Woody Harrelson

UPDATE AT END OF POST: Hillary Clinton campaign circulated Obama photo in Muslim attire.

Polls released Monday showed a large percentage of Republicans in Alabama and Mississippi think President Obama is a Muslim.

In a shocking display of unhinged rhetoric hours later, MSNBC's Ed Schultz blamed it all on former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin (video follows with transcribed highlights and commentary):

As NewsBusters reported last Wednesday, the stars and executives involved in the production of HBO's Sarah Palin-bashing film "Game Change" have given $200,000 to Democrats and liberal causes in recent years whilst donating absolutely nothing to Republicans.

Now we learn from a Men's Journal interview with "Game Change" star Woody Harrelson that what members of the GOP say makes him "weep for humanity" (MJ questions in bold, Harrelson's answers in regular print, serious vulgarity warning):

Now that HBO's Sarah Palin-bashing film "Game Change" has premiered, it is fascinating to note that its two heroes are the very advisers who not only were responsible for the worst presidential campaign in decades, but also ended up backstabbing the candidates they represented.

As John Podhoretz wrote at the Weekly Standard:

Although Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) kept true to his word that he wasn't going to watch HBO's Sarah Palin-bashing film "Game Change" which premiered Saturday evening, he did have some harsh words about it on Fox News Sunday.

"It's based on a book that's completely biased and with unattributed quotes," McCain said before taking issue with the depiction of him as a vulgar man that asked his campaign manager to find him a female running mate (video follows with transcript and commentary):

As NewsBusters has been reporting, Obama-loving media members have almost been orgasmic in their adoration for HBO's new Sarah Palin-bashing film "Game Change."

Firmly on the bandwagon is Chris Matthews who on the syndicated program bearing his name this weekend actually said that Woody Harrelson's performance as McCain campaign manager Steve Schmidt is "the role of the century" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Days before HBO's anti-Republican propaganda film "Game Change" premieres, it has been revealed that the top stars and executives involved in the movie have given $200,000 to Democrats and liberal causes over the years.

By contrast, according to the Hollywood Reporter, they've given exactly nothing to Republicans:

In an interview published November 11 at Salon.com, titled, "Woody Harrelson on war, death, LBJ and Obama," by Andrew O'Hehir, actor Woody Harrelson, who stars in the new film, The Messenger, recounts his conspiracy theory that America invaded Afghanistan not because of the 9/11 attacks, but because Chevron wanted to overthrow the Taliban and build an oil pipeline. Harrelson:

The guys from Chevron went in and met with the Taliban and realized those guys just weren't in control enough. That's why they wanted to oust them. Otherwise it's an absurd concept: You're going to war because a guy from some other country, a Saudi, is living somewhere in the mountains?

Harrelson, known for being anti-capitalism, continued: "It's a foreign policy gone way wrong. But that's how it always is. American foreign policy has always been not about spreading democracy, but about spreading capitalism."

He also made known his concerns that Barack Obama could become another LBJ because of an unwillingness to withdraw from Iraq and Afghanistan, and opined that while JFK was "one of our last great Presidents," Jimmy Carter "was pretty great, too."

Chris Matthews, on Tuesday's "Hardball," invited on former Cheers star Woody Harrelson to promote his new movie, The Messenger, and also talk Afghanistan war policy. The Zombieland actor announced that he was opposed not only to the war in Iraq, but also to the fight in Afghanistan as he compared it to Vietnam and advised that Barack Obama should "pull those troops out," to which Matthews chimed: "It doesn't look like he's pulling out. He's not gonna follow the recommendation of Mr. Woody Harrelson it looks like...although he might be better off doing that." [audio available here]

The following is the relevant exchange between Matthews and Harrelson as it was aired on the October 27 edition of "Hardball":

CHRIS MATTHEWS: Let me ask you about this, the war. I mean we’ve got two wars going now, one that hopefully is settling down, we’re coming home next year from Af-, from Iraq. But the other one looks like we might be beefing up. Your feelings about it?