Bill Maher Disses The Daily Show Rally for Sanity

[telemann.livejournal.com]

Last night, Bill Maher criticized last week's Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear, saying, "If you're going to have a rally: you might as well make it about something," before detailing his specific problems with Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert's efforts. I think some of what Maher observes as shortcomings with the rally are completely valid, especially this idea there is craziness on both sides of the aisle. And even Jon Stewart told Chris Wallace last week, MSNBC can't come close to doing what Fox News is able to do.

“Try not to pretend the insanity is equally distributed through both parties. Keith Olbermann is right: he is not the equivalent of Glenn Beck. One reports facts, the other is very close to playing with his own poop. And the big mistake of modern media, has been this notion of balance for balance's sake. That the Left is just as violent and cruel as the Right, that unions are just as powerful as corporations, that reverse racism is just as bad as racism. The message of the rally, as I heard it, was that, if the media stopped giving voice to the crazies on both sides, then maybe we could restore sanity. It was all nonpartisan and urged cooperation with the moderates on the other side -- forgetting that Obama tried that and found out: there are no moderates on the other side. When Jon announced his rally, he said the national conversation was dominated by people on the Right who believe Obama’s a Socialist and people on the Left who believe 9/11’s an inside job, but I can’t name any Democratic leaders who think 9/11’s an inside job. But Republican leaders who think Obama’s a Socialist? All of them.”

Video will not embed. Clicky here.

Comments

Re: ...and Napoleon defeated Wellington at Waterloo

[ofbg.livejournal.com]

"That is disingenuous."

Not at all. It's the truth! It would not have passed the house or senate without the republicans voting for it.

The house version had 95% of repubs and only 39% of dems voting for it. In all votes, the percentage of repubs was superior to the % of dems.

The actual vote count below:

The original House version:

Democratic Party: 96-152 (39%–61%)
Republican Party: 168-4 (95%–5%)

Cloture in the Senate:

Democratic Party: 44-23 (66%–34%)
Republican Party: 27-6 (82%–18%)
The Senate version:[10]

Democratic Party: 46-21 (69%–31%)
Republican Party: 27-6 (82%–18%)

The Senate version, voted on by the House:[10]

Democratic Party: 153-91 (63%–37%)
Republican Party: 136-35 (80%–20%)

Re: ...and Napoleon defeated Wellington at Waterloo

[devil-ad-vocate.livejournal.com]

Congratulations. You can paste from Wikipedia. Yes, Republicans voted for it. Now - once again - read what I said.

Re: ...and Napoleon defeated Wellington at Waterloo

[ofbg.livejournal.com]

I did. I can paste from your comment too!

"it is to give the younger generation the impression that they were holding hands with Martin Luther King, and singing "We shall Overcome"

The Republicans didn't see a need to do that. That is what the Democrats did and still do.

It's their manner of trying to live down their history of being the "party of slavery", well earned in the 1800's and until after the Civil War when that plank in their platform was made unconstitutional.

Re: ...and Napoleon defeated Wellington at Waterloo

[devil-ad-vocate.livejournal.com]

We were discussing 1964 - not 1864. The Parties were not the same.

Claiming the Republicans in 1964 were "all for" the Civil Rights Bill is ludicrous. Black people weren't fooled then; they aren't now.

Re: ...and Napoleon defeated Wellington at Waterloo

[ofbg.livejournal.com]

The stats speak for themselves. And where did I say "all for"?

"Black people weren't fooled then; they aren't now."

They were then and they are now, but not by the repubs.

Re: ...and Napoleon defeated Wellington at Waterloo

[telemann.livejournal.com]

Civil Rights, Brought To You By... Republicans?

President Johnson also helped to push through the 1964 Civil Rights Act and the 1965 Voting Rights Act. Yet the Republican Freedom Calendar describes these laws as Republican triumphs. The calendar does not mention that Barry Goldwater, the 1964 Republican presidential nominee, won five Deep South states because of his opposition to the Civil Rights Act. It does not mention that Republican George H.W. Bush opposed the Civil Rights Act in his 1964 run for the U.S. Senate. (Bush lost to Democrat Ralph Yarborough, who was the only Southern senator to vote for the Civil Rights Act.) The calendar does not mention that Ronald Reagan, in his 1966 campaign to become governor of California, endorsed repeal of California’s Fair Housing Act, saying, "If an individual wants to discriminate against Negroes or others in selling or renting his house, it is his right to do so."

What the calendar does say is this: "Republicans supported the 1964 Civil Rights Act and the 1965 Voting Rights Act overwhelmingly, and by much higher percentages in both House and Senate than the Democrats. Indeed, the 1964 Civil Rights Act became law only after overcoming a Democrat filibuster."

Like similar statements made by black conservatives over the past several years, this account suggests that the Civil Rights Act was a partisan contest between Democrats and Republicans. In fact, Congressional votes on the Civil Rights Act did not break along party lines – they split along regional lines. In the North, both parties supported the Civil Rights Act; in the South, both parties opposed it. The difference was that the Republican Party had very little presence in the South, which had been dominated since the 1870s by the segregationist wing of the Democratic Party.

Today, of course, the old Dixiecrats have nearly disappeared, and white Southerners vote heavily for the GOP. This is not a coincidence; it was the 1964 split between Northern and Southern Democrats that opened the South to anti-civil-rights overtures from Republicans such as Goldwater, Reagan, and George H.W. Bush. The realignment of the South is one of the most important consequences of the civil rights movement, yet the Republican Freedom Calendar makes no mention of it.

Re: ...and Napoleon defeated Wellington at Waterloo

[telemann.livejournal.com]

Many of the Republicans that did support the Civil Rights laws passed in the mid 1960s simply don't exist in the GOP today, they'd be drummed out as Rhinos.

And here is the regional breakdown by vote.

The original House version:

* Southern Democrats: 7–87 (7%–93%)
* Southern Republicans: 0–10 (0%–100%)

* Northern Democrats: 145-9 (94%–6%)
* Northern Republicans: 138-24 (85%–15%)

The Senate version:

* Southern Democrats: 1–20 (5%–95%)
* Southern Republicans: 0–1 (0%–100%)
* Northern Democrats: 45-1 (98%–2%)
* Northern Republicans: 27-5 (84%–16%)

Re: ...and Napoleon defeated Wellington at Waterloo

[ofbg.livejournal.com]

Link to those numbers?

Re: ...and Napoleon defeated Wellington at Waterloo

[telemann.livejournal.com]

Wikipedia.

Re: ...and Napoleon defeated Wellington at Waterloo

[ofbg.livejournal.com]

Never mind. I found it. (same as mine)

Re: ...and Napoleon defeated Wellington at Waterloo

[ofbg.livejournal.com]

So what's your point?

Re: ...and Napoleon defeated Wellington at Waterloo

[telemann.livejournal.com]

Read my previous messages up in the thread. Obviously you haven't, or it didn't sink in, otherwise you wouldn't have asked this question in all seriousness.

Re: ...and Napoleon defeated Wellington at Waterloo

[ofbg.livejournal.com]

Nothing untrue there but the relevance escapes me. It certainly doesn't paint present day repubs as racist.

Re: ...and Napoleon defeated Wellington at Waterloo

[politikitty.livejournal.com]

Many of the vociferous Democrats you're complaining about switched parties. They were alienated by LBJ's overtures to secure minority voters for the Democratic party and felt welcomed by Nixon's Southern Strategy.

When the Democrats fairly successfully rid themselves of the unwanted masses, it seems pretty disingenuous to pretend that it's the party that courted those racist candidates and voters that has the moral upper hand.

Re: ...and Napoleon defeated Wellington at Waterloo

[ofbg.livejournal.com]

Your comment is misplaced.

I haven't brought up either "vociferous Democrats" or "party that courted those racist candidates and voters".

If you found those written in this thread, you should comment to the writer.

Re: ...and Napoleon defeated Wellington at Waterloo

[chessdev.livejournal.com]

THANK YOU!!!

This revisionist bullshit about Republicans bringing forth civil rights is just insulting coming from someone who claims they were an adult from the 60's.

Re: ...and Napoleon defeated Wellington at Waterloo

[ofbg.livejournal.com]

I turned 21 about three months before JFK died.

Re: ...and Napoleon defeated Wellington at Waterloo

[chessdev.livejournal.com]

Good for you. But apparently you weren't paying attention to the news until then...

Re: ...and Napoleon defeated Wellington at Waterloo

[ofbg.livejournal.com]

Oh yeah, everyone was. Bombings and church burnings all over the south. It was front page in Spokane and the Stars & Stripes(I was in the Navy '61-65).

Re: ...and Napoleon defeated Wellington at Waterloo

[ofbg.livejournal.com]

I never said they brought it forth. I said it would have failed without them.

Re: ...and Napoleon defeated Wellington at Waterloo

[telemann.livejournal.com]

Take Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott, R-Miss., who was a student at Ole Miss when black student James Meredith was trying to integrate the school, and campaigned against Meredith being allowed to attend the school.

Re: ...and Napoleon defeated Wellington at Waterloo

[ofbg.livejournal.com]

There a lot of stories like that on both sides. Sen Byrd. So what? Neither are the majority of either party.

If I remember right it was RFK as AG that enabled Meredith to integrate Ole Miss and many other schools too.

And then there is Eisenhower. http://www.boston.com/ae/books/articles/2007/11/21/an_inside_look_at_eisenhowers_civil_rights_record/

Before him, Truman took the first steps to integrate the military which Ike finished by ordering all enlisted and officer ratings/billets be opened to all regardless of race.

We could probably go back to FDR and Hoover but it gets tiring.

Re: ...and Napoleon defeated Wellington at Waterloo

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

Yeah, and the GOP retreated with their tails between their legs in the 1870s rather than deal with the Confederates launching mass lynchings and terrorism all over the South. Your party ruined the South for an entire century doing that, so fuck Republican revisionism and the horse it rode in on.

Re: ...and Napoleon defeated Wellington at Waterloo

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

Now when is the Republican Party going to own up to being the political Party of Rutherford B. Hayes?

Re: ...and Napoleon defeated Wellington at Waterloo

[ofbg.livejournal.com]

From Wiki: "During his presidency, Hayes ordered federal troops to suppress The Great Railroad Strike of 1877 and ended Reconstruction by removing troops from the South. After the removal of the Federal troops, all southern states soon returned to Democratic control, signaling the start of the Jim Crow South."

Sorta what I've been saying without using his name. (Reconstruction = occupation)