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The host of Fox & Friends on Thursday decided to find out once and for all if the "War on Christmas" was real by asking a mythical figure who listens to the fantasies of children.

"I like to think that I'm a Santa for boys and girls of all ages," Santa Claus impersonator Sal Lizard told Fox News host Steve Doocy and Gretchen Carlson.

"What do you make of the political correctness part of our culture?" Carlson wondered. "Have you seen it change over time?"

"There was a time a few years back when suddenly I started showing up at Christmas parties and was told that they were having holiday parties, so therefore, they didn't need a Santa anymore," Lizard explained. "And that was the time that the Surgeon General said that Santa should lay off the cookies and start picking up more carrots and broccoli. And I heard that Santas in Australia had to say 'Ha, ha, ha!' so as not to offend certain gals. And that Santas in England weren't weren't allowed to have children on their laps anymore, so as not to create an image of impropriety."

A Media Matters analysis recently determined that culture warrior Bill O'Reilly, who is leading the charge on the "War on Christmas" for Fox News, had spent three times more airtime on the manufactured war as on actual wars for the second straight year. Between Dec. 1 and Dec. 18, O'Reilly spent over 55 minutes talking about the "War on Christmas," while spending only 15 minutes covering Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Libya and Gaza combined.

(h/t: Think Progress)

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As we've already discussed here, even though Susan Rice has been vindicated and John McCain has been made to look like a fool for attacking her, he's still out there acting as though he's the foreign policy "expert" for the Republican party, along with his other two "amigos," Lindsey Graham and Kelly Ayotte, who were out making more waves over the Gaza ceasefire this Wednesday.

Susan Rice defended her initial comments on Benghazi and called McCain's criticism "unfounded" and was much more gracious to him than he deserves after the way he's acted. In the segment above, after noting that McCain's primary complaint about Susan Rice has been that she "said something wrong on a Sunday show," Rachel Maddow walked her viewers though the many, many times that John McCain -- who has made some twenty Sunday show appearances just this year, with another one coming up on Fox this Sunday -- has said something wrong on a Sunday show.

If your career has to come to an end for that transgression, when is McCain going to be held responsible for all of the remarks he made about the invasion of Iraq, or his election loss in 2008?

If it's Sunday, it's John McCain getting something else wrong on one of the bobble head shows. Too bad someone doesn't ask David Gregory's producers to quit putting him on the air week after week.

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John Cornyn believes the killed pro-Palestinian activists that were killed in a clash with Israeli defense forces were asking for it.

ABC's Jake Tapper asked Cornyn how the U.S. should react after Israeli commandos killed, Furkan Dogan, a U.S. citizen in the process of raiding an aid flotilla bound for Gaza.

"We don't know all the circumstances yet. But It appears to be a premeditated provocation of Israel and an attempt to run the blockade that's existed since Hamas took over Gaza," Cornyn said Sunday.

"They are entitled, as matter of their self-defense to look to see if weapons or other items are being smuggled in," Cornyn continued.

"This was pretty clearly a premeditated provocation and it's unfortunate that lives were lost. I think it should have been a situation like it had been before if the people organizing this flotilla had been committed to peaceful activity, as opposed to provocation, this would not have occurred and Israel would have been able to examine the contents of the flotilla and they would have been delivered to the people of Gaza who needed help," said Cornyn.

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Steve Benen asks the correct question about Liz Cheney's latest attack on President Obama over him daring to point out on Larry King's show this week that maybe people dying is not such a good thing, Can't Deaths be "Tragic"? Liz Cheney is really a piece of work. I would really love to see Markos get a chance to lay into her on the panel of This Week but I'm not getting my hopes up. Cheney has the art of filibuster and just plain mean down well enough that I'll be surprised if he gets some shots in without being talked over by her or not given a chance to respond or cut off by the host if he tries.

On CNN last night, Larry King asked President Obama about the Israeli raid on the flotilla intended for Gaza. The president responded by calling it a "tragic situation," adding, "You've got loss of life that was unnecessary."

According to Liz Cheney, this was a terrible thing to say. Greg Sargent flags her latest complaint:

Yesterday, President Obama said the Israeli action to stop the flotilla bound for the Gaza Strip was "tragic." What is truly tragic is that President Obama is perpetuating Israel's enemies' version of events. The Israeli government has imposed a blockade around Gaza because Hamas remains committed to Israel's destruction...

President Obama is contributing to the isolation of Israel, and sending a clear signal to the Turkish-Syrian-Iranian axis that their methods for ostracizing Israel will succeed, and will be met by no resistance from America....

Yes, for Liz Cheney, we've reached the point at which characterizing violence and death as "tragic" is somehow offensive to delicate right-wing sensibilities.

It's quite a conservative discourse we have.

As Steve noted, President Obama did express concerns for the security of Israel with rockets raining down on cities on their border and called those concerns "legitimate" and asked how this is "perpetuating Israel's enemies' version of events"?

Steve's right but it doesn't matter how pro-Israeli a line President Obama takes, it's never going to be enough for the likes of Cheney.

Transcript of the segment from Larry King that got Cheney worked into a lather below the fold.

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From The Daily Show June 3, 2010:

Nobody but Glenn Beck seems willing to show footage of Israeli commandos getting attacked by clubs during the flotilla raid.

... except for every network the day before Beck's hackery. Leave it to Beck to accuse our pro-Israeli corporate media of not supporting Israel.

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Jeremy Scahill debated Ed Koch about the Israeli attack on the flotillas headed for Gaza with humanitarian aide. Jeremy Scahill wrote in his post at The Nation:

During the commercial break during my debate with Koch, the former mayor called me a "terrorist supporter." I told him, "Say it on the air." He didn't.

Figures. Scahill would have torn him up more badly during the interview than he did already. Here's more from Scahill's blog at The Nation. My TV Debate with Ed Koch About Israel's Gaza Flotilla Massacre:

On MSNBC today, I debated former New York Mayor Ed Koch about the deadly Israeli attack on the humanitarian Flotilla attempting to deliver much needed goods to the people of Gaza, who are forced to live under a constant state of siege and blockade imposed by Israel. Among the dead is reportedly a 19-year old US citizen, Furkan Dogan, who was shot four times in the head and once in the chest.

Israel and its apologists like Mayor Koch attempt to portray the humanitarian Flotilla as terrorist-affiliated, a "hate boat" in the words of Prime Minister Benjamin Netenyahu, "capable of smuggling large amounts of weapons" that "was trying to break the naval blockade of Gaza, not bring humanitarian aid." But Koch and the Israeli spokespeople conveniently leave out the fact that there were no weapons being smuggled on the Flotilla and that members of the Flotilla included former US diplomat Ann Wright, who helped reopen the US embassy in Kabul after 9-11 and former US ambassador to Iraq Ed Peck, as well as a member of the Israeli parliament and other international politicians and diplomats.

On the show today, I read from a list of the items Israel has banned from entering Gaza. Among these are such dangerous spices as sage, cardamom, cumin, coriander, as well as children's toys, fruit preserves, ginger, fishing rods, chocolate, fresh meat and well-known terrorist sympathizers such as horses, donkeys, goats, cattle and chicks. See a list of the banned and permitted items for yourself here [PDF].

As Dov Weisglass, an adviser to the Israeli Prime Minister, said earlier this year. 'The idea is to put the Palestinians on a diet."

When I asked Koch how a goat or a horse or a children’s toy could be used as rocket to hit Israel, Koch responded by saying only, “that’s nonsense.” When I pointed out that there were respected international diplomats on the Flotilla, contrary to his characterization of it as a terrorist vessel, Koch would only say, "I don't want to argue with you."

h/t Marcy and as she and Jeremy noted, here are some of the items prohibited by the blockade.

* sage
* cardamom
* cumin
* coriander
* ginger
* nutmeg
* chocolate
* seeds and nuts
* fishing rods
* various fishing nets
* fabric (for clothing)
* sewing machines and spare parts
* size A4 paper
* writing implements
* notebooks
* razors
* toys

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Democracy Now! had the interview today with a witness to the event, first reported on the ISM site a few days ago. Video of the event has now surfaced so I've included raw footage at the end of the the clip.

American college student Emily Henochowicz, 21, has lost her left eye after being shot in the face by an Israeli tear-gas canister during a protest against the flotilla assault in the occupied West Bank. A talented visual artist whose recent work has been inspired by her experiences in Israel and the Occupied Territories, Emily also suffered considerable facial damage, including fractures to the bone around the eye socket, cheek and jaw. We speak to Israeli peace activist Jonathan Pollak, who witnessed the attack.

Full text of the interview below. I didn't include it but Amy Goodman also asks about the emerging details of the death of 19-year-old American Furkan Dogan, killed during the raid on the flotilla.

(Left)(AP) A Palestinian woman reacts as she holds a cloth to the bleeding face of an American activist who was wounded during clashes with Israeli troops at the Kalandia checkpoint between the West Bank city of Ramallah and Jerusalem, Monday, May 31, 2010.

(Right) Sheikh Jarrah Swings by Emily Henochowicz

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Keith talks to former Ambassador Edward Peck about his experience while aboard one of the flotilla's that was seized by the Israelis while trying to deliver humanitarian aide to Gaza.

There's been a lot of back forth about whether or not there were any weapons were on board the ship where the deaths occurred and if the Israeli's had the right to attack the flotilla in international waters. Ambassador Peck could not say if there were any weapons on board the other ship but maintains that they did not have any on the ship he was on. Keith and Peck discussed the political response to the incident here in the United States.

Olbermann: To some degree has the political equation here also been a question of words being turned on their head? Because it seems as if there are only two positions being offered now. Either you support the Israeli government in all things, uniformly, they can do whatever they want, they could do whatever they wanted to in this situation, or somehow you don't support the State of Israel's existence. This has been drawn that dramatically. What's your reaction to that reality of American politics?

Peck: Well if you want to look at reality and you're asking me for my view, I'll say this again because I've said it before, no one in his or her right mind and I'll recognize that not everybody qualifies, wants a bad thing to happen to one Israeli or one Palestinian or one American. But the sad truth of the matter is that bad things have happened, are happening and will happen to all three groups because of what is going on in Palestine and Gaza and what isn't going on in Palestine and Gaza. And backing Israel was one thing. Backing Israel in everything she does is not only very bad for us, it's very bad for Israel.

Sadly all the back and forth on who had weapons or not has done nothing but give the American media an excuse to repeat the Israeli talking points and to ignore some of the larger issues at hand. For more on that here's an op-ed written by Suat Kiniklioglu, a member of Turkish Parliament from the Justice and Development (AK) Party and its deputy chairman of external affairs.

This Israeli Government Has Gone Too Far:

I have many friends in Israel and I did not hesitate to visit Israel when an invitation was extended to me by an Israeli think-tank. I maintained my optimism that Turkey and Israel would be able to mend their differences despite their disagreements over the humanitarian situation in Gaza.

However, Monday was a turning point for me and my nation’s 72 million citizens. On Monday Turkey was shocked to watch Israeli commandos raiding a Turkish flotilla loaded with medical supplies, toys and food bound for Gaza, killing at least nine peace activists in the process.

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Israel needs someone to support them and surprise, surprise... their neocon chickenhawk defender John Bolton crawls back out of the woodwork and into the studios of Fox News.

AlterNet published an article on John Bolton back in 2005 which takes an extensive look at Bolton's career if anyone needs a reminder of how sleazy this guy's background is.

The Armageddon Man:

A comprehensive look at John Bolton's career reveals a man who champions extremism in the service of expediency.

When Irving Kristol regarded by many as the "godfather of neoconservatism" described a neoconservative as a "liberal who has been mugged by reality," he was not describing John Bolton. Unlike many of his supporters in the Bush administration, the U.N. ambassador-designate did not start out his political career on the center-left either as a liberal, social democrat, or socialist.

In the 1950s through the 1970s, the political forerunners who established neoconservatism as the defining trend within American conservatism went through a left-right transformation. In that political morphing, the neoconservatives have redefined U.S. politics from the Reagan administration through the current Bush administration.

Bolton shares much with the closely knit neoconservative political camp: their red-meat anticommunism, their obsession with China, their support of right-wing Zionism in Israel, and their glorification of U.S. power as the main force for good and against evil in our world. Bolton has also forged close links with neoconservatives while a scholar at the Manhattan Institute and the American Enterprise Institute (AEI). Although sharing most of the neoconservative ideology, Bolton is not himself a true-blue neocon.

It's not only his political origins that separates him from other middle-aged neoconservatives. Bolton also stands apart from the neoconservative camp because of his longtime association with moderate conservative James Baker and the close ties he had with Dixiecrat Sen. Jesse Helms (R-NC). Unlike most neocons, who stay removed from electoral politics, Bolton has repeatedly immersed himself in the mundane and often dirty politics of ensuring Republican Party electoral victories.

One political label that certainly fits Bolton is that of "hawk" or militarist. Like most other Bush administration officials, Bolton is a militarist who has never gone to war which according to some detractors makes him a "chickenhawk." In his work in the Reagan, George H. W. Bush, and George W. Bush administrations, Bolton has become known as the right's most effective and strident opponent of the United Nations and all forms of global governance and international law not controlled by the U.S. government. Read on...

Transcript below the fold via Lexis Nexis.

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Glenn Greenwald took on Dylan Ratigan fill-in Eliot Spitzer on MSNBC over Israel's raid on the flotilla and the Gaza blockade and frankly it was refreshing to see this sort of debate that is not all pro-Israel all the time on one of the cable news shows. Glenn has a bit more on this at Salon.

Talking about Israel with Eliot Spitzer on MSNBC:

I was just on MSNBC talking about Israel, the Gaza blockade and the flotilla attack with Eliot Spitzer, who was guest-hosting for Dylan Ratigan. It was a rather contentious discussion, though quite illustrative of how Israel is (and is not) typically discussed on American television, so I'm posting the whole 8-minute segment below. Two points: (1) before I was on, Spitzer had on an Israel-defending law professor, followed by Netanyahu's former Chief of Staff, and both of them (along with Spitzer) were spewing pure Israeli propaganda in uninterrupted and unchallenged fashion; at the end of Spitzer's discussions with them, he asked them to "stick around just in case," and once I was left, he brought at least one of them back on to respond to what I said without challenge; (2) literally 90 seconds before my segment was about to begin, the new cam and sound system I just acquired stopped working, forcing me to unplug everything and use only my laptop cam and mic, which caused the technical aspects to be less than ideal (though still perfectly workable).

Most of the interviews I've seen with him are worse than this one with that awful web cam of his, so I hope he's got something better if he's going to keep coming on television. It's hard to make your points if the viewers can't hear what the hell you're saying, but anyway, back to the subject at hand.

sluggahjells at Daily KOS made a few points about the interview that I agree with.

What makes this interview so important to watch is that it features a perspective that isn't common place on Israel in American television.

The ugly nature of the Netanyahu's Administration preference to keep the Gaza blockade going on and claim that the blockade is "To make the people of Gaza go on a diet" is really disturbing. And you'll never here what Greenwald said in a regular discussion about Israel here on our sad cable television news stations. Instead, you'll get the usual cautious dribble of support that preceded no matter how heinous the crimes that transpired under Israel's watch are.

Because sometimes the truth, especially in regards to international news in the Middle East, can be too much for the networks to bare. And that was certainly the case with TV's potential next network man in Spitzer, when he had to deal with a completely honest broker like Greenwald is.

The other thing Glenn pointed out is that Israel and the United States do not have the rest of the world with us on this one. The humanitarian crisis in Gaza is untenable and when you've got this coming out in reports the problem is not going away any time soon.

Turkish navy 'to back next convoy' following Gaza flotilla raid:

Israel is facing another potentially explosive confrontation at sea as pro-Palestinian activists sent two more boats to challenge its blockade of the Gaza Strip.

Turkey - one of Israel's closest Muslim allies until Monday's clash left several of citizens dead - was last night reported to be considering sending a naval escort for the boats.

This would arrive in the region at the end of the week, creating a potential flashpoint for a major clash between the nations.

Yesterday Turkish premier Tayyip Erdogan called for Israel to be punished for its attack on the flotilla on Monday and said 'nothing would ever be the same' in relations between the two allies.

'Israel's behaviour should definitely, definitely be punished. No one should try to test Turkey's patience,' he said. Read on...

As the media has reported -- President Obama treads lightly in Gaza crisis:

The Obama administration walked a fine line yesterday in response to Israel’s deadly raid on a flotilla trying to break the blockade of Gaza, urging Israeli leaders to let more aid into the beleaguered territory but refusing to criticize the U.S. ally.

President Obama telephoned Turkey’s prime minister to express his “deep condolences” for the deaths and injuries aboard a Turkish-flagged vessel and called for an impartial investigation. And Secretary of State Hillary Clinton expressed support for a U.N. Security Council statement that condemned the “acts” that cost the lives of nine pro-Palestinian activists off the Gaza coast.

The raid put Obama in a difficult position, caught between pressing Israel to ease harsh conditions in the Gaza Strip while at the same time supporting efforts to stop the smuggling of arms into Gaza that could be used to attack Israel. Read on...

Not a huge surprise there but as Jason noted, Israel really stepped in it this time and made it extremely hard for the United States to continue being a friend to Israel.

Democracy Now devoted most of their hour long program to covering the rest of the world's reaction of the attack on the flotilla. You won't see much of this in our corporate media that takes most of their talking points from the pro-Israeli lobbyists in the United States either. John King's been allowing Amy Goodman to come on his new show on CNN once in a while. I would guess he'll never allow her to come on and comment about this situation.

Global Condemnation of Israeli Armed Attack on Gaza-Bound Freedom Flotilla: At Least 10 Dead, Hundreds Remain in Detention

To compare and contrast the "news" coverage out there, here's propagandist Sean Hannity with Get-Off-My-Lawn-You-Kids Grandpa McCain complaining that President Obama hasn't done quite enough to suit them to kiss Israel's ass yet since of course the Israelis are never, ever wrong and the people living in squalor, the ones they're keeping confined to a third world slum they can't escape and those attempting to help them and draw attention to it, are never, ever right.

Israel has a right to make sure weapons aren't going into Gaza. They should not a have a right to do what they're doing to the general population of that country.

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