If you haven’t seen this, then you truly must watch it, I happened to be watching Countdown last night, and this speech gave me goose bumps. Amen Keith, Amen.
UPDATE (by David): Here it is. It’s a must-watch. If only there were more journalists willing to speak truth to power.
Please share widely!
I was amazed when I saw this last night. Who knew that the former sportscaster of my local LA teevee station would grow up to be such a ballbuster – go Keith!
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Check out this Diary on dKos. It’s not enough to watch, we gotta have Keith’s back when the rightwing smear machine gears up.
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Email MSNBC and let ’em know you support honest old-school journalism.
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Anybody know where I can watch Rummy’s remarks that sparked this?
Rummy Gone Wild
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Not sure if it’s the whole thing, but you’ll get the gist of it.
that more people haven’t commented on this commentary by Olbermann. I’ve been waiting to see what people would do, and I have to say, I’m truly saddened (not that my disappointment matters to anyone, but rhetorically speaking, anyway). This was truly a stunning moment. Olbermann, so intelligent, so erudite, so trenchant, articulates the rage and offense that so many of use feel at having to endure such a mockery of American government.
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Two comments? Two freakin’ (I would use the real word, but I’m afraid my post would get deleted) comments? What’s the matter with you people? Are you so parochial, so provincial that you can’t muster a few comments on the most offensive address given by an Administration member since Bush took office? That you can’t muster a few kudos for a newsguy who has the courage to call him (them) out?
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While I am heartened that so many are taking an interest in our local gubernatorial race, I am appalled that so few find Olbermann’s comments noteworthy. This is a raw moment of truth to power, spoken with an eloquence and a fire one rarely sees in anybody these days. And we’re the goddamned choir, the people who should be on our feet singing, only we greet him with silence. The choir, it seems, is preoccupied with more important matters like who has a shitload of lawn signs or is visionary in reforming public education.
But I’m totally feeling your pain. I’ve felt this way since, well, ever since Bush was elected and I’ve always wondered why this bullshit doesn’t get called out more often. Things just get worse and worse and people just sit and watch. Or not. More people are probably watching Big Brother, then even know about Rummy’s disgusting speech. The saddest part is it seems that’s the way that some folks like it.
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I tend to look at BMG as local stuff, so I tend to go to dKos and Firedoglake for discussion of national issues. More of a habit then anything else really.
go to Kos, TPM, or Think Progress for my national stuff, but still. The petty stuff that floats the boats of so many here, that prompts double-digit responses of pique and angst, is worthless in the Big Picture. The Commonwealth of Massachusetts is not a nation unto itself.
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Aaach. To make myself feel better I’ve designed a poster with the Murrow quote for my classroom. I’ll get it printed up this weekend. Can’t be said often enough, apparently:
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I’m sorry, but I have outrage fatigue. I can’t speak for everyone else. I can tell you that I’m glad that Keith is speaking out like this, but I wish the Cronkites of today spoke like this. I share your frustration, lightiris, but after 2004, it’s hard to keep it up.
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Sure, I can write a post or comment about my fury at Rumsfeld. That’s why I signed on with Dean — he was pissed and so was I. We both still are. Rumsfeld created this crisis by arming Hussein, nurtured it by participating in a half-ssed job attacking Hussein, intensified it by thinking that taking down a statue is equal to legitimizing an occupation, and glories in it by holding to ignorance with stunning steadfastness.
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We all know the assertive incompetence that was watered the Iraqi desert with the blood of our men and women, and the men and women of so many good people. But we all also know that nothing will change at all until January 2007, and not as much as we need until January 2009. I blogged earlier about the Senate races in CT and RI, and I still believe Senators Whitehouse and Lamont will do more for this than Governor Whoever. I sing to the undecideds, the waverings, the thinkers. But if I have to preach here, I’m moving back to Canada.
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I agree with everything you write here. I, too, was an early supporter of Dean and was very active in his campaign. I think he’s a rare voice in these go-along-to-get-along times. People like him don’t come along every day.
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On the local NE front, the good news is that Chaffee is in real trouble with Laffey, which sets up Whitehouse nicely. The Lamont race is going to be interesting because it’s very difficult to predict what the unenrolled voter will do. Have you been following Brown and DeWine in Ohio? Tester in Montana? There are some terrific races going on around the nation that help buoy my hopes and keep a lid on my cynicism, but one does get fatigued. I think the indifference to Olbermann’s rant, that rare moment when someone who has a forum actually uses it responsibly to say things everybody knows but few are willing to publicly say, just was too much last night.
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BTW, my family’s Canadian going back to the 1700s; I’m second generation American myself. What I would give to have been a first generation at this point….
I don’t think comments are an exact measure of interest. Besides, as Susan says, this is all over all of the national blogs. I don’t usually repeat stuff I read at TPM or Kos, unless I think there’s a need for an echo chamber effect.
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I also feel the outrage fatigue. You know, one of the reasons we started this blog is to work on things on which we could have a real effect. So I wouldn’t downplay the local stuff — people are doing what they can, where they can. This blog doesn’t have to be “big picture” all the time.
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Can’t say that I recall that I suggested this blog be ‘”big picture” all the time,’ but I understand your point. This is a local blog, certainly. That was never really the issue.
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And I’m not particularly interested in an “echo chamber effect,” either.
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Seems like I offended you. Didn’t mean to. My apologies.
No way. You asked why there weren’t more comments, and I suggested some reasons. Sorry if I seemed peevish.
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“No, after you!”
how you do go on….
I can barely believe this was on television. Too bad he’s not taking over the CBS evening news!
(1) He doesn’t cite directly from the Rumsfeld speech, so it is hard to know what he is so worked up about if one hasn’t seen it. (2) His argument that Chamberlain intentionally deceived the British people (to what end, one wonders) has not, to the best of my knowledge, been established as conclusively as he seems to think. (3) There is no good evidence that fascism, or even McCarthy-esque intimidation, has been, or is being, established. There are no black lists that I am aware of, no political show trials, no political prisoners (unless one wants to count Jose Padilla and the guys at Guantanamo). Murrow had specifics: HUAC. Either Olberman knows more than he is saying, or he’s saying more than he really can justify.
Here’s a Think Progress link to Rumsfeld’s comments.
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I think you are overanalyzing Olbermann’s comments; he was making a rhetorical commentary, not giving a lecture. I know people are very sensitive to the use of the term fascism, but reasonable people can disagree on the merits of recent usage. Robert Paxton’s Anatomy of Fasicsm, however, does help in providing contemporary context for the term. At any rate, Olbermann was not the first to use it; Rumsfeld was.
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That said, it’s the irony of Rumsfeld’s comments on the whole that are so egregious. Watch/read Rumsfeld comments comparing us to Hitler appeasers and then you make get a better sense of why Olbermann is so angry.
On the one hand, yes, Olbermann went a bit over the top with the goose-steppers and likening Rummy to a modern-day Chamberlain (and who? Murtha? to a modern-day Churchill). But, on the other, his basic point (that dissent is American as apple pie) is unquestionably a valid one. Further, in the current environment, it’s necessary for the few journos with the courage to speak out to do so loudly, with as many rhetorical flourishes as they can muster, to counter the noise machine coming from Pennsylvania Ave. I’m glad he did it.
Do you think that that Olbermann’s commentary, if viewed, could cause older and more moderate Americans, who remember WWII to “soften up” significantly.
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Can this six minute video, under all the right conditions be the watershed for this whole stinkin’ mess? The “Senator McCarthy,have you no shame moment.”
Who is the best messenger of the commentary? Not the left or even the Dems.
Not sure I know the answers. If we still had a Walter Cronkite (or an Edward R. Murrow, for that matter) in the press, that’s someone who maybe could do it, but of course we don’t.
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Oprah?
Only not from people like you; unless you are part of a much wider community that includes moderates and republicans who aren’t stupid.
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An e-mail campaign from friends to friends asking them to do them a personal favor and give them 6 minutes. Olberman is the messenger.
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But moderate dems, independents, and republicans can ask people to watch this. Bringing it to their attention. People with credibility. It should be in “On Demand” on TV and people could be encouraging others. Old people aren’t stupid. But they are trusting of government and don’t like lefties like you guys and lefty weirdoes like John Kerry. (Nothin’ personal)
But they dont like being fooled and have experiences that say it can happen on a huge scale.
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Can this be used as the main instrument to bring about the tipping point that eventually will happen anyway?
On points #1 and #2, but respectfully disagree on #3.
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UU minister Rev. Davidson Loehr delivered a sermon back in 2004 that paints a pretty stark (and accurate, imho) picture of where we stand in this country.
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It’s good to remember that “fascism” can indeed seem “friendly,” as the title of the Bertram Gross book goes; it needn’t be of the overt, sterotypical, jackbooted head-bashing kind that we conventionally associate with Hitler or Mussolini.
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And the phenonmeon of fascism — or quasi- or neo-fascism, if you’d prefer — is absolutely nothing new in this country…. Something about the convergence of economic and political power, that’s been prevalent since WWI.