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I was very glad to see that Salon's Joan Walsh is about as tired of those in the media playing the "both sides" false equivalency game, where they compare the craziness that's become the mainstream on the right to some either nonexistent, or out of the mainstream entity on the left, for the sake of so-called balance or fairness, as I am.

It was nice to see her call out The Daily Beast's Lauren Ashburn for doing just that on this Wednesday's edition of Hardball with guest host Michael Smerconish filling in for Chris Matthews. Here's more on that from Walsh herself in her column at Salon: The wingnut trifecta:

Right-wing claims that Hillary Clinton faked illness to avoid testifying about the Benghazi tragedy would be funny if they weren’t so ugly. It’s the wingnut trifecta, smearing our most popular past Democratic president, Bill Clinton, along with our current president, Barack Obama, and the current 2016 front-runner, all with one shot. Imagine birtherism crossed with the worst of the hateful anti-Clinton lies, like the “Vince Foster was murdered” claim. That’s Hillary-health trutherism.[...]

I talked about the crazy Benghazi allegations on “Hardball” today and I was surprised to find myself in strong disagreement with the Daily Beast’s Lauren Ashburn. Ashburn acted shocked at the Clinton slurs; I argued they’re just the latest outbreak of Clinton-Obama derangement syndrome. But even more significant, Ashburn tried to declare that both sides are somehow equally to blame for the “incivility” of our current political debate, claiming that someone (she didn’t say who or where) had wished death on former President George Bush when the news broke that he was in the intensive care unit.

I’m on record, often, saying that false equivalence about haters on the right and left is dangerous. To equate Democrats and Republicans on this front, you’d have to imagine, say, Susan Rice suggesting something that crazy, not to mention unethical, about Mitt Romney’s secretary of state, had the 2012 race ended differently. And you can’t equate some random commenter on the HuffPost with people like Krauthammer and Hannity who have regular perches atop Fox News. That would be like Chris Matthews wishing death on the former president; it would never happen.

I agree completely, except I wasn't surprised by what Ashburn said. She's one of Howard Kurtz's favorite guests on his Sunday show on CNN where what she did during the Hardball segment is the norm and not the exception.

h/t Captain Kangaroo

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If anyone thought the NRA's Wayne LaPierre's rambling, bizarre speech wasn't quite bad enough this Friday morning and needed just one more dose of right wing crazy to make it through their day, the producers at MSNBC's Hardball managed to find some nut to bring on the air to one up him. Guest host Michael Smerconish and guest David Corn seemed equally appalled when fellow guest, author Steve Siebold, came on and not only defended LaPierre's push to have more armed guards in our nation's schools, but he wants the teachers and students armed as well.

When Smerconish asked him what would happen if a teacher did not want to be armed, Siebold's response was that he wouldn't want his kid going to that school. And when he asked him why he didn't think we should arm all of the children as well if he actually believes that more guns make everyone safer, Siebold responded that they shouldn't be arming children. When Smerconish pointed out that seniors and college students are adults, Seibold was all in for arming them as well.

I don't know where MSNBC found this nut job, but shame on them for giving him an ounce of air time.

MSNBC featured two very bright high school students on Hardball and then on Lawrence O'Donnell's Last Word and seeing these kids stand up to the history revisionists like Michele Bachmann or these people trying to push creationism into our school kids as science gives me some hope for our future.

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In the video above -- Andy Kopplin's son takes his anti-creationism campaign to 'Hardball':

Zack Kopplin, the son of Andy Kopplin, Mayor Mitch Landrieu's chief of administration, was featured on a segment of "Hardball with Chris Matthews" this evening.

Kopplin, a high school student, discussed his efforts to combat the Louisiana Science Education Act, a 2008 law that governs how local school systems can introduce supplemental materials into science lessons on topics such as evolutionary biology, global warming and cloning.

During the segement, Kopplin expressed his belief that Gov. Bobby Jindal, who graduated as a biology major from Brown University and signed the act into law, in his "heart of hearts" knows "how vital evolution is to biology."

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And the subject of the threats did not come up on O'Donnell's show, but here's a reminder of what this student put up with after challenging Bachmann that Dave wrote about last week -- Right-wingers flood teen who challenged Bachmann to a debate with threats of violence.

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Former Gov. George Pataki apparently thinks that if you repeat yourself enough times and keep regurgitating the same lies over and over again, eventually that makes you right. Pataki along with a lot of others on the right apparently aren't too happy about the outcome of the trial of now convicted terrorist Ahmed Khalfan Ghailani.

Palin Adviser Wanted Execution Without Trial For Convicted Terrorist Ahmed Ghailani :

A Federal District Court in Manhattan convicted Ahmed Khalfan Ghailani yesterday on one count of of conspiracy for the 1998 terror bombings of U.S. Embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. While Ghailani — the first former Guantanamo detainee to be tried in civilian court — was acquitted of more than 280 other charges, he faces 20 years to life in prison.

On cue, conservatives are outraged at the result of the trial (even though he’ll spend time in a maximum security prison for least 20 years), claiming he should have been tried in a military tribunal. Liz Cheney’s group Keep America Safe claimed that “bad ideas have dangerous consequences. … We urge the president: End this reckless experiment. Reverse course. Use the military commissions at Guantanamo that Congress has authorized.” (The Center for American Progress’ Ken Gude notes on the Wonk Room that military commissions “deliver shorter sentences than civilian courts” and “the minimum sentence that Ghailani can receive is longer than the combined sentences” of three of the four detainees who have been convicted in military commissions.)

The extremely patient Jonathan Turley wrote about the case at his blog as well and Rep. Peter King's similar reaction to Pataki's here to the verdict.

Ghailani Acquitted On Major Terrorism Charges — Rep. King Responds With Call To Change Legal System:

In a truly disturbing response to the verdict, Rep. Peter T. King (R-N.Y.) denounced the jury verdict as “a total miscarriage of justice” and insisted “this tragic verdict demonstrates the absolute insanity of the Obama administration’s decision to try Al Qaeda terrorists in civilian courts.” Of course, no one would accuse New Yorkers as being ambivalent on terrorism.

Nevertheless, Rep. King’s solution to a jury of citizens acquitting an accused person is to rig the system to avoid such juries in the future. It is the most raw demonstration that the interest in the tribunal system is the view that it is outcome determinative and pre-set for convictions. Rep. King appears to be joining the Queen of Hearts that we must have a system that guarantees “sentence first, verdict afterwards.”

Matthews sub Michael Smerconish completely lost control of this interview and allowed George Pataki to control it and talk over everyone. I think Pataki's been going to the same media training school as Ron Christie where they teach you to talk over everyone else, never come up for air, filibuster, feign outrage and hope you run the clock out so the other guests never get a chance to get a word in. This was just a shameless display by Pataki defending torture.

UPDATE: Transcript via Lexis Nexis below the fold.

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Now that Fox has been pushing this race baiting non-story on the New Black Panthers for the last month or so or longer and now that all seven Republicans on the Judiciary Committee have decided that ClusterFox witch hunting is now in season, Chris Matthews allows radio talk show host Michael Smerconish to come on his show and rant breathlessly about how he thinks there needs to be some investigations of this case even though he can't cite any proof that the Justice Department was wrong in not pursuing the it for lack of evidence.

I still haven't decided what's more annoying about this interview; the fact that Matthews is basically repeating Fox's spin but putting a kinder, gentler face on it with Smerconish, or that every time he asks E. Steven Collins a question he talks over him before he's allowed to answer him and that he treats him like some hostile witness in a criminal trial with the manner in which he asks him to defend the decisions of the Attorney General's office, like he's responsible for them or might know the answers to his questions.

If Matthews was doing his job he would not be hammering a radio host to explain things that his staff could find out for themselves by picking up the phone and making a few calls to the Attorney General's office.

I also have to wonder if he even wanted to cover this story or if his producers forced him to cover it given he ends the segment with this.

MATTHEWS: I hope we don`t have to revisit this. I hope something gets done. Well, maybe it shouldn`t get done, but I hope we don`t have to talk about this one again!

I'll just say I agree with that sentiment completely. I hope you don't cover it again either since you seem to desperate to give some "balance" to the story that you're willing to overlook facts and talk over your guests that are attempting to give them to you.

Transcript via LexisNexis below the fold.

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Phil Gingrey joins the ranks of John Boehner, Eric Cantor and Michael Steele who went on the Sunday talk shows and called the racist and bigoted rhetoric from the Tea baggers as just "isolated incidents". When Michael Smerconish asks Gingrey if it's fair to hold the GOP leadership accountable for the conduct of some of the protesters he lets Gingrey get away with this.

GINGREY: Of course not. The Tea Party activists don't even represent themselves as Republicans. They have a policy in regard to what they stand for. But I mean when you have literally thousands, I don't know, there may have been twenty five thousand people on Saturday and I stopped and spoke to many of them and they're good red blooded Americans and good honest people who traveled thousands of miles in some instances, some drove, some took buses, so you know, they're frustrated.

In any crowd like that you're always going to get somebody who goes a little bit over the line in regard to their remarks, what they shout out or the signs they carry, but I think Jim Clyburn who's a good friend, I respect the Majority Whip and John Lewis of course in my own delegation, the senior member of the Georgia delegation is a great human being. And we, I think they understand that people sometimes get out of line. But they're not representative certainly of the Republican Party and I don't think of the Tea Party movement in general.

Michael Smerconish failed to ask Phil Gingrey about his participation at that protest which consisted of quite a bit more than just stopping and speaking to a few of them. If you go look at the screen shot in this video, that's Phil Gingrey standing behind Michele Bachmann while she thanks Sean Hannity for providing a forum for her to organize the health care reform protests. Smerconish didn't bother to ask Gingrey how anyone could say that Dick Armey's fake grass roots organization Freedom Works could not be considered just an arm of the Republican Party.

As Thomas Frank pointed out, the Tea Party Movement is Led by Characters from the Jack Abramoff Story. Fox News and Republican astroturf groups started this movement and Michael Smerconish allows Gingery to paint them as some independent group that isn't being used by the Republicans for political gain. Pitiful.

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From Larry King Live April 28, 2009. While discussing Arlen Specter's defection from the Republican party, David Gergen has to explain to Dana Perino what the term "big tent" means. I love the pinched look he got on his face while she was spouting her nonsense. Hint to Dana...it doesn't mean all moderates. And I hate to break it to you there girly but the idea that there's a chance in hell of your party even becoming slightly more moderate right now looks laughable at best.

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While discussing the recently released torture memos, Michael Smerconish tries to dismiss the torture as rare and isolated incidents and gets his talking points shot down from both Chris Matthews and Joe Conason. Matthews tries to explain the relationship him between those two prisons to him and argues that the underlings at those prisons did not come up with those policies on their own. He's right of course, but if he really wanted to drive that point home he should have asked Smerconish if he'd read Janis Karpinski's book. From part of her interview on Democracy Now explaining how Abu Ghraib was "Gitmo-ized":

AMY GOODMAN: Our guest is the former Commanding General of Abu Ghraib. Her name is Janis Karpinski. She was a Brigadier General. She has been demoted to Colonel. She is the only one of the Generals who has been demoted at this point. And she has written a book about her experience. It’s called One Woman’s Army: The Commanding General of Abu Ghraib Tells Her Story. We’re talking about General Miller, General Geoffrey Miller, coming from Guantanamo to Iraq, to the Abu Ghraib prison, the biggest of the prison facilities. You were in charge of it and all of the prison facilities in Iraq.

COL. JANIS KARPINSKI: Correct.

AMY GOODMAN: And he said he was there to “Gitmo-ize” Abu Ghraib. We have heard the stories out of Guantanamo. We now certainly know what happened at—some of what has happened at Abu Ghraib, in Cell Blocks 1A and 1B, only because soldiers themselves took photographs, not clear what has been happening throughout Iraq.

COL. JANIS KARPINSKI: Correct.

AMY GOODMAN: Is there any reason to believe this hasn’t happened in the other facilities that you oversaw?

COL. JANIS KARPINSKI: Well, there were only—interrogation operations were only taking place—at prisons under my control, interrogations were only being conducted at Abu Ghraib, and they were only being conducted in interrogation facilities built specifically for interrogations at Abu Ghraib. There was what they called “Interrogation Facility Wood” and “Interrogation Facility Steel.” The pictures, although they were—when they were released, it was widely reported that this was during interrogation operations. In fact, it was not during interrogation operations. These pictures were being staged and set up at the direction of contract interrogators, civilian contract interrogators, for the use in future interrogations.

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This wanker was also on Washington Journal today and from the little bit I got to hear of it on my XM radio he was just as infuriating there as well. Apparently Stephen Moore got the same memo as Lou Dobbs today on this "grass roots"...cough... rather astroturf tea bag movement from the conservative lobbyists and Fox Noise as to who is driving it. That Rick Santelli is just such a populist don't you know. He represents the people!

At least Matthews, unlike Dobbs was honest enough to show the extent that Fox is promoting this thing even though he plays as though he's clueless during this interview as to where this movement is being financed. I think Matthews knows full well who's funding it but just doesn't want to come straight out and say it.

Bob Cesca summed this interview up pretty nicely here: Ass Troturfing:

The last time we saw Stephen Moore of the Wall Street Journal, he was participating in Glenn Beck's insane "War Room" episode during which he helped to game out Beck's paranoid delusions. And the next day, Colbert discredited the whole ridiculous event -- right in front of Moore's smirky face.

Somehow being a laughing stock on both FOX News and Comedy Central hasn't prevented Moore from appearing on Hardball where he lied about the tea bag parties:

This really isn't something that's being driven, a) by the Republican Party, or b) by the national conservative groups. You gotta give credit where credit is due on this Chris, it really is a genuine kind of grassroots thing that kind of just spontaneously combusted around the country.

Lies. FOX News Channel, which could be considered a national conservative group, is promoting the tea baggers. FreedomWorks, a national conservative lobby, is funding the tea baggers. Fine -- whatever floats their boat. But don't say it's grassroots when it's clearly astroturfing of the highest order.

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Chris Matthews and Christopher Hitchens take on Michael Smerconish for his pro-torture views. Smerconish uses the "ticking time bomb" scenario which is a ridiculous argument and one better left for the screen writers of 24. Hitchens has really come around on this issue since volunteering to undergo waterboarding himself and if Chris Matthews could stop talking over him every once in a while, he might have had a better chance making his arguments against Smerconish. That said the two of them do manage to make Smerconish look as foolish as he is for taking this stance. Waterboarding does not produce reliable information and it's a war crime and Smerconish is just dead wrong.

John Amato:

Smerconish is also staking out the position that torture is a wonderful thing no matter if the ticking time bomb scenario is in play or not. Whatever it takes is his mantra and I expect as soon as Obama takes the presidency, the right wing zealots will ramp this thing up to insane proportions.

It is truly sickening to witness this in real time. We prosecuted the Japanese for torture on our own troops, but to justify some sick sense of loyalty to the Conservative movement on Smercs part---he's willing to compromise the moral high ground to go on the air and praise the use of torture just shows us how far the Conservative movement has fallen .

More transcripts below the fold:

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