“And anyone who claims that I and others like me are ’soft,’ or have ‘forgotten”‘ the lessons of what happened here is at best a grasping, opportunistic, dilettante and at worst, an idiot whether he is a commentator, or a Vice President, or a President.”– Keith Olbermann
I think he truly is turning into Edward R. Murrow and he may eventually be responsible for changing the media, the nature of media commentary, or even saving the country. His latest 9/11 commentary was the third in recent memory that was an eloquent commentary on the state of propaganda, partisanship and our nation’s political climate in general. Instead of just saying “can’t we all just get along” he has seriously looked at why it is that we apparently can’t, and courageously pointed his finger in the direction of our country’s massive black hole that sucks everything horrible in it. Yes, the Bush regime and its merry band of excusers and profiteering sycophants.
The Republican party, still unable to be grateful for the power they hold over the country, are still whinging about the Democrats, who have no power whatsoever. Yet, no power whatsoever is not enough for the Republicans. I think they want to wipe liberals and Democrats and everyone “not Republican” off the face of the earth along with al Qaeda, terrorists, and others they hate. Because the Republicans are all about hate. Hating and killing. That is a completely fair thing to say because that is ALL I hear coming out of their mouths lately: bitching about Democrats, wild-eyed comments on “liberals”, and their burning desire to kill people. Pretty much anyone; they don’t seem too picky.
Their leader has said we are in a clash of civilizations; a life or death struggle, “It is the decisive ideological struggle of the 21st century, and the calling of our generation,” he spouts, glassy-eyed, and continues with more such over-arching hyperbole that would make McCarthy himself blush. We can only hope Keith Olbermann keeps up the good fight to counteract such monumentally false nonsense. Here’s a snip of his speech from his live broadcast on September 11:
“History teaches us that nearly unanimous support of a government cannot be taken away from that government by its critics. It can only be squandered by those who use it not to heal a nation’s wounds, but to take political advantage.
Terrorists did not come and steal our newly-regained sense of being American first, and political, fiftieth. Nor did the Democrats. Nor did the media. Nor did the people.
The President — and those around him — did that.
They promised bi-partisanship, and then showed that to them, “bi-partisanship” meant that their party would rule and the rest would have to follow, or be branded, with ever-escalating hysteria, as morally or intellectually confused, as appeasers, as those who, in the Vice President’s words yesterday, “validate the strategy of the terrorists.”
They promised protection, and then showed that to them “protection” meant going to war against a despot whose hand they had once shaken, a despot who we now learn from our own Senate Intelligence Committee, hated al-Qaida as much as we did.
The polite phrase for how so many of us were duped into supporting a war, on the false premise that it had ’something to do’ with 9/11 is “lying by implication.”
The impolite phrase is “impeachable offense.”
Not once in now five years has this President ever offered to assume responsibility for the failures that led to this empty space, and to this, the current, curdled, version of our beloved country.
Still, there is a last snapping flame from a final candle of respect and fairness: even his most virulent critics have never suggested he alone bears the full brunt of the blame for 9/11.
Half the time, in fact, this President has been so gently treated, that he has seemed not even to be the man most responsible for anything in his own administration.
Yet what is happening this very night?
A mini-series, created, influenced — possibly financed by — the most radical and cold of domestic political Machiavellis, continues to be televised into our homes.
The documented truths of the last fifteen years are replaced by bald-faced lies; the talking points of the current regime parroted; the whole sorry story blurred, by spin, to make the party out of office seem vacillating and impotent, and the party in office, seem like the only option.
How dare you, Mr. President, after taking cynical advantage of the unanimity and love, and transmuting it into fraudulent war and needless death, after monstrously transforming it into fear and suspicion and turning that fear into the campaign slogan of three elections? How dare you — or those around you — ever “spin” 9/11?
Rock on, Keith, and don’t stop now.
Read the entire speech here.
Submitted by Shelly, of Citizen Against Lies Check out the latest podcast from 9/11.
I think you’ve been exposed, Mr. Bush. You can’t use Osama to do your dirty work for you anymore. The French have blown your cover story. According to the French ministry, it looks like he finally died in August of typhoid. In fact, that report was from Saudi intelligence. You no doubt knew that, George. Yet you and the CIA and probably the cat kept dragging in old videos of him to terrify the people you claim to want to protect.
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