I wonder why Joe Scarborough didn't challenge Gene Robinson

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Fri Jun-12-09 07:58 AM
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I wonder why Joe Scarborough didn't challenge Gene Robinson

the way he went after Paul Krugman?

After all, Robinson wrote the same thing in his column today that Paul Krugman wrote in his.

Paul Krugman, 6/12/09: Back in April, there was a huge fuss over an internal report by the Department of Homeland Security warning that current conditions resemble those in the early 1990s - a time marked by an upsurge of right-wing extremism that culminated in the Oklahoma City bombing. Conservatives were outraged. The chairman of the Republican National Committee denounced the report as an attempt to "segment out conservatives in this country who have a different philosophy or view from this administration" and label them as terrorists. But with the murder of Dr. George Tiller by an anti-abortion fanatic, closely followed by a shooting by a white supremacist at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, the analysis looks prescient.

There is, however, one important thing that the D.H.S. report didn't say: Today, as in the early years of the Clinton administration but to an even greater extent, right-wing extremism is being systematically fed by the conservative media and political establishment.
. . .

What will the consequences be? Nobody knows, of course, although the analysts at Homeland Security fretted that things may turn out even worse than in the 1990s - that thanks, in part, to the election of an African-American president, "the threat posed by lone wolves and small terrorist cells is more pronounced than in past years."

And that's a threat to take seriously. Yes, the worst terrorist attack in our history was perpetrated by a foreign conspiracy. But the second worst, the Oklahoma City bombing, was perpetrated by an all-American lunatic. Politicians and media organizations wind up such people at their, and our, peril.

Gene Robinson 6/12/09: For days, some conservative commentators tried mightily to paint the memo as an underhanded attempt by the Obama administration to smear its honorable critics by equating "right-wing" with "terrorism." It made no difference to these loudmouths that the number of hate groups around the country has increased by more than 50 percent since 2000, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center. It didn't matter that the memo was backed up by solid intelligence and analysis. For these infotainers, the point isn't to illuminate a subject with light but to blast it with heat.And it wasn't just the Sean Hannitys, Rush Limbaughs and Glenn Becks of the world who pretended to be outraged. Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele accused the administration of trying "to segment out Americans who dissent from this administration, to segment out conservatives in this country who have a different philosophy or view from this administration, and labeling them as terrorists.". . . . . .The thing is, though, that words have consequences.

There's profit for the pundits, and perhaps personal advantage for some politicians, in calling President Obama a "socialist" and calling Judge Sonia Sotomayor a "racist Latina" and claiming that Democrats want to "take away your guns" -- in creating and nurturing a sense of grievance among those inclined to be aggrieved. But what about those who might not understand that it's all just political theater?...What we don't know is whether all the blast-furnace rhetoric coming from the right is giving validation and encouragement to some confused, angry man or woman with a rifle or a truck full of fertilizer -- the next "lone wolf," preparing to howl.

But Scarborough took off after after Krugman, actually comparing him to Rush Limbaugh, while he yukked it up with Gene Robinson, not even mentioning Robinson's column, although Robinson's column was much harsher (he called Joe and his crowd "loudmouths!").

Could it be that Joe Scarborough is a big, but empty, bully who talks a good game about someone who's not in the room, but doesn't have the guts to confront anyone he thinks might actually stand up to him?

Hmmmm.