Olbermann: 'Neocon' May Be ‘Code’ for ‘Stupidity’ and ‘Indifference to Human Life’

On Monday’s Countdown show, MSNBC host Keith Olbermann slammed Jonah Goldberg of the National Review during the show’s "Worst Person in the World" segment because Goldberg complained about the treatment of neoconservatives by liberals, as the National Review Online editor recently charged that "mainstream liberalism and other outposts of paranoid Bush hatred have portrayed neoconservatives – usually code for conservative Jews and other supporters of Israel – as an alien, pernicious cabal."

Olbermann, who has a history of blaming conservatives like Glenn Beck and Bill O’Reilly for violent acts by extremists, accused the "far right" of "enabling" recent murders, and then claimed not to have ever heard the term "neocons" associated with a particular "religious or ethnic group." He went on to suggest that the word "neocon" may really be code for "belligerence, pig headedness, stupidity, wasteful, indifference to human life," and "paranoid."

Olbermann:

I have been hearing and using the term neoconservative for nearly a decade now. This is the first time I have ever heard it associated with any religious or ethnic group. The thought never occurred to me until Mr. Goldberg raised it. Nor did the religions of any of the people described by the term. Neocons, whatever their faith, are not judged by that, nor referred to by it. Neocon may indeed be code, but for belligerence, pig headedness, stupidity, wasteful, indifference to human life, and, especially as Mr. Goldberg`s qualifications for the title, paranoid.

Below is a transcript of the relevant portion of the Monday, June 15, Countdown show on MSNBC:

KEITH OLBERMANN: The silver to Jonah Goldberg of the National Review, defending the far right, despite its enabling of such terrorists as Scott Roeder and James Von Brunn, writing that perhaps the left is responsible for Von Brunn because, quote, "After all, for years, mainstream liberalism and other outposts of paranoid Bush hatred have portrayed neo-conservatives – usually code for conservative Jews and other supporters of Israel – as an alien, pernicious cabal."

I have been hearing and using the term neoconservative for nearly a decade now. This is the first time I have ever heard it associated with any religious or ethnic group. The thought never occurred to me until Mr. Goldberg raised it. Nor did the religions of any of the people described by the term. Neocons, whatever their faith, are not judged by that, nor referred to by it. Neocon may indeed be code, but for belligerence, pig headedness, stupidity, wasteful, indifference to human life, and, especially as Mr. Goldberg`s qualifications for the title, paranoid.