Alan Grayson

Liberals love substituting the word "choice" for abortion in their futile attempt to render it bloodless.

Liberals despise when those they consider allies "choose" to reconsider their enthusiasm for abortion. (video clip after page break)

Apparently unconcerned about being hypocritical or lacking intellectual honesty, in the same program today MSNBC's Martin Bashir celebrated the over-the-top partisan smarminess of former Rep. Alan Grayson (D-Fla.) and blasted GOP presidential contender Mitt Romney for his decidedly tame quip about President Obama's economic (mis)management.

The mid-afternoon host proudly featured the ex-congressman in a segment entitled "Sunshine State of Mind," proudly reminding viewers that it was Grayson whose hallmark achievement in Congress was charging during debate on the House floor that Republicans want sick Americans to "die quickly" because they opposed ObamaCare. [video follows page break]

Democrat Rep. Alan Grayson of Florida, the fiery leftist and Republican hater whose offensive comments about Republicans may well have cost him his seat last November, gets a fairly fond send-off in Monday's New York Times.

Reporter Michael Barbaro, previously known for his hostile coverage of Wal-Mart, called Grayson the “pugnaciously partisan, verbal-bomb-tossing, liberal folk hero of the 111th Congress,” and the headline and text box are complimentary. “Enter: Swinging. Exit: Much the Same Way.” The text box: “In or out of Congress, Alan Grayson is a man of strong views.”

Barbaro only briefly dealt with Grayson’s history of foul partisan fusillades, skipping Grayson’s campaign ad calling Republican opponent Daniel Webster “Taliban Dan” (which may have cost Grayson the election).

After relaying a few newly minted Graysonisms like calling incoming speaker of the House John Boehner a “tool of special interest,” Barbaro summarized the bombastic former lawmaker with a stream of ambivalent adjectives:

Representative Alan Grayson, a Democrat from Florida’s Eighth Congressional District, is leaving office on Wednesday much as he entered it two years ago -- as the pugnaciously partisan, verbal-bomb-tossing, liberal folk hero of the 111th Congress.

For the second night in a row, MSNBC's Lawrence O'Donnell exposed a prominent liberal for being totally ignorant about the tax code.

His victim on Wednesday's "The Last Word" was liberal media darling Rep. Alan Grayson (D-Fla.), and this time O'Donnell had some assistance from two very unlikely participants (video follows with partial transcript and commentary):

Are you an elected Democrat?  Someone who managed to survive the whacking this week, but is still looking forward to early retirement beginning in 2012?  We've got the perfect political consulting firm for you: Grayson-Uygur . . .

Sitting in for Ed Schultz this evening, Cenk Uygur embraced Dem loser Alan Grayson's hyper-confrontional campaigning style, while adding a suggestion all his own: Dem arrogance and triumphalism.

Please, Dems, retain this apocryphal firm immediately: we could be headed to the first 435-0 House in history. View video after the jump.

 

The Democrats’ strategy to salvage the 2010 campaign was to distract voters from their record over the past two years and paint their opponents as wacky extremists. Win or lose, the Democrats got a lot of help from their friends in the supposedly objective “news” media. MRC analysts reviewed the ABC, CBS and NBC evening newscasts from September 1 through October 25. Key findings:  

■ Only conservative/Tea Party candidates cast as “extreme.” Congressional Democrats and President Obama are facing voters’ wrath because of their extreme agenda over the past two years: government-run health care; massive unsupportable spending; a proposed “cap-and-trade” tax on energy, higher income taxes, etc. But MRC analysts found 35 evening news stories which conveyed the Democratic spin point that conservative and Tea Party candidates are “extreme,” “fringe,” or “out of the mainstream,” vs. ZERO stories conveying the charge that left-wing Democrats are “out of the mainstream.”

In a story on Florida Democratic Congressman Alan Grayson's bid for reelection on Sunday's CBS Evening News, correspondent Michelle Miller described the left-wing bomb thrower this way: "Freshman Democratic Congressman Alan Grayson considers himself a fighter....Whether taking on the foreclosure mess or the Republican Party."

Miller briefly referred to Grayson's history of controversial comments: "...this lawyer, former businessman, and economist, has gained notoriety for his partisan remarks on the House floor." A clip was played of the Congressman proclaiming that Republicans wanted to people to "die quickly" because they opposed ObamaCare. However, missing from the report was any mention of Grayson accusing his opponent of being like the Taliban for having socially conservative views. of controversial comments: "...this lawyer, former businessman, and economist, has gained notoriety for his partisan remarks on the House floor." A clip was played of the Congressman proclaiming that Republicans wanted to people to "die quickly" because they opposed ObamaCare. However, missing from the report was any mention of Grayson accusing his opponent of being like the Taliban for having socially conservative views.

Last week, on the Thursday, September 23, The Ed Show, MSNBC host Ed Schultz touted inflammatory Democratic Congressman Alan Grayson as an example that other Democrats should be following, and, apparently oblivious to the history of partisan polls being notoriously inaccurate, treated with credibility a poll conducted for Grayson’s campaign which showed the Democratic incumbent 13 points ahead of his Republican challenger, Daniel Webster, as evidence that other Democrats should learn from the Florida Congressman. Notably, a Sunshine State/VSS poll released this week finds Grayson trailing Republican Webster by seven points, 43 to 36 percent.

On his radio show Monday, Schultz even praised Grayson's controversial ad that compares Webster's religious views to the Taliban, declaring, "I love it," and, during a panel discussion on Monday's The Ed Show on MSNBC, Schultz played a clip of the ad without noting its blatantly dishonest distortion of the Republican’s words. The MSNBC host, who introduced the ad by calling it a "blockbuster," ended up claiming that Grayson’s activities were no worse than those of Republicans as he debated conservative talk radio host Michael Medved.

Back to the September 23 Ed Show, Schultz plugged his interview with Grayson at the top of the show, contending that the Florida Democrat "is a loud and proud progressive, and it’s working with voters in his district," and later introduced the segment declaring his belief that Grayson's alleged success offered "hope" for struggling Democrats:

MSNBC daytime anchor Contessa Brewer has recently drawn much attention for her shameless bias towards gay-rights activists, especially since she anchors an MSNBC news hour and not a talk show. But today, interviewing ultra-liberal Rep. Alan Grayson (D-Fla.), Brewer actually grilled him for his shamelessly-edited ad attacking his Republican opponent Daniel Webster.

Grayson, a freshman Democrat, has made a name for himself in the past year for his outlandish soundbites and theatrics on Capitol Hill. His latest venture into psycho talk is an attack ad accusing Webster of degrading women, calling him the "Taliban."

"So Congressman, your opponent is a fellow American, a longtime public servant of the people of Florida, and you called him the 'Taliban'," Brewer began. "How do you defend that?"

Brewer also asked Grayson to explain his editing of Webster's reference to Scripture. The commercial showed Webster quoting the Bible, "Wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands." However, the ad conveniently left out what Webster said before the quote, distorting the whole context of the remark.

Only Good Morning America's Jake Tapper on Monday highlighted an attack from the liberal Alan Grayson that his Republican opponent "doesn't love this country." CBS's Early Show and NBC's Today have yet to report on the harsh new commercial by the Democratic Congressman.

Additionally, none of the networks have discussed an ad where Grayson compares the same Republican to the Taliban.

Focusing on the upcoming midterm elections, Tapper explained, "And many Democrats are playing the only card they feel they have left, the fear card." He added that Grayson himself is not a veteran, but "that isn't stopping him from using an anonymous narrator to assail his Republican opponent for not serving either."

It was inevitable that someone with enough time on their hands would compile a list of the best viral campaign video ads of 2010. There sure have been some doozies this year, so I can't fault Time magazine for including hits like "Demon Sheep" and the Dale Peterson ad in their top 20 list.

That said, of the 15 Republican ads in the list, most were panned by Time staffers. By contrast, two Democrats' ads -- Rep. Tom Perreillo (Va.) and  Sen. Pat Leahy (Vt.) primary opponent Dan Freilich -- were panned,  yet neither candidate's Democratic affiliation was mentioned in the blurbs about the ads.

By contrast, Democratic Rep. Stephanie Herseth Sandlin (S.D.), who's presenting herself to voters as a fiscal conservative, was praised for an ad featuring her toddler son, and Time's FeiFei Sun cheered Colorado Democratic gubernatorial nominee John Hickenlooper for his "Clean Campaign" in which he humorously promised to eschew negative campaign ads.

There's a phrase that has been conspicuously absent the media's coverage of the recent flap between White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs and those he dubbed the "professional left": civil war. In contrast, media coverage of Republican infighting consistently pushes the term.

Gibbs is under fire from the left for sharply criticizing liberal critics of President Obama saying that "they need to be drug-tested" and "will be satisfied when we have Canadian healthcare and we've eliminated the Pentagon. That's not reality."

His comments have drawn heated criticism from the left. Democratic firebrand Rep. Alan Grayson, Fla., wants "Bozo the Spokesman" fired. Prominent activist and blogger Jane Hamsher claimed Obama is "having trouble across the board" with liberals. Lefties at the Daily Kos and Democratic Underground were frantic.

Yet almost no "civil war" labels from the media, in contrast to coverage of other instances of intra-party squabbling. The ouster of Dede Scozzafava in the special election in New York's 23rd District earned the "civil war" label 23 times from major media players, according to a Nexis search.

Did you think that, with the perspective that time tends to impart, Alan Grayson would have backed off his unhinged allegation that Republicans wanted sick people to die quickly?  Trick question! I did say Alan Grayson.  On the evening's Ed Show, the dippy Dem congressman from Florida emphatically stated that his ugly assertion, made on the floor of the House, was "the truth."

Grayson was responding to the suggestion by Kurt Kelly--one of the seven Republicans vying for the right to knock Grayson off--that by missing a vote on an allocation of funds for our overseas military, perhaps Grayson wanted the troops to die.  Kelly was clearly riffing off Grayson's earlier allegation.  That didn't stop Grayson from taking great umbrage, claiming that the difference between his assertion and Kelly's was that Kelly was lying whereas he Grayson was telling "the truth."

On CBS's Sunday Morning show, correspondent Jim Axelrod filed a report touting the movement in America to make it the law of the land that some employers must provide paid vacation to their employees, even giving controversial Democratic Congressman Alan Grayson - known for making vicious attacks against conservatives – a chance to plug his proposal to make paid vacation, which the Florida Democrat called a "right," legally mandated:

Alan Grayson is adamant that vacation is a right. In fact, he wants to make it a law. ... Grayson wants to guarantee at least one week of paid vacation for every worker at a company with 100 or more employees. He says it will lead to greater productivity from well rested and healthier workers.

Touted as the show’s "cover story" by host Charles Osgood, the segment was teased:

Bill Maher on Friday said Barack Obama is a moderate Republican by '70s standards.

As the subject on the most recent installment of "Real Time" moved to the retirement of Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens, the HBO host actually said that it was the Republican Party that has changed in the past thirty or forty years and not Stevens' view of the world.  

"You know what's ironic is that you know who's really a moderate Republican by '70s standards?" Maher asked. "Barack Obama."

This stupidity came seconds after guest Richard Clarke actually said that the gun rally in Virginia on April 19 was to commemorate the Oklahoma City bombing (video follows with transcript and commentary, file photo): 

It was by no means surprising to see Rep. Alan Grayson (D-Fla.) come down harshly on the Florida doctor who posted a sign in his office telling Obama supporters to seek care elsewhere. 

What was somewhat shocking was seeing CNN's Anderson Cooper take on Grayson Friday evening when the Congressman accused Dr. Jack Cassell of being racist.

"What he is doing is no different from saying I will not treat a black person," amazingly stated Grayson.

Cooper surprisingly didn't agree (video embedded below the fold with transcript, file photo, h/t HotAirPundit): 

Does Alan Grayson owe Dan Rather royalties for borrowing his famous sign-off?

As a loyal member of the Democracy For America [Howard Dean's old organization] email list, I just received a fundraising message from Grayson.   The Dem congressman from Florida who sprang to national attention with his stunt on the House floor accusing Republicans of wanting Americans to "die quickly" has death on the noggin again.  Excerpt from his money-seeking missive [emphasis added]:

These [health insurers] have decided that if it costs too much to keep a child breathing, then this child will die. They will deploy their lawyers and their accountants, to make sure that this child dies.

Accusing companies of wanting to "make sure that [a] child dies" sounds like it could be libel, but I digress.  Here's how Grayson ends his melodramatic pitch:

Jordan Marks, the head of Young Americans for Freedom and a Tea Party activist, took on CNN's Rick Sanchez and Rep. Alan Grayson (D-Fla.) Monday and came out looking like the only sane, civil man in the room.

Appearing on "Campbell Brown" to address recent allegations of death threats by Tea Partiers against Congressional Democrats, Marks told substitute host Sanchez, "I think it's a shame that people point to the tea party as inciting ignorance."

When Sanchez challenged him on this point, Marks calmly responded, "I would put them in the same category as the same people that call the tea party organizations or call FreedomWorks or call Americans for Prosperity or Young Americans for Freedom spouting the same ignorance."

As you might imagine, the typically hyperbolic Grayson was having none of this (video embedded below the fold with transcript and commentary, h/t NB readers Reginald Thornton and Patrick Mohan):

Rochelle Riley of the Detroit Free Press recently penned a column so wrought with falsehoods that it is difficult to navigate the ensuing minefield of absurdity. 

But navigate we shall...

Riley sets out with a fully sarcastic, yet hearty, thank you to John Boehner, alleging that his fiery speech to the House had contributed to the Democrat's healthcare victory.

"Boehner and many of his supporters - as well as some extremists the party hasn't decided how to handle - faced off against the American people and lost."

It is difficult to comprehend the unmitigated arrogance of liberals as they repeatedly voice that talking point:  The healthcare reform legislation is a victory for the American people. 

This simply is not so.  As recently as Sunday, Americans were staunchly opposed to Obamacare by a 54-41% margin according to a Rasmussen poll.  The veracity of their opposition was also overwhelming, with 45% who strongly oppose the plan, and 26% who strongly favor the plan.  If this were an election, we'd be speaking in terms of a landslide.  In reality, it is a landslide defeat for the American people.  For Obama, Pelosi, and their liberal media cohorts to define going against the will of the governed as a victory for the people, is to essentially spit directly into the collective face of this nation.

On the day after the historic healthcare reform vote in the House of Representatives, CNN's Rick Sanchez decided to use his interview with Congressman Alan Grayson (D-Fla.) to bash former Alaska governor Sarah Palin.

After spending a few minutes getting the outspoken Floridian's views of what happened in the House Sunday, Sanchez moved on to what he and his producers must have felt was a more important topic: "Let me ask you about something that just went on between you and Sarah Palin. You got into a little bit of a scuffle recently."

Moments later, Sanchez said, "Well, you came back and you called her a 'Alaskan dingbat.' Did you really say that?" (video embedded below the fold with transcript):

Could Sen. Jim Bunning's desire to pay for extended unemployment benefits with stimulus funds be the result of a serious mental disorder? So suggested Rachel Maddow during her show last night. Maddow based her report on unfouded allegations from a liberal newspaper, and neglected to mention the numerous unstable congressional Democrats that have come unhinged from time to time.

Maddow noted that "even his hometown newspaper has at times questioned his mental fitness," and quoted the Louisville Courier Journal, which in October 2004 asked, "Is his increasing belligerence an indication of something worse? Has [he] drifted into territory that indicates a serious health concern?"

Of course Maddow neglected to mention that Bunning's doctor at the time said his health was "excellent". His campaign manager said the Courier-Journal was spreading false accusations to damage Bunning's election prospects "because he's not a liberal." A political press? Never! (Clips from Maddow's show below the fold - h/t Brian Maloney.)

Chris Matthews on Friday accused Rep. Alan Grayson (D-Fla.) of pandering to the far-left members of the liberal blogosphere known as the netroots.

As they heatedly debated the future of healthcare reform on MSNBC's "Hardball," Matthews continually pressed the Congressman over his assertion that Democrats would pass a bill via reconciliation.

"You ever call up a Democratic senator and say, why don`t you do this by reconciliation?" chided Matthews.

When Grayson's answer didn't make sense, Matthews scolded him: "You`re pandering to the netroots right now...Every night, we deal with two worlds, the real world of Congress that has to do things and get things passed, and this outside world represented by the netroots and other people out there, like yourself, who play this game" (video embedded below the fold with transcript, h/t Story Balloon):

The Florida Congressman that in September said "Republicans want you to die quickly if you get sick" has asked Attorney General Eric Holder to prosecute and convict one of his staunchest critics.

More precisely, he wants her "imprisoned for five years."

The Orlando Sentinel reported Friday (h/t Ed Morrissey):

[Rep. Alan Grayson (D-Fla.)] accuses Republican activist Angie Langley of lying to federal elections. His four-page complaint highlights the fact that the Clermont resident lives outside his district, but that Langley still uses the term “my” in “mycongressmanisnuts.com.”

Here are some of the hysterical highlights from the letter Grayson sent to Holder Tuesday:

Glenn Beck - he has one of the highest-rated shows on the top cable news network. He's had a number of bestselling books and he's called attention to some unsavory characters working in the Obama administration. Yet - he's somehow considered to be a risky business decision for the powers in charge at Fox News.

On CNN's Nov. 29 "Reliable Sources," host Howard Kurtz pointed out Glenn Beck accusing Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-La., of "hooking" for the so-called $300 million "Louisiana Purchase" provision of the health care bill.

"He's talking there about Louisiana Sen. Mary Landrieu, who did get a provision in order to get her support for breaking the filibuster on the health care bill - $300 million for Louisiana," Kurtz said. "He said she was ‘hooking,' basically called her a prostitute."

In late September, Florida Congressional Democrat Alan Grayson earned attention and apparently fawning support from the far left by describing the Republican Party's health care plan, as "1. Don't get sick; 2. And if you do get sick, 3. die quickly."

Grayson's supposed apology for these over-the-top remarks on the House Floor -- remarks that would surely have earned him censure and relentless media coverage had he been a Republican criticizing a Democrat -- consisted of saying, as paraphrased by Clay Waters of NewsBusters, that his "remorse was not for Republicans, rather for the dead .... comparing the existing health care system to the Holocaust."

This is from a guy whose party has several go-to health care "experts" and others (e.g., Zeke the Bleak Emanuel, John "Sterilize The Water Supply" Holdren) who advocate what Sarah Palin correctly characterized as "death panels."

Little did we know that in September, Grayson made himself a House ogre with his floor remarks, he hurled a grievously sexist and offensive insult at a senior Federal Reserve adviser. Wait until you see what he called Linda Robertson on the apparently syndicated but apparently lightly heeded Alex Jones show (relevant audio begins at about 0:35 of the 1:43 YouTube video; Warning - Objectionable language follows):