Ed Asner

NBC's Gifford Praises 'Nonpartisan' Ed Asner Film That Blames Financial Crisis on 'Greed' and 'Lack of Regulation'

By Kyle Drennen | May 16, 2011 | 15:32

In the 10AM ET hour on NBC's Today on Monday, co-host Kathie Lee Gifford applauded the new HBO movie on the 2008 financial crisis, 'Too Big to Fail,' as "not a partisan film at all." However, after asserting that "It didn't take one side or the other," she touted the liberal moral of the story: "that greed is what got us there and lack of regulation."

Left-wing actor Ed Asner, who plays the role of billionaire Warren Buffet, came on to promote the film: "...this movie is practically a study course. You go back and learn each time that you watch it....you become involved and very informed..." He added that the "tragedy" of the crisis "has not been repaired yet." Gifford agreed: "No, it certainly hasn't. Everything's still in place for it to happen again."

Ed Asner, Harry Belafonte Both Lament Obama's Betrayed the Left

By Tim Graham | February 10, 2011 | 14:45

Brian Maloney at Radio Equalizer reports hard-left actor Ed Asner is slamming Obama as another "corporatist as president," another "president who represents corporations more than people." The remarks came on the liberal Stephanie Miller radio show:

ED ASNER: I’m on the board of Defenders of Wildlife, and at a recent board meeting the announcement was made for just wildlife alone the conditions are worse with this administration than they were when Bush was president and both houses were under Republican control.

STEPHANIE MILLER: Now, how so, why? What’s happening?

ASNER: Well, I guess you’ve got craven Democrats and you’ve got maniacal Republicans who are being infected by Tea Party candidates who got elected. I don’t know.

Ed Asner on PBS: Why Excrete Money in Iraq When You Can Waste It Here at Home?

By Tim Graham | June 06, 2009 | 23:48

This interview is a little old, but worth sharing. Socialist actor Ed Asner appeared on PBS’s Tavis Smiley show on May 21 to promote his new Pixar film "Up." Asner typically kvetched about the wasteful disaster of Iraq and blundered into an odd quote when he lamented "The crime is you can convince all those Congressional people and the people through the media to piss away all that money overseas and it becomes socialism to convince them to piss away the money here at home."

He also suggested illegal Mexicans are taking some of the racist hate off black people, which Smiley protested, since he didn’t want anyone thinking we were living in "post-racial" (or post-racist) America. Asner also patted himself on the back for having the political courage to play a slave-ship captain on the 1977 ABC miniseries "Roots."

SMILEY: I only know that because I saw you in "Roots" when I was a kid. You played that villain pretty good.
ASNER: I regard that villain as, let's call him, a guy who was trying to be a good Nazi and he failed.

Ed Asner: Conservatives Landing 'Mortal Blows' on American Society

By Tim Graham | February 20, 2009 | 09:09

The Washington Post's Weekend section on Friday included an interview with left-wing actor Ed Asner in advance of his appearance at nearby George Mason University playing William Jennings Bryan, "the infamous attacker of Darwinism and evolution." Or so says his Post interviewer, Michael O'Sullivan. Conservatives are killing America, Asner proclaimed:

"Our education has just gone into the toilet in this country," Asner says, before fulminating in a way that begins to sound a little bit like, well, a more liberal version of Bryan. "Having suffered, from the time of Reagan until now, with onslaughts against government daubing at improving the welfare of American citizens, and the education and health of American citizens, the anti-government forces have struck, perhaps, mortal blows to our society."