Speaking Truth to Power is Officially Out of Style at MS-NBC, but I Have Questions
Man, I love it when the left starts firing on itself, and these days, it’s been happening at lot more often.
Mark Halperin, of Time magazine and a frequent contributor to the shrieking monkey cage that is MS-NBC, uttered an indelicate phrase about the Obamessiah and was subsequently sent into a television time-out for a while. Here’s the transcript (warning, mildly spicy language of a not-quite-cussing, but Not Safe for Church nature).
Joe Scarborough: Mark Halperin, What was the president’s strategy? We are coming up on a deadline and the president decided to please his base, push back against the Republicans.I guess the question is, we know a deal has to be done. Is this showmanship? A lot of times you go up there and both sides and they act tough so their base will be appeased, then they quietly work the deal behind the scenes.
Mark Halperin: Are we on the seven second delay?
Mika Brzezinski: Lordy.
Halperin: I wanted to characterize how the president behaved.
Scarborough: We have it. We can use it. Go for it. Let’s see what happens.
Brzezinski: We’re behind you, you fall down and we catch you.
Halperin: I thought he was a dick yesterday.
Dun dun DUUUNNNN!
Yeah, there was no chance in the world that he was going to get past that unscathed. The venerable tradition of Speaking Truth to Power that the left so loved just a couple of years ago is no longer fashionable now that they’re the ones in power. I’m not going to go into the merits of his insult or MS-NBC’s reaction (but here’s a pretty good defense), since others have done so pretty well (via memeorandum). I do, however, have a couple questions.
1) Why are Joe Scarborough and Mike Brzezinski not suspended? Yes, Halperin said the magic D-word but he did so only after assurances by both hosts that the word would get bleeped out. If not for Joe and Mika’s insistence, Halperin would never have said what he said. They share blame here, too. Think of them as the friends of the kid who threw the rock through the neighbor’s picture window who encouraged him to do it. No parent worth their salt would let those kids get away scot-free. The powers that be at MS-NBC shouldn’t let Joe and Mike skate on this either.
2) Don’t you think MS-NBC’s disciplinary policy is just a little bit capricious? Keith Olbermann broke a black-letter company policy and only got two days for it. His post-suspension rant on the air earned him no punishment at all. Ed Schultz earned a two-week suspension for calling Laura Ingraham a “slut” on the air. That was mild, though, compared to Olbermann’s tirade in 2009 against Michelle Malkin, in which he accused her of “fascistic hatred” and called her a “mashed-up bag of meat with lipstick”. MS-NBC pretty much ignored that venture into misogyny and Olbermann didn’t lose a minute of air time over it. Halperin’s suspension is indefinite, according to the network, which means they consider a mild crude insult against the President a worse offense than a violation of their own ethics rules or borderline slander against two innocent women. I’d love to see their disciplinary policy right about now. I imagine it amounts to “Don’t talk smack about our side”.
Okay, one more question.
3) Will Time take any action against Halperin? After all, he is only a contributor to the network, not a full-time employee (so far as I know). He’s there as a representative of Time. Surely they have some interest in how their employees represent the magazine on television.
Other Posts of Interest:
- What They Share is Blood on Their Hands
- Halperin: Why Won’t Those Awful Republicans Help the President Win?
- So What Did Mark Halperin’s Book Not Say About John Edwards Affair? Only How the Media Failed Us.
Category: Oh, THAT liberal media.
