The MTV Video Music Awards show was as predictable as watching Keith Olbermann or Chris Matthews do their broadcast. Other than celebrating its 25th anniversary and giving Britney Spears a possible opportunity for a comeback, the program was chock full of insults towards conservatives by the show’s emcee, U.K. comedian Russell Brand.  As a former MTV staffer, I was surprised by the selection of such an obscure individual to emcee the program.

By the audience reaction, Brand knew he was considered a “nobody” here in the United States, so his immediate course of action was to go political to try and endear himself to the MTV audience:

Update/Clarification (Jan. 24): Ocean MacAdams of MTV News responds (see bottom of post) Politico's Ben Adler has a story today about Rock the Vote submitting a friend-of-the-court brief in favor of overturning a law requiring voters furnish photo identification before casting a ballot:

Here's something you don't see every day: A rapper condemning MTV for, of all things, promoting homosexuality. It makes a little more sense, though, when you realize that he only did so to shift the blame from the increased criticism that rap music has come under following the Don Imus "nappy-headed-hos" incident. In an interview with Complex magazine (h/t RightwingSparkle), rapper Jeffrey Atkins, aka Ja Rule, blasted both MTV and homosexuality. I've taken the liberty of removing his numerous vulgarities:

Yeah, they got my man Doug Morris under fire and s---, they got him going down to go speak to Congress about hip-hop lyrics, are you f---ing serious? There's a f---ing black kid right now about to get 25 years for having a fight with some white kids over hanging the nooses over the white tree, lets get to that. Let's get into s--- like that, because that's what's tearing up America, not me calling a woman a b---- or a hoe on my rap songs.

It's not very surprising coming from the same guys that tried to scare young voters in 2004 with fears of the military draft, but Human Events online producer Ericka Andersen takes a look at the left-wing, anti-war in Iraq slant of MTV.com's political news section:

Not that I expected MTV to be fair and balanced but this is ridiculous. I checked out the MTV site after seeing their recent commercials featuring two musicians strumming along to Spanish music in a cool setting to cool music with two cool looking Latin folks. But the wordless tone is clearly MTV's embrace of illegal immigration. Though they did provide different viewpoints to choose from on the immigration debate on the politics section of their web site, the same could not be said for coverage of the Iraq War. When you enter the think:Politics section of MTV.com, you can choose to to click Iraq: Take a Stand. Then, there are two sections -- one for if you support the war, one if you do not. The section labeled "If you are against the war" features six different websites and resources to choose from. The section labeled "If you are for the war" lists only one.