Right Wing Round-Up

Maybe it's just me, but it feels like the right wing have pulled out all the stops in recent days in terms nastiness, trickery, and deception.  The following are some re-caps of recent stories.

Ben Stein disparages the unemployed

The people who have been laid off and cannot find work are generally people with poor work habits and poor personalities. I say “generally” because there are exceptions. But in general, as I survey the ranks of those who are unemployed, I see people who have overbearing and unpleasant personalities and/or who do not know how to do a day’s work.

Of course, Stein is only echoing the current Republican lambasting of the unemployed.  I guess seeing long lines of people at job fairs or at unemployment offices scrounging for the few jobs available and trying to subsist on what little unemployment insurance can be had just makes Republicans remember it was THEIR legislation removing regulations on the finance industry which lead to those people being unemployed in the first place when the economy inevitably tanked.

Stein is basically saying that, with some "powerful exceptions", 15 million people are unpleasant people and lazy.  While I am sure Stein enjoys the hard labor he does by being a talking head, I strongly doubt any of the unemployed out there compare to his sheer douchebaggery.

Dishonesty by Breitbart and Fox News leads to smearing of Obama official

MediaMatters does a nice round up of this story.  Basically, it goes like this:  Andrew Breitbart is a lying sack of shit who posted a heavily edited clip from a speech given by a Department of Agriculture official.  The clip's editing makes the speech sound like the official is making racist statements (a black woman being racist against a white man, no less).  The video goes up on Breitbart's site and then Fox News starts talking about it online, followed by on-air punditry.  The White House and NAACP knee jerk react and jump all over the official.  She resigns.  Unedited video surfaces showing she wasn't saying anything remotely racist.  NAACP retracts condemnation and the White House begins "reviewing" her case.  Long story short, the White House fell for a right wing smear campaign.  Here's hoping they reinstate her and learn from their mistake.

Right wingers lie about Obama's dog

I already posted on this earlier, but it's worth repeating in the context of the latest lies from the right wing.  Here is Snopes' take on it again:

Bo flew to Maine in a different plane than the rest of the First Family not because he was part of a special canine-only flight, but because the local airport (Hancock County-Bar Harbor Airport in Trenton, Maine) was too small to accommodate theBoeing 747-200B in which the President usually travels. Therefore, the Obamas flew to Maine in a Gulfstream GIII/G3 jet (which seats six to nineteen passengers), while Bo was loaded onto an earlier flight which carried a contingent of presidential aides and staff members.

Echoes of Fala, anyone?

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4gztvtSyTdY

Right winger offers money for assault on Democratic Representative

Another good MediaMatters catch:

Dan Gainor is a right wing pundit at NewsBusters and when confronted on this via another Tweeter, he quickly walked it back and said he was joking.  But that he would love to see the video anyway.  See what he did there?  Called for violence, claimed he was joking but then subtly called for it again by his desire to see footage of it.

Rep. Grayson, however, is not some fading flower.  He responded to the Tweet:

"I think he's overlooking something important: I punch back."