WatchdogThe t h e m r c ’ s m o n t h l y m e m b e r s ’ r e p o r t CREATING A MEDIA CULTURE IN AMERICA WHERE TRUTH AND LIBERTY FLOURISH Vol. 18 • Issue 3 • March 2011 Conservative Incivility = Wrong; Liberal Hate = Okay The liberal media regularly tag con- Republicans as “a group of unqualified, servative speech as hateful or extreme. unstable individuals who will do what MRC Headquarters • Alexandria, Va They go ballistic when conservatives call they are told ... and march this nation federal spending “socialist” or say gay as far backward as they can get, INSIDE marriage is “immoral.” Liberals even backward to Jim Crow, or backward to whine about the word “Obamacare.” the breadlines of the ‘30s, or backward PAGE 3 Such speech is intolerable and wrong to to hanging union organizers.” MRC Special Report the liberal media and must be silenced. Earlier in 2010, Olbermann de- Documents Liberal Media’s They want conservatives to shut up or scribed Massachusetts’ GOP Senate can- Vicious Assault on Ronald be shut down. didate Scott Brown as “an Reagan’s Legacy But when media liberals irresponsible, homopho- attack conservatives, it’s bic, racist, reactionary, PAGE 4 Bits & Pieces: different on two counts. ex-nude model, teabag- What Court Ruling? First, their attacks are far ging supporter of vio- What Other Court Ruling? more direct, ugly ad ho- lence against women and Obama’s Uprisings, minem, ruthless personal against politicians with The Anti-Palin Wing, slurs. Second, it’s perfect- whom he disagrees.” Wacky Hardball ly okay to them because In trashing GOP op- PAGE 6 they’re just trying to stop position to Obamacare, Brent Bozell’s old, repressive ideas from MSNBC’s Ed Schultz said Nationally gaining traction. MSNBC host Ed Schultz in 2009, “The Republi- Syndicated Column: It’s a double standard on Republicans, “They cans lie! They want to see Planned Parenthood, Spiked that says conservative want to see you dead! you dead! They’d rather speech, no matter how ac- They’d rather make make money off your PAGE 7 money off your dead MRC in the News curate and professional, is dead corpse! They kind of wrong. But liberal talk, no corpse! They kind of like like it when that woman it when that woman PAGE 8 matter how venomous, is has cancer and they don’t has cancer ….” MRC’s Legacy Society acceptable. have anything for her.” Here at the MRC, we document, ex- In 2009, liberal radio host Montel pose, and neutralize liberal media bias. Williams called on Rep. Michele As part of this, we keep track of some Bachmann (R-Minn.) to slit her wrist of the most incivil attacks against con- and then advised “a better thing. Move servatives by the media. In this letter is that knife up about two feet. I mean, a small sampling of those acidic verbal start right at the collarbone.” Also, assaults we’ve gathered documenting, liberal radio talker Mike Malloy cheered proving, how it is the Left that is respon- in 2009, “I have good news to report: sible for hate speech in America. Glenn Beck appears ever closer to On MSNBC’s Countdown a week suicide. I’m hoping that he does it on www.MRC.org before the mid-term election then-host camera.” Keith Olbermann described Tea Party Continued on page 2 The 2 Watchdog MARCH 2011 Continued from page 1 On Apr. 18 last year, Time’s Joe Klein lectured that he had read the definition of sedition, “and a lot of these statements, especially the ones from people like Glenn Beck, and to a certain extent Sarah Palin, rub right next — right up close to being seditious.” MSNBC’s Cenk Uyger railed on Aug. 26, “Tonight, we start with the party of hate. The Republican Party in this country has been running on hate and division for the last 50 years.” Although no evidence ever surfaced that Tea Party activists made racial epithets toward congressmen at a March 2010 rally on Capitol Hill, the NYT’s Frank Rich wrote, “There’s nothing entertaining about watching goons hurl venomous slurs at congressmen like the civil rights hero John Lewis and the openly gay Barney Frank. … How curious that a mob fond of likening President Obama to Hitler knows so little about history that it doesn’t recognize its own small-scale mimicry of Kristallnacht.” While CBS’s Jeff Greenfield described the Tea Party in September as “new militancy on the right,” ABC’s Dan Harris said they were partly driven “by a refusal to accept a black president.” The liberal media even blamed the Tucson shootings on conservative speech. A typical example was CNN’s interview, 4 hours after the shooting, of the Arizona Daily Star’s David Fitzsimmons, who said “it was inevitable” because “the right in Arizona, and I’m speaking very broadly, has been stoking the fires of a heated anger and rage successfully in this state.” Examples of left-wing violent speech as documented in the MRC In other words, conservative ideas lead people to Special Report, The Real Radio Hatemongers. President Brent kill other people, including the assassination attempt Bozell discussed these hateful comments on Fox’s Hannity on Jan. against Democratic Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords. 14, in light of the liberal media coverage of the Tucson shooting, The liberal media despise conservative ideas (and which tried to blame conservative speech for the violence. their spokesmen) because they resonate with the vast When Republican Sharron Angle ran against majority of Americans. Give people the truth and they’ll Democratic Senator Harry Reid in Nevada, ABC’s Joy take it, which is why conservative talk radio, Fox News, Behar, on Oct. 26, said Angle should “Come here, bitch! and the alternative media are so successful. Come to New York and do it!” and gleefully added, To win the battle of ideas, liberals have to spin, “I’m telling you right now, she’s going to Hell! She’s slant, distort, lie and censor conservatives. It’s the only going to Hell, this bitch!” way liberalism can advance in America: control the As for conservative Sarah Palin, who the liberal message. That’s why our mission is so vital. media attack every day, writer Joe McGinnins told We have four divisions, 54 employees, and a relatively NBC Today on June 1, 2010: “I think it’s probably a small budget compared to the media behemoths ABC, lesson for the American people of the power Palin has CBS, NBC and CNN. But we do a heck of a lot of damage to incite hatred and her willingness and readiness to do to their battle lines every day. We’re America’s media it. She has pushed a button and unleashed the Hounds watchdog, and we won’t be muzzled. We’ll always tell of Hell, and now that they’re out there slavering and it like it is. barking and growling. ... That’s the same kind of tactic that the Nazi troopers used in Germany in the ’30s.” Sincerely, On election night 2010, MSNBC’s Chris Matthews wondered if Palin would look like “an imbecile” on Jeopardy: “Does she know anything? … Have you ever L. Brent Bozell III seen her reading words on a piece of paper? Have you Founder and President ever seen her read something?” The MARCH 2011 Watchdog 3 • SPECIAL REPORT • SPECIAL REPORT • SPECIAL REPORT • SPECIAL REPORT • SPECIAL REPORT • SPE MRC Special Report Documents Liberal Media’s Vicious Assault on Ronald Reagan’s Legacy As a nation, we have been celebrating the 100-year anniversary of Ronald Reagan, which is very good. But let us not forget just how much the left-wing media disliked this man, and how they attacked him at every turn. In a new Special Report, the MRC documents how the liberal media smeared Ronald Reagan during his presidency, and how they continue to attack his great achievements and conservatism now, more than 20 years after he left office. The report, Rewriting Ronald Reagan, was prepared by the MRC’s senior analysts Brent Baker, Tim Graham, and Rich Noyes. Below is just a sampling from the more than 100 quotes and video clips in the report. (To read the entire report, visit www.MRC.org.) “Reagan’s approval ratings “I predict historians are go- “It’s with Reagan, who set a never put him in the top rank ing to be totally baffled by how standard for exploiting white an- of most popular presidents; that the American people fell in love ger and resentment rarely seen was always a myth. And his con- with this man and followed him since George Wallace stood in fectionary, heavily scripted pre- the way we did.” — CBS’s Lesley the schoolhouse door, that the sidency tended to lead the coun- Stahl on NBC, 1/11/89 Republican [Party]’s selective try backward.” — Newsweek’s “Oh, Ronald Reagan and the memory about its race-baiting Jonathan Alter, 12/31/91 magic of the marketplace was habit really stands out.” — Jack “Good morning. The Gipper the theme of the ’80s. Greed in White, Time, 12/14/02 was an airhead! That’s one of this country is associated with “What Reagan did was de- the conclusions of a new biog- Ronald Reagan.” — Eleanor Clift, stroy the economy!” — Sam raphy of Ronald Reagan that’s Newsweek, 7/29/90 Donaldson, ABC’s This Week, 3/28/93 drawing a tremendous amount “People who want to give Ron- of interest and fire today.” — ald Reagan the entire credit for “And so it goes with President Katie Couric, NBC Today, 9/27/99 the collapse of the Soviet Union Bozo...coming to the end of his “Reporters should have been ignore the fact that the Soviet eight-year reign, and reign it has writing for the entire eight years economy was collapsing and the been, no matter how it rained of his reign that this man was Reagan Administration covered it on the poor.