The Other McCain

"One should either write ruthlessly what one believes to be the truth, or else shut up." — Arthur Koestler

NBC Interviews Breitbart

Posted on | July 22, 2010 | 20 Comments

First, I would object to this headline:

Blogger: It’s about NAACP, not fired worker

Andrew Breitbart is not just a “blogger.” Not to be derogatory of the blogosphere, but Breitbart is New Media mogul who may yet prove to have the kind of revolutionary influence in the online world that Rush Limbaugh had in talk radio and Roger Ailes had in cable news. The headline would have worked just as well with his name:

Breitbart: It’s about NAACP, not fired worker

But I suppose someone at NBC didn’t want to suggest that Breitbart is becoming so famous — or notorious, if you insist — that his name has celebrity recognition value. With that quibble noted, here’s the video:

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

At this point I believe it is generally accepted, even by Breitbart, that he jumped too hard on the Shirley Sherrod video, claiming that it proved things that it did not prove. Still, as he says, his target was the NAACP’s outrageous blanket accusation of racism against the Tea Party movement.

Andrew Breitbart has at least succeeded in getting those “progressives” who are now attacking him to grant an important premise: Unfair accusations of racism are a very bad thing.

That’s one happy ending of l’affaire Sherrod — who has been offered another job by the Department of Agriculture and offered an apology by the White House — and there are more moral-of-the-story takeaways to this week’s Breitbart-induced teachable moment, which played out in an interesting online tango with the not-entirely-unrelated Journolist saga:

  • Online media have a powerful impact — You may say. “Well, duh,” but between them, Breitbart and the Daily Caller grabbed hold of the news-space this week in a spectacular way.
  • The Obama administration is running scared — According to Sherrod, after Breitbart posted the video, she was hounded by phone calls from her bosses at USDA, one of whom finally told her she must resign because Glenn Beck was going to air the video on his show that evening. (Which, in fact, he did not.) Remember that Sherrod’s USDA bailiwick is Georgia, and where former Democratic Gov. Roy Barnes is seeking a comeback this year. Don’t you think that the Barnes campaign and other Georgia Democrats recognized the explosive potential of the Sherrod video? Democrats can still win statewide elections down South, but they can’t win them without a respectable showing among rural white voters and the immediate impression created by the Sherrod video (which we now know was unfairly edited) was anathemic to any such prospect. I’ll bet Roy Barnes made at least one call to his friend Tom Vilsack during all this.
  • Democrats don’t think they can win without the race card — This is where the Sherrod affair really intersects with the Daily Caller’s Journolist revelations. Why were members of Journolist so eager to kill the Rev. Wright story in April 2008? If the story of the “G–d– America” preacher had torpedoed Obama’s campaign during the Democratic primaries, the result would have been that Hillary Clinton got the Democratic nomination. Yet the Journolisters viewed such an outcome as unacceptable, even though Hillary’s “progressive” bona fides are as solid as Obama’s. (She did her senior thesis at Wellesley about Saul Alinksy, remember?) The obvious explanation is that the Journolisters perceived that Obama’s race would function as a sort of political Kryptonite against the GOP, so that liberals could automatically accuse Republicans of racism merely for opposing Obama.

Wasn’t the constant playing of the race card by Team Obama what finally disgusted the Hillary-supporting PUMAs like Cynthia Yockey and HillBuzz? And over the first 18 months of the Obama administration, we have seen this race-card Kryptonite tactic employed over and over again.

Oppose the stimulus bill? Raaaaacist! Oppose civilian trial in Manhattan for Khalid Shaikh Mohammed? Raaaaacist! Oppose the health-care bill? Raaaaacist! In the Era of Hope and Change, there is no political controversy, major or minor, which Democrats will not use as an opportunity to play the race card.

Since I’m currently en route to an undisclosed location (this is advance-posted) let me direct you to “Why Can’t Media Matters Read?” Also, ABC News has an exclusive interview with Breitbart, but not yet the Diane Sawyer interview alluded to previously.

Category: Andrew Breitbart, Racism

Comments

20 Responses to “NBC Interviews Breitbart”

  1. Joe
    July 22nd, 2010 @ 6:55 pm

    Jeff G is spot on with this.

  2. Joe
    July 22nd, 2010 @ 2:55 pm

    Jeff G is spot on with this.

  3. just a conservative girl
    July 22nd, 2010 @ 7:31 pm

    I am so sick of the race card being played. It has gotten so out of control since he has taken office. Do they seriously expect any thinking person to believe that a fiscal conservative would be okay with Obama’s policies if he were white?

    So much for the post racial presidency. I have been called a racist on quite a few occassions since he took office. Which is odd considering who I am married to.

    What is really dangerous with all this accusations of race being thrown about, is that when a real case happens, believe are less likely to believe it. People who say they care about race relations in this country are making it worse, not better.

  4. just a conservative girl
    July 22nd, 2010 @ 3:31 pm

    I am so sick of the race card being played. It has gotten so out of control since he has taken office. Do they seriously expect any thinking person to believe that a fiscal conservative would be okay with Obama’s policies if he were white?

    So much for the post racial presidency. I have been called a racist on quite a few occassions since he took office. Which is odd considering who I am married to.

    What is really dangerous with all this accusations of race being thrown about, is that when a real case happens, believe are less likely to believe it. People who say they care about race relations in this country are making it worse, not better.

  5. Adobe Walls
    July 22nd, 2010 @ 7:44 pm

    Unless Breitbart edited out parts of the video he received his only sins are tactical. His belief that others would see the well known raaaaacism of the NAAAAACP as the moral to be gleaned the segment of video, was somewhat naive. As for the Saintliness of Shirley Sherrod I’m throwing out the “hooey card”. Even if one believes that she had an epiphany bestowing socially just value on POOR white folks that’s not the same as lack of racial animus towards white folk generally. Her recent statements affirming her belief that opposition to Obama’s policies, in particular Health-care are evidence of raaaaacism not just by the Tea Partiers but by FNC indicates that she views every thing through a racial prism at best. Attempting to have a calm, reasonable, productive discussion with any element of the left about race, is a fool,s errand. We shall gain no points from nor give or receive any enlightenment from the left. We on the right don’t need to convince each other that all forms of raaaaacism are unacceptable and the cowardly moderates can not stand the heat required to produce the light an honest discussion about race in this country needs.
    And another nagging question, why was someone who had sued any govt. agency, given a job at any level of govt. let alone the agency she sued?

  6. Adobe Walls
    July 22nd, 2010 @ 3:44 pm

    Unless Breitbart edited out parts of the video he received his only sins are tactical. His belief that others would see the well known raaaaacism of the NAAAAACP as the moral to be gleaned the segment of video, was somewhat naive. As for the Saintliness of Shirley Sherrod I’m throwing out the “hooey card”. Even if one believes that she had an epiphany bestowing socially just value on POOR white folks that’s not the same as lack of racial animus towards white folk generally. Her recent statements affirming her belief that opposition to Obama’s policies, in particular Health-care are evidence of raaaaacism not just by the Tea Partiers but by FNC indicates that she views every thing through a racial prism at best. Attempting to have a calm, reasonable, productive discussion with any element of the left about race, is a fool,s errand. We shall gain no points from nor give or receive any enlightenment from the left. We on the right don’t need to convince each other that all forms of raaaaacism are unacceptable and the cowardly moderates can not stand the heat required to produce the light an honest discussion about race in this country needs.
    And another nagging question, why was someone who had sued any govt. agency, given a job at any level of govt. let alone the agency she sued?

  7. Red
    July 22nd, 2010 @ 8:35 pm

    No joke. I’d like to know more about this Pigford snafu, this “$600 million dollar lottery for blacks”. Didn’t Shirley Sherrod and husband enjoy a higher payout than most of the other black farmers in the lawsuit?

  8. Red
    July 22nd, 2010 @ 4:35 pm

    No joke. I’d like to know more about this Pigford snafu, this “$600 million dollar lottery for blacks”. Didn’t Shirley Sherrod and husband enjoy a higher payout than most of the other black farmers in the lawsuit?

  9. Steve in TN
    July 22nd, 2010 @ 9:00 pm

    1) “But I did enough.” and “I took him to his own kind.” Those two sentences belie the same kind of bigotry we condemned in whites decades ago. This bigotry is no less excusable in blacks today.

    2) Sherrod goes on to relate how she helped “save” a black farm but bemoans how a “white man” got a portion of it. She may claim redemption for her “former” racism, but her words and acts say that racism is still in her heart.

    3) Sherrod, in blatant racist form, declares that Obama and Obamacare are opposed by Republicans because he is black, not because of his policies. She is transferring the bigotry in her heart onto he political opponents.

    All this is on the NAACP video and I am disgusted by supposed clear minded conservatives that quake in fear of declaring exactly what Sherrod, the NAACP, and the crowd at the NAACP are: Blatant racists who revel in the telling of acts of bigotry. It was inexcusable of Robert Byrd and it is inexcusable of Sherrod, the NAACP, and their supporters.

  10. Steve in TN
    July 22nd, 2010 @ 5:00 pm

    1) “But I did enough.” and “I took him to his own kind.” Those two sentences belie the same kind of bigotry we condemned in whites decades ago. This bigotry is no less excusable in blacks today.

    2) Sherrod goes on to relate how she helped “save” a black farm but bemoans how a “white man” got a portion of it. She may claim redemption for her “former” racism, but her words and acts say that racism is still in her heart.

    3) Sherrod, in blatant racist form, declares that Obama and Obamacare are opposed by Republicans because he is black, not because of his policies. She is transferring the bigotry in her heart onto he political opponents.

    All this is on the NAACP video and I am disgusted by supposed clear minded conservatives that quake in fear of declaring exactly what Sherrod, the NAACP, and the crowd at the NAACP are: Blatant racists who revel in the telling of acts of bigotry. It was inexcusable of Robert Byrd and it is inexcusable of Sherrod, the NAACP, and their supporters.

  11. young4eyes
    July 22nd, 2010 @ 11:20 pm

    “I am so sick of the race card being played. It has gotten so out of control since he has taken office”
    I agree:
    “We need segregated buses… This is Obama’s America.”
    “Obama’s entire economic program is reparations”
    –Rush Limbaugh
    Yeah, let’s talk policy.
    ConGirl, Your idea of playing the race card is calling out racism when we see or hear it.
    “So much for the post racial presidency”
    I know, and you guys tried so hard to ignore it…
    Nashville Steve, keep trying buddy. And kudos for comparing Sherrod/NAACP to a former Klan member.
    Yeah, you guys are real winners….

  12. young4eyes
    July 22nd, 2010 @ 7:20 pm

    “I am so sick of the race card being played. It has gotten so out of control since he has taken office”
    I agree:
    “We need segregated buses… This is Obama’s America.”
    “Obama’s entire economic program is reparations”
    –Rush Limbaugh
    Yeah, let’s talk policy.
    ConGirl, Your idea of playing the race card is calling out racism when we see or hear it.
    “So much for the post racial presidency”
    I know, and you guys tried so hard to ignore it…
    Nashville Steve, keep trying buddy. And kudos for comparing Sherrod/NAACP to a former Klan member.
    Yeah, you guys are real winners….

  13. just a conservative girl
    July 23rd, 2010 @ 2:20 am

    Sorry Young 4 eyes, that isn’t my idea of the playing the race card. My idea of the playing the race card is being called a racist simply because I don’t agree with his politics. Me being called a racist because I don’t believe in socialized medicine. That is playing the race card. My differences with the president are political, I could care less that he is black. He could be green, orange or yellow and I wouldn’t agree with him.

    People from left having been saying since day one that we don’t like him because he is black. We don’t like him because he is a far left liberal who believes that the job of the government is make everything fair. Life hasn’t been fair since the beginning of time, and Obama can’t make it so. As much as you may want to believe that he can. What exactly is fair about putting racial quotas in a financial reform bill? What if the most qualified person happens to be a white man? He can’t have the job because of the quota, how is that fair? I want a colorblind society. I realize that it will never be 100%, but we can make it much closer than it is today if we all just stop making everything about race. Sometimes we don’t like people who happen to be another race, that doesn’t make us racist. Sometimes we disagree with a politician’s policies. Am I supposed to agree with everything Obama says because he happens to be black and I am not? What sense does that make? That is playing the race card.

  14. just a conservative girl
    July 22nd, 2010 @ 10:20 pm

    Sorry Young 4 eyes, that isn’t my idea of the playing the race card. My idea of the playing the race card is being called a racist simply because I don’t agree with his politics. Me being called a racist because I don’t believe in socialized medicine. That is playing the race card. My differences with the president are political, I could care less that he is black. He could be green, orange or yellow and I wouldn’t agree with him.

    People from left having been saying since day one that we don’t like him because he is black. We don’t like him because he is a far left liberal who believes that the job of the government is make everything fair. Life hasn’t been fair since the beginning of time, and Obama can’t make it so. As much as you may want to believe that he can. What exactly is fair about putting racial quotas in a financial reform bill? What if the most qualified person happens to be a white man? He can’t have the job because of the quota, how is that fair? I want a colorblind society. I realize that it will never be 100%, but we can make it much closer than it is today if we all just stop making everything about race. Sometimes we don’t like people who happen to be another race, that doesn’t make us racist. Sometimes we disagree with a politician’s policies. Am I supposed to agree with everything Obama says because he happens to be black and I am not? What sense does that make? That is playing the race card.

  15. Rob
    July 23rd, 2010 @ 3:22 am

    Young4eyes wasn’t being sarcastic. He finally agree with us. That’s what I call progress!

  16. Rob
    July 22nd, 2010 @ 11:22 pm

    Young4eyes wasn’t being sarcastic. He finally agree with us. That’s what I call progress!

  17. Latte Links (7-22-10) | Caffeinated Thoughts
    July 23rd, 2010 @ 12:27 am

    […] The Other McCain: NBC Interviews Breitbart […]

  18. Estragon
    July 23rd, 2010 @ 5:47 am

    Breitbart should have either specified the video was edited and he had requested, but been refused, the whole thing by the NAACP, or else held off until he could obtain it from his source. Having failed in that, he needs to out his source, so they can explain the editing.

    Unless he does that, he will be treated as “the guy who smeared Sherrod on the internet” and lose credibility.

    Perhaps it isn’t right, but that’s the way these things happen. Look at Dan Quayle, who never lived down repeating the misspelling a public schoolteacher had written on a flash card.

  19. Estragon
    July 23rd, 2010 @ 1:47 am

    Breitbart should have either specified the video was edited and he had requested, but been refused, the whole thing by the NAACP, or else held off until he could obtain it from his source. Having failed in that, he needs to out his source, so they can explain the editing.

    Unless he does that, he will be treated as “the guy who smeared Sherrod on the internet” and lose credibility.

    Perhaps it isn’t right, but that’s the way these things happen. Look at Dan Quayle, who never lived down repeating the misspelling a public schoolteacher had written on a flash card.

  20. Ed Driscoll » Hold On, I May Have Judged the JournoListers Too Harshly
    July 23rd, 2010 @ 5:27 am

    […] consensus about the quality control efforts employed by the information wing of General Electric spotted here. Hope! Change! Room for agreement between the right and left, at last. Filed under: Liberal […]