I don’t have anything special against Mark Halperin. Okay, that’s not true, I think he’s a sociopathic douchebag. But what bothers me most about him is not his poor sense of humor or poor track record of predicting things accurately, what bothers me is that he presents himself as a non-partisan observer. He’s a Republican, his dad served in the Nixon White House, he loved the Bush White House even more than the rest of the Villagers, I could go on and on. Every now and then, the mask slips, as when he called Obama “a dick” yesterday.
It’s going to be a blast watching him and Mika and Joe Scar cry about Jon Huntsman’s failed candidacy.
stuckinred
It was today.
Dexter
But then this is a good news for John McCain.
JGabriel
When you throw away a used douchebag, it gets picked up by the garbage collector, sits in the dump, dries up, and develops a kind of crust around the rim.
That crust is Mark Halperin. Douchecrust.
.
Chief Brodie
I wonder what Halperin is paid for that level of analysis. But then, this is why I can’t stomach the Morning Joe show. They try to present themselves as measured, but everyone tries so hard to get a sound bite.
Han's Solo
I’m going to keep reminding people that Halperin is the same doofus that said that John McCain not knowing how many houses he owns was bad news for Obama.
That is f’n stupid.
But you are missing the point. This is just the first step of next year’s version of the Southern Strategy. The goal this time will be to paint Obama as “The Angry Black Man.” Last time brought us Ground Zero Mosques (which wasn’t a mosque nor at ground zero) and the New Black Panther Party (another group of scary black men.)
arguingwithsignposts
I love joe scar’s attempted explanation: the new producer didn’t know how to use the seven-second delay button. Has anyone ever witnessed the use of a seven-second delay button on any of the live shows on msnbc or the other cable newsers?
Also, an interesting question: since it was obviously premeditated, would this fall under the “fleeting expletives” fcc rule? Lawyers?
wenchacha
Republicans never complain about Cheney being a dick 24/7.
OzoneR
Oh, I thought if Obama used the bully pulpit, the media would just broadcast what he says without commentary or spin.
Isn’t that what everyone smarter than me told me. All those people who also said Harold Koh should be appointed to the Supreme Court.
TheColourfield
When you throw away a used douchebag, it gets picked up by the garbage collector, sits in the dump, dries up, and develops a kind of crust around the rim
I agree but really don’t want to know how you know this
Poopyman
Still, I think the point needs to be made that the Republicans are such enormous dicks that they need called on it, and they’ll squeal whenever somebody says something “mean” (i.e. accurate). Halperin’s hyperbole was that squealing. I wouldn’t complain if Carney pointed this out again and again, but of course the White House is “above the fray”.
JPL
Well a friend told me that Halperin suffers from small dick syndrome.
Alex S.
In my heart, Halperin will always be hack #1.
Bullsmith
Clearly the President needs to follow the collegial, respectful tone set by so many Republicans and exemplified above all by the Tea Party.
OzoneR
and this is supposed to accomplish what exactly?
1.) Call Republicans assholes
2.) ???
3.) Job creation
vtr
It’s just a tactic to get the twelve year olds to vote GOP.
Han's Solo
Here is a link, please contact MSNBC and tell them this kind of thing is not acceptable.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10285339/
bkny
it was this morning; and markie mark had to apologize later in the show. meeka was mortified that he said ‘dick’; the rest of the frat pack got a big laugh out of it… oohhh, mark said ‘dick’…
fucking children.
Culture of Truth
So Obama touched a nerve with Team Rove/Halperin. Carney needs to point it out every day from the White House podium? To those who would pay attention, it’s already obvious.
Surly Duff
All this villager bullshit is tiresome. The past two or three weeks have been spent complaining that no one knows what the President wants because he wasn’t on the television telling everyone what he thought about the negotiations. Talking head rending garments and asking, “How is anyone supposed to know what the administration thinks about all of this?”(nevermind that Biden, as the administration’s rep was at the negotiating table the entire time). And then when the Pres does step up and lay out exactly what he will and will not accept, he is called a dick and questioned whether it was appropriate to step into the negotiations now. Whether his involvement will hurt the ability to compromise.
The media…Fuck em all. Fuck Halperin the most of all. Game Change was a pile of shit that can’t even be used as toilet paper.
Zandar
Can’t have what the President said be news. Has to be what Halperin said.
MarkJ
Of course Halperin has small dick syndrome – there are far larger dicks all over Faux News. Try as he might he just isn’t that big.
Culture of Truth
You’ll never whining so loud as from bullies
SiubhanDuinne
@stuckinred #1:
I suspect Halperin says that pretty much every day, so DougJ is technically correct.
Lysana
MSNBC has apparently stated that Mr. Halperin has been suspended indefinitely. Couldn’t happen to a more deserving bit of dick cheese.
Poopyman
@OzoneR:
Pointing out the fact that Republicans engage in smear and innuendo while simultaneously whingeing about the slightest pushback is hardly the same as calling them assholes. And Democrats do want to see some pushback.
JGabriel
arguingwithsignposts:
Not a lawyer, but I think intent would compensate for “fleeting” here. Halperin asked about the 7 second delay before using the the vulgarity, and clearly expected the producer to blank it out of the audio.
Anyway, I’m not even sure dick would show up on the FEC’s radar. It’s a pretty mild and widely accepted vulgarity.
.
Valdivia
I remember that David Plouffe and/or Axelrod stated clearly that they actually knew they were doing ok if Halperin told them they lost the day/week. I think Halperin hates that he was never able to game the Obama team during the election and is trying to make them pay for not bowing to him. Aside from everything DougJ mentioned.
OzoneR
bully pulpit!
Han's Solo
Lysana – They did? Sweet.
I’m sure they’ll find a replacement. It’ll probably be Pamela Geller, or some other wingnut extremist.
OzoneR
I’m sure David Brooks will tell us how Obama only fueled the fire of partisanship and increased the chances of default by not ending Medicare and sucking Eric Cantor’s cock.
kd bart
I’m surprised that MSNBC suspended Halperin so quickly.
NonyNony
And how much authority does the Federal Election Commission have to regulate MSNBC anyway (okay, now I’M being a dick.)
Ahem. On a more serious question – since MSNBC is a cable channel and not a broadcast channel, does the FCC have much to do with regulating content anyway? I’ve heard far worse things that “dick” come out of the mouths of folks on non-news networks.
OzoneR
No, they don’t, they want to see effective pushback. They’ll never see it because there will never be effective pushback.
Dave
This is just sad. And it’s not that Halperin said “dick” – it’s that “dick” somehow now passes as political commentary. We used to produce people like Twain and Mencken and Parker. Now incisive commentary for the masses is calling someone a “dick”.
That aside, Halperin can cram it with walnuts.
biff diggerence
Snowflake Snookie has not been passing many public farts recently, leaving the pillowbiting Halperin with too much time on his hands. Dick? It’s what’s for breakfast for Snarky Mark.
Culture of Truth
Republicans like Halperin have trying to make Obama into a mean jerk forever; it isn’t going to work.
What’s more, it’s self-defeating. My Republican friends vote GOP in part because they think Republicans are meaner and therefore tougher on issues like terror, law & order, excessively generous spending, etc. Whining about how mean Obama is to them like Eugene Robinson going on tv saying Republicans are just too darn compassionate. It’s laughable, but if it were true it would only help them.
JGabriel
NonyNony:
Nah, you’re not a dick — you’re right. It should have been FCC, not FEC. I fucked up. C’est la vie.
.
UncertaintyVicePrincipal
Well the good news is that you can therefore be assured that the President was being no such thing yesterday, since Halperin is most famous for the most inane ever among his inane pronouncements, when John McCain had been asked how many houses he owned and said “I can’t remember”, and Halperin pronounced on This Week “looking back this will be seen as the worst week for one of the candidates… Barack Obama”.
He then blathered something about how this is because it “opens the door” to Reverend Wright or something or other, as if Birthers and racists need anyone to open anything, since they seem to just barrel right through walls leaving a racist-shaped hole behind on a regular basis. Thus “Great news for McCain!” took its maiden meme voyage.
But I digress. The point is, I thought yesterday was the first time in some time that Barack Obama was being entirely reasonable and for once fair to “both sides” rather than you know, slamming the left to score points with the right and yes sorry, he does that, but not yesterday. And the point of course here is that if there were any doubt how the rest of the world will see it, well, choose the opposite of what Halperin says and you’re gold.
LittlePig
I’m surprised that people are surprised. Halperin has been such an obvious hack for years, I can’t understand the kerfuffle over his (mild) words. He and that little twerp with the bad glass eye have been “The GOP Can Do No Wrong” go-to guys on Joe for ages.
kd bart
I give it till about 2PM before Fox starts demanding that Comedy Central suspend Jon Stewart.
LittlePig
Dave @30That aside, Halperin can cram it with walnuts.
I see what you did there.
Scott
They suspended Halperin for saying “dick” but they’ll never, ever get rid of Buchanan…
Valdivia
I would second OzoneR and note that every time Obama gets even a little hot under the collar he gets called out on it by the media. Why is he picking a fight? Why is he so mean? So this is what happens when he uses the bully-pulpit. First they say he is not engaged, out of the loop etc, then when he does what they call for, he gets castigated for it. Obama will have to go back to the 2008 strategy of circumventing the Village to win the election because they are actively rooting against him.
Linda Featheringill
I saw this clip and it reminded of the comic who was doing Obama imitations entertaining a group of Republicans. His jokes were a bit edgy but I didn’t think they were racist. HOWEVER, I did think that the laughter was racially motivated. I have seen that kind of laughter before and it is specific and can be recognized.
Okay, so Mark Halperin is beyond redemption. But don’t let Joe and Mika try to tell you that they were shocked and dismayed to hear what Mark said. They loved it. And then they put on their straight faces and went on.
Any apology they present will be a lie.
Southern Beale
Yeah well I remember when it was considered the height of treason to say you were ashamed the president was from Texas. My how times have changed!
I love the liberal media! Meanwhile, MSNBC has indefinitely suspended Halperin. But Time Magazine …? Clearly their senior political analyst’s impartiality is a joke.
Poopyman
@LittlePig:
??? Whoozzat? Mika?
Violet
That clip is interesting. It’s not like the word just slipped out. He clearly wanted to say it, had them check for the seven second delay, said he was going to say and bad word and then said it. So he can’t just claim, “I got careless in the heat of the moment” or something dumb like that. He wanted to say it. Good for MSNBC for suspending him.
4tehlulz_lite
inb4 Halperin becomes a right-wing martyr
Montysano
On a related note, while channel surfing last night I stumbled on Ben Stein on O’Reilly’s show, with Laura Ingraham hosting. Stein was talking about how tax cuts don’t create jobs, and started to lay out actual facts to support his case. Ingraham went into panic mode, basically babbling nonsense to drown him out until they could escape to a commercial. It was fucking bizarre. After the commercial, Stuart Varney came on to provide some snide-Brit dismissal of Stein.
Culture of Truth
Second what Dave said.
As Segreti says in All the President’s Men, at least have a little wit attached
handsmile
Please remind me, who was the political commentator banned from the cable networks for using the phrase “B###J##? Surely such a fate will not befall the Very Serious Mark Halperin for his ribald locution.
After all, former GOP congressman Scarborough explained that it was the fault of the show’s producer. Likely a card-carrying union member.
This Salon article lays out a pretty definitive indictment of the foul Halperin and his confederates: http://www.salon.com/news/war_room_hack_thirty/index.html
Currently the lead article at MSNBC.com blares: “Why Obama is picking such a big fight on debt countdown”. So I guess the new Village taunt will be ‘Obama as Angry Black Man.’ Thus replacing last week’s taunt, ‘Obama as disengaged, out-of-touch Robot.’ Why can’t they just agree to settle on “uppitity”?
Mr. Stagger Lee
I would wish President Obama would act like a dick towards the Republicans, on a level like Rick Scott is acting towards those with $100,000 income in Florida
Valdivia
I want to add one more thing–the Halperin thing for me fits into the way he and a lot of the Village and all Republicans simply show NO deference to the office of the President now that a black man is in it. It royally pisses me off. It’s a tell of something larger than he being a Republican-lover, it’s a tell of their loathing of Obama.
Jim C.
The irony of Halperin calling someone a dick. Some people are truly lacking in self awareness.
UncertaintyVicePrincipal
What, someone said “Balloon Juice”?
Well, I mean, had a point, didn’t they. Banning for that I mean. Filthy place.
Poopyman
One more data point: FSM help us, here’s Dana Milbank —
Bobby Thomson
Mask?
Pongo
Halperin indefinitely suspended by NBC according to ABC just now.
Surly Duff
@ efgoldman
Please. They could take one of the old ones and simply change the date. That ass wrote the same article over and over again anyway.
I’m actually surprised they are not doing this anyway. Here’s an oldie but goodie from Broder. It still applies!
burnspbesq
Halperin should thank whatever deity he worships that Obama doesn’t use Reggie Love the way Coach K used him.
ira-NY
I used watch Morning Joe. But, at some point, I just could not start my day that way any longer.
I knew going in that Joe was an abrasive ass. So, he wasn’t what pushed me over the edge. It was actualy Mika “Colmes” Brzezinski. She is horrible.
geg6
Poopyman @48:
I think it might mean Jonathan Capehart, but I’m not 100% sure.
LittlePig
Marcy Wheeler, emptywheel over at FireDogLake Acres.
bemused
Not long ago Lawrence O’Donnel had Halperin on his show and really knocked down Halperin’s very serious punditing that we must take Donald Trump and Palin seriously. Halperin looked pissed…he’s not used to that. It was quite amusing.
If Halperin really is suspended, it couldn’t happen to a more deserving jerk. It’s not surprising he got so cocky when he’s felt so comfortable on Joe’s show and Joe was egging him on. My question is will he eventually be allowed back on msnbc unlike David Shuster?
LittlePig
I think it might mean Jonathan Capehart, but I’m not 100% sure.
Oh heavens no. This is a small WHITE male, looks to be early 20’s, and the pupil in one eye stays fully dilated. May be medical condition, may be an artificial eye.
Either way my horribly lookist self thinks ‘Hey Popeye’ when I see him on Joe. He’s been rare lately, but he out-Halperins Halperin.
Han's Solo
burnspbesq @ 61 – Okay, you lost me. How did coach K use Reggie Love?
UncertaintyVicePrincipal
ira-NY
I have to say I agree. Sycophantic foils like that are worse than people like Scarborough or whoever Colmes used to “spar” with. They’re essentially the same as straight men in a comedy routine, who of course are not straight at all but comedians also, intentionally acting as if they’re not in on the joke to make the joke funnier. Or in this case acting like inept, hapless non-conservatives, only to make the conservative’s point seem stronger.
Culture of Truth
what’s he doing on NBC anyway? Doesn’t he write for ABC’s The Note?
J
Halperin is an extreme example of the perverse incentives that prevail in our media culture, which reward shallowness, smugness, and a kind of willed, cultivated cretinism that should earn him and others richly deserved contempt instead of fame, money and power. Is it any wonder that our benighted fellow citizens don’t have a clue about how to exercise the franchise when they’re fed a steady diet of this kind of drivel?
hamletta
I don’t know about that. They weren’t much better when Clinton was in office. That’s how the Village became the Village in the first place.
DBrown
Sorry to respectively disagree with everyone here on BJ about halperin but he has no dick but only a single orifice which functions just like a bird’s asshole – the place where all waste products are eliminated from – his mouth.
Cat Lady
Why in the name of the FSM does anyone watch that morning joe crap? It’s been the same since it started, with the same preening dicks trying to out dick each other with a Mika dashboard bobblehead and the dickitude dialed to 11 if it’s about Obama. It’s as predictable as a morning shit, and less satisfying.
Enceladus
Not too long ago, press corps hacks like Halperin just loved it when the Frat Boy President would call them demeaning names to their faces.
They would laugh and laugh and laugh: “Thank you sir, may I have another!”
Culture of Truth
Halperin was set up, just like what Tunch did to that dog.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
The entire Chris Christie groundswell–which I think is what you call the pile of dirt voles or moles or halperins make in your garden–is based on a desire for “pugnacity”, dickishness.
If Halperin had said “jerk”, this would be dismissed with a smirking, passive-aggressive “are you happy now?” half-assed apology from Scarborough. If he had gone to Peggy Noonans vocab list and said “boor”, we would quickly see a Beltway meme developing about Obama’s boorishness. Anyway…. MSNBC is just a mirror image of Fox, donchaknow.
burnspbesq
@Han’s Solo:
The polite way to say it is that Reggie’s job was “to establish a physical presence in the lane.” We don’t have thugs in the ACC. They have thugs in the Big East.
Villago Delenda Est
The Village really got formed in the 80’s when they scraped and bowed to Ronaldus Magnus, even though he was showing signs of early Alzheimer’s from at least the time of his inauguration (but, thank goodness, he and Nancy were elegant and regal, unlike those foul hicks from Georgia) and they continued their royal courtier role into the Bush Sr. administration. Then an usurper took over in ’93 and the gloves were off. Once a legitimate occupant for the White House was found in 2001, it was back to scraping, bowing, and approving admiration of strutting asswipes in flight suits.
Cut to 2009, and another usurper is in the White House. Gloves off!
Valdivia
@71 but we had the Office of the President Must be Respected Bush-interlude.
Han's Solo
burnspbesq – Ah, thank you, I did not know that.
Culture of Truth
MJ is a show purely for DC insiders, who pride themselves on their even-handed, knowing, above-it-all smirkiness. By being crude and partisan, Halperin violated a Beltway cultural norm on show for DC denizens. Therefore he must be suspended for day.
FlipYrWhig
@ Villago / 78 : What was the press treatment of Ford and Carter like? My impression is that both were roundly ridiculed. But I was too young to remember it, and I may be thinking of old Saturday Night Live sketches.
The Moar You Know
And he is outta there.
My bet: he won’t be back, either. The Village needs to be able to preserve plausible deniability. Halperin just fucked that up big time.
myiq2xu
That was an insult to dicks.
handsmile
Just imagine how frantic it is over in Roger Ailes’ office right now.
Chris Wallace has already cancelled Sunday’s original guests. John Roberts is both speed-dialing and tweeting his good friend to coo dinner invitations. Ed Henry is making reservations for them at Per Se. And somewhere deep in the bowels of Fox HQ, staff attorneys are crafting a shiny new contract to entice this latest victim of the liberal media.
Scrolling through the comments:
Little Pig: Thanks for the answer!
Bobby Thomson (#58): Pithy. Precise. Perfect!
jnfr
They really are middle school kids, aren’t they?
Rhoda
The majority of the media really doesn’t like Barack Obama and they don’t understand why there are so many in the country that love him. For the most part; they dismiss it as race. But then they see video of that lady in Iowa whose restaurant he went to visit and how gaga everyone there was for the President. They see the genuine emotion and feeling at the political rallies he’s held or the events as President and they know something is there; because they see it. But they don’t understand it.
Barack Obama is a political force in this country that they haven’t wrapped their heads around. They don’t understand how he won the nomination. They don’t understand how after 2.5 years he still has his base behind him and people like him personally. They don’t understand why no one is blaming him personally for the mess the economy is in; despite the frustrations people have and the fact from Nov. 5, 2008 they’ve been saying Obama owns the economy. They keep saying he’s aloof, he’s cold, he’s remote, and then watch as people who meet him fall all over themselves and how well liked he is and how he connects to people. He doesn’t do it as Clinton did or W did; but he really connects.
They don’t get it and they resent it because they say one thing and the public sees the opposite; the debates in ’08 were a clear example of this. It frustrates them and they hate it.
The dick comment; that was despite the fact Halperin knows it didn’t play like that in the heartland. He just doesn’t like Barack Obama. IMO, he’s jealous of him. But that’s just my take.
So, fuck them.
Ben Cisco
@ Han’s Solo:
__
Sent the following:
__
__
Felt damned good.
__
ETA: So he got suspended? Good. I guess there’s a line that cannot be crossed after all. Wonders never cease.
Villago Delenda Est
82. FlipYrWhig: Gerald Ford was ridiculed in popular culture, but not by the MSM (at least the nominal “news” people) per se, as he was well liked by the Broderist faction for his “bipartisanship”, and particularly for the “healing” pardon of the criminal Nixon, which was supposed to “end our long national nightmare” (Ford’s own words) when in fact all it did was set the stage for an extended nightmare we’ve yet to wake from.
Carter was pretty much routinely ridiculed by the press as inept and amateur, specifically because Carter rejected the imperial capital meme of DC that is absolutely central to the self-image of the Villagers. The sort of “cronyism” that Carter practiced with bringing all these Georgians up with him was replicated during the Reagan years as his small army of handlers from California did the same thing, but the criticism was muted in the MSM.
The Villagers actively covered up Reagan’s growing problem with Alzheimer’s.
arguingwithsignposts
also accurate.
beergoggles
Apparently dick is fine.. the only thing that gets censored by Scarborough is ‘dead intern’.
david mizner
Yes, he’s a Republican-loving prick, but don’t blame his father “who served in the Nixon White House.” He was an opponent of the Vietnam War whose alleged leaking of info about the war led Nixon to wiretap him, and then he headed the ACLU office in DC. Dickhead fell far from the tree.
Bruce S
You’re sort of mischaracterizing Halperin’s father, Mort. The problem isn’t that Mark is like his dad, but that he’s not. Mort Halperin served in both Democratic and Republican administrations as a “defense expert” (including Clinton’s) and worked for Nixon because he was “kept on” by Kissinger from the prior administration. Halperin was involved deeply in the Vietnam war planning but became a “dove” and a friend of Daniel Ellsberts. The Nixon gang proposed firebombing the Brookings Institution to destroy Halperin’s files, that they assumed he was using to leak information they wanted to keep secret. He was also director of the DC ACLU. And he’s worked for Open Society Institute and Center for American Progress. A more complex figure than simply “GOP Progenitor of the little douchebag we see on our TeeVees.”
I share your repulsion at Mark, but I think he fell pretty far from the tree…
SIA
They’re signing him up at Fox already.
Frapalinger
I’m sure Morning Douche will carry on with its usually nonsense without Halperin. That program’s atrocities against the truth on any given topic are far more horrifying to me than this crap. It is nice to see a scumbag like Halperin screw himself out of a job. If TIME gets rid of him too, look for Michael Scherer to take over Halperin’s post with no discernible difference (except a little more obsessive love of Romney).
myiq2xu
Halperin should personally apologize to every dick in the country
Valdivia
@87 Rhoda–
what you said. a thousand times.
murbella
you know DougJ, im going to give a little bloghistory lesson on your current nic.
A Gay Girl in Damascus is just the latest instantiation of Hot Abercrombie Chick, Libertarian Girl, lonelygirl15, and “Vichy Fournier” who posted at the radical libertarian and seriously wierd site, One-sided Conversations.
Every instance turned out to be a guy pretending to be a girl, except “Vichy” who was never conclusively outed.
I’m sure Vichy was a guy, because how many hot chicks even know who Heidegger, Mises, and Stirner are, let alone adore them and quote them?
So are you aware of that internet tradition?
;)
Boots Day
I wouldn’t be surprised if Halperin’s career is over, or at least seriously damaged. Calling the president a dick is really bad, on many different levels. It’s childish, obscene and overtly partisan.
Or maybe he’ll just go over to Fox.
Linda Featheringill
rhoda #87.
Yes.
kc
@Linda Featheringill
Mika always looks like she just smelled a fart. Maybe Joe needs one of those butt-guards ABL was laughing about.
stuckinred
kc –
that was a post that can just go and die
lamh34
@Rhoda
I love ur comment. Can I steal it, with appropirate acknowldegment of course…lol?
do you post over at WSY?
Citizen_X
J @ 79:
I had never actually seen Halperin before. Maybe I subconsciously mistook “Halperin” for some sort of drug that’s become notorious for its black-market popularity. But now that I see him, I think, “Oh, really? That smirking, helmet-haired weasel is Mark Halperin? You don’t say!”
Bullsmith
Now that he’s been suspended, I wonder if Halperin blames Joe and Mika for egging him on? Such a telling exchange, really.
TR
For me, the real issue here isn’t the curse word, it’s that Halperin’s entire analysis was based not on the substance of the policies being advanced, and not on the means through which the president suggested advancing them, but rather on the tone and how his words might make the poor widdle Republicans feel.
His language was juvenile, but more important, so too was the “political analysis” for which he is so grossly overpaid.
Maude
MSNBC prolly suspended Halperin so quickly because of Imus.
Imus does Republican talking points just like Rush.
Halperin must have a huge sense of self superiority to say that about a sitting president. ALso because Obama is black. He wouldn’t say that about a white man.
Obama is intelligent and that is resented by the MSM.
myiq2xu
Halperin should have called Obama a slut. The going rate for that is only a week
gwangung
Well, and how far will this penetrate the mass media and how far will this penetrate into the mainstream of the country?
This will get ignored by the media and middle America, unlike the Dixie Chicks.
Admiral_Komack
@efgoldman:
Rachel will probably have Halperin as a guest and both will spend the entire hour bashing the President.
‘Cause she’s soooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo smart!
amused
Halperin should personally apologize to every dick in the country
@lowiqboy So, should he send you an email or call you?
Alex S.
@myiq2xu:
Or he should have called him a thug.
Rhoda
@lamh: Yes, go ahead. And yes, I post at WSY as Rhoda.
Mike in NC
Halperin will cry some crocodile tears, be back on Morning Ho in a couple of days, and maybe even land a gig as backup when fellow Republican David Gregory goes on summer vacation.
He’s too much beloved by the rest of the Village to be shunned.
Allan
In Halperin’s defense, I know that if I were seated across from Joe Scarborough, I might blurt out the word “dick” as well.
Admiral_Komack
Give em’ hell, Rhoda!
Tom Q
Yes, Rhoda, great post.
I’d add this: back in Reagan’s day, an identically-toned press conference skewed to his issues would have been proclaimed a triumph by The Village — old Reagan had used his charm to make the Democrats look silly and petty.
And that wouldn’t have been incorrect analysis. Reagan did have that conversational ease (even when he lacked facts), and the vast middle would probably have been won over.
As they likely were yesterday (esp. given that they’re already disposed to the Obama side of the argument).
The great Halperin mistake was not in using the word “dick” — as has been alluded to, Jon Stewart uses the word frequently without being censored. It’s that his analysis was so off — Obama was humorous and sensible and appealing yesterday, and NOT IN ANY WAY A DICK. Only someone actively marinated in GOP talking points could have that response to such an effective press conference.
I mean, Eric Cantor walking out and saying anything short of complete capitulation to his side was failing to negotiate — that wasn’t being a dick? But this is? Please.
Exurban Mom
For those who asked about the FCC’s regulations: the FCC does regulate content on cable TV, prohibiting OBSCENE content. But even if Halperin had said “dick” on a broadcast station, there probably wouldn’t be any penalty, because “dick” doesn’t rise (heh) to the level of being obscene, in my opinion.
They are still arguing over the “fleeting expletive” exception in court. I believe the appellate court recently told the FCC to make clearer rules so that broadcasters had a much more exact idea of what was and wasn’t acceptable.
arguingwithsignposts
The real question is WTF would it have mattered if he had a 7-second delay? Would that have excused the statement? No. What a dick.
trollhattan
@59.Poopyman
Speaking of Milbank, does this mean we now have a dick whisperer and a dick talkerer?
Poopyman
… And while we’re “dick”ing around, has anyone heard any blowback (heh!) about Lawrence O’Donnell’s unedited F-bomb on Monday night? Since it was a clip of Philip Seymour Hoffman in Before The Devil Knows You’re Dead, it might be exempt. Or not. In either case, I haven’t caught any news of it since it dropped.
Yutsano
Or a dick blurter, if we wanna go that route. Though a blurt is usually extemporaneous, and Mark’s actions are anything but that.
liberal
@92 VDE:
Heh. There’s an Alexander Cockburn column ridiculing pundits’ (e.g. Broder’s IIRC) response to a Reagan press conference. Cockburn said of the response that it rated pretty high “on the Alzheimer’s graph.” That was years before it came out that Ronnie’s brain had been rotting.
Poopyman
@Yutsano:
“DickDropper”?
Admiral_Komack
@Han’s Solo
This is what I sent MSNBC:
Good morning,
I saw a clip of Morning Joe, dated June 30, 2011, where Mark Halperin calls President Obama “kind of a dick” on national television.
I am glad to see that MSNBC has such high journalistic standards (SNARK).
I also noticed how Joe and Mika were all “hee, hee, hee!” after Mark Halperin called the President “kind of a dick”.
They thought it was funny.
THEY THOUGHT IT WAS FUNNY.
I firmly believe that President Obama will be called a nigger on national television before the voting in the 2012 American Presidential election.
It won’t be by a comedian.
It will be said on one of the pundit shows, BY one of the pundits.
BEFORE the 2012 American Presidential election.
Hey, it might happen on MSNBC.
Then you’d have a scoop!
Thank you.
Yutsano
Don’t pick that up! You don’t know where it’s been!
LittlePig
Most of us present at the time picked that up right away. Folks knew Ronnie was a doofus, but the Village adored him and so it was never said publicly.
But you didn’t have to be rocket scientist to figure out that Ronnie was NO rocket scientist.
Han's Solo
Admiral_Komack – You know who MSNBC should really fire? Joe Scarborough.
And Mica can go to. Why? Because she’s about as good a counter point to Joe as Alan Colmes was to Sean Hanity.
Since I’m complaining about Mica let me add something that has bugged the shit out of me for awhile. She keeps babbling about women not knowing their worth, how women are so weak in the workplace, how they don’t stand up for themselves. First, I know quite a few women who are tough as nails and don’t have those personality flaws. Second, and more importantly as far as what’s pissing me off, there are organizations that make sure women and minorities and others don’t suffer the discrimination she sees everywhere: THEY ARE CALLED FUCKING UNIONS! IF SHE THINKS WOMEN AREN’T GETTING A FAIR SHAKE SHE SHOULD BE ADVOCATING FOR UNIONS!
Sorry for the allcaps. She’s just really getting on my nerves.
drkrick
Is there a reliable standard account of Reagan and Alzheimer’s? He never struck me as all that bright even in the ’60’s, so my first reaction to his diagnosis was along the lines of “how could you tell?” I remember reading that his WH doctor said that looking back he could see signs starting in the second term, but that could be the self serving account of someone who had at least an arguable ethical obligation to speak up if he had seen it before the reelection campaign.
Ben Cisco
@ Han’s Solo: Mika is the reason I quit looking at so much as a clip from Mourning Schmoe (as a general rule, I won’t even look if Stewart is ripping them a new one). Scarborough’s smug, petty, hypocritical, clueless bama bumpkin ass was nothing unexpected – in fact, I was more likely to be shocked when he DIDN’T say something stupid. Mika, on the other hand, was so ineffectual as a counterpoint to Joe that she was the verbal equivalent of the damsel tripping and spraining her ankle in every B horror movie ever made.
Don
I really don’t get this. Who gives a shit? He called the president a dick, so what? Cable news is filled with pundits who consistently lie and misrepresent and it’s considered a feature. We’re drawing the line at a boring ad hominem insult? That would be a STEP UP from things that can be clearly identified as factually false – at least it’s just an obvious objective opinion.
I’d like to see someone go through that episode and list out all the completely demonstrably wrong things that were said by Halperin and others and apparently are not suspension events.
Tonal Crow
Self-misrepresentation of the Halperin brand is widespread among winger pundits and their media masters. How many times have you heard something to the effect of “And now we’ll discuss this week’s politics. Representing the conservative viewpoint is Senator Jim DeMint, and representing the liberals is James Carville.”
I’m pretty sure Bobo got a business-method patent on this approach 30 years ago.
gogol's wife
Admiral_Komack #128: Excellent. Their smirking and laughing is just as bad if not worse.
Frankensteinbeck
Rhoda:
While I agree strongly with the spirit of your comment, I would argue with one detail. The press does know why Obama is popular, to the extent that they care to know. That only infuriates them worse, because he is Doing It Wrong. Obama plays politics to advance his policy aims. This is the exact opposite of how they know the game is supposed to be played. It implies that policy is important and the government is something other than a chariot race at the circus. He doesn’t talk in cute sound bites, and he hardly ever gets mad, and he goes on and on and on about policy and why it’s important and what he wants, to the point where they can’t even cover him because it’s so dull. Then to add insult to injury he doesn’t invite them to enough barbecues and schmooze, which they’ve written articles actually complaining about.
He does all of this, and yet it’s WORKING. He’s a relatively popular president, even under very adverse circumstances. He is more popular than and regularly outmaneuvers politically the people they really love and admire who do things right. People like John McCain.
Obama is a constant, glaring refutation of their bedrock principles. His success makes it clear that politics is not a show and both sides are not the same. When they unite against him and he still succeeds it slaps them in the face with the fact that they don’t control what the average American thinks, that they’re not the great wise men of our society.
So yeah, they understand him. They’re desperately hoping there’s some other explanation!
MTiffany
@don
The Village is run by crusty old white guys. The President is black. Someone mentioned ‘dick.’ Insecurities were aroused.
Admiral_Komack
@Han’s Solo #131:
It wouldn’t break my heart if both of them lost their jobs.
Marc McKenzie
@137:
“Obama is a constant, glaring refutation of their bedrock principles. His success makes it clear that politics is not a show and both sides are not the same. When they unite against him and he still succeeds it slaps them in the face with the fact that they don’t control what the average American thinks, that they’re not the great wise men of our society.”
Bravo, man, bravo. This sums it all up. Gotta get you a case of beer for this one.