Ari Fleischer: Fire Helen Thomas

[The Straight Story]

Ari Fleischer: Fire Helen Thomas


Longtime White House scribe Helen Thomas caused more than a few eyebrows to perk up when video surfaced on Friday of her declaring that Jews should "get the hell out of Palestine" and go back to Germany and Poland.

Captured by Rabbi David Nesenoff of RabbiLive.com, the footage made the rounds on mostly conservative and neoconservative sites, with some private complaints that her comments weren't getting wider play.

Thomas on Friday apologized in a written statement, saying she deeply regretted the comments -- which were offered, ironically, during the White House's Jewish Heritage Celebration.

But even as she was trying to walk back the remarks, calls for her firing mounted. Among the more vocal was former Bush Press Secretary Ari Fleischer, who claimed to have a close relationship with Thomas when he was manning the daily briefings.

"She should lose her job over this," Fleischer said in an email. "As someone who is Jewish, and as someone who worked with her and used to like her, I find this appalling."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/06/04/ari-fleischer-fire-helen-thomas_n_601565.html

[ananda]

1. I hate to say it...

... but I think Helen Thomas' career is toast.

This is all so sad.

[Dinger]

3. Yup, Just As I Thought

Someone asks REAL questions of this administration, and within a short period of time, the dogs come out. Fucking disgusting. (Not Helen either) "You're with us or you're against us." Makes me sick. I don't care for Helen's comment, but when DUers start referencing fleischer, well, I guess it's a matter of time . . .

[stray cat]

5. jews should get the hell out of palestine is now seen as a question?

[wtmusic]

12. It's the "going back to Germany and Poland" part which is inexcusable. nt

[notesdev]

13. And not only that

but to be sent back to the very lands where the concentration camps they fled were constructed and operated.

The undeniable truth is that a great majority of those who oppose Israel would be most satisfied if there were no more Jews at all. Few would admit it, but all they do and say points in the same direction, and it doesn't take an Einstein to figure out what the endgame is.

[wtmusic]

19. Your "undeniable truth" is horseshit

and you might be surprised to learn that many Jews oppose Palestinian occupation.

http://www.jewsagainsttheoccupation.org/

They must no longer want to exist.

[movonne]

38. I doubt that people who oppose Israel would wish there were

no more jews...because we do not like what Israel (the ones who are running the show)is doing does not mean we hate jews...no more than when bush and cheney was running the show we didn't like Americans...to say something like that is very one sided and inflammatory..

[notesdev]

66. Well then, what is the explanation

why Helen Thomas isn't condemned with the same vigor that would be applied had she uttered such a bigoted statement about any other group?

There is a special standard that is applied only to Israel, and looking for a good reason behind it one cannot find much other than that the age-old hatreds persist.

This woman uttered a statement that was a half step away from "send them back to the concentration camps" (what the Israelis of European origin fled from to avoid extermination), and it is somehow treated like no big deal.

I bet if someone says "send the Arabs back to Arabia" people would be all over it like white on rice. Yet somehow this is no big deal...

[MH1]

67. What other 'group'

had land taken away from others to give them their own state, and have significant amounts of US tax dollars defending their appropriation of the territory?

[notesdev]

73. That's an easy one

The United States, of course. We wiped out nearly a whole continent full of people. Australia and New Zealand also qualify. More recently, I'm pretty sure we did just that to Serbia not long ago.

Now if you would like to extend the question to those where US tax dollars are not involved, there's hardly a country on the planet not guilty of the charge. And please note, that the objections to Israel are very rarely about US tax dollars (an objection I support, by the way). People aren't coming out to say "why is the US supporting Israel with its tax dollars", they are coming out to say the Israelis should act this way or that - in the face of unrelenting existential threats from the very people they are called on to be nice to.

[Synicus Maximus]

79. Almost every group has had land taken away from them by

someone else. History is basically the study of one group of people taking or trying to take over somebody else land.

[crikkett]

60. What bullshit. That "truth" is deniable alright

Furthermore your own generalizations speak reams about your own prejudice.

The undeniable truth is that a great majority of those who oppose Israel would be most satisfied if there were no more Jews at all. Few would admit it, but all they do and say points in the same direction, and it doesn't take an Einstein to figure out what the endgame is.

This is absolute bullshit.

[Raineyb]

62. Bullshit.

I don't support any apartheid government and that certainly includes Israel.

[LaurenG]

78. Woah! What kind of facts are you basing your argument on?

If you can call it that. It sounds like a "poor me" post. I know no one who holds views as crass as yours, no one. You flipped this sucker out of the box and so I hope you are ready to be peppered with your own bs. Black and white thinking, us against them and now no more Jews at all? Idiocy abounds...

[notesdev]

81. What happened to the Jews who were in Germany and Poland?

If you can answer that question, then it should be damned obvious what telling Jews to go back to those places means.

[LaurenG]

88. That wasn't my issue with your statement.

I know what happened to the Jews in Germany and Poland it was genocide.
I take issue with your statement that "the undeniable truth is that a great majority of those who oppose Israel would be most satisfied if there were no more Jews at all." That's horseshit and inflammatory. Get off your demented soap box.

[Dinger]

24. No, Definitely Not That

The Afghanistan question, asked just a few days ago. It took guts, and she was the only one who dared asked it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sepLekpdF3E

My apologies for the faux news link. I couldn't find another video link.

[Yupster]

33. Jews should go back to Germany and Poland?

Yeah, that is a comment that most wouldn't care for.

When Jews think of Poland a lot of them think of their relatives who lost their lives at Auschwitz, Poland, and Germany brings back even worse memories.

Perhaps it's time to retire Helen.

[Dinger]

34. OK, Maybe Retire, But Not Fire

And let me say again, FUCK ari.

[Arkana]

44. Look, I don't think Helen Thomas should be fired. She's 89, working on borrowed time,

and there are a shitload more "journalists" with longer and more offensive rap sheets than her who still have jobs.

But her comments do deserve scorn--it's just that hearing it from "The Hatchet" is just particularly rich.

[wtmusic]

9. Agree, very sad.

An acquaintance, who can be quite personable, made a racist comment while among an ethnically diverse group of friends. It was in a moment of frustration and he apologized profusely, but those apologies are always like putting toothpaste back in the tube...there's always some left over.

I hate to see something like this happen to an older person whose career has been so productive.

[izquierdista]

26. I wouldn't be so sure

Helen is still at White House press conferences and Ari has been "watching what he should say" while spending time with his family.

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

70. Probably, because INOKIYAL. Sad. -nt

[Mari333]

2. ari fleischer can go fuck himself.

[City Lights]

4. +10! nt

[Darth_Kitten]

7. 10^10

:)

What a knob.

[Darth_Kitten]

6. Yup.................

:)

[PCIntern]

8. Even a stopped clock is right twice a day...

I don't particularly care if she's fired or not,but HOW DARE anyone say that people need to leave their country? Maybe we should all leave America to the Native Americans? We're certainly living on their conquered lands in toto.

It's a racist, obnoxious comment on her part and she didn't exactly come over on the Mayflower either, so WTF is she thinking?

[Darth_Kitten]

15. Free speech?

Were widdle Israel's feelings hurt? Wonder how the family of the murdered American feel? The families of the others killed?

[ProgressiveProfessor]

30. She has the right to free speech, whether or not she continues to have a job is something else

The grand old lady of the WH press corps is indeed getting old and perhaps a bit dotty. In her prime she never would have said that.

[Darth_Kitten]

39. Old and dotty.....well, that sure shuts up women of a certain age, doesn't it?

Maybe Obama shouldn't have a job?....everybody misspeaks.

[wtmusic]

Women have no monopoly on being old and dotty

Getting there myself, actually.

[ProgressiveProfessor]

58. Happens to anyone eventually, not gender specific

And there is a time to step down for all of us. I remember the fight to get my dad to give up driving. He was well past being safe.

[PCIntern]

47. BRILLIANT RETORT!

"Go back where you came from." that's the best she could do?

Very constructive...and helpful.

Here's an idea: why don't the Israelis just move to...say, Mars. Oh yes, in a few years they'll have it up and running and all these folks would be screaming that that's their homeland and they want it back.

[CBGLuthier]

17. When white people conquered america the world was an ignorant place

I would have hoped by the 1940's we would have had the sense not to destroy one population in favor of another. But no, the world is stupid. Always has been. Always will be. the worm turns and now Israel is as fascist as anything they were ever victimized by.

[hlthe2b]

27. I can't defend what she said and don't think anyone can...

I can imagine the overwhelming sense of frustration that she might have, being of Arab heritage and seeing the lack of progress in the Middle East with respect to the Palestinians (and in our policies towards the situation) through an incredible number of Presidential administrations and decades. Sometimes when you see injustices over and over and over, you can loose your perspective and simply lash out in a reflexive way. I think that is what happened with Helen.

To the extent her comments reflect what she truly believes, I can't fault those who are calling her out (well with the exception of Ari Fleischer and his ilck who have carried a grudge and a political agenda for years). However, I have followed her throughout my adult life and really can not believe that those words accurately embody what she believes. I just can't but I am very very sad at the entire situation.

[Rage for Order]

16. And if Helen had said...

"All those black people should go back to the plantations and cotton fields" would you be so forgiving? The sentiment is the same - blatantly racist at best

[Laughing Mirror]

23. Black people are not occupying a people's lands and trying to obliterate them through starvation

So how can you make that comparison?

[Rage for Order]

28. Huh?

The population of Gaza is increasing, so I'm not sure where you get the "Obliterate through starvation" meme.

The comparison comes in the fact that, when last we saw large numbers of Jews in Germany and Poland, things did not turn out so well for them. Sort of like the last time black people were on plantations in the South and forced to work in cotton fields.

[cornermouse]

41. That's an inaccurate analogy.

An accurate analogy, as has already been mentioned, is the indians and settlers.

Israel was forced off their land many, many centuries ago. They left Germany and Poland when they were being massacred about 70 years ago. Once it was agreed upon that they deserved recompense by being given their own country, something they hadn't had for centuries, some idiot decided to move Palestinians off land they legitimately owned, had been living up, and passing down to their heirs for centuries. They moved their hereditary enemy (Israelies) in next door and for some reason couldn't figure out that what we have now would be the end result. I don't blame them for not wanting to move back to Poland or Germany. I do blame whoever thought this was a good idea and can't help but wonder if it was a variation of NYMB theme when they were allowed to return after what was literally centuries.

Your argument is false, possibly even malicious in intent.

[Rage for Order]

51. That's all fine and good

But completely irrelevant to the issue at hand, which is that what Helen Thomas said is reprehensible and should not be tolerated. She said the Jews should go back to the countries where they were slaughtered by the millions only 70 years ago. She's a disgusting bigot who apparently supports the holocaust.

[cornermouse]

74. Baloney.

She said nothing of the sort. What she said was insensitive and without forethought but she did not advocate the holocaust in any way.

[madrchsod]

65. it was`t their land...

[cornermouse]

76. It wasn't whose land?

The Israelis who were forced off it in the, I think, 7th century or the Palestinians who had been living there since the 7th century? Think about that a little.

[Laughing Mirror]

46. 'The idea is to put the Palestinians on a diet"

When you have an occupying power stating this as their policy toward the people occupied, you are free to draw your own conclusions.

[Rage for Order]

52. Yes, shortgaes of food abound

http://static.guim.co.uk/Guardian/world/gallery/2008/sep/29/islam/[e-mail]

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_g_7Qy56LNKw/SxHwIJn-vHI/AAAAAAAAAD4/-M4Y5ohqC0c/s320/gaza+market.jpg

[Laughing Mirror]

54. Yes, surely, a land of plenty ...

RAMALLAH, 30 May 2010 (IRIN) - The amount and quality of food available to the estimated 1.5 million Palestinians living in the Gaza Strip has been severely restricted by more than 1,000 days of a near-complete blockade, states a UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) report.

“Sixty-one percent of the Gaza population is food insecure,” said Sarah Leppert, FAO’s communications adviser for the West Bank and Gaza Strip. “There is a diverse range of foods available in Gaza; the problem is people do not have the means to purchase the food due to rising poverty and unemployment, now nearly 39 percent.”

Israel's import and access restrictions continue to suffocate the agriculture sector in Gaza, directly contributing to rising food insecurity, said acting Humanitarian Coordinator for the occupied Palestinian Territory (oPt), Philippe Lazzarini, in a joint statement with humanitarian aid agencies, and the Association of International Development Agencies (AIDA), representing more than 80 NGOs on 25 May from Gaza.

Protein-rich foods such as meat and poultry are especially difficult for Gazans to afford. Families have resorted to coping mechanisms including borrowing money and relying on aid from humanitarian agencies operating in Gaza, said Leppert.

A poverty survey conducted by the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) shows that the number of Palestine refugees unable to access food and lacking the means to purchase even the most basic items, such as soap, school stationery and safe drinking water, has tripled since the imposition of the blockade in June 2007.

http://www.irinnews.org/Report.aspx?ReportId=89302

[Rage for Order]

57. Did you read the story you posted?

It clearly states that there is no shortage of food. Rather, many citizens lack the money needed to buy food. From your post:

"There is a diverse range of foods available in Gaza; the problem is people do not have the means to purchase the food due to rising poverty and unemployment..."

"Protein-rich foods such as meat and poultry are especially difficult for Gazans to afford."

"A poverty survey conducted by the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) shows that the number of Palestine refugees unable to access food and lacking the means to purchase even the most basic items..."



Perhaps Hamas and their benefactors should focus on buying food for Gazans rather than rockets and ammunition to use against Israel.

[Laughing Mirror]

61. That's right

You can have a whole pile of food beckoning to you in a market, but if you don't have the means to purchase "even the most basic items," what do you do?

You starve.

[Dinger]

35. Yeah, But he Might Like That

:evilgrin:

[Individualist]

45. ++

but watch the DLC supporters swarm to agree with him.

[Karmadillo]

10. Let's fire her right after we prosecute Bush/Cheney for their crimes.

nt

[wtmusic]

43. AND Ari.

:thumbsup:

[Ishoutandscream2]

11. And Ari, you enabled a war criminal

And thus were complicit in said crimes. You should be in prison.

[Darth_Kitten]

22. Yeah, Ari, are you representing the U.S. or Israel?

Again, what a knob.

[Codeine]

14. She should lose her job.

It was a shameful, hateful, nasty thing to say. Unconscionable.

[Admiral Loinpresser]

72. She apologized.

As well she should have. That's what reasonable people do when they make mistakes. She became emotional and made some very tasteless remarks.

But in the context of her truly heroic career, she deserves a lot of slack. Something to which Fleischer and the other thugs in BushCo are not entitled. That whole lot (I include Colin Powell) are traitors to humanity and the planet.

Let's use some perspective here.

[JonLP24]

18. Yikes

Jews should "get the hell out of Palestine" and go back to Germany and Poland.

I'm not sure exactly what she meant by that but I can't think of any positive reason to say something like that.

Wow.

I still can't believe she said that and this is coming from someone who likes her a lot and have a ton of respect for her work.

[rucky]

20. This Jew stands with Helen.

:hi:

Fuck off, Fleisher.

[Mari333]

25. [phone]

[hlthe2b]

31. Seeing her in her entirety.... good on you, Rucky...

I cringe when I see those willing to judge Helen based on this one incident (however horrific). My hat is off to you, rucky for taking the long view.

[Dinger]

32. *HUGS To rucky*

:grouphug:

[wtmusic]

36. Hmm, Helen didn't tell Ari to fuck off.

She admitted she made a mistake, and apologized. :silly:

[rucky]

42. I added that part.

She's a bigger person than I :)

[Dennis Donovan]

21. Yikes! I adore Helen Thomas, however...

...the part of her statement in which she suggests Jews should go home to Germany and Poland really sucked. She knows it did, too because she apologized.:blush:

As far as Ari Fleischer goes, he's an irrelevant dweeb.:thumbsdown::eyes:

[madmom]

29. Helen Thomas should loose her job......

only after all the politicians who have said just as bad or worse things loose theirs. I have heard many more things said about people in all walks of life, non of it very pretty. So she expressed her opinion, who did it hurt? Just as everyone else has a right to an opinion (good or bad, right or wrong) she is entitled to it.She apologized, move on.

[laughingliberal]

37. Perhaps it's Ari Fleischer appreciation day on DU. nt

[wtmusic]

40. What it should be is Personal Challenge Day

to see how many of us can avoid the kneejerk and admit that scumsucking war-enablers like Ari can be right.

[Raineyb]

64. Only the scum-sucking war-enabler is WRONG.

Ari needs to STFU. And while we're at it for whom is he speaking? It's not like he's been doing anything in the American public's favor.

[laughingliberal]

83. +1 nt

[Individualist]

48. I'll be so glad when DLC is nothing more than a nasty memory.

The Ari love is reprehensible.

[PCIntern]

49. If Ari the F said "look both ways before you cross the street",

you'd argue with that?

come on...this is an indefensible gaffe on her part...and she told the 'truth' as she saw it...points for honesty, demerits for racism.

[laughingliberal]

84. Unless he's paying her salary, I don't think he gets to say she should be fired.

I'd be willing to bet he's always been in favor of Helen being fired. I think rather than piling on with a murderous RW supporter of the murder of countless innocents in our very profitable ME wars to slam a lady who has stood for the people for decades, I'd accept her apology and look at a preponderance of the life's work of the both of them.

[JonLP24]

50. I hope you didn't mistake my post

as in support for Ari. I'm really surprised that she said what she said and I do not know how to react to this because I admire her work and asking the tough questions, no matter who is President. I do agree with the poster up-thread though that she deserves scorn and probably not her job. :hi:

[laughingliberal]

86. She apologized. I think look at the total body of work over her lifetime allows me to accept that

and move on. Of course, she has always been a thorn in the side of the RW and I'm sure they wanted her fired long before she said this.

[tritsofme]

80. Give me a fucking break.

Helen said some reprehensible and indefensible things about Israelis. You could address that, rather than attempt to obfuscate by highlighting that it is Ari Fleischer who made the comment.

Even a broken clock is right twice a day.

[laughingliberal]

87. I think Fleischer could condemn what she said without comment on her employment status.

She apologized. Her body of work over a lifetime is more than enough for me. He may be right to condemn the remarks but calling for her to be fired is overreaction. But we're used to ginned up outrage from the RW to attempt to oust those who spend their lives trying to expose them.

YMMV.

[backscatter712]

53. Fleischer can go fuck himself.

Helen Thomas made a stupid, but she apologized, hasn't made a pattern of being stupid like all the right wing hacks have, from Fleischer to Beck.

[freddie mertz]

55. As always, I disagree with at-large war-criminal Ari Fleischer. nt.

[marshall]

56. This kind of reminds me of Connie Chung's interview of Gingrich's mother

Chung got the elderly Mrs. Gingrich aside and got her to make some embarassing statements, which were then trumpeted all over the place. Regardless of what folks thought about Gingrich, the circumstances to me seemed like a reporter preying on the frailities of age.

Folks have their prejudices which are grown out of their backgrounds, but like Robert Byrd they learn to get past them, or at least quit talking about them and pragmatically go with the progression of society. But age takes away some of the clear thinking that allows one to edit one's speech.

Shame on this reporter for getting Ms. Thomas to embarass herself. And shame on her employers/handlers/assistants for exposing her to that.

[wtmusic]

59. Agree, to a certain point

but Mrs. Gingrich was not working as a professional press correspondent. I do think that if Helen can't at least hold her tongue she should retire.

[ladjf]

63. In light of the fact that the Israeli Gvt. seems to be doing everything

in it's power to enrage all of it's neighbors, I personally would be afraid to live in Israel. Sooner or later some opponent may succeed in inflicting terrible casualties, and I don't mean "bottle rockets".

[Admiral Loinpresser]

68. Ari is all chutzpah and no brains.

Fire a national treasure for intemperate remarks, since retracted? What a joke!

Wasn't Ari the one who exiled her to the back of the room and refused to call on her, because she asked the tough questions on Iraq? At a time when the toadies in the WH press corps were still ignoring their own complicity in the invasion of a country which had absolutely nothing to do with 9/11?

That dog won't hunt!

[Heidi]

69. Heidi: Helen Thomas' accomplishments reveal Ari Fleischer as the preening blowhard that he is.

Envy does not become you, Mr. Fleischer.

[Politicalboi]

71. Fuck you Ari

Bush didn't lose his job for torture. Fuck you and the horse you came in on. Who needs to hear from this asshole, and what he thinks.

[spanone]

75. ari who?

fuck him

[Sebastian Doyle]

77. Ari FLIEscher can go fuck himself

Helen Thomas made one stupid statement in 90 years. Ari makes one every time he opens his fucking lying mouth.

[Shadow Creature]

82. Who cares what Ari thinks?

Ari? Who in the world cares what he thinks?

Press Secretaries aren't paid to think.

He probably forgot how while he was one.

[Dappleganger]

85. Ari's not fit to shine her shoes.

He'll never be in the same league as her.

She's earned the right to say what she wants, IMO.

[TexasObserver]

89. Ari Fleischer is the sleaziest liar to be White House Press Secy in decades.

And that's saying something.

He should have been prosecuted for his role outing a CIA spy.

[noamnety]

90. If I have to side with either Helen or Ari

That's a pretty simple choice.

Helen spoke in a moment of outrage. The bigger sin by far is the complete lack of outrage by so many in - and not in - positions of power over so many issues.