Fox's Griff Jenkin's played "chase the politicians" on Capitol Hill Thursday for Bill O'Reilly. As much fun as it was to watch Chuck Schumer speedwalking down a Washington corridor, there was more information available. Why does O'Reilly tell only part of the story? Are we too dense to pay attention long enough?
On Thursday's O'Reilly Factor, the "No-Spin master" did another half story on an issue. I'm becoming more convinced than ever, that either Bill thinks his viewers have the attention spans of gnats, or he has one of the worst research teams in the media business, who don't even seem to know how to use the internet.
In any case, the half story this evening regarded the Conservative Speech Suppression (aka "Fairness") Doctrine. He sent reporter Griff Jenkins, to Capitol Hill to do one of those amusing deer-caught-in-the-headlights segments where a reporter chases politicians or other miscreants with a bright light and tries to stick a microphone in their faces whilst they proceed to look like the speedwalker in the banned Mr. T Snickers commercial.
Griff's mission was to question lawmakers about their position on the Doctrine. During Mr. Bill's "Talking Points Memo" the audience was treated to the surgically frozen smile of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
The second lawmaker to be questioned, and to his credit, the only one of the three who actually stood still, was New Mexico Senator Ted Bingham.
Sen. Schumer of New York, was the third "contestant" and the one which most reminded me of the speedwalker. It's just too bad Griff hadn't brought along the tank, the Snickers, or, Mr. T.
Ok, let's just pause a second an enjoy the visual on that one. [Pausing....visualizing....] Who among us wouldn't love to watch Mr. T machine gun Chuckie Schumer with Snickers bars?
I can't embed the O'Reilly video here, but "Talking Points" is the default listing that comes up on the O'Reilly portion of the Fox site. Click the title for the November 20 "Talking Points Memo" 'Will Fairness Doctrine be reimposed?'
Of course the "Fairness" Doctrine is an important issue and the comments and reaction to reporters' questions on the issue are interesting and informative viewing.
But, as has become obvious to me, and perhaps I'm just slow-witted or too willing to give the benefit of the doubt, it seems that Bill O'Reilly only tells part of most important stories.
Towards the end of his "Memo" O'Reilly commented that he spoke with Schumer sometime after Grif attempted to speak with him on Thursday afternoon, and Schumer said he "didn't care about the issue, nor should he". O'Reilly labeled this response as "a ruse".
According to Merriam-Webster online:
ruse (noun): a wily subterfuge
Is anyone else tired of tap-dancing? Mr. Schumer's statements to Bill were neither a "subterfuge" nor "wily".
Let us call things what they actually are. When a feathered, beaked creature quacks, we call it a duck. When someone says something that is not true, we call it a lie.
And Chuckie Schumer did lie. On November 4, Election Day, on Foxs News Channel, Schumer equated talk radio with pornography. Perhaps after the imbecility of those comments, the estimable Mr. Schumer decided he'd better stop "caring" about the Fairness Doctrine, really quickly. He is right about one thing (kind of like a broken clock, it is accidentally right twice day) he shouldn't care.
As if the pornography analogy were not enough, Chuckie has additional reason to continue to distance himself from the issue. Apparently he's taking heat from people. I mean real people, not just people with pointy heads and huge egos.
On Monday, November 17, Mark Levin received a call to his radio show from a woman named Carla, from Brooklyn, New York.
[You can listen to the Monday Mark Levin show by clicking HERE. The conversation with Carla occurs about 48 minutes into the broadcast (as long as that version doesn't contain commercials, like the Podcast).]
Here is a transcript of the conversation:
Carla: Hi. I am so glad to talk to you and I'm also kind of nervous because I don't want to end up like Joe the Plumber. Um, I had, an, let's just say, an altercation with Charlie Schumer in the airport, at La Guardia, on Saturday night, that was pretty extensive and kind of -
Mark: Well, wait a minute, by "altercation" you mean a discussion.
Carla: Well, yeah, a heated discussion, about the Fairness Doctrine. I was deplaning, he was ahead of me, there was a fawning Democrat chick, who came over to him, and was like all over him and I had heard what he had said on, I think it was Fox News, on Election Day, I had heard his comments, about uh, about talk radio, and about the Fairness Doctrine which really repulsed me. So, I saw him there and he had this big smile on his face.
And I just said to him, "Don't you dare try to take my talk radio away from me."
And he said to me, "I'm not trying to take your talk radio away from you, but we can't allow people to be nasty and rude and, and say things that aren't true."
And I said, "Are you kidding me? That's what our democracy is about. Our democracy is messy." I said, "Our democracy is about being able to be nasty and rude and sarcastic, and wrong when we want, and say opinions that may be wrong when we want. That's what makes us different than Europe."
And he, he just started lashing out at me. He told me how ignorant I was. And that they were not going to permit -
Mark: Wait a minute, wait a minute. So in other words, so in other words, he was shrill, and rude, and vile.
Carla: Well, he was obnoxious and shrill, and it was attacking my intelligence and uh, and my I.Q., [Mark: Gee whiz.] and I was dumb. And I told him that there was a very good country that believed in his philosophy and it was called Red China and it sounded like he was talking right out of, uh, Mao's Red Book, and that that was not what our country was about and that our democracy was unique in that we allowed our discourse to be messy. And that we allowed our discourse to be wrong when it's wrong. And that's the nature of democracy.
Mark: Well, let me tell you something. You're a patriot, uh, I wish more people would engage like you; politely but firmly, confronting the Left. Uh, and you're not stupid, he's a moron. And let me tell you Carla, what, what's really upsetting Schumer. You know what it is, Carla?
Carla: No. I didn't notice anything upsetting him, he looked pretty smug.
Mark: It's me. Because he doesn't like me, my mocking him. I know it gets under his skin because he thinks he's greater and better than the rest of us. That's why I mock all of them, to knock them down two or three notches. But when he says, "shrill" and all of that, he's talking about me. Because he doesn't like me 'cause I'm in his face, because I've challenged him, because I've urged him to come on this show, because I know he's coward. But he's a menace, he's a menace to this country, he's a menace to this society, he's a menace to the judiciary. I think he should call a hearing. I think he should invite me and a couple of the others, we'll come up there, and I'd be more than happy to testify under oath, assuming of course, that he would swear in, too, so he could be punished under penalty of perjury. I'd be more than happy to do that, Schmuckie. I'd be more than happy to educate you about the First Amendment, political speech, and if you don't like it, it's none of your damn business. I'd be happy to educate you, Schmuckie. What do you think of that, you dope?
And Carla, you're I.Q. is twice of his. So you're I.Q.'s about 140.
Carla: Yeah, well, I told him. I said I will fight to the death, for my, for my talk radio, for anyone else, to be obnoxious, to be as loud and as nasty as they want. Because -
Mark: But is he not the most obnoxious member of the Senate?
Carla: Of course, of course he is. But I said the point of our democracy is that we don't censor our tones, we don't control our tones.
Mark: Well, of course, of course, you're right. And you're extremely intelligent. But he wants to do by brute government force what the Constitution doesn't allow him to do. You see, the Founding Fathers had dealt with people like Chuck Schumer; they'd dealt with people who would punish people dared to say things they didn't believe in. They tried to squelch dissent, they tried to squelch free speech and that's why, when they, when they passed the Bill of Rights, the very first one included the right to free speech, uh, and they would be appalled by Chuck Schumer. But Chuck Schumer doesn't give a damn. He's a power hungry menace. Thank you, Carla, God Bless You, and good job. You take care.
So, Bill O'Reilly devotes a "Talking Points Memo" to the topic, featuring Sen. Schumer, who had very recently (Nov. 4) made an ass out of himself on the issue. O'Reilly who works for the same network on which Schumer made his ridiculous statements, doesn't play the tape. That's getting your point across effectively, that's following up. It's about as effective coverage of the issue as O'Reilly's was of Obama.
But there was additional information available regarding New Mexico's Sen. Bingham. Although he was polite and forthright enough to stand still, to not play duck and cover, he is on record elsewhere, letting everyone know exactly where he stands on the issue of the Fairness Doctrine, with more detail and more in-depth information than the twenty seconds Griff spent with him.
In late October, Bingham was interviewed on New Mexico radio station, KKOB, on this issue. You can read more about this
HERE and listen to an audio clip of it.
Read More......
"We contend that for a nation to try to tax itself into
prosperity is like a man standing in a bucket and trying
to lift himself up by the handle."
