Mark Halperin calls Obama a ‘Durbin’ on MSNBC (Update: Halperin suspended ‘indefinitely’)
My bad, Halperin didn’t use the Turbin’s last name, he used his first name to describe Obama’s performance in Wednesday’s press conference.
Mark Halperin offered a very candid, and bleep-worthy, assessment of the president’s Wednesday press conference performance Thursday on “Morning Joe.”
“I think he was kind of a dick yesterday,” Halperin said, after first checking if the broadcast was on a 7-second delay to allow for correcting four-letter FCC violations.
“Morning Joe” hosts Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski encouraged Halperin to “go for it,”and go for it he did. The offending word was not bleeped.
Halperin later apologized, but I’m not sure why he needed to. The president’s behavior ranged from petulant to piggish during that press conference. He replaced the misguided assault on ATM’s with a misguided assault on corporate jets. He chided Congress for its work schedule, when everyone knows he’s the most golfingest president evah. And he tried lecturing and hectoring, but never seems to have thought that it might be a good idea to try leading.
So the president was a Durbin in that press conference. Halperin got this one right.
Update: MSNBC has suspended Halperin “indefinitely” over this remark. Just a guess here, but it’s not so much the remark that has him in hot water, but the target. This is MSNBC we’re talking about.
“Mark Halperin’s comments this morning were completely inappropriate and unacceptable. We apologize to the President, The White House and all of our viewers,” in a statement by MSNBC spokesperson Jeremy Gaines. “We strive for a high level of discourse and comments like these have no place on our air. Therefore, Mark will be suspended indefinitely from his role as an analyst.”
Right. This is the same network that had Keith Olbermann ranting about President Bush’s “fascism” in Special Comments for years on end. Calling Obama a “dick” was a bit off-color, but wasn’t far off from the channel’s typical fare — other than the fact that this remark was aimed at Obama.
Why is this being promoted? Are there some lines that need not be crossed?
Why is this being promoted? Are there some lines that need not be crossed?
It’s pretty certain that Halperin will be promoted, after some faux repentance. How edgy, how urbane, to speak truth to power in real gutter talk! Those in the know will always recall it as a triumph for media star power. Beat this, you CNN wimps!
It’s being “promoted” because it’s the truth.
Though apparently the Phallic Respect Society is protesting the comparison…
Obama is just doing what Marxist professors do.
If you think that press conference was bad, remember, the campaign season hasn’t even gotten into high gear.
Halperin is usually so wordy as he defends this administration.
I didn’t know he could be so succinct.
As I recall, the splendid Mr. O has used the term “teabagger” to refer to American patriots in the past. While two wrongs don’t make a right, it seems to me that some media outrage should have ensued after THAT if such name calling is truly out-of-bounds, and yet I recall little more than sniggers.
In my opinion it is FAR worse for a sitting US president to smear American patriots with disgusting pornographic epithet than it is for a lowly editor to use a vulgar term to label that same president…
At A Boy , Halpern !!! If they fire you at the pansy network, please come to FOX !!!
When you hate jets
You hate jets all the way
From your first union march
To workers’ party parades
When you hate jets
And the spit hits the fan
You got Journolistas around
To distort what they can
You’re never alone
You’re never unprotected
The economy goes down
You can bet it’s …unexpected!
You’re well protected!
When you’re in with this set
every lie is in play
You can take from the “rich”
Til they take you away
When you hate Jets
You hate Jets all the way!
When you hate jets
And you’re the top putz in town
Each critique is a gaffe
Every opponent a clown
When you hate jets
In every place that you see
If they try to make more
Just call the NLRB
When you hate jets
Laws don’t mean a thing
Little Marx you’re a czar
Little czar you’re a king
When you hate jets
The borders are hell
When the state’s cry for help
You might sue them as well
When you hate Jets
Little world step aside
Tel Aviv and D.C.
You’ve been convicted not tried
We’re drawin’ the lines
So keep your garlic noses hidden
We’re carryin’ signs
Free market is forbidden
And we ain’t kiddin’
We hate all the Jets
And ATM’s too
We hate teabaggin’ Christians
And their Bible pal Jews
Here we come
those who hate Jets
to take your economy down
would you like to place bets?
To
Take
Your
Whole
Mother
Lovin’
Economy
Down
Heck hath no fury like an Obama lover scorned. Those who have slavishly adored Obama are now being made to look like the idiots we always knew they were. For a Halperin, or a Brooks or an Althouse, the problem isn’t the ruin for the country; the problem is the ruin for their oversized egos. For that President Obama must be punished.
At last a liberal got it right. Obama’s ineptness is only exceeded by his arrogance.
I hope that when Mark Halprin gets his new job on another network, he will show Dick Obama the respect he so richly deserves!
Bryan Preston writes that, “Morning Joe” hosts Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski encouraged Halperin to “go for it,”and go for it he did. The offending word was not bleeped.”
If MSNBC had any shred of decency, which it doesn’t, the two co-hosts would be suspended indefinitely, as well, on counts of aiding and abetting. If they hadn’t egged him on, Halprin might have held his tongue and his job.
It is too bad that MSNBC doesn’t apply the “truth is the best defense” rule and retain all commentators who speak the plain truth. That Obama is a dick is a perfect example of plain truth.
He’ll probably end up co-hosting with Olbermann.
And what would have happened if the word had been bleeped? Nothing.
NBC isn’t concerned about the word, it’s concerned about the word getting out.
So why isn’t NBC firing the producer?