We got even more Dana Loesch insanity for you: My earlier blogpost says that Loesch should be fired from Emmis. She WILL the The Big Tool of the Week and likely Assclown on the Week.
Adam Shriver of the St. Louis Activist Hub had this:
I wrote earlier about how horrible human being Dana Loesch demanded that a MoveOn activist apologize for having her head stomped on by an angry Rand Paul supporter while being held on the ground by other Paulites.
Now Loesch is doubling down, claiming that MoveOn wasn't "chivalrous" because they didn't prevent a woman from attending a political debate:
She's still harping about "'Union Thugs' beating up Gladney" nonsense.
Adam Shriver of the St. Louis Activist Hub calls her bullshit out.
Dana Loesch, who really does not actually know very much about the Kenneth Gladney case (as evidenced by her embarrassing attacks on a local county counselor), has recently been spreading more verifiable misinformation about the altercation. Pointing out some of these falsehoods will serve as a nice reminder of some of the main flaws in treating the police report on the incident as gospel. In fact, the police report contains several falsehoods and is based entirely on the testimony of biased tea party activists. As stated by someone arguing with Loesch on Twitter:
Even more nonsense from Liar Loesch claiming that "Conservatives got beaten up for being Conservative."
That, as we will see, is particularly salient in this case, but first I'll focus on some of Loesch's specific falsehoods. For starters, Loesch repeatedly claimed that Kelly Owens was "beaten" and "punched in the face." And, in fact, the police report also states that Owens was hit in the face. However, in an extended video from the night that includes Owens being interviewed by the police, Owens specifically responds, when asked by the police where she was hit, that her camera was hit which in turn hit her face. So she was not "punched in the face," and she certainly was not "beaten." Now, I'm certainly not saying that Cheryl Joiner's act of hitting Owens' camera was OK. Joiner was wrong to do that and I'm glad that charges were filed. However, to claim that a simple act of slapping a camera is the same thing as beating someone or punching them in the face, and specifically as being in the same category as stomping on a woman's neck, is just plain wrong.
So, just to review:
We have at least three central claims in the police report being directly contradicted by video evidence from the scene or later interviews with the same witnesses.
We also have only three "witnesses" who didn't actually witness the fight starting and who all happen to be tea partiers with clear ideological agendas.
And finally we have a ridiculous arrest of Post-Dispatch reporter Jake Wagman by the same police during the same events.
The only thing I've seen from St. Louis Tea Party blogs on the brutal attack on the MoveOn supporter at the Rand Paul rally was a couple of posts by Jim Hoft essentially claiming that Paul supporters were forced to drag the woman to the ground and step on her head.
Loesch wants to start trouble on her BigJournalism blog:
If she didn’t want to be restrained she shouldn’t have gone with the intent to start trouble, but congressional members also need to provide their own security. Sure, the man shouldn’t have placed his foot on her head. Me writing that just now is more than Soros employees Eric Boehlert and his Soros crew over at Media Matters will ever say on Kenneth Gladney and Kelly Owens, two victims of actual violence. They’re too busy defending the people who beat them, mocking and slurring the victims. Boehlert is terrified to touch the subject of Kelly Owens’ beating because he’s more concerned with making sure he remains popular amongst an organization that would condone the beating of women and minorities.
People like this fraudster Dana Loesch are the scum of the earth and should go to Hell. I hear there's a room for her down there next to Breitfart and James O'Keefe. Also, for any aspiring musician in St. Louis, boycott Shock City Music because it is owned by Dana's jerkass husband, Chris.
Dana Loesch is joining Gateway Pundit in condoning violence against a liberal woman who had the audacity of being present at a Rand Paul event. Loesch said that the woman was asking for it and the poor angry mob of conservative men just had no choice but to "restrain" her by stomping on her neck, giving her a concussion:
My rip on her for her arrogance:
@Dloesch: You are a lying little scumbag that's an absolute arrogant bullshit diva. #DLRS
Dana, what that Conservative did was wrong + WAS curbstomped. YOU owe an apology to Boehlert. 4 minutes ago • JGibsonDem
Loesch is disgusting, even to conservatives:
Remember, Loesch calls herself a "conservative feminist." Call me an optimist, but I actually believe that there are conservative feminists, and that they would want nothing to do with a horrible human being like Loesch.
Other tweets that Loesch mentioned that she was insane:
Those of you who never spoke up for Gladney, Owens, or Bautsch, spare me your fake outrage.about 1 hour agovia Seesmic Desktop
Sorry political tweeters, @dloesch has declared that no one is allowed to talk abt politics until they buy tea party conspiracy theories.
Jim Hoft, who started the fracas, was where Loesch got her ideas from:
Following last night's debate between Kentucky Senate candidates Rand Paul and Jack Conway, MoveOn.org activist Lauren Valle reportedly attempted to give Paul a fake award. According to the Associated Press, Paul's supporters responded by wrestling Valle to the ground; one of them then repeatedly stomped on her head:
Jim Hoft, at the least, is reacting to this incident with barely concealed glee.
I guess we shouldn't be surprised at this sort of thing after a conservative consultant asked "why the MMFA boys don't get curbstomped fortnightly."
= Barbara Morrill of Daily Kos had this:
Now we know why Rand Paul spent the past twelve or so hours blaming the vicious assault of Lauren Valle by his supporters on "both sides" and a "daze of lights flashing" -- because one of the assailants is Tim Profitt, the Bourbon County coordinator for Paul's campaign.
According to Mr. Profitt:
... the camera angle made the scuffle Monday night appear worse that it was.
Of course it wasn't "a supporter" since it took one man to hold Valle down and one to stomp her head, and it wasn't an "incident," it was an assault. And of course Paul didn't bother to mention that one of the attackers is a part of his campaign.
Contacts to denounce Loesch's violent antics on-air: Please e-mail Emmis STL: jaallen@stl.emmis.com Dana Loesch: dloesch@971talk.com.
= I think that Dana Loesch NEEDS to be fired by Emmis for her actions. She is a parasite and poison to St. Louis's airwaves.
== UPDATE:
Limbaugh, Loesch join chorus blaming MoveOn for activist beating
October 26, 2010 4:56 pm ET by Sean Easter
Today on his radio show, Rush Limbaugh also shifted the blame onto Valle and MoveOn, asking "What if somebody from MoveOn had tried to move through the crowd and give something to President Obama? What would the Secret Service have done?" Limbaugh called Valle a "professional agitator," and claimed that reports of the assault were exaggerations, saying: "Her head was not stepped on, her shoulders were." Limbaugh also made sure to note Valle's activism with regards to Citibank, Tibet, and the Gulf oil spill.
Big Journalism.com editor Dana Loesch has also chimed in, tweeting: "So let me get this right. Another paid Soros activist tries to incite violence at debate, was restrained. MoveOn owes apology."
Dana Loesch Wants MoveOn.org To Apologize For Letting Staffer Place Her Head Under Angry Man's Foot
Via St. Louis Activist Hub, I see that FM NewsTalk 97.1 radio personality and St. Louis Tea Party leader Dana Loeschis calling on MoveOn.org to apologize for causing a conservative activist to stomp on the head of one of their staffers when she was laying on the ground outside a debate between Rand Paul and Jack Conway in Lexington, Kentucky.
And how many crazy things will Dana Loesch need to say before officials, candidates and activists stop supporting her brand of hateful politics?
Dana Loesch went on CNN's Parker/Spitzer and AC360 yet again.
From 10.25.2010's Parker/Spitzer: Note: they again spelled her last name as "Loesh" instead of "Loesch."
Loesch falsely claims that keeping the Bush Tax Cuts for the rich will somehow reinvigorate the economy, when the opposite is true:
Loesch wants the GOP to follow the Teahadist Agenda, which is proof that the Tea Party = Republicans.
Transcript:
SPITZER: And that's what we're going to be talking about, tonight, Kathleen we'll discuss these issues and so much more. And tonight leading this off, we got Nate Silver, a whiz kid who not only predicts everything when it comes to baseball, but politics too, just an incredibly smart creative mind. It's going to be fun.
PARKER: Well, maybe he can predict what's going to happen with those cuts and the deficit. But we're also -- what does the community -- what do the Tea Party movement and the hip-hop community have in common? I'll bet you thought nothing, but think again, Eliot. You're wrong yet again.
SPITZER: You'll teach me. All right, we'll find out. And then, of course, as with every night, we're going to keep our guests feet to the fire, we're going to make them name their cuts. You can't close the deficit without making tough decisions. We're going to force them to do it. Now it's time for tonight's "Headliner."
You know, Kathleen, she calls herself a conservatarian and the last time we had her on the show, she called me "crazy."
PARKER: Gosh, I wonder where she got that idea. So naturally we thought, let's invite her back. Dana Loesch is a radio host and is the new editor of the conservative blog, BigJournalism.com and she joins us right now from St. Louis.
Welcome back, Dana. Let's say the predictions are true. Fast forward to January, and John Boehner's the speaker. He said this amazing thing not long ago that he would continue the Bush tax cuts for the middle class, but not necessarily for those earning over $250,000 a year. Would the Tea Party go for that?
DANA LOESCH, BIGJOURNALISM.COM: Well, first of all, thanks for having me back. And I'm not too crazy about Boehner's little class division, there. I think it's not necessary. Tax cuts are tax cuts and you have to look to people who are above that line in the sand that he drew. These are people who are providing jobs, these are people who are helping the engine of the economy turn. And sort of by singling these people out in a recession airy period, especially in a recessionary period, I don't think -- I think it does more harm than good. But I'm glad to see at least that he's bringing them up, that someone is bringing them up in D.C.
PARKER: I have to say, that you're not being very Boehner- friendly. I mean, he's going to be the new speaker of the House, it seems like you would be celebrating.
LOESCH: Well, I mean, I'm glad to see if it were to go red as opposed to being blue, I'm excited about that, but just because it's a Republican in there doesn't mean I'm going to be any less tenacious than I already am nipping at these folks' heels to make sure that they fulfill the promises that they've been telling everyone. In fact I'm probably going to be even more harsh on Republicans than I would be Democrats if they assume control in the House.
SPITZER: Dana, that's, I think, what we're waiting to see. Will you be as rigid, ideologically, and I say that with all due respect to doubt what you've done, will you be as rigid in holding John Boehner's feet to the fire or Mitch McConnell, whether or not he is the majority leader in the Senate, as have you been aggressive in attacking Democrats. The moment the Republican Party deviates from the rather clear position you've taken, which is cut those taxes and do not compromise a bit -- we want to know, are you going to be just as aggressive?
LOESCH: Oh, yes, absolutely. In fact, I think that it would be worse for Republicans to break their promises than for Democrats to do what they're doing, right now. I absolutely would. I see no difference and this is why I am not a member of any party nor will I ever be, because I don't believe in party worship, but at the same time, I'm going to be incredibly strict. And I know a lot of other people are going to be on these guys to make sure that, hey look, if we're going to help support your party and help you get in here, because you're the best chance we have of accomplishing our beliefs that are our platform right now, then, yeah, we don't want a bait and switch. Don't say one thing, and court everybody and romance everybody and then get into office, assume power and then after the fact change it up and, no, no, no, we can't have any of that. We won't have any of that.
SPITZER: Dana, you know we are asking every night of our guests, to name their cuts so we can actually kind of put some flesh on the skeleton of how we're going to balance the budget. If your tax cuts, the Bush tax cuts were extended across the board for not only the middle class, but also the wealthy, the calculation, and it may be off by a tiny little bit, but basically over the next decade, we have a deficit of over $11 trillion. So, I want to come back, how are you going to cut that budget to balance out the deficit of $11 trillion?
LOESCH: Tax cuts pay for themselves. This is the money that's -- it's our cash dollars. This is our money. Tax cuts pay for themselves, because when people have their discretionary income, when they have that money, they put it back into the economy. It takes care of itself. But there are cuts that need to be made, but it's not that.
SPITZER: What are the cuts? I mean, you're -- look, everybody on either side of the aisle looks at these numbers, it's $11 trillion or so, give us the cuts in Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, defense, which as you know, subsumes the vast majority...
LOESCH: Social Security is already broke.
SPITZER: I'm sorry?
LOESCH: Social Security is already broke. In fact, I just read an article the other day, it was in "Business Insider" that said people who are my age are going to be lucky if they can even get something like 13 percent of their Social Security benefit. The money is not going to be there, it's already broke. It's already been cut by Washington.
SPITZER: Well, that's actually not the case. But what are you going to cut. I mean, give us the cuts.
LOESCH: But it is. SPITZER: I'm just trying to understand.
LOESCH: What would I cut? This is what I would cut, I would cut the stimulus. Let's -- just put the money -- let's stop with the excess spending. Everyone wants to cut every single thing that is enumerated by our Constitution as things our government is allowed to do. But nobody wants to cut anything extra that our government is doing that it doesn't have the constitutional authority to do.
SPITZER: Dana, the stimulus is irrelevant to the $11 trillion we're talking about. Give us in Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid..
LOESCH: Oh, no it's not.
SPITZER: It is.
LOESCH: No, it's not. The stimulus is not irrelevant. Medicare is already broke. Medicare, in fact, the president, Obama, he was even discussing about how he was going to cut more money out of Medicare.
SPITZER: How would you fix it?
LOESCH: So, that's already been...
SPITZER: No, I want to know how you're going to fix it, then. We have an $11 trillion chasm here and I haven't heard...
LOESCH: Well, if I answer you, does that mean I have your vote?
SPITZER: I'm sorry?
LOESCH: I said, if I answer you, does that mean I have your vote?
SPITZER: If you give me the right answer, absolutely.
(LAUGHTER)
LOESCH: No, I would cut out all of this egregious, nonessential spending. Stop with the stimulus. And this is something else that's so goofy to me...
SPITZER: Dana...
LOESCH: No, no, let me answer you. You want me to answer you, I'll answer you. We just passed a bill, $26 billion called the Edu- Jobs bill. This $26 billion went to go pay for stuff that we had already allocated $38 billion out of the stimulus to pay for. Why did we have to pay for the same stuff twice? That's just one example. If you don't think that adds to our deficit. I have a bridge to sell you, it's a fantastic bridge. It's beautiful...
SPITZER: We love bridges here in New York. Explain to me, though, Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, defense, which is, as you know, we put these numbers on the screen every night. That's where the money is. That's what we saw went to the banks, you rob the banks because the money's there. What are you going to do to defense? Will you cut defense spending?
LOESCH: Well, defense spending is one of the things that our government is empowered to do. Do I think that money should be spent wisely? Absolutely. Do I think that in a time when we have people coming into our borders, threatening to set their bridges on fire during a flight and all of this, do I think that we should cut out programs that are essential to our national security? No, I don't think so. Medicare and Medicaid, these are already broke programs that have been so completely convoluted and are so corrupt, that's almost a moot point.
SPITZER: So you're...
LOESCH: There are some -- go ahead.
SPITZER: I just want to make sure I'm clear.
LOESCH: Social Security is already broke, it needs to be privatized. Why can't people -- I have a better idea as to how to spend my money more so than the government. That's why there isn't any money there for the baby boomers, because it got out of Al Gore's lockbox.
SPITZER: Can I tell you something? Privatizing Social Security would add trillions of dollars to the deficit because of the way Social Security works. It would add to the deficit.
LOESCH: No, it's not going to add trillions of dollars to the deficit. You give people a choice, you give people a choice. Do you want the government to manage your money or do you -- people will get higher returns if they invest the money themselves as opposed to the government.
SPITZER: Dana, let me make this clear. We can debate whether it's a good or a bad idea in terms of the return to the investor. But that's a separate question from whether or not if you do it, it will increase the federal deficit. Without any question it will increase the federal deficit...
LOESCH: Giving people back their own money isn't going to add to the deficit, when you have again -- this is economics 101 -- when you have your discretionary income, you put that -- what's the first thing that you do when you have extra money? I know what I do, I go out and I'll send it in the economy. I'll save a little bit, and I'll go out and spend it.
SPITZER: Can I give you some advice?
LOESCH: If I need to get a new vehicle, I'll do that.
SPITZER: We should all save more than we're spending. But listen, Dana, I hate to say it...
LOESCH: Well, of course. Why can't Washington do that? SPITZER: You haven't given me a single cut.
LOESCH: Yes, I did. You just didn't like the answer that I gave you. So that doesn't mean that I didn't give you a valid answer. And your disagreement with me does not make my premise any less valid.
PARKER: She said, kill Social Security and Medicare. What do you want?
SPITZER: No, she said, they're already broke, so therefore we're not going to do anything more with them. Dana, that's not an answer. I want to know...
LOESCH: Stimulus, Edu-Jobs. All of the entitlement stuff. All of that. No, we still have $38 billion that were allocated to the states for education. That's why the $26 billion in Edu-Jobs...
(CROSSTALK)
SPITZER: When Piers Morgan's on this network, a big "X" will come up saying this answer doesn't fly. I'm sorry, that's not a answer.
LOESCH: It totally does.
PARKER: I just want to ask you about 2012. You noticed, I'm sure, the article that the Washington Post did over the weekend in which they described the Tea Party as being very dispirit and there's no leadership. You're, of course, one of a few different people who speak for the Tea Party. And when I asked people, Tea Party people, who they identified as their leader they said no one, which seems to be a point of pride among Tea Party members. And when they named those who were most often mentioned, were Sarah Palin, Glenn Beck and (INAUDIBLE) Senator Jim DeMint.
So my question is, given that all of those people have a national approval rating in the vicinity of 22 percent, does that concern you at all, when we're looking forward to the 2012 election?
LOESCH: No, it doesn't really concern me at all. I -- when I read that article, I was -- that article really I found odd in two respects, the first, the polling that they did, they never released the concrete number of how many people they spoke, to how many different groups they spoke to. And secondly, there was this underlying theme in the article that unless you're a national organization your work doesn't count, it doesn't exist. Two things that I thought were weird.
But, I think one of the reasons that Palin's name and that Beck's name are constantly mentioned, regarding the Tea Party is that they're the people who really speak, the really -- they go out and they talk to people, they speak to people, they speak to the issues that the grassroots movement has at the top of their list right now, and I think that's probably why a lot of people would mention their name. I know Michele Bachmann's name is mentioned a lot, and Paul Ryan's name is mentioned a lot, as well as Marco Rubio. So, I think it's just because that they have these principles that a lot of the people in the grassroots movement have, and I think it just kind of plays off in that respect.
PARKER: Does anybody dome to mind for? I mean, is there someone out there that you have your eye on?
LOESCH: There are several people. I don't do fantasy football, I do fantasy presidential tickets. And I have some people that I -- I some people -- I know it's super early, I don't even like to speculate at this point in the game, nut I do like Michele Bachmann, Lieutenant Colonel Allen West, Charles Lollar who's in Maryland, who's another guy that I really, really like. I like Paul Ryan too, but I don't think that maybe it's time, necessarily in 2012. I think he's still sort of blossoming as it were. But, there's some really good up and comers in the GOP.
PARKER: Dana, thank you so much for being here. You're a good sport. It was a lot of fun having you here.
SPITZER: Coming up next, want to bet on the midterms? We've got one of the country's best sport and political handicappers joining us. We'll be right back.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Right now, for reasons we can talk about, the Democratic message of, "they will take something away from you seems to have no resonance whatsoever." The Republican message of, "they will build this authoritarian state" is remarkably powerful, given how remote from reality it is.
SPITZER: James, there's a reason. There's nothing left to take from us. It's already gone...
(LAUGHTER)
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
Loesch said that she'll be harsher on the Repubs. Give me a break! Even if they take back the House and/or Senate, she'll be harsher on the Democrats.
From 10.25.2010's AC360:
Transcript:
COOPER: So unmanly and not a bake-off, get your man pants on. That's Christine O'Donnell talking about her GOP primary opponent, Mike Castle. Now, if you look up the definition of sexism in Merriam Webster's Dictionary there's actually a couple of them.
But one of them is, quote, "Behavior, conditions or attitudes that foster stereotypes of social roles based on sex". Now, you can decide for yourself if labeling a male political opponent unmanly and telling him to put his man pants on is sexist. But it certainly seems to be a double standard.
If someone told Christine O'Donnell to put on a skirt that would certainly be somebody that would raise an outcry understandably. We should point out this is not the first time that Christine O'Donnell has leveled an allegation of some kind of gender discrimination.
She filed a lawsuit in 2005 against her former employer alleging the gendered discrimination and wrongful termination. The suit against -- was actually against a conservative non-profit in Delaware where she had worked. She sued for $6.95 million but ended up dropping the lawsuit.
So is Christine O'Donnell the victim of a double standard, the victim of sexism? You can decide for yourself but without specific examples put forward by her campaign it's an easy charge to make and one that's not so easy to find in the record of this campaign.
Joining us now is Democratic strategist, Paul Begala and Dana Loesch, editor of BigJournalism.com and host on the radio station 97.1 KFTK in St. Louis. Paul, what about this? You say sexism -- sexism is definitely alive and well in politics. Is it alive and well in this particular campaign?
PAUL BEGALA, CNN POLITICAL CONTRIBUTOR: I don't think it is. And -- and you're right. It is alive in politics. Look, I'm a big liberal but Sarah Palin is certainly has been the victim of some sexist caricatures, particularly I mean, you know photo-shopping her face on to a picture of a woman in a bikini. We don't do that to Mike Huckabee.
So -- it is out there, certainly, Hillary Clinton was -- was subjected to a lot of sexism when she ran for president. But I don't see it here. I think -- I think that by her own standards, she, quoting Gloria Steinem saying "If you would say the same thing about a guy". We would.
I mean, come on, if a guy said these kinds of eccentric things about sexuality, about -- about the Constitution, about dabbling in witchcraft, some guy claimed to have briefly dabbled with warlockism or whether it might be. You know, of course we would. So I -- I think, I think she's crying foul here.
COOPER: Dana, what about you, what do you think?
DANA LOESCH, NATIONWIDE TEA PARTY COALITION ORGANIZER: I don't think it's sexism. I don't, I don't -- I think that there are -- as Paul point it out, there are clear-cut cases of sexism. I think, Hillary Clinton, and I think that Sarah Palin, I think that Meg Whitman most recently have all been examples of this.
But I don't think that sexism has played any role in this race. And I -- I -- I have problems with Chris Coons, I have problems with Mike Castle, I have problems with some of the arguments that Karl Rove put out discussing Christine O'Donnell.
But sexism has no place here. This is about people looking at her as someone who is running their campaign as a person who is very new to politics. She's running her campaign like a freshman.
Now, I'm not being mean. I'm saying that she's running -- and it's refreshing, to see someone who is not completely just burdened by Beltway baggage and establishment status quo and all of that.
But at the same time, people are attacking her because of some of the things that she said, because of some of the things that are in her past and it has nothing to do with the fact that she's a woman.
COOPER: Do you think Paul, or Dana, do you think that this is a calculated move? Or this is just -- you know, she's just speaking from her heart? This is what she believes? She doesn't give a lot of interviews to national media and this just came up, or do you think this is some sort of calculated thing to garner votes? Frankly.
BEGALA: Go ahead Dana. LOESCH: Well, I think this is -- it's like -- it's some of the things that I've been witnessing lately. And like, with -- with the case of crystal ball, the woman who have the photos up on Facebook.
The first defense that I see some women, not all but some women run to is "sexism." And it's becoming as overused as the term "racism" is becoming overused. Not every single case is sexism. Now, you had Jerry Brown call Meg Whitman and denigrate her for being a female and use a slur, I don't know, if I call it "slur" but use a nasty word against her and then now it turns around a day later and endorses him.
That was the case of him using her sex against her. This is not anyone using her sex.
(CROSSTALK)
COOPER: It's not clear whether, just for the record it's not exactly clear whether he said it or somebody behind him said or a campaign aide or maybe --
LOESCH: Right, but it's with his camp. Yes. Yes, but Christine O'Donnell, this isn't sexism.
COOPER: Paul? Go ahead, Paul.
BEGALA: I agree, it's not sexism on the part of Ms. O'Donnell. I don't think it's calculated. I haven't seen much out of her campaign that seems to have been calculated. She's sort of an accidental candidate. And so I don't think that -- and you know, look, we're seven days out. People are going to say -- we're just beginning to get to the really crazy part of the campaign. I can't wait.
I mean, if they'll do it on my side of the aisle they'll do it on the other side of the aisle. When you put people under this much pressure and this much scrutiny, they're going to -- some of them are going to say some things that they, perhaps, later can't back up.
COOPER: Guys, stick around. We want to talk about this debate that just occurred about two hours ago in Kentucky between Rand Paul and Jack Conway. Obviously, the last time they had a debate it was a brutal slugfest. The two guys didn't even up shaking hands afterwards.
We'll show you what happened tonight.
Also why is a Democratic candidate telling President Obama to, and I quote, "Shove it?" We'll find out in a moment. The live chat is up and running at AC360.com. Let us know what you think about Christine O'Donnell and this charge of sexism.
And just ahead also, a new feature on 360 "Dirty Politics." See who's running the dirtiest ad or pulling the dirtiest trick this week.
And later tonight, ever wonder what it's like to be in the eye of a tornado? Well, we'll talk to the guy who is right in the middle of this absolutely riveting footage that he took. He'll tell us what it was like.
We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
COOPER: Well, you don't see this too often: A candidate telling the president, a member of his own party, to take something and shove it. Listen to what Frank Caprio, the Democratic nominee for Governor of Rhode Island said about being passed over for an endorsement by President Obama?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
FRANK CAPRIO (D), RHODE ISLAND GUBERNATORIAL CANDIDATE: Well, I've never asked President Obama for his endorsement. And what's going on here is really Washington insider politics at its worst. You have two former senators, Senator Chafee and former Senator Obama, who, you know, have behind the scenes, tried to put together an endorsement. He can take his endorsement and really shove it as far as I'm concerned.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: So the Senator Chafee he is referring is Lincoln Chafee, independent candidate for governor. Back in 2008, Chafee who is a former Republican endorsed then candidate, Barack Obama. So the White House says out of respect for that relationship the president is withholding an endorsement in the race.
Let's bring back in Paul Begala and Dana Loesch. Paul, are you surprised that a sitting Democratic president would opt not to endorse a viable Democratic nominee in a heavily Democratic state like Rhode Island?
BEGALA: I wish I had my thesaurus -- surprise doesn't begin to explain it. It's unimaginable to me. The notion that the leader of the party is being disloyal to his party is I think its own precedent. I can't think of a time -- and he went to the state today. That's the thing too. You go to Rhode Island -- it's the most Democratic state in the union.
The Democratic Governor's Association has spent $1.5 million trying to elect Mr. Caprio there. And the president has just completely undercut them. Keep in mind, in a three-way race with Linc Chafee, who is a moderate to liberal former Republican, the key vote here unlike anywhere else, the swing vote here, is the liberal vote.
So liberals are the most prized voters in this three-way race in this very liberal state. And so Barack Obama, still beloved by liberals, he might have cost the Democrats this seat. He might have cost the Democrats the governorship in Rhode Island. And he's -- I think is still a Democrat, Obama -- Mr. Obama is -- it's unbelievable.
COOPER: Dana, do you think it was a calculated move though, for the candidate to say -- to "shove it" on the radio?
LOESCH: That's I -- I -- I do and I don't. I'm not quite sure. I -- I haven't obsessed over this race like I have others but everything that I know of Frank Caprio he's always been -- pretty well-represented. He's always presented his -- his viewpoints pretty articulately and he's never really just sort of tossed statements out off of the cuff like this which makes me think that this is calculated but then, why is it calculated? Why would he say something like this?
Is he worried? Is the gap closing between him and his opponent? Is he trying to make himself look more attractive to those independents and moderates out there? It raises a lot of questions. And then you have to think, well, if this was calculated is the president in on it, like in Missouri.
BEGALA: Yes.
LOESCH: Robin Carnahan has totally run from Barack Obama; when he's in the states, she goes to the opposite end of the states. It's kind of chronicle, so I don't know if that is the same situation as with Missouri and Robin Carnahan or if he's just genuinely --
(CROSSTALK)
COOPER: Right.
LOESCH: -- just that upset and he was calculated in saying so.
COOPER: Paul, what are -- what are you hearing.
BEGALA: I checked with some Rhode Island Democrats Dana, and -- and they did say that they think, perhaps, Frank Caprio overreacted to this on purpose for -- for effect and to get some attention that, perhaps he is --
(CROSSTALK)
COOPER: It certainly got a lot of attention.
BEGALA: It did. It's not the language I would recommend. But he is a -- a -- by all accounts from Democrats, perfectly qualified. This is not, say this guy Alvin Green. Ok, the Democratic nominee for Senate in South Carolina, every Democrat has disavowed him.
LOESCH: Oh.
BEGALA: Well, they have. He's -- he's not a serious or -- or qualified person to be in the United States Senate and I understand if President Obama doesn't want to support him. I agree with that. But this -- this -- Mr. Caprio, for Democrats, perfectly attractive candidate --
COOPER: Yes.
BEGALA: -- it's very odd to me.
COOPER: I don't know if you all saw any of the debate tonight in Kentucky between Rand Paul and Jack Conway.
BEGALA: Yes.
COOPER: Obviously, the last time the debate was -- it was probably one of the nastier debates certainly I've -- I've ever seen Rand Paul refused at the end to even shake Conway's hand. I just want to show the little clip from this time because I've got to tell you, it was not heated at all. It seemed purposely, designed to be as dull as possible even though they were sitting right next to each other.
I guess one of the most heated moments came when Rand Paul was asked about statements he made to Rachel Maddow and others about the Civil Rights Act of 1964. His opponent tried to pin -- pin him on it and then Rand Paul fired back. Let's play the clip.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JACK CONWAY (D), SENATORIAL CANDIDATE, KENTUCKY: I watched on MSNBC, 20 of the most painful and embarrassing moments I've ever seen on national cable TV as my opponent questioned fundamental provisions of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. His words were had he been -- had he been in the Senate then he would have been seeking to modify the lunch counter provision.
RAND PAUL (R), SENATORIAL CANDIDATE, KENTUCKY: I never said that I believe in anything remotely regarding segregated lunch counters. I never said I was for repealing the Civil Rights Act which is what Jack said over and over again on Chris Matthews show (Hardball). And then, Chris Matthews came back on the next day and said Jack Conway was lying. And it was false is what he was saying and he ginned up a lot of interest on this. So he had some success but he was being dishonest.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: Dr. Paul there is basically taking issue with his opponent's spin on a different MSNBC show -- MSNBC show which is not only the crux of his comments I guess to Rachel Maddow. I just want to roll that clip with the original comment.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
PAUL: There's ten different titles you know to the Civil Rights Act and nine out of ten deal with public institutions and I'm absolutely in favor of -- one deals with private institutions and had I been around, I would have tried to modify that.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: It seems like Paul, for -- I mean, at this point in the race, you know, people have heard that plenty of times and have probably made up their minds about it. Why bring it up in the debate again?
BEGALA: Well, you're right. They've heard it. I'd say, I think that's where the moderator should have thrown the flag, blown the whistle or kept them honest, as you do, instead of just letting each one say "Well, you're a liar." No, you're a liar.
I watched the debate and it was both boring and unedifying. But Dr. Paul does have -- he did at least have this view that the government -- the federal government is powerless to stop private actors, lunch counters is the classic example from discriminating on the basis of race. That's an eccentric position but it is one that's held by libertarians like Dr. Paul.
And -- and I don't think the moderator should have let him get away with --
COOPER: Yes.
BEGALA: -- walking away from that.
COOPER: Dana, at this point do you think it matters?
LOESCH: I don't it matters. I think people heard it enough. I think that it was framed a certain way and I thought it was weird the way that it was allowed to kind of go on in this debate which I also found at the same time, boring but then I kept waiting for them to get amped up and reach behind their chairs and grab pillows and start girl-fighting because it was just getting right to that line.
BEGALA: That's sexist, Dana.
LOESCH: But -- well, no. Because they what are you saying? Boys don't use pillows when they fight, too? I'm kidding --
COOPER: I saw Rand Paul reaching for something at one point but I think it was just a glass of water.
LOESCH: His pillow.
COOPER: Yes.
LOESCH: Well, but that was a really weird moment. There were a couple of really odd moments where they spent the entire portion of that time going back and forth, yes, I did. No, I didn't. Yes, I did. No, I didn't.
COOPER: Yes.
LOESCH: So, I don't know if we got anything new from this debate.
COOPER: Yes. Yes. I don't think we did.
Dana Loesch, I appreciate you being on.
Paul Begala, as well, thanks.
Coming up: on a week until Election Day, tonight on PARKER SPITZER: their guest was Nate Silver, who predicted the outcome of the '08 election with almost perfect accuracy.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, PARKER SPITZER)
KATHLEEN PARKER, CO-HOST, PARKER SPITZER: Is there anything candidates do at this point, or is it sewn up, do you think?
NATE SILVER, FIVETHIRTYEIGHT.COM: Really, first of all, a lot of people have already voted, right, because you can early-vote now in a majority of states. And, second of all, you know, most people have made up their minds.
And so, really, you're dealing with a universe of 5 percent of the electorate is really undecided. If you sweep those voters, it's still not enough if you're down by more than five points, which plenty of candidates are.
ELIOT SPITZER, CO-HOST, PARKER SPITZER: And, you know, that -- that is the interesting point. I was in this game for some period of time. And it used be that, going into the last week or two weeks, there was still a significant bloc of undecided voters.
SILVER: Right.
SPITZER: And you could make a play and make your last closing argument to them.
It seems as -- as though there is -- is greater polarization and there are very few less undecided voters still left to capture.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: That was Parker/Spitzer. You can see it every weeknight 8:00 p.m. Eastern time.
Up next: money and politics. You heard everyone from the president on down railing against secret money funding Republican campaigns. The question is, are Democrats guilty of doing the same thing? Well, the answer probably is yes. We're "Keeping Them Honest," both sides.
And later: my interview with Sean Penn about the totally preventable tragedy now unfolding in Haiti, the cholera outbreak. What about all that money pledged to help rebuild the country? Why has so little of it actually been delivered?
Plus, this:
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We are in a tornado. We are in the tornado, in the tornado.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COOPER: We are going to talk to the guy who shot these images, find out what it's like to be in the middle of a tornado and get out alive.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
== Same old, same old for Dana Loesch: more lies spewed on National TV.
Here was Monica sending a letter calling her out on her lie about Abortion. Background: So I was flipping around the radio on Friday on my way home from work, and I happened upon The Dana Show on 97.1. She was telling this absolutely horrendous story out of China about an 8 month pregnant woman violently beat by Chinese police and then forced to have an abortion. As Loesch was railing against the Chinese officials, I actually thought I might agree with her about something. But then, alas, the crazy came out. It went from Chinese officials assaulting a women and forcing her to have an abortion is evil to American feminists and pro-choice individuals want this to happen in America. Sigh. Then, excitement! We are discussing rhetorical and logical fallacies in my comp class, and Ms. Loesch just gave me about 5 different real world examples for my class. Woo-hoo! So, nice person that I am, I decided to email Ms. Loesch and let her know that she may have, unwittingly of course, used several different rhetorical and logical fallacies during the course of her argument. I even attached the handout I give to my class so that she won't continue to repeat these errors, which as all my students know, weaken rather than strengthen an argument. And in my email, I modeled for her what "fair and balanced" actually means. Email below. Enjoy!
Email:
Dana,
I just wanted to thank you. I teach composition, and you give me so many great examples of logical fallacies for my class.
I would like to point out that saying that the Chinese government violently assaulting and forcing a woman to have an abortion is the same as being feminist and/or being pro-choice is an example of a false analogy, a non sequitur, and a scare tactic all in one. Wow! Thanks for the great example!
It has actually been feminist scholars and activists who have fought against the forced and coerced sterilization and abortion of women of color and poor women (and any woman at all for that matter). There have been several conservative groups discovered coercing poor women and women of color to be sterilized or have abortions. I have never heard a feminist or a person who is pro-choice say that a woman should be forced to have an abortion (possibly with the exception of Margaret Sanger, who was unfortunately a member of the eugenics movement in this country, a fact that most feminists are willing to acknowledge and criticize).
The argument that being feminist or pro-choice means you want to violently force women to have abortions is just a logically fallacious statement. The opposite in fact is true. Feminists believe that women should have the right to make their own choices about when and how to have children, whether that means choosing to have an abortion or choosing to have a baby, or even choosing to work or choosing to be a stay-at-home mom.
I'm not surprised you didn't take my call; I have never once heard you take a call with a viewpoint that significantly opposes any of your own, though in all fairness, I have not listened very often. As I tell my students, you can have any opinion you want, but when you engage in an argument, you need to be "fair and balanced," support your claims with sound evidence in a logical way, and keep an open mind. I would give the same advice to you. Mischaracterizing your opponent's argument or trying to scare your audience is at best lazy argumentation and at worst overt manipulation. I have attached a handout on rhetorical fallacies in the hope that in the future you will avoid faulty arguments and be a more effective speaker/writer, not because I agree with you, but because no dialog or open exchange of ideas can occur otherwise.
Well, Ms.Loesch, the NPR will NOT be defunded unless the Repubs take it back, and that's scary if they do. She had a huge hissyfit over NPR's firing of Juan Williams on yesterday's The Dana Show.
Lines are packed. Inbox is exploding. People are outraged over @npr and Juan Williams, the last of true classical liberals.about 23 hours agovia Seesmic Desktop
She tried to claim that Juan Williams was a "classical Liberal," but that claim was false as he was behaving like a Fixed Noise stooge, even on NPR for several years now, just like Mara Liasson.
The ones that steal elections are the Republicans, like what happened with Bush/Gore/Nader in 2000 in Florida and Ohio in 2004, plus countless other elections.
== For the love of Christ, grow up and quit being a 4th grader, Dana! This woman has called me a "momma's basement troll," when in fact I do not even live with my mother and doesn't even have a basement. This woman has threatened to put a restraining order on me for simply calling her out on her bullshit.
In today's BigJournalism (aka BigFraudulism) entry by Teabagger Dana Loesch, she falsely claims that the NAACP are "racists". Let's not forget her pal Jim Hoft's own problems on this topic.
The NAACP is back again with yet another attempt to defame and smear the multicultural tea party movement.
Strike 1: July 2010 the NAACP’s demand for tea party racism repudiation fell flat when video emerged the day before showing an NAACP press conference where the victim of a racially-motivated crime was mocked, called an “uncle Tom,” slurred, and had his melanin content questioned. trike 2: The NAACP releases teapartytracker.org, a website devoted to all things tea party extremist.
STRIKE 3: The NAACP realized their mistake with the last statement and this time brought in the Institute for Research and Education on Human Rights. The IREHR is a group comprised of liberal journalists and activists who are led by ideology and seek to use their bias against conservatives as a fulcrum to further push apart the country. I would bet that most – I really believe all but I’m being generous – have never been to a tea party event like UCLA grad student Emily Ekins.
Yes, I remember that when a far-left “reporter” asked the SPLC to comment on local television if they thought that I and St. Louis Tea Party Co-Founder Bill Hennessy were Klansmen because of our belief in more individual liberty.
You get the idea.
In St. Louis the local NAACP sent out a press release – yes, the same NAACP who publicly mocked and used slurs against Kenneth Gladney, the man beaten in the parking lot of a Russ Carnahan townhall by SEIU workers (Kelly Owens was punched in the face, police witnesses, on camera, by a woman with SEIU) and essentially stated at their press conference that Gladney wasn’t black enough for the NAACP’s help.
What Loesch did was make excuses for White Supremacy.
Today's TeaPartyNationalism.com report had this regarding the STL Tea Party:
The St. Louis Tea Party passed a resolution which included language that: “The very term ‘racist’ has diminished meaning due to its overuse by political partisans including members of the NAACP.”240
It is here, at the conjunction of nativism, opposition to birthright citizenship, the denigration of President Obama, and the fear of the new majority in American life, that the unstated racism embedded within the Tea Parties becomes vocal and unmistakable.
The Tea Party Caucus: Name Party State Dist HIRC MEM HR 1868 Co-Sponsor Robert Aderholt R AL 4 YES NO Roscoe Bartlett R MD 6 YES YES Trent Franks R AZ 2 YES YES Pete Hoekstra R MI 2 YES NO John Shadegg R AZ 3 YES YES Michele Bachmann R MN 6 YES NO Wally Herger R CA 2 YES YES Todd Akin R MO 2 YES YES Tom McClintock R CA 4 NO YES Blaine Luetkemeyer R MO 9 YES NO Gary Miller R CA 42 YES YES Gregg Harper R MS 3 NO NO Ed Royce R CA 40 YES YES Denny Rehberg R MT At-large NO NO Mike Coffman R CO 6 YES YES Howard Coble R NC 6 YES YES Doug Lamborn R CO 5 YES YES Sue Wilkins Myrick R NC 9 YES YES Gus Bilirakis R FL 9 YES YES Adrian Smith R NE 3 YES YES Ander Crenshaw R FL 4 NO YES Joe Wilson R S C 2 YES YES Cliff Stearns R FL 6 YES YES Phil Roe R TN 1 YES NO Paul Broun R GA 10 YES YES Zach Wamp R TN 3 YES YES Phil Gingrey R GA 11 YES YES Joe Barton R TX 6 YES NO Tom Graves R GA 9 NO NO Michael Burgess R TX 26 YES YES Tom Price R GA 6 YES YES
===
This is further proof that she is deliberately race-baiting to provoke her fanbase.
= UPDATE: She labeled me as a "Liberal momma's basement stalker" and this blog as "mommasbasement.blogspot.com". the real url for this site is danabusted.blogspot.com.
LOESCH: "...They had it all, you guys, they had it all. They're gonna need therapy, and I don't get yous all too optimistic and not vote. I want to win and leave corpses in my wake. Let's see how that's spun on mommasbasement.blogspot.com. Imagine-- you know why I say that are like, wait a minute, 'I play that game.' I'm not talking about you guys, being that because that you are Conservative and all, obviously have lives, girlfriends, and get laid. So you have children, family, and all of that, so it's okay. I'm not talking about you. You guys know who I'm talking about: mommasbasement.blogspot.com. That's not even a real url. Someone's gonna create it. I'm positive.
The highly insane Dana Loesch, fresh off a Real Time with Bill Maher appearance that happened to draw a lot of controversy, appears on CNN's Parker/Spitzer to spew more falsehoods on Health Care Reform.
From the 10.19.2010 edition of Parker/Spitzer:
Transcript of Loesch's segment of the show:
SPITZER: You know, trust me, I'm a coffee guy. The day you see me drinking green tea and granola, get me out of here. Not going to happen.
Now it's time to go into "The Arena," tonight we're talking with the smartest Tea Party spokesperson out there, St. Louis radio talk show host, Dana Loesch.
PARKER: Dana, thanks for joining us. We're two weeks from the election. What's your prediction and how well does the Tea Party do -- will they do, rather?
DANA LOESCH, TEA PARTY SUPPORTER: Oh, goodness. I think that we are going to do better than the media perhaps would have given us credit for, but really -- the House, I think it looks good for conservatives, for the House of Representatives. For the Senate, that's sort of the nail biter to me because we have a lot races that are incredibly close and that's sort of the one -- that's the chamber I'm most concerned about. But, I think at best, if anything, we would get gridlock. SPITZER: Dana, let's put the Senate aside. I don't think anybody can predict which way that's going. Let's presume for a moment that you and I'm glad you said we and I can say you -- you take the House. John Boehner is the speaker of the House. What's the first thing you're going to do? Are you going to try to repeal what you call Obamacare, what we call health care reform?
LOESCH: Well, I call it health control. I just like health control better. I don't really say Obamacare too much, because I don't think it was entirely Obama's idea. I think it was the congressional Democrats. But I would expect Boehner to definitely either defund or repeal the health control law. And it's interesting...
(CROSSTALK)
SPITZER: In its entirety or are there certain pieces? I mean, there are some things that I think every sane person likes which is, you know, pre-existing conditions won't prevent you from getting insurance anymore. I mean, that's a good thing, right? That's in the law. You're not going to repeal that, I hope.
LOESCH: Well, there's -- we just need to redo it entirely, because this is the thing. A lot of people were talking about the commerce clause and commerce -- the individual mandate, the penalties, that is completely unconstitutional. That's not one of the enumerated powers of the Constitution. I would like to see the commerce clause properly applied to lift restrictions on insurance companies being able to sell interstate policies.
SPITZER: I don't mean to be snarky about this, but we heard Christine O'Donnell today in, you know, your Senate candidate from Delaware saying separation of church and state was not in the Constitution, either. So, maybe the Tea Party's working off a different Constitution. We'll wait and see.
LOESCH: It's not. No, it's not. That phrase isn't in the Constitution at all. That phrase is not in the Constitution
SPITZER: Well, let me ask one more question. Do you want to repeal the provision that permits people with pre-existing conditions to get health insurance?
LOESCH: Do I want to repeal pre-existing conditions? Well, I think you have to look at health insurance, too, in this way, it's a policy against catastrophic situations. It's like, you don't go out and get homeowners insurance after your house is already on fire. So, you have to look at it in a proper perspective. But I do want to say that the separation of church and state wasn't in the Constitution. It was a letter that Thomas Jefferson wrote to a group of Danbury Baptists.
SPITZER: Say that again. Wait a minute, there is this thing called the First Amendment in the Constitution. But so you do want to repeal pre-existing conditions? I just want to make sure the public understands this. LOESCH: Well, no. You're trying to frame it that I hate anyone that would have any kind of problems of getting health insurance coverage and that's not what I'm saying at all. What I'm saying is that there are -- children, right now, the way the health control law is written, children are even exempt. There are massive loopholes in this health insurance that already discriminates against people that have pre-existing conditions, but that was one of the things that we didn't find out until we passed it, like Nancy Pelosi said.
PARKER: All right, Dana, I want to switch gears just a minute, here. I mean, what do you think of Sarah Palin's warning yesterday to the so-called "GOP machine" saying they must support this Tea Party or the GOP is finished? What do you make of that?
LOESCH: I think she was correct in delivering the warning. And I was sort of -- I alluded to the problem earlier. We have, what was it? Judd Gregg who said that he doesn't think, just sort of going back to health control, he doesn't think that that should be refunded or repealed. That's in complete contrast with the majority of conservatives out there who are really taking to task this GOP establishment. So, I think Palin's warning was to Judd Greggs and to these Mitch Daniels and Lamar Alexanders and folks like that who really aren't on board with a lot of thing that is these grassroots conservatives are demanding of their elected officials.
SPITZER: OK, can we go back to your other priorities? Are you going to also try to defund or repeal the financial re-regulation bill, Dodd-Frank is the technical name, you going to try to repeal that so we go back to the Wild West of Wall Street craziness?
LOESCH: Well, I don't know. Are Democrats going to try to keep control of Social Security and deny people the choice of investing their own money and growing their own nest egg? I mean, we can do that.
SPITZER: Whoa, whoa, if you're saying are we going to try to protect our seniors and not privatize which would have sent tens of millions of seniors into poverty, you bet we are, and I think anybody today...
LOESCH: Oh, it would have not have. There isn't any Social Security money, anyway. You're going off the presupposition that there's money in Social Security.
SPITZER: You guys don't know how to read a table. You don't know how to read an actuarial table.
LOESCH: It's already broke. Medicare's broke. The president even proposed to cut more from Medicare. There are cuts already in this law.
SPITZER: Answer the question. Are you going to try to repeal the financial regulation bill that imposed constraints on what the bank finally can do? Are you going to repeal that one, also.
LOESCH: I am not for any legislation where the government attempts to regulate the private sector because the government is horrible at stimulating jobs, that's not one of the enumerated powers of the Constitution.
SPITZER: Whoa, you just said something kind of remarkable.
LOESCH: So from that, if you can deduce my answer from that, then you can...
SPITZER: OK, so you want to repeal the civil rights laws?
LOESCH: What -- why would I want to repeal that?
SPITZER: Well, you said you want to repeal the laws that...
PARKER: Oh, come on Eliot, you know she didn't mean that.
SPITZER: No, no, no, she just said that. You said you want to repeal laws which where government tells the private sector what to do. It said you can't discriminate. The civil rights laws tell private sector companies they can't discriminate. You just said you want to repeal that. Yeah, well, some of your candidates have said that.
LOESCH: So you actually had to revert to a racism argument?
SPITZER: No, no, no...
LOESCH: No.
SPITZER: Dana, I'm just understanding the plain, precise language of what you said.
LOESCH: I'm not Rand Paul. I'm not Rand Paul.
SPITZER: Well, but Rand Paul said repeal it.
PARKER: No, he didn't.
LOESCH: Rand Paul wasn't talking about the repeal of the civil rights -- Rand Paul was making an example of the government exceeding 10th Amendment rights and how certain things needed to be dealt with an a state level.
SPITZER: That is why he said he'd repeal...
LOESCH: If you want to be ignorant about the topics and completely gloss over that and say that, well, that's somebody's being a racist, then they are completely misunderstanding A, argument and B, the 10th Amendment practice and the context of that conversation.
PARKER: All right, Dana, I want to ask you, what I'm hearing in Washington is that what happens on November 3, that is once these Tea Party candidates move into Congress, what happens then depends on what President Obama does. And so, I wanted to ask you what would you like to see him do on November 3? LOESCH: Oh gosh, the very first thing that I would like to see is an extension of the Bush tax cuts. Because we're going into a new year and businesses, middle class Americans have no idea what's happening with their finances, because we don't know what's going to be coming down the track with this. I mean, this is going to be a huge tax hike by way of repeal of tax cuts, so that's something that has everyone really terrified. And I don't know if we have ever post election, have ever entered a period where we just honestly didn't know what's going to happen. That's really bad for business.
SPITZER: Well, let's get rid of this bogeyman. The Republicans are holding up the extension of the middle class tax cuts to protect the rich who don't need it. This is going to add $1 trillion to our deficit every year. So, where are you going to fund that trillion dollars? Tell me right now, where will you cut the budget? Where you going to cut?
LOESCH: Well, we'll cut stimulus and repeal...
SPITZER: That's not moneys in the budget. That's not money in the budget, Dana.
LOESCH: No, here's the thing...
PARKER: Let her talk, Eliot.
LOESCH: You're framing the argument in a crazy way, you're saying that they are trying to protect the rich with tax cuts. Do you not understand that when you heavily tax corporations that this ends up where you have higher unemployment than the unemployment that you originally had...
SPITZER: Dana, your economics is worse than voodoo economics. You're numbers don't add...
LOESCH: It's basic economics 101. I'm not talking about (INAUDIBLE)...
SPITZER: No it isn't. You're negative 101. Dana, answer this question. Answer this question: Where will you cut $1 trillion, every year, from the budget, to fund those tax cut extensions? What are you going to do?
LOESCH: I would cut out any excessive egregious spending that is unrelated to the enumerated powers that our government has in the Constitution...
SPITZER: That's gibberish, Dana, gibberish. It means nothing. I'm sorry.
LOESCH: That's not gibberish.
SPITZER: Means absolutely nothing.
LOESCH: Do you not know what government is allowed to do according to the Constitution? SPITZER: OK, there it is, hoax and hokum from the Tea Party.
PARKER: Well, in the spirit of this show I would like to lock Eliot Spitzer and Dana Loesch in a room and make them sort this out and find common ground.
SPITZER: I've never hears such silliness. I got to tell you. All right, OK.
PARKER: All right, Dana, thank you so much. We'll be back in 60 seconds.
LOESCH: Thank you.
Note than CNN spelled Loesch as "Loesh".
=== Loesch also appeared on AC360 tonight:
From the 10.19.2010 edition of Anderson Cooper 360, via Crooks and Liars:
Transcript:
COOPER: Again, a lot of people, including myself, get confused about constitutional amendments, but not a lot of people running for Senate based on their deep analysis and study of the Constitution.
Joining us now is Democratic strategist Paul Begala, Tea Party organizer Dana Loesch, and senior legal analyst Jeff Toobin.
Paul, is it a fair criticism? If she says she is running based on her deep understanding of the Constitution, and that's how she's going to govern, is it fair then to say, well, she didn't know what the -- you know, these amendments were?
PAUL BEGALA, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, I think it is.
I think you make a good point. People might get confused. I mean, how many of us have had to invoke the Third Amendment, for example, that prohibits the quartering of troops in our home? OK. I -- I get that.
But what bothers me -- and it's not just Christine O'Donnell, I think, who can plainly -- who can plainly plead ignorance as a defense -- but across the conservative movement, there is this schizophrenia, this claimed fidelity to the Constitution, when, in fact, they want to shred a whole bunch of it.
As you pointed, they want to repeal the 17th Amendment, the direct election of senators, the 16th Amendment, which allows an income tax. They want to change the First Amendment to ban flag- burning. They want to allow school prayer, which change the First Amendment. They want a balanced budget amendment, a line item veto amendment. They want to change the 14th Amendment, so that people who are born here, some would not be citizens.
I could go on. They want to ban same-sex marriage and put that in the Constitution. So they -- they don't really like the Constitution. It's a little like saying -- say you get married, and you're on your honeymoon, and turn to your wife and you say, honey, I love you, but you need a butt job, a boob job, liposuction. Could you put this wig on?
I mean, you know, if you love the Constitution, love it or leave it alone.
COOPER: Dana, is this a fair criticism of Christine O'Donnell, that -- that, you know, she's running on the Constitution and doesn't seem to know at least what two of the amendments are that are -- have been talked about a lot on the campaign trail?
DANA LOESCH, ORGANIZER, ST. LOUIS TEA PARTY COALITION: Well, I have to say -- and, Anderson, thank you for having me back -- I think Mr. Toobin's assessment of what conservatives think of the Constitution was grossly partisan.
Secondly, I don't know why anyone isn't talking about why Chris Coons wasn't able to mention...
(CROSSTALK)
COOPER: Paul Begala, not Toobin.
(LAUGHTER)
LOESCH: Oh, sorry, Paul. Sorry, Paul Begala.
COOPER: That's all right.
(CROSSTALK)
COOPER: Toobin is going to say something you're going to criticize also.
(LAUGHTER)
(CROSSTALK)
LOESCH: I don't have a monitor. Everyone's voices sound the same.
(LAUGHTER)
LOESCH: But, no, Chris Coons was unable to list...
(CROSSTALK) BEGALA: Sorry. I am grossly partisan. Toobin is -- is brilliant. But...
COOPER: Sorry. Go ahead, Dana.
LOESCH: Well -- well -- OK.
Chris Coons was unable to mention the five enumerated rights in the First Amendment in this debate. No one's discussing that at all. And you would think that someone who is running for Senate, the First Amendment, that's an easy. That's a gimme. That's stuff that everybody learns in seventh and eighth grade.
You would think that he would at least -- and I realize that we're not all constitutional experts, but if we're going to have the same standard applying to Christine O'Donnell, it also needs to be applicable to Chris Coons as well.
JEFFREY TOOBIN, CNN SENIOR LEGAL ANALYST: Fair.
COOPER: Fair point.
TOOBIN: That's certainly a fair point. Everybody has to be judged by the same standard.
You know, it's hard to evaluate something like this in a way that makes -- that is fair criticism, but you don't want to sound like a jerk or a scold. I had to look up the 16th Amendment. I didn't remember the 16th Amendment off the top of my head.
COOPER: Right.
TOOBIN: But the 14th is a big deal. The First is a big deal.
COOPER: The 14th -- the thing about the 14th -- and -- and I was hesitant to be critical of this, but the 14th has been bandied about so much over the last couple of months with citizen -- birthright citizenship and the like.
TOOBIN: That's right.
And if you listen to the full context of the -- the debate about the First Amendment, it wasn't just that she didn't know the phrase separation of church and state was not in the First Amendment. She didn't know what the First Amendment was about.
I mean, that, I think -- you know, you don't need it to be...
COOPER: Well, her defenders will say, well, look, she was pointing out that term separation of church and state is not in the First Amendment.
TOOBIN: That's what her supporters would point out. That's not what the tape shows. What the tape shows is she didn't know anything about the First Amendment, at least as I saw...
COOPER: Dana, do you think that's true?
(CROSSTALK)
LOESCH: I don't agree with that.
TOOBIN: You don't think that's true?
LOESCH: No, I don't agree with that at all.
I think what she was pointing out was Chris Coons' unequal application of the establishment clause regarding the First Amendment, and how really, when you deny rights in the classroom to one group, when you deny rights to one group in favor of secularism, which is its own religion -- religion is not -- is not patented by just a faith in God or Christian principles. It's a devotion and a set of beliefs to a certain something.
You could be religious in your love of music or religious about green causes. But when you deny rights to one, that's -- that's unequal. It's just let it -- let whatever be represented be represented. That's a fair application of the establishment cause in first -- religion -- and if people -- really, that was put in the First Amendment to protect religion from government.
And this is really -- when you delve into Thomas Jefferson's letter to the Danbury Baptist, the sentence following the wall of separation between church and state really sheds a lot light onto that.
COOPER: Jeff?
TOOBIN: Well, I just -- I think the point O'Donnell was making and just -- was making right here -- is a lot of conservatives believe the courts have pushed God out of too many places in American life, that they have pushed God out of classrooms, they have banned school prayer.
And that is a perfectly legitimate widely-held view that I think O'Donnell held. Now, the Supreme Court has not really embraced that view much lately, but it is certainly not some exotic, crazy view. That's a view a lot of conservatives hold.
Paul, is...
BEGALA: But there -- there...
(CROSSTALK)
COOPER: Go ahead.
BEGALA: But there is an exotic, crazy view that some conservatives hold, at least Sharron Angle, the Republican candidate for Senate in Nevada.
And that is that Sharia law is coming to America, or even has come. Right? If -- if you don't believe there's a separation of church and state, then you could get Sharia law. So -- so, Ms. Angle and the other Tea Partiers have to choose. Are they more fearful of Muslims and Sharia law or more desirous of tearing down the -- the separation of church and state, so that maybe -- I guess they don't want the Mohammed law. They want the Jesus law.
But I don't think it's going to work that way. And I think we need that wall of separation.
COOPER: Paul, you're saying...
(CROSSTALK)
COOPER: You're saying the idea of separation of church and state actually prevents Sharia from becoming the law of a land?
BEGALA: Exactly. It's -- it's why we can't have Sharia law in America, because we have a separation of church and state.
LOESCH: Well, Sharia -- no, no, no. Sharia law allows for -- in fact they just passed this, I believe, over in Saudi Arabia, that it is OK under Sharia law to beat your wife, as long as there are no bruises. So I think we have basic assault laws that would prevent that, not the separation of church and state.
COOPER: Paul, you want to respond?
(CROSSTALK)
BEGALA: No, but, if you changed the law, then it wouldn't be assault anymore. I mean, come on.
(CROSSTALK)
COOPER: You're too much in shock.
TOOBIN: I'm too much in shock.
So what that Saudi Arabia -- I mean, Saudi Arabia's legal system is very different from ours.
BEGALA: Yes.
TOOBIN: The case you're referring to I believe is actually from the United Arab Emirates -- Emirates, which said that you can beat your wife as long as there's no marks here. But that's there. And that's here. And the law is very different here. And I think we can all celebrate that.
LOESCH: Oh, no, but I was responding to -- to Mr. Begala's explicit remark about -- about Sharia law in the United States.
COOPER: Do you think any of this matters to -- I mean, Dana, obviously, voters -- Christine O'Donnell needs to get independents. She needs -- I mean, she's far behind in the polls. Do you think this -- I mean, does this end her campaign? I mean, is this a major deal?
LOESCH: I don't think it ends her campaign, but I think she needs to stop being reactionary.
That's just my particular take on it. Obviously, if I were advising her campaign, which I am not in the business of, I would tell her to stop being so reactionary with stuff. Quit allowing other people to put you in a particular frame when it comes to a particular issue, because she's spending her entire campaign being reactionary to whatever Bill Maher does or whatever Chris Coons does. And she needs to get out of that rut.
COOPER: Paul, does she have a chance?
BEGALA: Not much of one.
It's a Democratic state. Joe Biden held that seat for 36 years. She's a good 10 or 20 points behind. This probably doesn't help, but, you know, the -- the percentage of people who are for her, maybe this isn't going to move them off, but it's not going to get her any independent votes.
COOPER: Got to leave it there.
Paul -- Paul Begala, Dana Loesch, Jeff Toobin, appreciate it. Thanks.
Let us know what you think. Join the live chat right now at AC360.com.
Up next: the Senate candidate who says what an opponent did in college is fair game. He's sticking by an attack ad against Rand Paul, joins us next to defend it.
Just ahead, reaction also to tonight's breaking news: a judge reaffirming her ruling that the military's don't ask, don't tell policy is unconstitutional. We are going to talk with two former servicemen, both discharged from the military, one of them signing up again today.
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==== To the Conservatives who accuse me of having Loesch Derangement Syndrome, you are all on kool-aid.
