Bill Maher slams Brokaw's "Both sides do it" bullshit

[JBoy]

Recently, MSNBC host Chris Matthews had quite a tense segment with RNC Chair Reince Priebus, during which he accused Republicans of “playing the race card.” In particular, he pointed to Mitt Romney‘s joke about never having been asked for his birth certificate. In a blog post, Bill Maher lauded Matthews’ taking on Priebus, while arguing that the likes of Tom Brokaw encourage birtherism.

<snip>

While Matthews launched into a vehement disagreement with Priebus, Maher said, Brokaw “chimed in that he disagreed with Chris, and thought it was just an “awkward joke,” adding that Republican leaders should have corrected the record when people started calling Obama a Muslim and a socialist, but ‘both sides’ do it.”

Calling out Brokaw’s “bullshit,” Maher said it’s different because half of Democrats don’t believe Romney was born in a different country. “That was the whole point of Romney’s ‘joke,’ wasn’t it?” Maher asked. “‘Nobody’s ever asked to see my birth certificate’ — yeah, because you’re a white guy, you dipshit, and you’re not the victim of that kind of racism.”

<snip>

People like him are always championing “balance” over objectivity. They have to bring everything back to a discussion about how “both sides” are guilty, instead of doing his job as a referee. If every single journalist just simply labeled birtherism what it obviously is — racism — the cancer wouldn’t have infected half the party.

http://www.mediaite.com/online/bill-maher-tom-brokaw-championing-balance-over-objectivity-aids-birtherism/

[Zoeisright]

1. Tom Brokaw is an idiot.

I don't know if he was bought off or if he has dementia, but he's been an apologist for repukes for a long time. He stinks. He's one of the main parts of the problem that for some reason, "journalists" seem to think that the truth is in the middle of two positions. When, almost every time, one side is right and the other is wrong. I blame HIM for Bush/Cheney.

[Bozita]

6. He sure as hell ain't Walter Cronkite!

[Whisp]

18. He was just born with 'the voice'.

otherwise he's as stupid as a bag of hammers. Never did get why he's supposed to be some hotshot whatever he is.

[freshwest]

25. He lost my respect when he was pearl clutching over the crowds protesting the Shrub's coup in 2001.

[abelenkpe]

2. I dunno

" If every single journalist just simply labeled birtherism what it obviously is — racism — the cancer wouldn’t have infected half the party."

I think it's far more than half of those that still call themselves republican.

[speedoo]

3. Good. Need to expose Brokaw as the tool he is. Nt

[Cha]

4. Fucking Brokaw.. Thank You, Bill Maher for

Logically heaping on him exactly what he deserves. Tom Brokaw is a big part of the Problem as he sits back and Disingenuously says: "both sides do it". WTF, Brokaw..give us an example..why the fuck should we take your word? You've rendered yourself UnFReakingReliable.

[7wo7rees]

5. Maher invited Brokaw to call Bullshit on him IMHO

[Hissyspit]

7. I get so tired of the "balance bias"

Brokaw thinks he's so smart. It's not smart to deliberately or ignorantly engage in false equivalence.

[SheilaT]

8. The "both sides to it" meme is genuinely dangerous.

I'm just waiting for the justification of almost every single sentence that Paul Ryan speaks is a falsehood as "both sides do it."

No, both sides don't do it. One side lies and lies and lies, and then acts surprised that anyone cares because, after all, both sides do it.

They need to be held accountable for their lies.

Some say the earth is round. Others hold that it's flat. The truth is obviously somewhere in between. Yeah, right.

[chknltl]

10. Been pointing out to Republicans for years that the earth is round, like a basketball....

......not round like a Domino's pizza! Not sure why it seems to rankle some of them but it does.

[SheilaT]

17. I love it!

I will have to remember that line.

[freshwest]

28. True. Same as the both parties are the same, ala David Icke. The Democratic Party supports

My freedom as a woman, equal protection under the laws and saving lives that the GOP doesn't. Hearing that, I know the speaker must not expect to be affected by the GOP's libertarian philosophy, where those who have wealth, power and rights now can keep them and the rest of us can just shag off. My lack of freedom or equality under the law won't affect them. So we part ways there.

[Suji to Seoul]

9. It needed to be said. Brokaw is just parroting the asswipe idea that all sides do the same thing

and all arguments have equal validity.

Somehow, I don't understand the bullshit attitudes we have as a people today. . .but I'm tired of being told that Democrats do the same thing Republicans do.

I'm tired of Alan Grayson being compared to assholes like Michele Bachmann and Steve King (and to a lesser extent, Peter King). Grayson uses facts, logic and reality. Those three use their ass as a mouth piece.

[freshwest]

30. Not the first time Bill Maher has called the media out on their False Equivalency, as in this video:

There is nothing in the Democratic Party to equal the idiocy and bigotry of the GOP. I'm sick of it.

[mfcorey1]

11. Finally! Someone has called out that hack for his pseudo mediating. He is a bigger fraud than

Whining Joe, who show he often appears on to buffer for Joe when one his guest is kicking his ass.

[jp11]

12. It is laziness if not conscious bias

allowing those news/journalism people who can't or won't be bothered to tell the truth to just pass the buck and blame both sides.

Then they can sit back and continue to tell the message dictated by the RW corporate media with their conservative cry baby bias about how they are always the victims of mean democrats, liberals, and progressives who are actually anti-american socialists/communists/marxist/anarchists whenever they challenge their oversimplification of issues if not outright lies.

Best way to make a buck with the least amount of effort is to blame both sides and let the corporate media narrate the direction of news you are supposed to relay to the people instead of actually investigating it yourself and telling the truth. It also helps keep you off the shit list of the RW who'd label you mean nasty divisive, partisan, socialist/communist/leftist/anarchists who get lumped in with the RW nutjobs who dream of fighting off the US government when it comes for their freedom, god or guns.

You only get to avoid being tossed into the fictional pot of the extreme hard crazy 'left' if you bow to whatever the RW's agenda is and only if they don't feel threatened by you at the time.

[mgarr]

13. argument of equivalency

The argument of "equivalency"--that both right and left are guilty of the same lies--drives me crazy.

And Maher is correct.
It is the "respected mainstream media" who have allowed this argument of equivalency to prevail.

A lie is a lie. Lies can be found on both sides.

The magnitude of the lying garbage spewed by the right has no equivalency on the left.

Time to combat this equivalency argument by demanding of the mainstream media that it cease.

I remember Murrow. I remember Cronkite. And you, Mr. Brokaw, are neither.

[newspeak]

14. my SIL was a repug

we were discussing politics one time and she came up with the "both sides do it" repug BS. I informed her that both sides don't do it in the same degree. When one side does it a little and the other side does it a hell of a lot more, then both sides do not do it the same. And that's the problem of making such a statement, when one side has proven to be more corrupt, morally bankrupt and underhanded than the other. She didn't say anything after that.

[truebrit71]

15. Brokaw's false equivalency was just as disingenuous as John Stewart's was at the Reason rally..

..or whatever that was called...

Both sides DON'T do it....that's the whole fucking point...

[BumRushDaShow]

16. On Rachael last night, Dan Rather actually commented on the use of false equivalency

and I was surprised that he excoriated his fellow (probably including retired) anchors on resorting to the "both sides do it" excuse.

[porphyrian]

19. Maybe Brokaw accidentally took Ambien that time, too. n/t

[Javaman]

20. Brokaw thinks he can get away with statements like that

only because he has basically outlived all the others or had been railroaded.

He has the grossly misplaced arrogance of "elder statemen" in journalism. When in fact he hasn't done a bit of real journalism in years. He's just phoning it in now and it shows.

[indepat]

21. What a dipshit remark by Brokaw, but what can one expect of one with a history of making so many

dip-shit remarks other than even more dip-shit remarks? The "both sides do it" remark shows how delusional or chicanerously unfair and unbalanced Brokaw's views are.

[lindysalsagal]

22. Love Maher's critical thinking skills

He's like mental turpentine in a morass of irrationality, minimalizations, excuses, and distractions.

[WillyT]

23. HUGE K & R !!!

[Vietnameravet]

24. Angers me

One think that really pisses me..among a whole shit load of others..are these lazy bastards who dont bother to look at an issue and really get to the facts and so they take the easy way out and simply say "they all do it"
So easy, so seemingly objective and so seemingly fair.. and so much bullshit...

"They" dont all go around doing the things Repubs do..

I could spend another ten pages repeating the hateful divisive things these repubs have done and the damage they have caused... but everyone here knows what they are so no sense in wasting my time....'

[orpupilofnature57]

27. G.E. Disease

[Walk away]

29. I agree entirely that journalists should be reporting the truth and not give equal time to the lie..

however, in the "News" business if you are a "News" person and not a commentator you are supposed to (ideally) not take sides.

To you and I that is no excuse to report lies and truths as equal parts of the news but they do. I have friends at MSNBC who are life long Liberals who never even express their political views outside of their closest family and very closest friends.

[tavernier]

31. He has patted himself on the back for years

and beat his own chest with his greatest generation boasts. But excuse me... wasn't it his generation that sent the young men of my generation into Viet Nam to be slaughtered like lambs? I just can't listen to him anymore.

[LiberalFighter]

32. Next time someone should tell them all journalists and reporters like to twist or hide the truth.

That all journalists and reporters don't like to be objective and honest.
That all journalists and reporters are bias and corrupt.