Wolf Blitzer Makes a Fool of Bill Maher for Complaining About CNN Airing Tea Party's SOTU Response

January 26th, 2011 10:02 AM

NewsBusters for years has chronicled the staggering idiocy of comedian Bill Maher.

On Tuesday's "Situation Room," we got a hand from Wolf Blitzer when he marvelously countered Maher's complaint that CNN's decision to air Congresswoman Michele Bachmann's (R-Minn.) Tea Party response to the President's State of the Union address was depriving Democrats of equal time (video follows with transcript and commentary):

WOLF BLITZER, HOST: What's unusual tonight also, not only that they're going to be sitting next to each other -- they've got dates -- is that there will be the president's State of the Union address.

The official Republican response from Republican Congressman Paul Ryan, a rising star in the GOP of Wisconsin, the chairman of the budget committee. And then another response from Republican Congressman -- woman Michele Bachmann, who's representing the Tea Party Express. We'll carry all of that live here on CNN. I don't know about the other networks, but we'll let -- we'll let all of those speeches breath.

What do you think about the decision by the Tea Party to go ahead and have their own response?

BILL MAHER: Well, I understand why they would. Who wouldn't want to? I don't understand the decision by CNN to air it. Why are you giving two -- why are you giving air time to basically two Republican responses? I mean, the Tea Party is the Republican Party. It's just a rebranding.

The Republican Party realized a couple of years ago they were very unpopular with the American public, possibly because all of their ideas had been miserable failures over the last 10, 20, 30 years. So they rebranded as the Tea Party.

Why don't you give equal time to the Democratic response, and then have Representative Anthony Weiner, who's from the more progressive wing of the Democratic Party, why doesn't he get some -- some air time?

BLITZER: Well, I'm sure -- I'm sure he'll get plenty of opportunities. We'd love to have him in THE SITUATION ROOM. He can -- he can respond.

I will point out, the president will speak, probably, for an hour. Paul Ryan will speak maybe for 10 or 15 minutes. And Michele Bachmann's speech will be very short. So in terms of the amount of time that the response will be is nothing compared to what the president of the United States will deliver in making his message, as it should be, since he is, after all, the president of the United States. And this is the State of the Union address, although we will be getting some responses.

Of course, Blitzer was correct. Congressman Paul Ryan (R-Wisc.) ended up speaking for 10:40 while Bachmann spoke for 6:36 giving them a combined total - one I doubt Maher can calculate - of 17:16.

Over the years I've covered Maher's ignorance of just about everything, I quite imagine he can't determine that with the President speaking for 61 minutes, this means he got almost four times the air time as the combined Republican response.

It really staggers the mind that this man has an hour once a week to share his uneducated opinions with the country on national television, and we sincerely thank Blitzer for helping us prove this point.

For those interested, here are some other recent examples of Maher's ignorance:

(H/T Matt Schneider)