Lou, when you find yourself in a hole,
Stop digging.
Lou Dobbs is not my favorite news commentator, he's too elitist for me, but I came home last night and hubby was watching him (which is strange, because he's usually on G4). I went with it. Then, came the argument between Lou Dobbs, Karen Finney and Errol Louis. Chris Stirewalt seemed to be the bemused spectator.
It was hilarious, except it was an example of how reasoned discourse on the merits of health care reform gets sidetracked. We are covering the distractions not the meat of the matter. What happened was an exchange of a lot of hot air with very little substantive discussion on health care. Lou Dobbs lost his cool...not that he has much cool to begin with.
Anyway, Mr. Dobbs has a big ego healthy self-image, and he didn't like the fact that both Karen Finney and Errol Louis both told hem he referred to Howard Dean as a Vampire on his radio show on this transcript.
Here's the lead up to the bruhaha
DOBBS: These polls are showing that independents are deserting the president both in terms of approval rating, in terms of health care. And we're seeing independents side with the protesters in these town hall by a two to one margin. What's that about?
FINNEY: I think it's a little hyperbolic to say that they are abandoning the president. And to say that you, sympathize with the protestors --
(CROSSTALK)
DOBBS: It's 65 percent of the unaffiliated -- I'm sorry. I used shorthand and said independent.
FINNEY: Well, again, speaking to what we're seeing at the town halls, I think that some people believe -- I believe people should have the right to go and speak out and ask questions.
But that's not what we've been seeing. What we're seeing is people organizing against letting the questions asked and asked. And I wonder if we'd ask that question if we're talking about, when they say they sympathize with the protestors, are they sympathizing with the people who are asking the questions, or are they sympathizing with the people who are actually creating -- causing violence and hate speech, which I think is the absolutely destructive to the process and un-American.
DOBBS: Do you think they are also evil mongers? Is that the latest from Senator Reid? We've gone from un-American now to evil mongers. FINNEY: Our American values say that we believe in free speech. We believe in --
DOBBS: Then why is everybody trying to constrain expression?
The transcript reads like Lou's being reasonable, but on the tape he was interruptive, defensive and snappy.
FINNEY: Because what we're seeing is, I believe that tyranny is when you organize for the purpose of being disruptive, or when you use hate speech like "I want to drive a stake through Howard Dean's heart."
DOBBS: Really? Did I say I wanted to do that through Howard Dean's heart?
FINNEY: I heard that on your radio program.
DOBBS: You heard me make a reference to Bram Stoker, an allusion to Howard Dean and, as a matter of fact, I was --
FINNEY: That is a convenient correction, Mr. Dobbs. But you called him a blood sucking liberal.
Well, Lou Dobbs was not going to stand for being mis quoted. Nosiree, so I figured a stop by YouTube was in order and The young Turks didn't let me down.
Ok, neither Karen or Errol got it quite right. What Lou Dobbs really said was (starts at 30 seconds in and is done at 55 seconds):
One of those liberals that advance the idea of liberal fascism is none other than...Howard Dean.I thought we got rid of this left wing pest for a while, but I guess he's... He's just...he's resurgent. He's a blood sucking leftist. I mean he's... I mean, you gotta put a stake through his heart to stop this guy. So you gotta give him credit for resilience.
leftist...liberal...they're close...the only creature I know you put a stake through their heart to stop them is a vampire. Again, close enough, allegorical, analogous. It was a verbal hand grenade that hit the mark.
Yes, Lou.
You really did say that.
It's there.
On file.
For all the world to hear.
Now, here's what you didn't say and didn't allow your guests to say about the current debate on health care.
- The Health Care Town Hall Meetings are not venues to exhange information, they've become shouting matches.
- The arguments against health care reform are lies and half truths concerning side issues that aren't in HR3200.
A. There is no Death Panel
B. We won't be killing old people.
C. We won't be killing babies.
D. We won't be killing disabled people (unlike how we currently do).
E. Unfortunately Birth control won't be available in school based health clinics.
- During Lou Dobbs show 2-3 people died because they didn't have access to health care (22,000 die per year).
- About 583 people learned they didn't have health insurance during Lou's show (14,000 per day).
- HR3200 is considered fiscally neutral (The net deficit increase is slated to increase the deficit by $65 billion at the end of 10 years.
- The Public Option is a market driven solution. It competes with companies that currently have no competition.
- The Public Option increases consumer choice.
- Lou, you're full of ...