by canadian gal, Wed Apr 23, 2008 at 08:49:55 PM EDT
seriously - keith olbermann really is one of the biggest douches in the media. and that's saying alot if you've seen the biased coverage this primary.
tonight he proved it yet again. talking about getting HRC out of the race, this is what this brilliant 'journalist' had to say...
"Someone takes her (HRC) into a room and only he comes out?"
what do you think he meant by that?
Tags: Bias, Media, MSNBC, obama (all tags)
the biggest douche in the media is Bob Johnson of BET...insinuating that Obama was a crack user, then denied that that's what he was doing.
Far bigger hack for Hillary than Olbermann could ever be for Obama.
Did you even hear his comment ~ or do you just keep repeating the'line'
also NOT everything is misogyny just because Hillary is a woman.
seriously, you guys are just as bad as Bo supporters calling racism.
sorry dude - the fact that you find this funny means that i am not feeling interested in discussing why this is offensive to women.
Wow. Do we really have to use kid gloves here? No wonder Clinton supporters rail against the media; if you think this is misogyny, good Lord. Let me take you to Free Republic or Little Green Footballs, I'll show you misogyny. Here, lemme surf over to Free Republic, I saw a picture there that would fit.
Hold on... it's here somewhere. Damn. Well, I'll find it, you just wait; then you'll see the difference.
SO, if you don't agree that Hillary is the greatest thing since sliced bread,
and you see some poor logic in the Clinton arguments, you are sexist?
If you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen!
Talk about whining!
Exactly. Unlike Hillary's new BFFs Rush Limbaugh and Richard Mellon Scaife, who are both swell guys.
um, no. let try this... how would you feel if a man said that about your mother, sister, wife, etc?
If she was running for public office, I hope she would use better arguments (logic) than she has. If she didn't you sometimes do get what you asked for, and well politics is full contact and you have to be tough.
That was what she said about Obama last week (being tough, taking a hit). Doesn't the same hold true whether you are a man or a woman?
yes - she should be able to take a punch. is that what you describe this as? disagree with her, but for progressives to allow this to go is disgraceful.
Oh, I see now what you are implying. Talk about reading way more into a comment than is there. Do you really think he meant rape? I saw it like the comment made when men fight "two went in, but only one returned." seriously, talk about only thinking the worst about people.
Do you also consider all sex between the sexes as rape? I mean, wow, I didn't realize how far from reality you are removed!
that is NOT what i am suggesting. i am stating that on the surface this statement is highly inappropriate. just like many, many, many, many, many (you get the point) comments made about HRC over this primary in the media. double-standards are a funny thing.
Pete Snyder:
"Someone's going to have to take her behind the barn, you know what I mean?" What an arse.
Olbermann is an idiot, his show is at the vary bottom of primetime ratings and as Ed Rendell said if he is already not on Obama payroll he needs to be, so why waste time on a complete ass like him. Writing about idiots and their bloviations is a waste of time.
You can't seriously think he was advocating violence towards women or something. It was a simple metaphor.
The facts of the matter are this, if the positions were reversed and it was Barack behind by every measure, if it was Barack lagging badly in financing, if Barack had lost 11 contests in a row the party elders, probably led by Bill himself, would have long ago moved and tried to talk him out of the race.
But because we are talking about the Clintons, a two term first couple, fixtures of the party for two decades, the usual rules don't apply. They aren't going to get out of the race until they run out of contests or cash. And this would be fine if she was keeping her campaigning to why she is a good choice, it would be fine if she was keeping her campaigning to why she is a better choice. But the central platform of her campaign isn't that she's better it's that he's worse. That is the bridge too far, you don't for example say you and the Republican pass the commander-and-chief "test". Unfortunately the normal rules of inter party decorum seems to be lost on the Clinton campaign. If it was anybody else they would have been shoved out the door long ago.
this is not about supporting your candidate! this is about allowing comments go that are inappropriate and offensive. but if you want to use this diary as another opportunity to promote your candidate, by all means go ahead - but in this diary i will not do it.
"You can't seriously think he was advocating violence towards women or something. It was a simple metaphor."
Oh. I get it. I guess it was like the voter in North Eastern PA we canvassed who started going on at length about how what should happen next was that someone should put a bullet in that n----r's head when referring to Senator Obama - I suppose only one would come out of that scenario also. We walked away in disgust in the middle of that revolting oratory, saying we didn't want any votes on that basis. I guess that wasn't really racism, and that voter wasn't really advocating violence, it "was a simple metaphor" and we should just get used to it.
Now if newscasters start going on in a similar vein I will expect you Obama supporters to suck it up and not "whine" about it.
Of course the race baiting and other horrible negative attacks against the Clinton campaign that have come out of the Obama campaign don't seem to count in your estimate of the destructiveness of the primary being leveled at Clinton.
I'd take 10 to 1 odds, Hillary would be the one who comes out.
It's the difference between being tough and "acting" tough.
ANYTHING with KO footage, please put a warning label in the title. I just ate, and now my keyboard needs to be cleaned.
Canadian Gal, how about explaining what the misogynist bent is here? As far as I see, it's a point about a gunfight or a mafia joke.
a joke? was he laughing? were you?
here's a little bit of media history to give you my bent:
"Over at Alternet, Eric Boehlert of Media Matters has a nice summary of the misogyny that has been so willfully directed at the first woman to ever have a real shot at the presidency. Boehlert argues that misogyny has been exceedingly profitable for Matthews.
I'm making a list of the boys who have made it their business to make Hillary Rodham Clinton's historic bid for the presidency especially difficult by tilting the race dramatically in favor of the boy candidate. Boehlert names some of the boys who deserve to be on the list of haters:
[T]he Hardball host has not been alone. This election season, we've seen a cavalcade of white, middle-age men express their deep, personal contempt for the first serious female contender for the White House. Contempt, of course, that has nothing to do with Sen. Hillary Clinton's policies or her beliefs. Instead, it's been an oddly personal disdain dressed up as political analysis.
The way Mike Barnicle on MSNBC said Clinton "look[ed] like everyone's first wife standing outside a probate court." The way Bill Kristol on Fox News said that among the only people supporting Hillary Clinton were white women, and "[w]hite women are a problem, that's, you know -- we all live with that." The way CNN's Jack Cafferty likened Clinton to "a scolding mother, talking down to a child." The way Fox News' Neil Cavuto suggested Clinton was "trying to run away from this tough, kind of bitchy image." The way MSNBC's Tucker Carlson announced that "when [Clinton] comes on television, I involuntarily cross my legs." The way Christopher Hitchens on CNBC described Clinton as being "sort of alternately soppy and bitchy.'"
..[T]he openly sexist comments have produced very few condemnations from within the industry and even less soul-searching from the (mostly male) press corps. In fact, in Matthews' case, the sexist outbursts have helped propel his career. That's how he landed on the cover of the Times magazine.
Why? Because misogyny pays.
Question: If Chris Matthews had been forced to apologize to Sen. Barack Obama for divisive, personal comments the host had made about the candidate, and if the comments had prompted civil rights groups to protest outside the MSNBC studios, do you think Chris Matthews, three months after the fact, would be photographed on the cover of The New York Times Magazine with an uproarious grin on his face?
. . [I]f he says wildly offensive and sexist things on the air, why isn't Matthews shunned instead of toasted? Why would the so-called liberal New York Times lavish so much attention on him?
Simple: The press plays dumb about the misogyny, and the Times magazine article was a perfect example. (The political press hates the word misogyny and considers the idea to be cuckoo. Click here to watch Keith Olbermann jump down Elton John's throat for even daring to utter the word in the context of the Clinton campaign."
http://womenhealth.helevele.com/uncatego
rized/misogyny-pays-women-of-america-owe
.html
Ok, I agree that many of those comments are sexist, though some are stretches.
Tucker Carlson's quote is extremely offensive and really has no place in America in 2008.
Christopher Hitchens' quote is mean-spirited and sexist (depending on what the meaning of the word "soppy" is).
Mike Barnicle's is really wacky as he is assuming all men have more than one wife. That seems like a pretty crazy quote. I'll take your word for it that it's also sexist.
I don't agree with Jack Cafferty on much (if anything), but I don't know how the quote you provided is sexist. Without the context that he is referring to, it's hard to tell. Doesn't seem sexist from just the quote though. She IS a mother, by the way.
I hate Fox News, but I don't know what the context of Cavuto's quote was either. If he was essentially saying that Hillary (fairly or not) has an image of being a bitch, that's true (the image part, not that she actually is a bitch). At the same time, he seems to be equating "tough" women with being a bitch, which seems pretty sexist.
I don't know what Bill Kristol was talking about in his quote. If he literally means "We all have to live with these damn women and their problems," that's the most sexist quote here. My guess is that is what he is saying, but I can't be sure.
Anyway, when did these guys start working for Obama? And when are you going to answer my question directly related to this diary?
What, specifically, is it about Olbermann's quote that is sexist? I'm trying to understand where the outrage is coming from. So far, you seem to be saying "Lots of white men have said things that sound sexist (and probably are sexist), so I'm going to jump on this quote from Olbermann because it too sounds like it could be sexist." How about actually explaining your view?
progressive - while i appreciate your analysis on the examples i have given, i provided them to illustrate the context by which the media (much of it anyway) has approached its 'reporting' of HRC. while there has been much justification here that KO just meant a 'mafia term' or 'take it like a man' - but i don't but it.
Ok, that's fair. I do agree that many members of the media have not been wholly fair to Hillary. And while I think there are some instances of unfairness toward Obama, I think Hillary still wins the "who has been treated worse?" contest. That being said, this specific comment doesn't seem to be the best illustration of it and hurts your ethos because you are using a mediocre (or worse) example to try to prove a larger point (unfairness toward Hillary) that could be made with much better examples.
i see your point. however many women (HRC supporters or otherwise) and i would hope men - see this comment as not exactly favourable to women. but thanks for your comment!
If you want to call him out on his bias, do so. But to say that comment reflects misogyny?
How ridiculous!!!!
Isn't it just a figure of speech?
He could have said the same thing to/about Obama. I think equality means that figures of speech get applied to you regardless of your sex.
Misogyny? HA not even close.
Olberman was making a half joke about someone high up in the DNC talking her out of continuing her campaign.
Not the greatest analogy to use, even in jest, but it was in no way related to her gender.
Keep crying Wolf Hillary-bots!
ah - now that smoothmedia has declared it not misogynistic, i have seen the light.
But, I wish you would try to understand something. We who support HRC get sick of hearing of how her continued candidacy is an effort to tear apart or destroy the party, retribution, or that she should be taken out back and put out of her misery. Many, if not most, BO supporters seem to believe this is some completely selfish and reckless crusade on the part of HRC that is opposed by the overwhelming majority of the party. Trying to strong arm HRC and her supporters to ignore the media double-standards, or inoffensive talk is much more destructive to the party in the long run than HRC's continued fight.
in addition to being a rather tame allusion to the smoke-filled back rooms of yore, where the bosses called the shots and both made and unmade candidates and presidents, Keith is making a rather funny (in my estimation) reference to Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome.
Unless you are objecting to the very oblique allusion to a possible resemblance between Senator Clinton and Tina Turner, I've got to say I see nothing misogynistic about the comment.
And this diary is as much of a waste as the "flipping of the bird" meme. Sorry.
Oh goodness. Retribution to get her out of the race? People have been trying to knock her out of the race for weeks. Let them tell her whatever they want. She's in to win, and dropping out isn't winning.
Also Keith is completely full of shit to say that the ultimate measure of electability is what the poll numbers do the days before the end result. Clinton polled even with Obama immediately before 2/5 in MA and CA and won by double digit margin and near-double digit margins. Clinton polled even with Obama in Ohio and won by a double digit margin.
I've always been unimpressed by his sanctimonious attitude, the cringe-worthiness of which was easy enough to ignore when he was bashing Bush for known errors and crimes against humanity. But someone needs to let him know that he is no Edward R. Murrow, and spending his career as a sportscaster gives him no right to tell people what the "ultimate measure of electability" is.
Olbermann is as disgusting as Rush Limbaugh.
Re your question: What did he mean by that?
He meant that he is a crass mouthpiece for his higher-ups at Double Standard, Hillary-Hating MSNBC.
It's obvious he was saying one politician would beat up (or do away with somehow) the other (mafia style. How does misogyny get into it?? It's the opposite of misogyny since it would be the same meaning whether the politician was a male or female. That's what you want. Don't you?
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