Tonight Keith Olbermann gave a “Special Comment” on the shootings at a public event hosted by United States Representative Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ). Not surprisingly, Olbermann condemned violent rhetoric from the right in his message. However, to the surprise of many, Olbermann also criticized himself and any other rhetoric from the left. Olbermann noted that he used a metaphor against Hillary Clinton in the 2008 campaign that could have been interpreted as a call to violence against Clinton. He repudiated himself, and made clear that he condemns even the slightest hint of violence in any platform.
The full video of Olbermann’s speech can be seen to the left. Highlight quotes are provided below.
"We need to put the guns down. Just as importantly we need to put the gun metaphors away, permanently left, right, middle, politicians and citizens, sane and insane."
Olbermann quoted Pima County Sheriff Charles Dupnik as saying,
“I think it’s time as a country we need to do a little soul searching because I think that the vitriolic rhetoric that we hear day in and day out from the people in the radio business, and some people in the T.V. business, and what we see on T.V. and how are youngsters are being raised. It may be free speech but it does not come without consequences. Arizona has become the Mecca of prejudice and bigotry.
And more quotes from Olbermann directly,
"If Sarah Palin, whose website, put and today scrubbed, bulls eye targets on twenty representatives including Gabby Giffords, does not repudiate today her own part, however tangential, in amplifying violence and violent imagery in American politics she must dismissed from politics. She must be repudiate by the members of her own party, and if they fail to do so, each one of them must be judged to have silently defended this tactic that today proved so awfully foretelling."
"If Glenn Beck, who obsesses nearly as strangely as this Mr. Loughner did about gold and debt, and who wistfully joked about killing Michael Moore, and Bill O’Reilly who blithely repeated ‘Tiller the Killer’ until the phrase was burned into the minds of his viewers, if they do not begin their next broadcasts with solemn apologies forever turning to the death fantasies, and the dream of blood lust, for ever having provided just the oxygen for those deep in madness, to whom violence is an acceptable solution. Then those commentators, and the others, must be repudiated by their viewers and listeners, by all politicians who would appear on their programs, including President Obama, and his planned interview with Fox on Super Bowl Sunday."
"And if those considered to be ‘on the left’, do not rededicate ourselves to our vigilance, to eliminate all our own suggestion of violence, however inadvertent they might have been, however mild they might have been, then we too deserve the repudiation of the more sober and peaceful of our politicians, and our viewers, and our networks."
Comments
Excellent demonstration of missing the point, Kaufman.
Do you ever think with that brain? Or do you just keep it disengaged from your mouth and typing fingers?
Let look at some facts that Feverdown wrote earlier (Edited by JB to kept within limits)
It was not fear of violence from conservatives that prevented speakers like Ann Coulter and David Horowitz from speaking on college campuses.
It was a liberal (1) who bit the finger off a man who disagreed with him on Obamacare (2) who was sentenced to two years for bringing the RNC convention in 2008 (3) who threatened to kill a government informant who infiltrated her Austin-based group that planned to bomb the RNC. (3) who assaulted police in Berkeley (4) who intimidated and threw rocks through the windows of medical (5) who destroyed AM radio towers outside of Seattle researchers.
It was our President who said: “Don't bring a knife to a gunfight”
It was Obama's friend Bill Ayers who used terrorism as a tool for political change.
The Black Panthers who stood outside polls intimidating people with nightsticks were probably not right-wingers.
It was Obama supporter Amy Bishop who took a gun to work and murdered co-workers.
Joseph Stack flew his plane into the IRS building after writing an anti-conservative manifesto.
It was progressive SEIU union thugs who beat a black conservative man who spoke his mind.
I seem to remember an actual movie was made showing President Bush being assassinated;
SDS is still radical, with arrests in 2007 and the storming of the CATO Institute in July 2008.
Your claims are incomplete and misleading.
There was only one Black Panther incident outside of a single polling station and the claim of intimidation was made by a single individual. He said, she said isn't enough to warrant prosecution but the Panther in question was booted from the organization.
Joseph Stack also hated the IRS and taxes, a decidedly conservative position. No one's calling him a right wing extremist.
Let's put it this way: In a court of law, where proof of allegation is required in order to achieve a conviction, none of your claims would hold up. Any idiot could isolate any incident on either side of the aisle --there are plenty to pick from-- and then go about blaming the other side. Anyone who does that is part of the problem.
Get this through your head: Your side sucks. So does the other one. One can only hope there are enough people in the middle who one day tell both extremes to shut up and go home.
Here we go again. You libs bend over backwards to make excuses for terrorists using 'REAL VIOLENCE', but get all hysterical about someone using a cliche.
Must we endure this constant lecturing by the left? Now that is speech that I could do without!?
Can Congress pass a law making it illegal for libs to lecture? The combination of arrogance and irrationality is enough to push sane people over the edge!
It's just plain dangerous and should be stopped!
Ah, and here comes Gigi - the other end of the extremist rhetoric chorus.
You and Kaufman should get a room - have it out where the rest of us don't have to watch.
Well I hate to say it but I think Olbermann comes across well here though I do disagree a bit about Beck; Beck regularly voices against violence on his programs and I think he should be recognized for that.
C'mon Mick. That's a regular part of Beck's routine. He uses his chalkboard to link his enemies to everything that's wrong with the country today. Warn about our eventual destruction by those people unless real God fearing Americans rise up and take a stand (He could "strangle Michael Moore with his bare hands") And then he closes out the show by saying that he prays that his followers will not become violent. Give me a break.
Well Mick, I'm going to focus on your first part and congratulate you on not being blinded by ideology to recognize that Olbermann's words were a wake up call for everybody. Left and right and center. His words were relevant and on point.
I'm not certain that if Beck had said the same, I would have been as gracious as you were.
For those of us who have been concerned for way more than 2 years with the hate-filled speech, this seemed an obvious consequence and many of us spoke in haste. Many of us are simply frustrated that everybody seems so angry - all the time. I usually try to make a point without being mean - yesterday I failed - my apologies.
Here is the actual quote from Glenn Beck....
"Would you kill someone for that?...I'm thinking about killing Michael Moore...I could kill him myself, or if I would need to hire somebody to do it,...No, I think I could. I think he could be looking me in the eye, you know, and I could just be choking the life out. Is this wrong? "
That is what Glenn Beck is recognized for .
You couldn't be a bigger idiot. Glenn Beck is known for his spot-on recognition of exactly where we stand today from a historical perspective. He has spoken about the left and the "coming insurrection". That is the left in their own words. Ok so I am supposed to ignore his 98% accuracy rate because of your 98% inaccurate ridicule? You're a jerk
“I would have never started watching Fox News if it wasn’t for the fact that Beck was on there. And it was the things that he did, it was the things he exposed that blew my mind.” – Byron Williams
Frumpy,
Your Beck quote is why you are recognized as someone who will quote something Beck said out of context when he was clearly joking and ignoring the fact that he preaches nonviolence everyday.
Libs said horrible things about Bush, but the minute Obama got in, they started lecturing us about our criticism, calling us racists and haters.
The truth is, they just want to shut us up and they are not above 'implying' that this shooting is somehow the fault of conservatives because we speak our minds about liberals. I don't recall the media blaming liberals when Reagan was shot. It's disgusting.
The most hateful politicians are libs. Pew research indicated than a much higher percentage of them used personal attacks in 2010 elections. That's why it is such a phoney transparent circus to watch them now with their sanctimonious high ground baloney.
If hate speach and violence were so objectionable to libs why did they nominate a guy who sat and listened to Jeremiah Wright for 20 years and pal around a guy who bombed a government building? Obama referred to Republicans as 'enemies' last year and has used gun metaphores himself.
Phoney, phoney, phoney.
Gigi: Your facts are flawed, but I won't get into that.
But I will ask how far you think you'd get if you were explaining to a judge and jury that you were "taken out of context" and you were "clearly joking" when you threatened to choke someone to death.
Beck knows exactly what he is doing. His background in "morning zoo" radio prepared him well for his current game of pushing the limits to the extreme. And the game has rewarded him well.
If Beck could make the same millions playing to the liberal audience, he'd switch in an instant. But he's learned, as have others, that you and your peers are much easier to con.
got a link to that Pew report?
The comment about the Pew report is a misrepresentation. Here is what the Pew report actually said on October 21, 2010:
"And the tone of the campaign -- on both sides -- is negative. By greater than two-to-one (58% to 26%), voters say Republican candidates in their state have spent more time attacking Democrats than explaining what they would do if elected. Voters offer a similar assessment of Democratic candidates: 56% say they spend more of their time attacking Republicans, 26% say they have been explaining their proposals."
Gigi is evidently an exponent of the Karl Rove school of political commentary -- "If the facts do not fit the theory, then change the facts!"
Except that Gigi doesn't even care about theory - she starts from extremist assumptions and molds everything to fit.
Sadly, Olbermann's words are falling on deaf ears...The right wing is already deflecting any push back that they had any hand in causing someone to shoot and kill other americans because of something they said...They deny dividing our country and fanning the flames of hate with their vitriol. This is not new, the right wing has pushed dozens to commit acts of violence since Obama took office and not once did they the right wing talking heads try and soften the rhetoric, they simply look in the camera and say, "who me, I had nothing to do with this"...
It is the MO they incite others with their words and when one of their listeners act on those words with violence, they simply say they had nothing to do with it...
Fox "News" should lose its license at minimum, it is illegal to yell "fire" in a movie theater, what Fox spews, is no different...There words create riots and violence in the streets of American as well as in the streets of other nations, both allies and enemies...
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Sanders, you're so stupid....
Yawn... shut up.
So may we assume YOU don't have a link to that alleged Pew report either?
Put up or shut up, dork.
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