Tag Archives: ishaan tharoor

CNN’s Tuchman Hints O’Donnell is a Totalitarian Due to Anti-Media Remark

CNN’s Gary Tuchman blasted Delaware Senate candidate Christine O’Donnell on Tuesday’s AC360, suggesting that the Republican was like the leader of a totalitarian regime, after she dared to say that the media should be left out of certain campaign events: ” I think, for most Americans, that gives you a little chill. When we go to places like Cuba and Iran and North Korea and China, we’re often kept out ” . Anchor Anderson Cooper led the 10 pm Eastern hour of his program with the latest on O’Donnell’s candidacy, particularly her interview with Fox News’s Sean Hannity the previous hour. Tuchman, who was reporting live from Wilmington, Delaware, raised the issue of her finances, and after reporting on two recent local events which the Republican attended, went into his lamentation over her stab at the media: TUCHMAN: One final thing we should mention is that, during this program, she said that the media was pushing and shoving at that particular event. I will tell you- I have been covering politics for almost 30 years, and it was nothing out of the ordinary. They were coming up to her. That’s what happens with any high-profile political campaign. And she also mentioned that, perhaps, it would be good if the media was kept out of certain events. And frankly, I think, for most Americans, that gives you a little chill. When we go to places like Cuba and Iran and North Korea and China, we’re often kept out. The media is kept out. There’s no free reporting, and it’s just something that we really don’t like to hear in the United States of America- to keep the media out . Here we have the CNN correspondent attacking a candidate who hold no office at the moment, when highest officeholder in the country, President Obama, and his Democratic allies in Congress, teamed up to break his campaign promise to “broadcast health care negotiations on C-SPAN.” Even Tuchman’s own colleague, Jack Cafferty, attacked Obama and the congressional leaders for their lack of transparency during a January 6, 2010 commentary . One wonders if he would have held those politicians to the same standard he’s holding O’Donnell. Just under two minutes later, Cooper raised the Senate candidate’s slam on the media with guest Erick Erickson. The conservative called out Tuchman for his remark: COOPER: I get the hatred of the media and stuff and stuff , but to hear a major candidate for U.S. Senate saying like- well, you know, they’re hurting my campaign by asking me questions, and they’re taking pictures of my dad on the lawn- I’m certainly sympathetic to that. ERICKSON: Right. COOPER: Someone’s family shouldn’t be bothered and stuff. But if she actually made herself available to the media, rather than run away and refuse to ask questions – ERICKSON: You know, Anderson- COOPER: I mean, it just seems odd . ERICKSON: Frankly, that’s the issue there. She doesn’t care about the national media, and she doesn’t really need to. It’s kind of the Rand Paul strategy in Kentucky. He’s raising a lot of money. He’s up on the air in Kentucky. He’s now 20 points ahead- although, admittedly, she’s behind. But they’re focused on local media, and the national media attacks- to have Gary bring up the point about Christine saying maybe there’s some events that the media shouldn’t go to, and then jumping to this is like in China and Korea and Cuba- I mean, when you hear- conservatives hear that, they’re thinking, obviously, this is biased, whether it is or not. I mean, she’s playing to her base, and the media’s just helping her .

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CNN’s Tuchman Hints O’Donnell is a Totalitarian Due to Anti-Media Remark

Time Interviewer Timidly Questions Daily Kos Founder’s Extremist Rhetoric About Conservatives

In his 7-question September 22 Q&A with Markos Moulitsas , Time magazine’s Ishaan Tharoor timidly challenged the left-wing blogger on his extremist rhetoric about how conservative Americans, particularly religious ones, are the “American Taliban.” Moulitsas was interviewed as part of his publicity tour for his new book, “American Taliban: How War, Sex, Sin and Power Bind Jihadists and the Radical Right” which “takes aim at what Moulitsas thinks is animating this right-wing revival,” Tharoor noted.   “You refer to a whole swath of U.S. conservatives as American Taliban. Is that really helpful?” Tharoor began meekly.    Moulitsas, of course, cranked it up to eleven and let loose with a boilerplate screed about how evil and subversive American conservatives are: Since 9/11, I’ve been hearing accusations over and over again that liberals like me want the terrorists to win. I have no love for fundamentalist Muslims — I think they’re basically hard-right Christians. There’s a shared intolerance. Liberals like me don’t want the terrorists to win just like we don’t want the American Taliban to win. I don’t think there’s any reason to say it nicer. It’s a two-word way to bring home just how dangerous these people are. In response, Tharoor then asked: But we don’t see these Americans blowing up statues of the Buddha or riding around in pickup trucks with AK-47s. More importantly, you don’t see Americans stoning adulterers or gays, but I see what Tharoor is getting at. Nonetheless, Moulitsas doubled down on his harsh rhetoric: The fact is that their movement is predicated on the notion that violence is a viable alternative. Abortion doctors have been killed; there’s an ammunition shortage across the country because some of these people are hoarding stores for the coming apocalypse. Sharron Angle [a Republican running for the Senate in Nevada] has warned that if voters don’t elect the right candidates, they may have to resort to “Second Amendment remedies.” The American Taliban may be more constrained by American society and laws than their Middle Eastern counterparts, but that’s not a function of tactics, more just the society they live in. Their goals are the same. This time Moulitsas gave a concrete example, fair enough, but one loopy statement by one candidate is hardly an accurate picture of the entire conservative movement. What’s more, Moulitsas unfairly associated all pro-lifers with the tiny violent fringe who are not representative of the peaceful pro-life movement.    All the same, Tharoor failed to suggest that Moulitsas might be more interested in writing a best-selling leftist screed than giving an accurate critique of his political opponents. Indeed, for the rest of the interview, Tharoor treated Moulitsas as a qualified expert to write on the conservative movement, including how Ronald Reagan would allegedly be treated as an apostate from conservatism were he alive and running for office today.    Complained Moulitsas: I also think it’s laughable that they keep on talking about Ronald Reagan as the patron saint of modern conservatism. I have sections of the book where I discuss how he would now be drummed out of the Republican Party because he was pro-amnesty, he met with our enemies, he wasn’t rabidly anti-gay, he raised taxes. He was a downright left-wing radical compared to the current bunch. Of course, various other lefty bloggers have been making similar complaints, namely Cenk Uygur, a recurring guest host on left-leaning cable news network MSNBC. But Tharoor failed to raise any skeptical notes about these talking points.   Photo credit: Alex Wong of Getty Images via Time.com website.

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Time Interviewer Timidly Questions Daily Kos Founder’s Extremist Rhetoric About Conservatives