shots.
Henke called upon the RNC to disassociate itself from WND, but they unsurprisingly have politely declined.
I encourage watching the discussion on Rachel Maddow's show, as well as visiting his site, The Next Right, which seems to be a sensible and respected right-wing blog.  I also suggest sending him words of support, as they seem in low supply at the moment. TheNextRight

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Pat Buchanan Apologizing for Hitler.

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Pat Buchanan has gone ahead and apologized for Hitler, claiming he sought no empire or wider war with Europe, and had merely benign interests of German unification at heart:
Indeed, why would he want war when, by 1939, he was surrounded by allied, friendly or neutral neighbors, save France. And he had written off Alsace, because reconquering Alsace meant war with France, and that meant war with Britain, whose empire he admired and whom he had always sought as an ally. As of March 1939, Hitler did not even have a border with Russia. How then could he invade Russia?

Included in the many historical inaccuracies in the article, he went so far as to blame the Holocost on the ALLIES, stating “Hitler wanted to end the war in 1940, almost two years before the trains began to roll to the camps.”

After Hitler conquered Poland, he HAD the border with Russia.  Hitler stated many times his ambitions to continue the war and the "expansion of the German Empire".

THIS is the person that previously ran for President?  THIS is the respected Repbulican leader?  THIS is someone who's paid for his political commentary?  If he can't even research historical facts and speeches to get something this well documented correct, why is anyone listening to him?

This is the same man who asked by Rachel Maddow why it was that 108 out of the 110 United States Supreme Court justices have been white, stated:

I think white men were 100% of the people who wrote the constitution, 100% of the people who signed the Declaration of Independence, 100% of the people who died at Gettysburg and Vicksburg, probably close 100% of the people who died at Normandy. This has been a country basically built by white folks.

So because minorities were oppressed throughout history, white men somehow deserve to be the Supreme Court justices.  I don't know.  I can't follow the thinking there.

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Corporate Sponsored Grassroots

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Rachel Maddow exposes the monied interests pretending to be "average Americans" who are fueling the outrage at these "town halls gone wild". First up, Recess Rally, sponsored by Michelle Malkin, Smart Girl Politics, Redstate, but also American Majority, and as Rachel points out, this group is hardly made up of average Americans even though they tout themselves as being a non-profit, non-partisan organization.

The people behind American Majority; Ned Ryun, former George W. Bush speech writer, Lonny Leitner, Regional Field Director for Bush/Cheney '04, Shari Weber, former Republican State Legislator, Matt Pinnell, a former Washington conservative lobbyist.

Rachel notes that American Majority is an offshoot of another Recess Rally sponsor, The Sam Adams Alliance. Their President, John Tsarpalas, former Executive Director of the Illinois State Republican party, their Director, Joseph Lehman, former Dow Chemicals engineer and president of the nation's largest conservative state level policy think tank.

Another sponsor of Recess Rally, Let Freedom Ring. Their founder, the money man behind the television ad exploiting 9-11 to promote the Iraq invasion. Another sponsor, the swift boaters.

Yet another sponsor, Americans for Prosperity, and their subsidiary Patients First. Americans for Prosperity's Director, Art Pope, who has the headquarters of the North Carolina Republican party named after him since he's given them so much money. Their Chairman, David Koch, the 19th richest man in the world who runs Koch Industries, which is the largest privately held oil company in the United States.

To talk about these town hall events as some organic outpouring of average American folks who have concerns about health care is to be willfully blind to what is really going on, which is professional P.R. operatives generating exploitative, manufactured, strategically deployed outrage in order to line their own pocket.

This is professional, corporate funded Republican staffed P.R., and it should be reported as such.




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Secret Plots to Kill Old People

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Rachel Maddow on the GOP's latest conspiracy theory. Republicans are trying to rally their base by painting health care reform as a way to advance assisted suicide and to literally kill old people. It would be bad enough if this were only coming from fringe groups or right wing web sites, but as Rachel notes, it's coming straight from these politicians' mouths.

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Rachel Maddow Takes On Pat Buchanan (VIDEO): "You're Playing With Fire... You're Living In The 1950s"

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Wow,  I can't believe he actually said that......
Maddow asked Pat Buchanan why he thought that 108 of the 110 Supreme Court Justices had been white. He replied:
"White men were 100% of the people that wrote the Constitution, 100% of the people that signed the Declaration of Independence, 100% of the people who died at Gettysburg and Vicksburg, probably close to 100% of the people who died at Normandy. This has been a country built basically by white folks, who were 90% of the nation in 1960 when I was growing up and the other 10% were African-Americans who had been discriminated against. That's why.
via Rachel Maddow Takes On Pat Buchanan (VIDEO): "You're Playing With Fire... You're Living In The 1950s".

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