On Friday, NewsBuster Justin McCarthy reported the interesting discussion that ensued on ABC’s “The View” concerning Nazi-style censorship of entertainers such as the Dixie Chicks. During this segment, Whoopi Goldberg shed some light on what really happened at a DNC fundraiser at Radio City Music Hall in 2004 (video available here courtesy of our friend at Ms Underestimated).
It seems her much reported remark about President Bush and a part of the female anatomy might have been taken a bit out of context, and that nobody seemed willing to stand up for the comedienne to straighten it out. Oddly, this included Democrats, who Whoopi stated, “Disappeared like cockroaches in the night.”
Maybe even more shocking, Rosie O’Donnell agreed with Whoopi’s assertion:
I remember that. They did. They ran screaming, and they didn’t want any part of it.
Goldberg continued her charges against the DNC:
They let the videotape out. It would have vindicated me…Because there were other things on that videotape for other people that would have cost a great deal of trouble…I figured that the DNC felt that rather than have everybody get run over by this train, that it was easier to let me go.
As the MRC reported on July 10, 2004:
Whoopi Goldberg on stage, as quoted in a July 9 AFP dispatch: “'Anybody who could wave to Stevie Wonder isn't fully there,’ she said to howls from the audience. But she also produced a few embarrassed grimaces with an unsubtle anatomical double-entendre enjoining voters to 'keep Bush where it belongs and not in the White House.’"
For those that have forgotten, this resulted in Goldberg losing a lucrative sponsorship arrangement with Slim-Fast.
On Friday, Goldberg described what she felt she said at the time:
I love Bush. Somebody’s giving it a bad name. Someone is not telling the truth to the country, and it’s time to put Bush back where it rightfully belongs. They took that, and turned it into something so disgusting, so horrific, that they, they wouldn’t even write what it was because all they needed was innuendo.
Then came another shocker:
The only person who stood up and said, “Wait a minute. We still have freedom of speech in this country.” Who do you think that was…Sean Hannity.
For those keeping score: Sean Hannity 1, Democrats 0.