For conservatives who aren’t enamored of liberal comedian Stephen Colbert’s “look, I’m an idiot conservative!” routine, it’s not amusing that Democratic pollster Tom Jensen went into South Carolina and found that Colbert was the “people’s choice” to replace resigning Sen. Jim DeMint.
But David Nir at the Daily Kos thinks that’s just perfect, since Colbert the Idiot is “overqualified” in a Republican caucus full of morons:
Jim DeMint (R-S.C.) announced Thursday that he will be trading his Senate seat in January to assume the helm of the Heritage Foundation. Covering the surprising development in its Friday edition, Politico dismissed DeMint as a mediocre politician with an undistinguished record who is moving on to captain a conservative think tank that has become "predictable, uninspiring, and often lacking in influence."
Manu Raju and Scott Wong mocked DeMint's lack of credentials in their front-page story titled, "DeMint Departure Fallout." They described him as a popular senator who has actually "accomplished very little" in Congress because he "wasn't a legislator" and having "no signature laws to his name." Of course, this betrays an inside-the-Beltway way of thinking about success in Congress. Conservatives dedicated to shrinking the size and scope of the federal government are not going to be be known for legislative accomplishments, which more often than not are about expanding the federal government's size and scope, not dismantling old bureaucracies.
In October of last year, MSNBC cravenly played the race card by showcasing South Carolina Democratic Party chairman Dick Harpootlian insisting that that Palmetto State's new voter ID law would amount to "electoral genocide" of blacks. MSNBC's Chris Matthews carped that the GOP was "randy" to "roll up the vote." There are countless other instances of the liberal network attacking South Carolina and other Southern states as racist for pursuing stricter voter ID laws.
Well, on Wednesday, in a unanimous ruling no less, a federal court ruled that there was absolutely nothing wrong with the law, but directed that it not take effect until after the presidential elections, for fear of a "potential for chaos" should state officials try to enforce it this November, the Washington Post's Del Quentin Wilber reported in the October 11 paper.
New York Times Atlanta bureau chief Kim Severson showed a little anti-Southern, anti-conservative condescension on the campaign trail in her Friday filing “From South Carolina, a Wary Welcome.” (Previously Jim Rutenberg had declared the state "famous for surfacing the dark undercurrents of American politics.")
New York Times campaign reporter Jim Rutenberg filed from Charleston on Wednesday, amplifying racial accusations against the Republican presidential field, especially Newt Gingrich’s recent comments on Obama as a “food stamp” president, in “Risks for G.O.P. in Attacks With Racial Themes.”
South Carolina has the nation’s first female Indian-American governor (a Republican), the highest-ranking African-American in Congress (on the Democratic side) and a rapidly growing population of Latinos, all evidence, longtime political players here say, that the state is shedding its racially charged past.
The liberal media have returned to assaulting the crowd reaction at Republican debates. Ken Tucker, a TV critic at Entertainment Weekly (a sister publication of Time magazine), suggested the “mob” was “heavy with malice.” He thought Jon Huntsman would find relief "he didn’t have to stand on-stage Monday night to face the most raucous, roused-rabble audience of any Republican debate held thus far."
Tucker strongly suggested the audience was racist in reaction to a Juan Williams hardball question to Newt Gingrich: “The jeers that erupted the second Williams uttered the phrase ‘black Americans’ was chilling on this Martin Luther King Day.” But not only was there no outcry as Williams used the words “black Americans” early in the question, but the outburst of noise didn’t really erupt until Gingrich said “No” to the Williams question. [MP3 audio available here; video follows page break]
Update (17:05 EST): Williams tweets in protest: "Not once did I say GOP voters are racists" and has asked that I correct this post accordingly. I stand by my assertion given the context wherein Williams was describing why he believes Palmetto State Republicans, despite their reticence about Romney's Mormonism, could vote for Romney, whom they consider most likely to beat Obama in the November presidential election. At any rate, you can judge for yourself by watching the video below the page break.
Correction: Williams is a former lobbyist, having quit his lobbying work recently to work on Dylan Ratigan's "Get Money Out" campaign, a drive to amend the Constitution to overturn the implications of the Supreme Court's Citizens United ruling. Williams is senior strategist for and co-founder of United Republic.
What better way is there, really, for MSNBC to celebrate Martin Luther King Jr. Day than by leveling charges that Republican voters in general and Republican candidates in particular are racist? That's what Now with Alex Wagner panelists Jimmy Williams and Joy-Ann Reid charged respectively on today's program. [MP3 audio available here]
While the news media has a professional "obligation to get it right," liberal network news anchor last week set out to "purposefully" take Mitt Romney's "fire people" comment out of context, Fox News host Sean Hannity complained on his January 13 program.
But it's not only "purposeful distortion" but "purposeful character assassination" by the liberal media added NewsBusters publisher Brent Bozell, who appeared via satellite for the popular recurring "Media Mash" feature. [MP3 audio available here; video embedded below page break]
Is there, or should there ever be, a point when a state is no longer penalized for its discriminatory past?
Not according to the Department of Justice, which last Friday rejected a South Carolina law that would have required voters show a valid photo ID before casting their ballots.
Justice says the law discriminates against minorities. The Obama administration said, "South Carolina's law didn't meet the burden under the 1965 Voting Rights Act, which outlawed discriminatory practices preventing blacks from voting." Why South Carolina? Because, the Justice Department contends, it's tasked with approving voting changes in states that have failed in the past to protect the rights of blacks.
For today's "Gut Check" segment on MSNBC's 2 p.m. Eastern NewsNation program, substitute host Craig Melvin interviewed a South Carolina sheriff who is urging women in his county to carry a concealed handgun for protection against would-be rapists.
During his Skype interview with Chuck Wright, Melvin worried about the poor dead would-be rapists being checked into the Spartanburg County morgue without the benefit of a trial (emphasis mine, video follows page break):
For the second day in a row, an MSNBC anchor raised a liberal Democrat's claim that South Carolina's new voter ID law would be "electoral genocide" that disenfranchises thousands of black voters in the Palmetto State.
Daytime anchor Thomas Roberts made note of the alarmist statement by South Carolina Democratic Party chairman Dick Harpootlian in an interview about the photo ID law in the 11 a.m. Eastern hour with Tulane professor and Nation magazine contributor Melissa Harris-Perry.
Neither Roberts nor Harris-Perry objected to the Harpootlian's rhetoric, although in a tweet a short time later Harris-Perry conceded that "genocide is too strong a term." [video follows page break]
MSNBC's scurrilous charges of racism against the GOP continued yesterday as Hardball host Chris Matthews tag-teamed with South Carolina Democratic Party chairman Dick Harpootlian and Judith Browne-Dianis of The Advancement Project to insist to viewers that a newly-enacted voter ID law will prevent thousands of blacks from voting in the Palmetto State. The law is currently under review by the U.S. Department of Justice.
As is standard operating procedure for Hardball, no defender of the South Carolina law was featured during the October 19 program's segment -- entitled "Voting Wrongs" -- to balance out the discussion.