Via TPM, and courtesy (sic!) of rightist media flack Brent Bozell and Fox News, this gem:
“How long do you think Sean Hannity’s show would last if four times in one sentence, he made a comment about, say, the President of the United States, and said that he looked like a skinny, ghetto crackhead?” Bozell wondered. “Which, by the way, you might want to say that Barack Obama does.”
You also might want to suck down a Clorox shooter, with a Sterno chaser at its back. The decision to do so would be less stupid.
Bozell might say he was provoked by Chris Matthews’ claim that everyone’s favorite amphibian gum disease “looks like a car bomber.” Which is, in fact, a stupid thing to say on many levels, but does at least bear some connection to the very broadly shared view of the Newtster as a bomb thrower. (See e.g. Bush I, and, by pretty direct implication, everyone’s favorite cyborg, Mitt Romney.)
But Bozell, were he to press such a “both sides do it” bit of weak sauce, would, of course, be (deliberately?) missing the real difference here. Calling Gingrich a man of violence assigns to him a specific crime. He has agency, individual choice, responsibility. Dude blows sh%t up.
Describing the President of the United States as a “ghetto crackhead”* falls into different order of rhetorical abuse. Bozell is saying that the President of the United States is defined by qualities, more or less immutable aspects of self and personality. “Ghetto crackheads” are (if one were to channel the disastrous Brooks) lost to the culture of their desolate place, and have abandoned agency to their drug. Such a person is inherently lesser than the non-addict, the non-cultural-determined poor. Morally, intellectually, there’s no way anyone matching the image in Bozell’s oddly torqued frontal lobes — all that skinny (black, black, blackity black) ghettoness with a monkey on its back — could possibly rise to the fully human capacity for thought and action that a properly brought up (white, white, whiter-than-white male) bomb thrower automatically acquires.
Which is to say that Bozell is a racist f**k not even trying to use the dog whistle anymore. He’s just flat out calling the President of the United States a drug-fiend slimeball (and did I mention, a black — oh no…please excuse me…a “ghetto” one?). He’s the kind of person a civilized society shuns; that he has such a bold megaphone tells you a great deal, not just about him, but about those who enable (endorse) the dissemination of those views.
Which is to say, if Fox News wants this as their brand, let’s make sure we don’t let them forget it.
Oh — and Main Stream Media: would you please, pretty please, sugar on top do me a favor?
Could you just this once ask each of the major GOP candidates whether they condemn these remarks, and the network broadcasting them? You could even ask if they think Fox owes Obama (and America) an apology.
Kthnxbai
*I’ll give him the skinny, I guess.
Image: Canadian War Bonds poster, “Je fabrique des bombes et j’achète des obligations – Achetez des obligations de la victoire.” (English: I’m making bombs and I’m buying bonds. Buy Victory Bonds!” before 1945.
Rick Massimo
It’d be nice if someone pointed out that Bozell’s conflation of Obama and Gingrich as “national leaders” is white privilege at its finest.
Yutsano
The funny thing is he MIGHT have gotten away with it if he hadn’t doubled down in his very next breath. But then he had to shoot his mouth off and attempt to throw red meat to the racist base. The worst part is he’ll have zero consequence for it. I bet Ailes is getting him his own show as we speak.
cathyx
A ghetto crack head? No way. I think he looks more like a nerd. But I really like nerds.
burnspbesq
You’ll get that Act of Contrition any time now.
And Santa will bring me a pair of these.
Samara Morgan
well “skinny” really frosts their chaps….because both human freak whale Chris Christie and Newt are too fat to be president.
Chris Matthews could have said Newt and Christie are too fat to be president — but then suzanne and khalid would be all up in his grill with moral poutrage.
;)
Bulworth
How long? Pretty long, I’d think.
japa21
No, he didn’t say that Obama looks like that. He said “you” (meaning his viewers) might want to say that. He himself would never come out and say he thinks Obama looks like that. The plausible deniability that runs rampant in right wing circles.
johnsmith1882
isn’t post-racial america a veritable paradise?
barath
Speaking of racism, I’m glad to see TPM and other semi-mainstream outlets hammering on Ron Paul’s letters. As TNC wrote, there’s a huge double standard that Sullivan and those like him are applying here (forget the hypothetical of Obama having sent out something equivalent in his own name—he was attacked throughout 2008 for things other people said and wrote).
I do wonder how FDL is handling it, though. I could imagine them defending Paul…
BGinCHI
Would even Cole care if a drone swooped down and doused Bozell with napalm?
JPL
What will the children think?
Maude
@Bulworth:
Hannity has been on the air a long time. He has said things very close to what Bozell said.
I want to see how this plays out. A year ago, Bozell would have been okay. Now? I doubt it.
Tom Levenson
@burnspbesq: Ooooh. Me too please!
gnomedad
As a white male with white hair, I’m tired of being stereotyped as a car bomber.
johnsmith1882
@japa21: i’m picturing him winking into the camera after saying ‘you’ (the viewer). u.s politics is like a cartoon these days.
Tom Levenson
@gnomedad: Then stop bombing cars.
@BGinCHI: I’m going with a “no” on this one. Not even John. Hell, even Glenzilla might look the other way.
Schlemizel
I hate Chris Matthews because he is a mindless pustule infecting the American conversation (which is to say a TV pundit) but that he is identified as on the left makes me want to shoot myself in the face.
After the revolution not only are all of these guys going up against the wall but one of my first acts as Commandante For Life will be the outlawing of all 24 hour news stations.
johnsmith1882
@burnspbesq: wow, you must be at the top of the ‘nice’ list! should we start holding our breaths for that apology now?
Enhanced Voting Techniques
How long would I last if I said Brent Bozell looks like a fading rent boy who has had an unnatural relationship with his own mother and just serviced his latest client? Which, by the way, you might want to say , Brent Bozell does.
Old white boys shouldn’t really go their on looks.
Dennis G.
Bozell is a long-time asshole with a record of dirty deeds that should have had him banished from any public role years ago. He was one of the conservative “journalist/think tankers” in the tank for Jack Abramoff. When Jack needed somebody to carry water to defend sweatshops or some other grift, Bozell was there–always ready to do whatever jack wanted done (and always willing to get his cut of the scam).
His latest scam as a “media watchdog” is just more evidence that most folks involved in the Abramoff scandal will never pay a price.
MattF
It does make me wonder what they say when they’re not on the air. Or, excuse the expression, what they think.
Zifnab
He clearly meant it as a joke. Hahaha! Why are you liberals always so sensitive? Now excuse me. I’m off to dress rehearsal for my glee club’s rendition of “Barack the Magic Negro”.
Villago Delenda Est
There’s a reason why all the sudden people are talking about Ron Paul’s newsletter past.
Ron Paul is polling well in Iowa. The Rethuglican establishment is concerned. Not with Paul’s racist past…but with his heresy of not being gung ho for the MIC. Paul has the potential of throwing a monkeywrench into their gravy train, and that will not stand. The Texas GOP has done its part, by eviscerating Paul’s congressional district so that he has retired from Congress, but Paul’s surge in Iowa upsets the fabric of the Rethuglican universe.
Maude
@Dennis G.:
I hope you do a post on his ties to Abramoff. When you get a chance.
johnsmith1882
@Schlemizel: i for one welcome our schlemizel overlord. as inane as tweety is, i’m not even seeing him in the top twenty in the first against the wall list. oh, he’ll get his, just against a wall already smeared with gore and guts.
Satanicpanic
Isn’t this the guy who’s always lecturing everyone about polite discourse?
Tom Levenson
@Maude: Second this.
Murphoney
Tom Levenson –
Consider that wasting any time whatsoever defending Matthews (below),…
…rationalizing Matthews’ unhelpful, grating, purposefully offensive turn-of-phrase even in the slightest, craps all over the point you’re trying to make. It blows your sh%t up. Don’t fall into the trap of making up excuses for him.
Bozell’s false equivalence is the thing — the fact that “both sides” isn’t just weak sauce in this case, it could never cover for throwing blatant, racist verbal bombs because it doesn’t matter what Matthews said. There is no excuse for Bozell’s words.<–(period)
Regardless, Matthews is an idiot in his own right and doesn't deserve any cover (he just didn't happen to make a racist statement).
IrishGirl
That racist pric, Bozell, needs to be fired AND the network needs to apologize to the President AND apologize to the nation
Gin & Tonic
@burnspbesq: 387 lbs! Each! Holy cow!
barath
@Villago Delenda Est:
Yeah, but I get tired of seeing self-proclaimed progressives defending the guy on vile newsletters that he made tons of money off of. (And in a classic Republican way, I might add: ginning up crazed fear of others and of the government.)
hildebrand
What will happen is utterly predictable. Matthews will apologize – the suits will demand it (due to fear), and Matthews will do it because, ultimately, he is likely a decent guy (whose mouth has always gotten him in trouble). Bozell, on the other hand, will continue to double down and likely as not blame wimpy liberals for not being able to take a joke.
It will play out this way because folks on the left have, simply put, more human decency (and a sense of shame) than the wing-nuts. It is why liberals always cave on issues, because they actually care about the people, and that means sometimes having to swallow wholly unsatisfactory results if it means that at least people won’t get hurt worse.
Its like bad guys in the movies/television shows when they are negotiating with good guys – pardon me, I am thinking of something like Dr. Who here – the good guys will always back down because they don’t want innocents getting whacked or hurt. They simply are forced into playing a longer game. It may not be as satisfying as simply bludgeoning the other side into submission, but it actually means that we care about each other and want to minimize pain and suffering, even if that means we take it in the teeth politically on far too regular a basis.
That doesn’t mean we roll over, but it does mean that we have to see how hard our job is, and how easy the other side makes it for themselves. If we didn’t care, well, we would be Republicans (which is why scorched earth Democrats are so difficult to deal with – they want to be Republicans, only with a different agenda – but they lose their soul in the process – that is not a trade I am willing to make). It means we are always having to take the slow road. We have to be patient, we have to play the long game, we have to do what is right for the people no matter how hard it is.
Makes me think of Gandhi – “When I despair, I remember that all through history the ways of truth and love have always won. There have been tyrants, and murderers, and for a time they can seem invincible, but in the end they always fall. Think of it–always.”
Zandar
The great thing about racism to someone like Bozell is that it’s a victimless crime. You can’t “prove” he’s being a racist, therefore it can’t happen, and he’s not a racist.
Best part is the inevitable sequence in which Bozell claims that people calling him racist are victimizing him, since there’s no proof he’s ever done anything racist, QED.
Same thing applies to Ron Paul’s newsletters.
And on and on the music plays.
Benjamin Franklin
They really hates them some black ass…
”
VIEWPOINT
Rep. Sensenbrenner Says Michelle Obama Has a ‘Big Butt.’ Really!!?
By AMY SULLIVAN | @sullivanamy | December 22, 2011 |
183
inShare
16
When a 17-term Republican congressman and former chair of the House Judiciary Committee says the First Lady has a “big butt,” there’s only one way to respond. So with apologies to Seth Myers (and Amy Poehler)…
Really, Jim Sensenbrenner? Really?! While speaking to a constituent–and one who has just expressed her admiration for Michelle Obama to you, no less–you decide it’s appropriate to slag the First Lady’s healthy eating initiative by saying she has “a big butt”? And then when it becomes clear that your impolitic remark might get you in some hot water, you repeat it loudly on the phone in an airport lounge and insist that you stand by your characterization?
Read more: http://swampland.time.com/2011/12/22/rep-sensenbrenner-says-michelle-obama-has-a-big-butt-really/#ixzz1hNQS5gHI
Villago Delenda Est
The only apology I will entertain from Faux Nooze, and the shitstains Ailes and Bozel, is a Captain Needa apology.
Amir Khalid
@Samara Morgan:
I keep telling you, it’s not moral poutrage. You keep claiming that being a Mormon will keep Mitt Romney from winning the nomination, let alone the election; and who is leading the Republican polls now? Romney. No one ever disputed the prejudice was there. You were never able to prove it would be determinative.
Christie chose not to run, so you’ll never know if his weight could have been similarly determinative. And the same is true of Gingrich’s weight. Fatter men than Noot have been elected president. Noot may be the fattest Republican candidate in this field; but fatter men than he have been elected president, and so far nobody has objected to his weight, nobody but you. Can you point to poll data showing that voters think Noot’s weight disqualifies him?
MattF
Point of information, fyi– the difference between an apology and an ‘apology’:
An apology has three parts
1) I did ‘X’.
2) ‘X’ was wrong and I regret doing it.
3) I will attempt to improve my behavior by doing ‘Y’.
If any of those parts are missing, it’s an ‘apology’, not an apology.
Tom Levenson
@Amir Khalid:
Nah. It’s the weight of Marley’s chain that trails behind him that will bar him from the presidency.
gnomedad
@hildebrand:
Comment of the year nominee.
The Republic of Stupidity
Indeed… indeed… and swinging a cosh to clear a path to the mic, no doubt…
Amir Khalid
@efgoldman:
Mmm … Wrenches dipped in gravy.
Schlemizel
@johnsmith1882:
There will be rewards for your loyalty good friend!
True enough he will have to wait his turn but because he identifies as liberal while acting the way he does I plan on carrying out the sentence personally and it won’t be a clean kill shot.
Slightly OT – did you know in the olden days the executioner would visit you before your date with the ax? If you bribed him well he would see to it that you got to the front of the line when the ax was still sharp. If you pissed him off he might not get the job done in one go around! This was one reason the guillotine was considered humane. I had an interesting education in High School
Linda Featheringill
@hildebrand:
Amen.
I am working my way through Gandhi’s “Non-Violent Resistance”. And work is the operative word. Not a book to just sail through.
Villago Delenda Est
If Winnie the Pooh were covered in ulcers oozing pus, this might not be a bad comparison.
daveNYC
You might say that, I couldn’t possibly comment.
Gin & Tonic
@efgoldman: “Smother that girl in chocolate syrup…”
carpeduum
Sigh….you people just don’t get it. The best thing you can do is ignore this just like the main stream media does. By doing what you just did Tom, I don’t understand how media works, Levenson you are only giving them more attention which is exactly what they want. Doesn’t matter if it’s good or it’s bad attention. They will take both.
And the more bad attention you give them with these “I’m outraged” posts, the more they will do it! You are basically reacting EXACTLY the way they want you to.
So your response will be…..”so I should just let these people get away with saying vile racist stuff”. The simple answer is yes. Especially when it comes from a place that thrives on attention. Namely, obscure Faux Noise morons.
dead existentialist
Skinny ghetto crackhead?
Cat Lady
I said this in kay’s thread about voter frauds always coincidentally being Republicans, but it holds here too – every single Republican is projecting, every time they open their mouth. Fox and radio have given them license to say it loudly and proudly, and that’s why they can’t help themselves. Their bubble is impermeable to reality or shame or self awareness. Republicans are clinical sociopaths and all of them need professional help.
4jkb4ia
@efgoldman:
You got home from the hospital? When was this? (Glad to see it)
Tom Hilton
In Bozell’s thesaurus, “ghetto” and “crackhead” are both acceptable synonyms for African-American.
4jkb4ia
I am glad that Tom isn’t completely speechless. It says everything that Bozell chose to go to a racially charged simile instead of an insulting cliche that liberals have asserted about Newt since he was Speaker. Attack that–it will give you an opportunity to mock liberals.
gbear
@Amir Khalid:
Now isn’t this the point where you try to find a compromise with John Cole, who’s actually in a mood for Italian?
Bex
@MattF: The Not-An-Apology:
1) Mistakes were made.
2) I am sorry IF anyone was offended.
3) crickets.
burnspbesq
@johnsmith1882:
It’s just a matter of having the right lobbyists. Santa’s no different than the Department of Agriculture.
Mnemosyne
@Schlemizel:
Fun fact: Anne Boleyn’s execution was delayed because King Henry VIII hired a special executioner (from France!) who chopped heads off with a sword instead of an axe and the guy didn’t arrive on schedule.
Bex
@Schlemizel: If you were nobility you could be assigned an executioner who was an expert with a very sharp sword.
Bex
@Bex: @Mnemosyne: Great minds…
Lojasmo
@Amir Khalid:
With all due respect, have men fatter than noot been elected president in the age of teevee? I suspect no.
johnsmith1882
@Schlemizel: all i ask is that i get to do george will. that bowtie would double nicely as a tourniquate.
no, i didnt know that, but it makes sense. the closest we had in high school to that was watching the made-for-tv movie about the guy who was executed in wyoming via a firing squad. and the only thing that i remember about that is that ‘don’t fear the reaper’ is about the coolest song ever when you are fifteen.
trollhattan
@Villago Delenda Est:
Especially if Pooh were seeing a younger, hotter Eeyore.
Also, too, Newton looks like the guy who would recruit and send out car bombers. The old guys never martyr themselves.
elmo
What gets me is not so much that this is what came to mind. It’s his barely suppressed outrage.
Think of what it must be like inside his head. For three years, he’s had to control the overwhelming urge to yell at people, “But he’s BLACK!” But he knows you’re “not supposed to say that.” And since “black” in his mind is just as disqualifying as “fat” or “hideous” or “looks like a car bomber” might be to somebody else, he translates “can’t say BLACK” into “can’t comment on appearance.”
So when he hears somebody on his side being mocked based on appearance, he sees that as violation of the rules that everyone has apparently agreed to, in not allowing him to point out that the President is BLACK. You can see it – he practically explodes with the need to even the scales. He still knows that you can’t just come out and say “Can’t you see that he’s BLACK!” But he can use the same words in public that “BLACK” mean in his own mind.
rikyrah
CAC is….
as
CAC does…..
Rathskeller
@elmo: this. well done.
Churchlady
@cathyx: I think he’s handsome and warm and looks smart and has a GREAT smile. But then the Right thinks we who are white and like Obama are besotted with racial guilt and give Obama a pass. Nope – we just pay attention to who he really is.
Churchlady
@Lojasmo: As far as Newt’s being fat, apparently the Sin of Gluttony has been repealed for the religious right. His suits are fitting worse every day he campaigns. I think between his obvious self indulgence in food his equally obvious conspicuous consumption of jewels makes him pretty suspect in the minds of the middle class working people. And then he opens his mouth and removes all doubt.
Roger Moore
@Villago Delenda Est:
Yeah, it’s because they’ve actually started to treat his candidacy seriously enough to bother looking at his past. If there’s something that needs explaining, it’s that the media hasn’t explored the issue before, not that they’ve finally decided to care about it now. Paul and his supporters have kept whining about how the media never paid attention to him before. How do you like the full media glare of a presidential candidacy now, Dr. Paul?
Roger Moore
@Bex:
I think 3) is actually:
3) I’ll make sure the mikes aren’t on the next time I say it.
Mnemosyne
@elmo:
That’s the weirdest thing — it’s like they think that none of the rest of us have noticed that he’s BLACK! and if they just bring it to our attention, all of a sudden we’ll say, “Holy shit, the man is BLACK! He can’t be president!” Like it’s some kind of instant disqualifier.
Not to speak ill of the people who raised me, but I remember that my mom tried to argue with me in 2008 that it was somehow a disgrace that our country would be represented by BLACK PEOPLE! and she got intensely frustrated with me that I just didn’t get why that was so bad.
wrb
Rush will just explain that, the best people, like himself, are built for comfort, not for speed, and the right will fall in behind the Newt.
And what does Obama do stay so skinny, anyway. Bozell might be the first of many to imply that skinny suggests unsavory indulgences.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GlBqo8Pco_A
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fJ2UadHc_Qg&feature=related
Brian S
Am I alone in thinking that if ABL had written this post instead of Tom, that some of the regulars here would have been falling over themselves to question whether or not what Bozell said was, in fact, racist?
Thoughtcrime
@Roger Moore:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r90z0PMnKwI
suzanne
@Samara Morgan:
Too late. I already posted this to my Facebook page this morning, expressing my objection to discussing his body at all. Fat or skinny, it’s not germane to his performance as President, and as a feminist, I deeply believe that one’s body is one’s own, and is not for public consumption.
It says a lot about you that you think lookism is an acceptable prejudice.
suzanne
@efgoldman: You were in the hospital? But are home now? I’ve been busy for the past couple of weeks and have missed a lot, but I hope you’re doin’ OK! Best wishes!
Schlemizel
@johnsmith1882:
Since you joined up early I’ll allow you Will & toss in Tucker Carlson & his bow tie too!
I still like Don’t Fear the Reaper!
David Hunt
@Tom Levenson:
Nah. It’s the weight of Marley’s chain that trails behind him that will bar him from the presidency.
Would that such things were true, this country would be a very different place. Remember Newt: All mankind is your business.
Mnemosyne
@suzanne:
I’m just waiting for her to tell us again that prejudice against fat people is a genetic trait even though our current cultural preference for thinness is only about 50 years old. That’s always good for a larf.
Calouste
@Gin & Tonic:
I thought you were talking about Chris Christie and Newt Gingrich there.
David Hunt
@Schlemizel:
Since you joined up early I’ll allow you Will & toss in Tucker Carlson & his bow tie too!
Ooh, can I be an early adopter and get Neal Boortz? I wouldn’t want to put him up against the Wall though. I’d put him in a transparent glass container and hang it in public. He’d be fed and watered through an opening in the top and that would go on until he drowned in his own bodily wastes. It’s the only way to get rid of pundits.
different-church-lady
I just wanna know if even for 3 seconds it occurred to Bozell or anyone else at Fox that saying Gingrich looks like a car bomber AND saying Obama looks like a crack head are BOTH wrong?
Hell, I wonder if it occurs to anyone here.
The first thing I’d do if I were supreme ruler is get rid of all cable news. Every single bit of it, left, right, or center. It’s all porn, and it’s all toxic.
different-church-lady
@Brian S: Alone? Not in the least.
The funny thing is that until I saw your comment I thought ABL had written this. Which I chalk up to my Percocet disorientation.
Calouste
@Bex:
Having your head chopped of was a privilege for the nobility anyway. Commoners were hanged, if they were lucky, or otherwise burned at the stake, broken at the wheel, impaled or some other treatment from the vast catalogue of execution and torture methods that existed in medieaval (and also somewhat more recent) times.
WereBear (itouch)
@elmo: Brilliant! That is so exactly what is going on.
Bozell has a bit of nerve opening the “appearance” door. He’s one if those, like Krauthammer and Rove, who do have some Karnic pushback going on, lookswise. Heck, I just watched the old Christmas Carol with Gene Lockhart, who is chubby and balding and adorable and attractive… because his character shines through.
j
Not snark, but Bent Bozell looks like a child molester. Really. There is something creepy about him.
Uriel
@Brian S: No, definitely not alone.
Tom Levenson
@different-church-lady: ABL would have been much funnier.
She does both high and low dudgeon better, also too.
wrb
Well, at least Bozell didn’t call Martin Luther King a “lying socylist satyr”.
Ron Paul did.
j
@suzanne: I’ve heard MANY pundits refer to Christie’s weight, but not in the sense of him being too fat “looking” to run, but him being too fat and out of shape to keep up with the grueling pace of a national election campaign. They were all afraid that he would either have a heart attack, stroke or collapse from exhaustion.
Allan
Jane Hamsher’s pissed that she didn’t think to call him that first.
Amir Khalid
@j:
Assuming Chris Christie doesn’t suffer (yet) from bumness of the ticker, I imagine that the physical rigors of a Presidential campaign — among them, being kept too busy to stuff his face as usual — might actually help him lose weight.
gnomedad
It still makes no sense. Maybe he meant to say Newt looks like a car bomb.
Odie Hugh Manatee
@Brian S:
No.
Odie Hugh Manatee
@j:
Exactly. Excessive weight can be an issue when discussing a potential President. Everyone has health issues of one sort or another but being excessively overweight just adds to it. Sorry but that’s just the way it is today. It is for now but maybe it won’t be an issue once everyone in America is supersized.
I believe that we will be there soon so be patient! ;)
Rathskeller
Back in 2007/8, I looked around on some white power sites to see what they were saying about the GOP candidate. With few exceptions, all the people on those sites were strong backers of Ron Paul, basically saying “he’s one of us.” I didn’t understand it at the time, since I didn’t know about these news letters, but there was clearly shared knowledge about Ron Paul. Correct or not, I am certain that they believed it.
Schlemizel
@David Hunt:
I LIKE you! You are on the short list of vice-commendate for life!!!!
vector56
Obama has ordered the killing of countless little Brown people in the Middle East during the 3 years he has been president. I ask you, which is more racist; words or deeds?
Admiral_Komack
Brian S.:
“Am I alone in thinking that if ABL had written this post instead of Tom, that some of the regulars here would have been falling over themselves to question whether or not what Bozell said was, in fact, racist?”
No, you are not alone.