Every once in a while, a media pundit says something that everyone knows but almost no-one talks about - at least not on the airwaves. Such was the case today with Chris Matthews of Hardball on MSNBC. It was unscripted and with passion.

Thank you Chris

And then there was Jon Stewart on Comedy Central. Priceless

It’s all so pathetic. From Michael Chertoff’s gut feeling about a terror attack this summer to the constant breaking news every time someone sneezes the wrong way on a plane; Americans have to be numb by now to the scare tactics of the administration and the exploitation by the networks.

Joe Scarboroough is priceless here, ridiculing CNN.

And the CNN coverage continued

Says it all.

Joe Scarborough:

Now you don’t have to have a political doctorate in Political Science to realize it’s never a good sign when you’re outpolled by Lucifer

But the PR blitz continues as the decider continues to decide and Iraq continues to burn. He brought in all the top brains from across the kingdom and then wisely ignored them because he hears directly from a higher father. These mere mortals know not what they do.

Every day Americans wake up to the catastrophe that he and his neocons have brought upon us and Iraq. Even the US media has woken up at least to this fact if not the rest.

Haven’t we heard this before?

Visit Scarborough Country for the complete video.

The discussion which followed Joe Scarborough’s stunning recap of the Bush press conference yesterday focused almost entirely on whether the president is delusional.

The consensus among Michael Crowley (New Republic), Josh Green (Atlantic Monthly), and Mike Barnacle (MSNBC contributor) was a resounding yes.

Joe is a former republican congressman who supported Bush twice. It sounds like he’s had enough.

The only thing at this press conference which was worse than the president’s snyde, contemptuous and contradictory answers were his sick attempts at humor for a situation that no-one is laughing about. Then there is the issue of questions from the press corps. Lame comes to mind.

Congress: let’s punish Palestinians some more.

Baker, Hamilton, Eagleberger, Minetta, Mitchell, — suddenly everyone is echoing the need to solve the Palestine - Israel conflict. According to James Baker, “every single person, almost without exception, that we talked to, counseled us about the importance of solving, at least trying to solve the Arab Israeli dispute”.

At the same time congress is voting on a bill to punish Palestinians for exercising their right to vote as insisted upon by the US and the international community. The US Campaign to End the Occupation has issued an action alert to call and ask President Bush to veto the bill.

No-where on US television, during any of these discussions, was there any mention of the Palestinian anti-terrorism act.

There is certainly no shortage of misstatements even by those calling for US involvement to solve the crisis. There is also no acknowledgment of US culpability for the situation that Palestinians are forced to endure. But collectively, I sense a shift happening. One can hope.

Another of the central recommendations of the Iraq Study Group is to talk to Iran and Syria. There was predictable opposition from people like Joe Lieberman. But again, the chorus is loud and clear and has some powerful voices in it.

Since the Iraq study group has come out with its findings, there has been a virtual chorus of US politicians calling for the US to work on solving the Palestine – Israel conflict, as if they have nothing to do with it.

That aside, Tucker Carlson actually asked the most obvious question today about whether the US would apply equal pressure to both sides, which is what (according to him) would be necessary to solve the crisis. Tucker actually acknowledged that anyone who dares to say publicly, what anyone who spends 15 minutes in the Middle East knows, is attacked as an enemy of Israel. Actually, I think they’re attacked as an anti-Semite but point made.

Both he and Larry Korb noted how well it worked out for Bush senior when he withheld loan guarantees from Israel because the Israeli government continued to build illegal settlements in the West Bank with US money.

Clinton was not about to make that mistake.

In a most cowardly fashion, Joe Scarborough of Scarborough Country on MSNBC, used a hostile caller into C-SPAN during an appearance by former President Jimmy Carter to call him an anti-Semite. Not only did he use a lame caller do do his dirty work but he did not even have the decency to run Carter’s response. To add insult to injury, he then interviewed David Bernstein, director of the Washington office of the American Jewish Committee. There was no one to represent Carter, the Palestinians, or the other side of a very divisive issue.

Not only is Scarborough an MSNBC host and personality, he is a former Congressman. His ignorance on the issue of Palestine / Israel is astounding. During the Israeli invasion of Lebanon, he was at one point raving about the fact that Israel had returned the entire West Bank and got nothing but suicide bombers and rockets in return.

Maybe it’s because he was a Congressman.

Note Bernstien dismisses Carter’s use of the apartheid analogy as a “publicity stunt.” Yet Ha’aretz, Israel’s most respected newspaper: wrote in an Sept. 13 editorial,

…the apartheid regime in the territories remains intact; millions of Palestinians are living without rights, freedom of movement or a livelihood, under the yoke of ongoing Israeli occupation…

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