• Menu
  • Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

Before Header

  • About Us
  • Lexicon
  • Contact Us
  • Our Store
  • ↑
  • ↓
  • ←
  • →

Balloon Juice

Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

A sufficient plurality of insane, greedy people can tank any democratic system ever devised, apparently.

Shocking, but not surprising

There’s some extremely good trouble headed their way.

How has Obama failed you today?

The revolution will be supervised.

I swear, each month of 2020 will have its own history degree.

Something seems odd about that, but i have been drinking.

Good luck with your asparagus.

Balloon Juice has never been a refuge for the linguistically delicate.

‘Forty-two’ said Deep Thought, with infinite majesty and calm.

I’d try pessimism, but it probably wouldn’t work.

Naturally gregarious and alpha

Is it irresponsible to speculate? It is irresponsible not to.

Nevertheless, she persisted.

You are either for trump or for democracy. Pick one.

They traffic in fear. it is their only currency. if we are fearful, they are winning.

Too inconsequential to be sued

If senate republicans had any shame, they’d die of it.

Just a few bad apples.

Today in our ongoing national embarrassment…

Where tasty lettuce and good mustard aren’t elitist.

They fucked up the fucking up of the fuckup!

Lighten up, Francis.

Shallow, uninformed, and lacking identity

Mobile Menu

  • Look Forward & Back
  • Balloon Juice 2021 Pet Calendar
  • Site Feedback
  • All 2020 Fundraising
  • I Voted!
  • Take Action: Things We Can Do
  • Team Claire, and Family
  • Submit Photos to On the Road
  • BJ PayPal Donations
  • Politics
  • On The Road
  • Open Threads
  • Topics
  • Nature & Respite
  • Information As Power
  • COVID-19 Coronavirus
  • Authors
  • About Us
  • Contact Us
  • Lexicon
  • Our Store
  • Politics
  • Open Threads
  • On The Road
  • Garden Chats
  • Nature & Respite
  • Look Forward & Back
You are here: Home / Completely and Totally Full of Shit

Completely and Totally Full of Shit

by John Cole|  July 21, 20102:16 pm| 49 Comments

This post is in: Blogospheric Navel-Gazing, Clown Shoes

Facebook0Tweet0Email0

For good clean fun, go read this Ed Morrisey post and count the factual errors and outright lies.

Here’s a partial list of lies and errors from just a quick reading:

1.) Ben Jealous was in the audience for the speech (Way to go Ed, trusting Jim Hoft!).
2.) It was an accident that Sherrod was “caught in the middle” when she was specifically targeted.
3.) That the NAACP “started” things by pointing out racist elements in the tea party.
4.) That the NAACP claimed the the entire tea party movement was racist.
5.) That the point of showing the speech was the audience reaction.
6.) That the WH demanded her resignation.
7.) That Sherrod has no role in the controversy (the first sentences in the original Breitbart piece accuse her of being racist).

I’m sure I’ve missed a few. I’m hard pressed to figure out how Ed could get more shit wrong in one post. Is he jockeying for a job with Fox News or the RNC?

Facebook0Tweet0Email0
Previous Post: « It Works
Next Post: The “It Was About the Audience” Lie »

Reader Interactions

49Comments

  1. 1.

    TR

    July 21, 2010 at 2:21 pm

    Is he jockeying for a job with Fox News or the RNC?

    There’s a difference?

  2. 2.

    strandedvandal

    July 21, 2010 at 2:21 pm

    I am hearing #6 repeated more and more from liberals as another reason Obama is teh suck. The phrase used to be, “Facts have a well known liberal bias.” Not so much anymore it seems.

  3. 3.

    Kryptik

    July 21, 2010 at 2:21 pm

    Don’t worry, he’ll never be called on it in a way that holds him accountable. Not like he said he had experienced racism and it changed the way he acted, after all.

    No consequences for absolute bullshit.

  4. 4.

    Bobby Thomson

    July 21, 2010 at 2:21 pm

    That the WH demanded her resignation.

    Not a clear lie or error. This is still She said/She said territory. And I’m more inclined to believe Sherrod, frankly.

  5. 5.

    MattF

    July 21, 2010 at 2:22 pm

    There’s also the way racism in the Tea Party is all due to “fringe elements that have been repeatedly and loudly repudiated by Tea Party activists.”

    ‘Cept, um, when they’re not, um, fringe or repudiated.

  6. 6.

    superking

    July 21, 2010 at 2:26 pm

    Is he jockeying for a job with Fox News or the RNC?

    CNN

  7. 7.

    Comrade Mary

    July 21, 2010 at 2:26 pm

    And I’m more inclined to believe Sherrod, frankly.

    I believe that she is truthfully repeating what she was told by someone at USDA. I am not yet convinced that person was telling the truth. Big difference.

  8. 8.

    Agoraphobic Kleptomaniac

    July 21, 2010 at 2:27 pm

    Here’s another logical inconsistancy I just realized from this story:

    If Briebart is now claiming that it was some random “citizen journalist” who handed him the video, how did he have the full video and was waiting for “approval” to post the full video? And If he did have the full video, when did he get it?

  9. 9.

    cleek

    July 21, 2010 at 2:28 pm

    @Agoraphobic Kleptomaniac:
    i’d love to know the answer to that, too.

  10. 10.

    Bobby Thomson

    July 21, 2010 at 2:28 pm

    @Comrade Mary: Fair point, but until Cook is forced to walk that back (whether truthful or not), it’s quite a stretch to say that it’s an outright lie.

  11. 11.

    danimal

    July 21, 2010 at 2:28 pm

    The rout is on. They (the Wurlitzer) always come up with a stable full of horse manure when they are caught. Often, they get away with it; this time it won’t work. Keep calling BS on them while people are paying attention.

  12. 12.

    Bella Q

    July 21, 2010 at 2:30 pm

    @Bobby Thomson: But believing Shirley Sherrod doesn’t change that. I don’t doubt her; what I doubt is that Cook was *actually* acting on behalf of the White House as she told Sherrod. It doesn’t ring true the way a panicked decision by Vilsack and Cook does. Of course they claimed it was on behalf of the White House – Sherrod was resisting.

  13. 13.

    Warren Terra

    July 21, 2010 at 2:30 pm

    It’s a sign of progress when he says the NAACP started it by being mean to the Tea Party, because his readers surely believe the NAACP started it much earlier when they criticized American apartheid.

  14. 14.

    ellaesther

    July 21, 2010 at 2:33 pm

    That NAACP! Damn them for starting all this! What with the slave ships and the whip and the Jim Crow laws and the racist signs at Tea Party rallies! Damn them all to hell!

  15. 15.

    Bobby Thomson

    July 21, 2010 at 2:35 pm

    @Bella Q:

    It doesn’t ring true the way a panicked decision by Vilsack and Cook does.

    I disagree, but I agree that you may be right that this is the way things went down.

    However, as I remarked above, unless and until Cook says “Yes, I said that to Ms. Sherrod, but it was a lie,” it’s hard to say that #6 is a baldfaced lie – at least without implicitly calling Sherrod a liar.

  16. 16.

    Bill Murray

    July 21, 2010 at 2:40 pm

    @Bella Q: and of course White House could mean many different people. But in the end the buck stops with the President, it’s the bad side of Unitary Executive power

  17. 17.

    Allison W.

    July 21, 2010 at 2:42 pm

    @Bobby Thomson:

    Sherrod said she was told the WH wanted her to resign. She was told this by Cook or Vilsack. when did she directly accuse the WH?

  18. 18.

    El Cid

    July 21, 2010 at 2:43 pm

    Please front page the Obama ice cream black power Kenyonesian jihad that the librul media is ignoring, [a threat we here at B-J are aware of] thanks to Davis X. Machina.

    A Saturday jaunt to a Maine ice cream parlor by US President Barack Obama has brought serious concern after analysis of the the shop’s logo shows a striking similarity to the logo used to represent Black Supremacy in America.
    __
    Obama was photographed Saturday by reporters enjoying a scoop of vanilla in front of Mount Desert Island Ice Cream in Bar Harbor, Maine, which proudly advertises its “fearless flavor” on its website. However, its black, clenched-fist logo bears an uncanny resemblance to the one created to represent the supremacist movement in the 1960’s.
    __
    In fact, store owner Linda Parker admits to intentionally modeling her logo after that of the Black Power Movement, telling a reporter in 2008, “Everyone has seen enough cows in the hillside.”

    How many frontal attacks on whites in this country are we willing to allow?

  19. 19.

    Allison W.

    July 21, 2010 at 2:45 pm

    @Bobby Thomson:

    why is it a stretch?

  20. 20.

    wyliecoat

    July 21, 2010 at 2:47 pm

    Is he jockeying for a job with Fox News or the RNC?CNN

    Fixed.

  21. 21.

    Mnemosyne

    July 21, 2010 at 2:48 pm

    @Bobby Thomson:

    However, as I remarked above, unless and until Cook says “Yes, I said that to Ms. Sherrod, but it was a lie,” it’s hard to say that #6 is a baldfaced lie – at least without implicitly calling Sherrod a liar.

    How is it calling Sherrod a liar if we say we think she was lied to?

  22. 22.

    Allison W.

    July 21, 2010 at 2:49 pm

    @wyliecoat:

    not if breitbart gets there first.

  23. 23.

    matoko_chan

    July 21, 2010 at 2:50 pm

    @Cole,

    That the NAACP “started” things by pointing out racist elements in the tea party.

    this is how they think. the reason Breitbart is about to stroke out over this is that Williams PROVED there are racists in the tea party, and they can’t weasel word around it anymore. They had to issue retractions, which means there are racists in the TPM.

  24. 24.

    Citizen Alan

    July 21, 2010 at 2:51 pm

    I don’t know whether the White House played a direct role in Sherrod’s firing and neither does anyone else here. But I don’t think it’s terribly controversial to point out that that the Obama administration has worked since about five minutes into his presidency (remember Rick Warren) to establish a culture and practice of preemptively groveling before various hard right constituencies in a futile effort to win their support or at least their non-hostility. That none of this ceaseless and embarrassing supplication has ever won Obama any support from the right nor even the slightest cessation of hostility has not deterred the man and his supporters from continuing their fruitless quest to win the favor of bullies by preemptively giving away their lunch money.

  25. 25.

    Davis X. Machina

    July 21, 2010 at 2:55 pm

    “The White House” can be anybody on pages 4-7 of the Plum Book (PDF file). The interns use “The White House” when they order pizza, and want it to arrive still hot.

    “The President wants…”, “The President told me to telll you…” — that’s different.

    We’ll know all when the memoirs come out.

  26. 26.

    Omnes Omnibus

    July 21, 2010 at 2:56 pm

    @El Cid: Obama ordered vanilla. How do you explain that, sir?

  27. 27.

    Mike Goetz

    July 21, 2010 at 2:57 pm

    I’ve just seen a summary of Gibbs’ daily briefing. Apparently, Gibbs offered her an apology from the podium and said that Vilsack is attempting to get in touch with her. When he does, he will also apologize and they will “discuss further steps,” presumably the restoration of her job.

  28. 28.

    Pseudonym

    July 21, 2010 at 3:01 pm

    @Omnes Omnibus: And yet he refuses to put the controversy to rest by releasing the long-form receipt. I wonder why that is, hmmmmm…

  29. 29.

    Warren Terra

    July 21, 2010 at 3:02 pm

    @ El Cid
    This delicious frozen creamy racism shall not stand!

  30. 30.

    Omnes Omnibus

    July 21, 2010 at 3:10 pm

    @Pseudonym: It is irresponsible not to speculate. The helicopters are not laughing.

  31. 31.

    El Cid

    July 21, 2010 at 3:14 pm

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    Obama ordered vanilla. How do you explain that, sir?

    An obvious signal to the gelato sleeper cells to continue preparing for their all-out double churned assault.

  32. 32.

    Bobby Thomson

    July 21, 2010 at 3:16 pm

    @Mnemosyne: My original point was that #6 is different in kind than everything else on John’s list. Every other point on that list is undeniably wrong.

    You think that #6 is wrong, and you have pointed to facts that are consistent with your (plausible) conclusion. You may even be right. But at this point, it’s impossible to say that #6 is conclusively wrong. And the harder you press the point, the more that at least some of the focus swings back to Sherrod, rightly or wrongly.

  33. 33.

    Davis X. Machina

    July 21, 2010 at 3:16 pm

    Remember, comrades, Chairman Mao teaches us that power comes from the muzzle of a waffle cone. That guerrillas must move like jimmies (that’s ‘sprinkles’ for you flatlanders) across the surface of a two-scoop.

  34. 34.

    Omnes Omnibus

    July 21, 2010 at 3:18 pm

    @El Cid: Channeling Beck, are we?

  35. 35.

    Omnes Omnibus

    July 21, 2010 at 3:23 pm

    @Davis X. Machina:

    That guerrillas must move like jimmies (that’s ‘sprinkles’ for you flatlanders) across the surface of a two-scoop

    They must sink in and stay in place? I am but a simple man from the land of frozen custard and your dialectic reason is beyond me. But I will follow your glorious lead in the name of the Party and the Revolution.

  36. 36.

    Davis X. Machina

    July 21, 2010 at 3:26 pm

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    Oh, shit — they’re not jimmies, they’re ants!

  37. 37.

    Bender

    July 21, 2010 at 3:31 pm

    6.) That the WH demanded her resignation.

    Why would you call The Sainted Ms. Sherrod a liar?

    SANCHEZ: Did she [agriculture undersecretary Cheryl Cook] tell you that the White House wanted you out –

    SHERROD: Yes.

    SANCHEZ: — because a right-wing commentator was about to do a story about you?

    SHERROD: The last time when I asked her, when she told me, I said, “Cheryl, what happened?” She said, “Well, when Glenn Beck said you would be on his show tonight, that did it.“

    Obama acted stupidly.

  38. 38.

    cleek

    July 21, 2010 at 3:43 pm

    @Bender:
    it’s not about questioning Sherrod’s story, i think everybody assumes she’s reporting what she heard. rather, people are wondering if perhaps the person on the other end of the phone invoked “The White House” as a way to apply pressure to Sherrod even though the White House itself might not have been directly involved.

  39. 39.

    maya

    July 21, 2010 at 3:49 pm

    @Citizen Alan: Exactly!

    When, Mr President, can we expect you to stand and fight rather than appease, November 3rd?

  40. 40.

    gypsy howell

    July 21, 2010 at 3:53 pm

    @Citizen Alan:

    In a related story, slipping by under the radar are the new federal regulations eliminating abortion coverage in state high-risk insurance pools. Wouldn’t want to risk pissing off the people who are never, ever in a million years going to vote for you anyway, while tossing all the pro-choice folks who did vote for you by the wayside.

  41. 41.

    maya

    July 21, 2010 at 3:53 pm

    cleek,

    people are wondering if perhaps the person on the other end of the phone invoked “The White House” as a way to apply pressure to Sherrod even though the White House itself might not have been directly involved.

    WH Press Sect. Gibb’s apology to Sherrod at the WH briefing today answers the question, doesn’t it?

  42. 42.

    frankdawg

    July 21, 2010 at 4:20 pm

    I spent some time in a Congressional office & saw an sr. aide talking to some functionary at the VA. The conversation was about resolving a conflict between a veteran in the Congressman’s district & the VA. The aide said several times “Can you look into this for me? or Can you fix this for him?” and was getting nowhere. He was transferred to some higher up & after explaining the problem said “We
    want this taken care of” BANG – it was done.

    My guess is the assholes in Vilsaks office used the same stunt – maybe because some asshole in the WH pulled it on them.

    Years later I thought about that conversation after hearing that mob guys would introduce someone they knew as a friend of MINE and a fellow mobster as a friend of OURS.

  43. 43.

    Bender

    July 21, 2010 at 4:28 pm

    @cleek:

    rather, people are wondering if perhaps the person on the other end of the phone invoked “The White House” as a way to apply pressure to Sherrod even though the White House itself might not have been directly involved.

    Then they aren’t listening to the White House its-own-self:

    But three Democratic sources said deputy chief of staff Jim Messina singled out the White House’s initial response to the incident for praise in the regular 8:30 a.m. staff meeting Tuesday morning. The sources differed on the substance of Messina’s praise, but concurred that he had praised the speed of White House communications in response to the flap, which was driven by a misleadingly edited video posted to Andrew Breitbart’s Big Government website.

    One source, who is unhappy with the administration’s handling of the incident, paraphrased Messina’s remarks: “We could have waited all day — we could have had a media circus — but we took decisive action, and it’s a good example of how to respond in this atmosphere.”

    The speed of the White House response isn’t something they’d praise themselves for if the White House didn’t have anything to do with the speed of the response, would it? And the speedy response was demanding Sherrod’s resignation.

  44. 44.

    Bender

    July 21, 2010 at 4:29 pm

    @maya:

    WH Press Sect. Gibb’s apology to Sherrod at the WH briefing today answers the question, doesn’t it?

    Did he say that the White House “acted stupidly?”

  45. 45.

    kommrade reproductive vigor

    July 21, 2010 at 4:31 pm

    You know, I really hope they don’t think “The brown people was pickin’ on us so we retaliated by scalping one of them” is orginal or clever (or not racist).

    Since they’re bent on repeating history I may have to repeat some family history. The part that involves my great-grandparents, a shot gun and staying up all night because the Klan was roaming the neighborhood.

  46. 46.

    Bender

    July 21, 2010 at 4:34 pm

    SHERROD: The last time when I asked her, when she told me, I said, “Cheryl, what happened?” She said, “Well, when Glenn Beck said you would be on his show tonight, that did it.“

    That’s the funny-in-the-tragedy. The White House fired her because they were afraid Beck was going to crucify her for being racist…but instead he defended her against Breitbart and criticized the administration for wrongly and hastily firing her.

    It’s like a plot written by Larry David.

  47. 47.

    Gus

    July 21, 2010 at 4:44 pm

    @matoko_chan: Breitbart is always on the verge of stroke. That’s one disturbed, angry motherfucker.

  48. 48.

    irritable

    July 22, 2010 at 10:54 pm

    Ann Coulter has explained Breitbart’s error.

    He was set up.

    An (imaginary) Commie Liberal God-hater persuaded him (against his better judgment, and with great reluctance) to defame Sherrod.

    Little did he know (because he was somehow forbidden to see the whole video tape) that the excerpt was grossly misleading.

    You see, the CLG-Hater unfairly exploited Breitbart’s inability to refrain from promulgating a falsehood! Typical!

    So like, is that clear now?

  49. 49.

    Graphictruth

    July 24, 2010 at 9:29 pm

    @cleek: Hah.

    Agoraphobic Kleptomaniac

    Here’s another logical inconsistancy I just realized from this story:
    If Briebart is now claiming that it was some random “citizen journalist” who handed him the video, how did he have the full video and was waiting for “approval” to post the full video? And If he did have the full video, when did he get it?

    …and how, exactly, could we know that the date stamps on the evidence provided was credible. I don’t think I’d take the word of anything short of an independent computer forensic lab on that one.

    But that’s what subpoenas are for!

Comments are closed.

Primary Sidebar

Biden-Harris Inauguration

Biden-Harris Inauguration Website
RSVP to Major’s Party

First Event: Tonight 7 pm (1/16)

Official events – watch at top link

Major’s Indoguration Party (1/17)

Do Something!

Call Your Senators & Representatives
Directory of US Senators
Directory of US Representatives
Letter to Elected Officials – Albatrossity
Letter to Elected Officials – Martin

I Got the Shot!

🎈Ways to Support Our Site

Become a Balloon Juice Patreon
Donate with Venmo, Zelle or PayPal
Shop Amazon via this link to support Balloon Juice ⬇  

Recent Comments

  • raven on Respite Open Thread: Kamala and Doug Sunday Morning Interview (Jan 17, 2021 @ 1:00pm)
  • Pauline on Respite Open Thread: Kamala and Doug Sunday Morning Interview (Jan 17, 2021 @ 1:00pm)
  • TaMara (HFG) on Respite Open Thread: Kamala and Doug Sunday Morning Interview (Jan 17, 2021 @ 12:58pm)
  • Bill Arnold on COVID-19 Coronavirus Updates: Saturday/Sunday, Jan. 16-17 (Jan 17, 2021 @ 12:58pm)
  • zhena gogolia on Respite Open Thread: Kamala and Doug Sunday Morning Interview (Jan 17, 2021 @ 12:58pm)

Team Claire, and Family

Help for David’s Niece Claire
Claire Updates
Claire update for the holidays 12/23

Balloon Juice Posts

View by Topic
View by Author
View by Month & Year

Featuring

John Cole
Silverman on Security
COVID-19 Coronavirus
Medium Cool with BGinCHI
Information Is Power

Calling All Jackals

Site Feedback
Submit Photos to On the Road
Nominate a Rotating Tag
Meetups: Proof of Life
2021 Pets of Balloon Juice Calendar

Culture: Books, Film, TV, Music, Games, Podcasts

Noir: Favorites in Film, Books, TV
Book Recommendations & Indy Recs
Mystery Recommendations
Medium Cool: What If (Books & Films)
Netflix Favorites
Amazon Prime Favorites
Netflix Suggestions in July
Fun Music Thread
Longmire & Netflix Suggestions
Medium Cool: Places!
Medium Cool: Games!
Medium Cool: Watch or Read Again

Twitter

John Cole’s Twitter

[custom-twitter-feeds]

Site Footer

Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

  • Facebook
  • RSS
  • Twitter
  • Comment Policy
  • Our Authors
  • Blogroll
  • Our Artists
  • Privacy Policy

Copyright © 2021 Dev Balloon Juice · All Rights Reserved · Powered by BizBudding Inc

Share this ArticleLike this article? Email it to a friend!

Email sent!