Since April 8 of this year, MSNBC’s Keith Olbermann has called former Governor Sarah Palin an "idiot" 22 times on his Countdown show, usually by uttering the words, "That woman is an idiot." But in August 2004, the MSNBC host claimed to be too "naive and old-fashioned" to call a woman an "idiot," as he attacked conservative commentator Michelle Malkin for misquoting him as having called her an "idiot," when, in reality, he had charged that she had "made a fool out of herself" instead. In fact, Olbermann contended that if he had in reality called Malkin an "idiot," it would have been grounds for him to apologize:
We at Countdown were preparing an apology for my choice of language last night after the writer Michelle Malkin went on Rush Limbaugh's radio entertainment program and wrote in her Web blog that I had called her a, quote, "idiot." It was Ms. Malkin, who on Hardball last night, raised the accusation that John Kerry's Vietnam wounds may have been self-inflicted. It's naive and old-fashioned, but I feel you should reserve those terms like "idiot" exclusively for men. Political differences, fault or innocence are all secondary. There are codes. There's also a problem. I never called her an idiot.
But since April, the words, "That woman is an idiot," referring to Palin, have become a near regular part of the show, as the Countdown host has called the former governor an "idiot" during 20 episodes of his show between April 8 and July 8, including once when he used the label three times in one show as he also called her "idiot woman" and "that idiot."
Over the last couple of years, Olbermann has a history of making even more incendiary attacks on Malkin and Palin, once comparing Malkin to a "mashed-up bag of meat with lipstick on it," and once crudely joking with Rachel Maddow about the difference between Palin and a pitbull being that "you can train a pitbull to occasionally keep its mouth closed."
Last February, he slammed Sarah Palin, former New York Lieutenant Governor Betsy McCaughey, and other ObamaCare critics, especially those who have used the term "death panels," calling such national health care opponents by the names "subhumans," "ghouls," and "fiends." He went on to "damn" to "hell" those who use the term "death panels." Olbermann: "It’s a life panel, and damn those who call it otherwise to hell!"
Below are transcripts of the times Olbermann has called former Governor Palin an "idiot" since April 8, in reverse chronological order, followed by the times from August 2004 when he called Malkin a "fool," and then claimed that calling a woman an "idiot" would be beneath him:
#From July 8:
KEITH OLBERMANN: Videotapes from Osama bin Laden grew irrelevant when it became clear what they were – without exception, rather loud, angry incoherent and boring. And in our fourth story tonight: Joining the ranks in both form and relevance are the videotapes from half Governor Sarah Palin. Her latest scoring the highest on that last coincidence: boring. The video produced by Palin`s political action committee, Sarah PAC, and features images of women at Tea Party rallies holding signs like, "Don`t Tread on Me." There are also plenty of shots of Palin at various events and voiceovers all Palin taken primarily from the speech she gave before the anti-choice Susan B. Anthony List. The nearly two-minute video is entitled, "Mama Grizzlies." Here is part of it.
SARAH PALIN: All across this country, women are standing up and speaking out for common sense solutions. These policies coming out of D.C. right now, this fundamental transformation of America, well, a lot of women who are very concerned about their kids` futures, saying, "We don`t like this fundamental transformation, and we`re going to do something about it." It seems like it`s kind of a mom awakening in the last year and a half where women are rising up and saying, no, we`ve had enough already, because moms kind of just know when something`s wrong. There in Alaska I always think of the mama grizzly bears that rise up on their hind legs when somebody`s coming to attack their cubs, to do something adverse toward their cubs. You thought, pit bulls were tough, well, you don`t want to mess with the mama grizzlies.
OLBERMANN: Mama grizzlies eat their own young. That woman is an idiot.
#From July 7:
KEITH OLBERMANN: When it comes to lies about health care reform, half Governor Sarah Palin can`t top her death panel stinker. But she has managed to smear a key Obama appointment with something similar, that he`s bent on rationing health care based on quality of life. And in our fourth story, if the GOP were not bent on drawing political blood, it might find out that the new head of Medicare and Medicaid is actually a choice they should like, just as he is liked by a man Bush 43 appointed to the same job.
President Obama made a recess appointment today of Dr. Donald Berwick to serve as administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. CMS has not had a confirmed administrator since 2006. White House communications director, Dan Pfeiffer, explained the recess appointment, quoting, "Many Republicans in Congress have made it clear in recent weeks that they were going to stall the nomination as long as they could solely to score political points."
Last night, a Republican not in Congress or employed, Sarah Palin, offered this Tweet of hyperbole: "Press corps, please do your job as Obama sneaks in Berwick appointmentt, please cover his mission, socialized health care and rationing based on quality of life."
I thought Americans were supposed to ignore the press corps? That woman is an idiot.
That left Senate Minority Leader McConnell to lead the chorus of Republican officeholders, quoting, "Apparently, the Obama administration intends to arrogantly circumvent the American people yet again by recess appointing one of the most prominent advocates of rationed health care to implement their national plan." The supposedly grievous intentions of Dr. Berwick deriving from this comment, quote, "The decision is not whether or not we will ration care, the decision is whether we will ration with our eyes open. And right now, we are doing it blindly."
But, as health care experts know, that was a statement of fact about an already broken health care system. And who echoed Dr. Berwick? Quoting, "Rationing happens today. The question is who will do it?"
Is that President Obama? House Speaker "Evil" Pelosi? No. Republican Congressman Paul Ryan of Wisconsin. But the CMS director under President Bush, Tom Scully, said this about Dr. Berwick, quote, "He`s universally regarded and a thoughtful guy who is not partisan. I think it`s more about the health care bill. You could nominate Gandhi to be the head of CMS and that would be controversial right now."
#From July 1:
KEITH OLBERMANN: Our runner-up, Sister Sarah, speaking at the International Bowl Expo in Vegas. According to the online Bowling Examiner, quote, "Palin recalled her youth when her father set pins in Idaho. (OLBERMANN IMITATES PALIN’S VOICE) ‘My dad was on a Thursday night bowling league,’ she said. ‘He bonded with his buddies. I have memories of that point of my life which mean very, very much to me.’" When her family moved out of Idaho, she was three-months-old. She can`t even get through a damn bowling convention without lying? That woman is an idiot!
#From June 28:
KEITH OLBERMANN: But our winner, yes, Sister Sarah. You`ve by now heard about the gaffe fest that was her speech at Cal State Stanislaus on Saturday. She said, perhaps, 100 things that brand her as a phony. But none is more symbolic of her imbecility, her corner-cutting, her downright endorsement of stupidity instead of intelligence, than this one.
SARAH PALIN: -because this is Reagan country. Yeah! And perhaps it was destiny that the man who went to California`s Eureka College would become so woven within and interlinked to the Golden State.
OLBERMANN: Eureka College is in Eureka, Illinois. Illinois, where Ronald Reagan was from. There is a town of Eureka in California, but it doesn`t have a college. And Palin went to three different colleges but doesn`t have an education. (OLBERMANN IMITATES REAGAN’S VOICE) Well, that woman is an idiot. The half governor of Alaska, today`s "Worst Person" – there you go again – "in the World."
#From June 21:
KEITH OLBERMANN: First, no, this is not your water coming to a boil, it`s our nightly checkup on the something for nothing crowd, it is "Tea Time." And we go back to the citizen zero of the plague, Sister Sarah herself. She has a solution for the Gulf. Pray, baby, pray. "Gulf disaster needs divine intervention as man`s efforts have been futile. Gulf lawmakers designate today day of prayer for solution/miracle."
Well, there you have it, a Palin presidency preview in microcosm. Oh, crap. Something bad happened, don`t worry, God will fix it. A quick miracle and presto change-o the oil stops. We should even have a "Department of Homeland Miracles" also. If you want to point to the success of prayer in your own life, I`m not going to argue with you, and I think I could offer my own examples. But I think even Billy Graham would admit that relying on honest to goodness structural miracles, fires stopping themselves, buildings falling up, 100,000 barrel a day oil cataclysm sealing themselves, that`s pretty poor public policy.
But who am I to criticize Mrs. Palin? I mean, I learned the other day that I have no political disagreements with her, no questions of right or wrong, people versus corporations, intelligence or idiocy because as an AWR Hawkins writes at the Web site Human Events, "Liberals hate Palin because she`s beautiful." "They despise her," he writes, "beauty. It pushes them over to the edge to know that she doesn`t just shoot an assault rifle but makes an assault rifle look good when shooting it."
Uh-oh, even Rich Lowry can see where this one is going.
"This was obvious when she was running for Vice President on the McCain ticket and it became known that she`d taken part in beauty pageants to get money to pay college tuition. How dare her that she is not only beautiful, but she used that beauty for profit."
Oh, no, Mr. AWR Hawkins, you didn`t just write "she used that beauty for profit," did you?
"So when a Keith Olbermann-type moron refers to Palin as an "idiot" again, or a Chris Matthews-type repeats his belief that she`s "frightening," we just need to remember that the left criticizes that which they fear. We also have to keep in mind that the fact that all the names they throw at Palin are really code words for `Dang, that woman looks good.`"
How can I be both honest and gentlemanly about this? Okay. Code words: No, no, they`re not. When I say that woman is an idiot, I mean, that woman is an idiot.
I`ll leave out the gratuitous shots Mr. Hawkins then takes at Hillary Clinton and Eleanor Roosevelt. But I did want to circle back to the headline. "Liberals hate Palin because she`s beautiful." I wonder if Mr. Hawkins understands the admission contained in his dubious premise. It is, in short, the climax of Mr. Lowry`s fevered review of Mrs. Palin`s performance at the vice presidential debate, and he wrote about her, watching her winking, winking at him, winking only at him.
To wit, this is how the right wants us to pick our leaders. This is their criteria for our women leaders? I think I might prefer Mrs. Palin’s idea. Start praying for divine intervention because man’s efforts to find intelligence among conservatives has been futile.
#From June 16:
KEITH OLBERMANN, IN OPENING TEASER: And the comic relief: Sister Sarah suggests getting a little Dutch boy to put his finger in the oil leak?
SARAH PALIN: The Dutch. They are known – and the Norwegian – they are known for, for dikes and for cleaning up water and for dealing with spills. They offered to help.
OLBERMANN: That woman is an idiot.
#From June 2:
KEITH OLBERMANN: First, a "Quick Comment" on the politician whose career ended the moment B.P. ignored the warnings aboard the doomed Deepwater Horizon. Thank goodness we still have Sarah Palin. We revert to Twitter, it may only be 140 characters per message, but the gifted queen of "Sarah-noia" can still rewrite history, even with such circumscription.
"Extreme greenies, see now why we push ‘Drill, baby, drill’ of known reserves and promising finds in safe onshore places like ANWR? Now do you get it?"
Yes, we get it. You`re lying again. The message of the farce that substituted for the 2008 Republican ticket said nothing about safe onshore places like ANWR. It was just "Drill, baby, drill." Not only that, but when President Obama mistakenly increased offshore drilling two months ago, there were no qualifiers about safe onshore places from his critics. The half-governor attacked the President thusly.
"While Interior Department bureaucrats continue to hold up actually offshore drilling from taking place, Russia is moving full steam ahead on Arctic drilling and China, Russia and Venezuela are buying leases off the coast of Cuba."
That woman is an idiot.
Ms. Palin can try to back fill all she wants, but she will never retroactively attach the caveat of safe onshore places. The phrase is hers, she owns it. It may well turn out to be her epitaph that mindless, deliberately double-entendred, three-word policy statement/bad porn movie title, "Drill, baby, drill."
#From June 1:
KEITH OLBERMANN: Sarah Palin`s response to all this has been to drill more, especially in wildlife reserves, onshore, because them is safer. Her neighbor Joe McGinniss answers her equally wacky response to his arrival in town and she shows up in the Twitter report, next.
OLBERMANN: Just who was spying on whom in Alaska? McGinniss v. Palin, next. First, the Twitter report and quelle coincidence, our Tweet of the day from Sarah Palin USA. And for some reason, she scrubbed this soon after posting it. "Governor Jindal, to avoid ravished coast, build the berms, ask forgiveness, later. Feds are slow to act. The local leadership in action can do more for the coast." Ravished? Ravaged, maybe? Even on Twitter, that woman is an idiot.
#From May 19:
KEITH OLBERMANN: But first tonight`s "Worst Persons in the World." The bronze to Little Miss Bendy Straws, appearing on Fixed News a little after 9:00 p.m. Eastern last night to discuss the special election in the Pennsylvania 12th, where the aide to the late Jack Murtha, Mark Critz, faced Republican Tim Burns for a seat in Congress right now. Her enabler, Mr. Hannity, said, (IMITATES HANNITY’S VOICE) "If Burns pulls this off tonight, what would that say to you?"
And she replied, in her usual inimitable gibberish, (IMITATES PALIN’S VOICE) "I think Burns will pull this off tonight. And just like the ‘Randslide’ that we were just talking about, you`re going to see Burns having this representation of a smaller, smarter government, getting the economy back on the right track with some limited overreach of the government. That`s what Burns stands for. We need someone like Tim Burns in there. And you`re going to see that via vote today with the electorate."
Critz 53 percent, Burns 44 percent, a Critz-slide. That woman is an idiot.
#From May 17:
KEITH OLBERMANN, IN OPENING TEASER: And little "Miss Bendy Straws" endorses racial profiling and hatred.
SARAH PALIN: It`s time for Americans across this great country to stand up and say, "We`re all Arizonans now."
OLBERMANN: No, actually, Arizona says it`s time for Americans in this great country to stand up and say: "No, really, we`re Americans. We have papers." That woman is an idiot.
#From May 14:
KEITH OLBERMANN: Former half Governor Sarah Palin had a busy day today, and experienced criticism. In our third story, she said she misses President George W. Bush. In the next breath, she bemoaned bailouts, including the one that President Bush engineered on his way out of office. And Palin said that if President Obama had his way, he would gut the Second Amendment. First, her speech before an anti-abortion group, she called the President, quote, "the most pro-abortion President ever to occupy the White House," and also spoke of her own decision to have a baby with Down’s Syndrome, her daughter`s decision in the face of an unplanned pregnancy.
Her first statement about her daughter`s pregnancy during the presidential campaign included the quote, "We`re proud of Bristol`s decision to have her baby." Palin still doesn`t address the fact that the decision implies choice, which she, if she had her way, would deny women who face an unwanted pregnancy. But on the topic of George W. Bush good, bailouts bad, Palin really hit her stride.
SARAH PALIN CLIP #1: Oh, of course, I always like seeing though, too, the sign of the billboard, George Bush saying, "Miss me yet?" I love that one.
PALIN CLIP #2: We do. Because when Washington goes on a spending spree and starts borrowing money to take over and bail out insurance companies and financial institutions and the banks, the automakers, and keeps spending endlessly, and running up dangerously unsustainable debt and deficits, and expect that our kids and our grand kids are going to pay the bills for us, for our overspending today, I think that`s immoral, it`s unethical, it`s not right, and I think that all of us agree on that.
OLBERMANN: Of course, the bank and financial institution part of that bailout litany kind of thing was heartily pushed by President Bush and Vice President Cheney, who were willing to try anything to keep an all out Depression from happening during their watch. As for deficits, Palin did not mention Bush`s two wars, massive tax cuts for the rich, even the Medicare prescription drug program.
At her second event today, the National Rifle Association, she attacked President Obama on the Second Amendment, even though Obama as a candidate had spoken favorably of a Supreme Court decision that said Washington`s ban on handguns had gone too far. And as President, Obama signed legislation which expanded gun rights, including the law permitting gun owners to carry concealed weapons in national parks.
PALIN: President Obama and his allies, like Nancy Pelosi, have been relatively quiet on the gun control front. Not because they don`t want to limit your rights, but because they`re afraid of the political consequences. Don`t doubt for a minute that if they thought they could get away with it, they would ban guns and ban ammunition and gut the Second Amendment.
OLBERMANN: That woman is an idiot.
#From May 13:
KEITH OLBERMANN, IN OPENING TEASER, WITH WORDS "DOUBLE DOG DARE YA SARAH" ON SCREEN: And idiot woman speaks in front of a big flag sponsored by a sump pump company, quote, "Somebody told me, ‘You know you`re going into enemy territory.’ I said, ‘It`s Chicago, it’s not MSNBC.’" Yeah, like you had the courage to come to MSNBC.
...
OLBERMANN: But our winner, Sister Sarah. The maestro of the bendy straw spoke to a crowd of 4,000 in Rosemont, Illinois, outside Chicago.
SARAH PALIN: A gal walked up and asked him where he was from. And he said Alaska. And then, all of a sudden, the clerk turns beet red and the veins pop out of her neck, kind of like how Rachel Maddow does sometimes. Now watch, that clip`s going to be on air for her dot com, increase her ratings.
OLBERMANN, IMITATING PALIN’S VOICE: "For her dot com." It`s pronounced Maddow, Ms. Paline. She continued, "I`m glad to be here on the President`s home turf. Somebody told me, ‘You know you`re going into enemy territory.’ I said, ‘It`s Chicago, it`s not MSNBC.’"
That woman is an idiot. And the event at which that idiot spoke was sponsored by an Illinois firm that specializes in battery-operated backup sump pumps. So it`s not just a sump pump political event, it was a backup sump pump political event.
Moreover, to put it plainly, and this is a matter of record, that woman does not have the courage – personal or political – to appear on MSNBC, not without an army with her. I mean that literally. The half governor of Alaska, now celebrating two years without holding an actual news conference, nor having the guts to be interviewed on a network like this one, but the toast of America`s backup sump pump political circuit, today`s "Worst Person in the World."
#From April 30:
KEITH OLBERMANN: President Obama putting a hold on his new offshore drilling policy until the investigation of this oil spill is complete. Mr. Obama is saying he is still committed to drilling here in the U.S.
PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA: I continue to believe that domestic oil production is an important part of our overall strategy for energy security. But I`ve always said it must be done responsibly for the safety of our workers and our environment. The local economies and livelihoods of the people of the Gulf Coast, as well as the ecology of the region, are at stake.
OLBERMANN: One half of the ticket which ran against Obama during the 2008 presidential election using the slogan "Drill, baby, drill," taking to her Twitter page, to say in multiple tweets, "Having worked/lived through Exxon oil spill, my family and I understand Gulf residents` fears. Our prayers are with you. All industry efforts must be employed."
And later, "Domestic drilling: why we can still believe," linking through to her Facebook page, wherein the human oil slick writes in part, "No human endeavor is ever without risk – whether it`s sending a man to the moon or extracting the necessary resources to fuel our civilization. I repeat the slogan, ‘Drill here, drill now,’ not out of naivete or disregard for the tragic consequences of oil spills, I continue to believe in it because increased domestic oil production will make us a more secure, prosperous and peaceful nation."
That woman`s ghost Tweeter is an idiot.
#From April 29:
KEITH OLBERMANN: Earlier this month, Sarah Palin told Republicans in New Orleans, no more study is needed to drill for new oil in the Gulf.
SARAH PALIN CLIP #1: We can produce it safely and responsibly. We don`t need more studies, we need more action.
PALIN CLIP #2: -because energy produced in America is security for America. And it is jobs for American workers, jobs that can`t be outsourced. Let`s drill, baby drill, not stall, baby, stall.
OLBERMANN: That woman is an idiot.
#From April 28:
KEITH OLBERMANN, IN OPENING TEASER: Which of these stories will you be talking about tomorrow? Rebellion in "Arizona-stan." The sheriff of Pima County, from Tucson, at the Mexican border, says he has no intention of enforcing the new "show me your papers" law. Clarence Dupnik calls it "unnecessary," "racist," "disgusting." Sheriff Dupnik joins us. Yet others demand more. "We want the National Guard on the border," says Republican Congressman Poe of Texas. Republican Congressman Hunter, the younger, of California, wants deportation of children born here to undocumented immigrants because the kids` souls are not American enough.
REP. DUNCAN HUNTER (R-CA): It takes more than walking across the border to become an American citizen. It`s what`s in our souls.
OLBERMANN: It sure is. And the half governor as usual sees a plot.
SARAH PALIN: I think that President Obama is playing to his base on this one, and I think that`s quite unfortunate.
OLBERMANN: That woman is an idiot.
#From April 16:
KEITH OLBERMANN: Two years ago today, then-Governor Sarah Palin urged Alaskans to sign advanced health care declarations. Last summer when a provision in the health care bill would have helped people get the facts from their doctors about such decisions and coverage from their insurers about such meetings, Palin irresponsibly dubbed it Obama’s death panel. In our third story on the Countdown, today is national health care decisions day, and President Obama has now made it easier for gay men and lesbians and others who want to designate as legal surrogates people who are not conventional family members. The President first, he has directed his Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius to issue new rules requiring most hospitals to extend visitation rights for the partners of gay men and lesbians and to respect a patient’s choice about who he or she designates to make critical health care decisions for them. The new rules would also apply to widows and widowers, and members of some religious orders who choose a friend or a companion for visitation or as a legal surrogate.
It was just two years ago that Governor Palin marked this day by encouraging people in her state to create their own advanced directives. But it was former half governor, former presidential candidate Palin who posted on her Facebook page last August quoting, "The America I know and love is not one in which my parents or my baby with Down’s Syndrome will have to stand in front of Obama`s death panel so his bureaucrats can decide based on a subjective judgment of their level of productivity and society, whether they are worthy of health care. Such a system is downright evil." Of course, she was right, the America I know and love is not one in which that would happen. Palin even reveled later in broadening that claim.
SARAH PALIN: We`re not going to back off on our criticism of the problems of the health care bill, and one aspect of it is the death panels still. If we have our health care paid for by the bureaucracy by the government, we`re going to be subject to bureaucrats deciding which – panels and commissions deciding, just like they do overseas, who will be worthy of receiving the health care that government is going to provide. So that is the death panel that I referred to, and I won`t back off on criticizing that aspect of the health care bill.
OLBERMANN: This woman is an idiot.
#From April 14:
KEITH OLBERMANN: Good evening from New York. We begin tonight in unprecedented fashion. Liberals, progressives, Democrats, our top story tonight is not really for you, though you are encouraged to rubber neck at the train wreck. Tonight, our fifth story is a genuine and sincerely genuine attempt to help Tea Party members around the country. Politico, a mainstream political news Web site, today publishing a secret document it obtained establishing definitively that some of the nation`s top Tea Party leaders are using you, using you to line their own pockets and propagate the precise establishment politics that you hate so much.
Here it is. And the reporter who got it is standing by to talk with us. It was written just days after last year`s Tax Day Tea parties proposing the creation of the Tea Party Express, the group that launched 1,000 bus tours. The express charter was not written by a Tea Party leader, nor even by a grassroots independent, but by a Republican operative telling Politico the Tea Party Express could, quote, "give a boost to his consulting firm`s PAC," political action committee, "and position us as a growing force."
The charter is worth quoting at length, bringing established Tea Party leaders unto the express, quote, "will be a very, sensitive matter. We have to be very careful about discussing amongst ourselves anyone we include outside of the family, because, quite frankly, we are not only not part of the political establishment of conservative establishment, but we are also sadly not currently part of the Tea Party establishment – i.e., Michelle Malkin, Eric Odom, Smart Girl Politics, TCOP, FreedomWorks, Newt Gingrich, etc. We can probably pull off a phenomenally successful tour without these big-ego establishment types."
The document also talks about how to appear authentic. "We`ve already discussed doing a casting call among our Nevada supports and donors to appear in at least one of our TV ads targeting Harry Reid to buttress our ‘authenticity,’" their quote marks, "in running ads in the state." One goal, electing Republicans, quote, "It is also worth considering making a return run to Michigan. Former Republican Michigan Governor John Engler has recently stated that he believes the Republican party will do quite well in Michigan."
But the big goal of founding firm Russo Marsh? Money – for them. Sal Russo telling Politico, "We`re hardly making any money at all." Politico reporting that after its scheme, the PAC quadrupled its fundraising, paying almost half that money to the Russo Marsh consulting firm itself and to Russo Marsh`s sister company King Media Group. The PAC`s former political director telling "Politico, quote, "We stole the brand name to make money." None of which stopped Sarah Palin from shilling for the Tea Party Express today in Boston.
SARAH PALIN: So, Tea Party Express, we applaud you for uniting and for putting up with all the B.S. from the "lamestream media" with some of the ginned up controversy with the Tea Parties, false accusations of being, this group being racist, being violent. Thank you to the Tea Party Express for putting up with that and still uniting Americans.
OLBERMANN: In a whole new way tonight, in the way of the three-card Monty dealer, this woman is an idiot.
And if Tea Partiers still doubt they are being played, consider what Palin said at the Tea Party Express rally today about Tax Freedom Day, the day signifying what portion of the year you work to pay your taxes. The later it is, the higher your taxes are. This year it fell on April 9, meaning you worked 99 days just to pay your taxes. This year and last, as the Tax Foundation itself shows, the earliest, therefore the lowest tax days in decades. Under Bush it was never earlier than April 14, meaning you worked at least 104 days for the government under Bush. But here was Palin today:
PALIN: Folks, we need your voice now more than ever. Americans now spend 100 days out of the year working for government before we even start earning money for ourselves, for our families, for our small businesses, 100 days out of the year.
OLBERMANN: That’s, whoa! As promised now, Politico’s senior reporter, Ken Vogel.
#From April 13:
KEITH OLBERMANN, IN OPENING TEASER: And Sarah Palin`s inconvenient taxable income. How much has she made since she walked out as governor of Alaska?
SARAH PALIN: We are not retreating. We are advancing in another direction.
OLBERMANN: The direction of $12 million. How is that selly outy thing working for you? That woman is an idiot. All the news and commentary, now on Countdown.
#From April 9:
KEITH OLBERMANN, IN OPENING TEASER: The Wilkerson declaration: Secretary of State Powell`s chief of staff says Bush and Cheney knew most detainees were innocent. Of Cheney, Lawrence Wilkerson says, "If hundreds of innocent individuals had to suffer in order to detain a handful of hardcore terrorists, so be it."
A spokesman for Mr. Powell says, "The general does not know the basis upon which Colonel Wilkerson claims to know the views and intentions of the senior officials cited in the story."
Our guest, attorney from the Hamdan case: Lieutenant Commander Charles Swift.
Republicans gather in New Orleans:
SARAH PALIN: Yes, we can kowtow to enemies, criticize allies, vacillate, bow, dither-
OLBERMANN: To repeat, this woman is an idiot.
#From April 8:
KEITH OLBERMANN: Good evening from New York. President Obama and Russian President Medvedev this morning signing a major treaty, the new START treaty, to shrink their nation`s respective arsenals of nuclear weapons. But in our fifth story on the Countdown, the agreement will be moot unless it is ratified by two-thirds of the Senate where Republicans have not yet decided if they’re for it or against it, even though the first START treaty was proposed by none other than President Ronald Reagan and signed by his successor, President George H.W. Bush, and this one has been endorsed by President Reagan`s secretary of state.
At a ceremony in Prague, the leaders of the two countries which combined account for 90 percent of the world`s nuclear weapons, putting pen to paper on a document that would reduce their deployed nuclear warheads to 1,550 for each country, a drop of 1/3, still impossibly high.
Long-range nuclear weapons would be limited to 700 for each nation. As we mentioned, the first START treaty initiated by President Reagan who once said, quote, "I believe we`ve come to the point that we must got at the matter of realistically reducing, if not totally eliminating, the nuclear weapons, the threat to the world." The treaty then signed by President Bush in 1991.
President Obama`s new START treaty endorsed by former Republican secretaries of state, George Shultz and Henry Kissinger. In fact, Secretary Shultz describing the treaty that was signed today as containing, quote, "relatively modest reductions." But he concluded, "I think it`s a constructive step."
Secretary of State Clinton at today`s signing ceremony in Prague noting that the Senate has a long history of bipartisan approval of such treaties. The view of Senator Lugar, the ranking Republican on the foreign relations committee, said to be favorable, and an aide to Senator Lugar saying that his boss ultimately hopes the votes to ratify the new START treaty will be there.
His party`s leadership possibly hoping something else. In a letter to the President last month, Minority Leader McConnell and Senator Kyl, the number two Republican in the Senate, raising concerns about the treaty because they believe it links offensive weapons and missile defense. The Senators warning the President, quoting, "It is highly unlikely that the Senate would ratify a treaty that includes such a linkage."
Any references to missile defense made only in the preamble and not in the treaty document itself to avoid an official link. At a news conference in Prague, the President is saying that he and the Russian president would continue to talk about missile defense, adding that he believes the U.S. would be no less safe because of it.
OBAMA: I`ve repeatedly said that we will not do anything that endangers or limits my ability as commander-in-chief to protect the American people. And we think that missile defense can be an important component of that. But we also want to make clear that the approach that we`ve taken in no way is intended to change the strategic balance between the United States and Russia.
OLBERMANN: Meanwhile, Sister Sarah opposing President Obama`s entire nuclear approach, the former half governor of Alaska reducing the President`s earlier decision to take nuclear weapons off the table in the event of a nonnuclear attack, but leave them in place for biological or chemical attacks, reducing all this to terms she could understand, kids on a playground.
SARAH PALIN: No administration in America`s history would, I think, ever have considered such a step that we just found out that President Obama is supporting today. You know, that`s kind of like getting out there on the playground, a bunch of kids ready to fight, and one of the kids saying, "Go ahead, punch me in the face and I`m not going to retaliate. Go ahead and do what you want to do with me."
No, it`s unacceptable. This is another thing that the American public, the more that they find out what is a part of this agenda, they`re going to rise up and they`re going to say, no more. National defense, national security is the number one job of the federal government.
(CHEERING AND APPLAUSE BY AUDIENCE)
OLBERMANN: That woman is an idiot. Earlier on ABC`s World News Tonight, the President asked by George Stephanopoulos to respond to Sarah Palin-
OBAMA: I really have no response to that. Last I checked, Sarah Palin is not much of an expert on nuclear issues.
OLBERMANN: All right, he put it better than I did.
#From August 20, 2004:
KEITH OLBERMANN: We at Countdown were preparing an apology for my choice of language last night after the writer Michelle Malkin went on Rush Limbaugh's radio entertainment program and wrote in her Web blog that I had called her a, quote, "idiot." It was Ms. Malkin, who on Hardball last night, raised the accusation that John Kerry's Vietnam wounds may have been self-inflicted. It's naive and old-fashioned, but I feel you should reserve those terms like "idiot" exclusively for men. Political differences, fault or innocence are all secondary. There are codes. There's also a problem. I never called her an idiot.
OLBERMANN, FROM THE AUGUST 19, 2004, SHOW: And this woman, Malkin, who made a fool out of herself on this network about an hour ago, basically said in this, in what she was reading, the book that accompanied the Swift Boat ad, that Kerry, at least, somebody asked whether or not Kerry should be asked, in that sort of, "let's step away from actually making a statement, let's just put it as a question about a question about a question."
JOHN HARWOOD, WALL STREET JOURNAL, FROM AUGUST 19: Right.
OLBERMANN, FROM AUGUST 19: -whether or not Kerry shot himself.
OLBERMANN: So that's what you're dealing with here. She's an author or a journalist or something, and she misquoted the insult to herself. And keeping track of this particular over-inflating souffle on Hardblogger on MSNBC.com, a nice place to visit on your way to our corner of the Web at countdown.msnbc.com.
#From August 19, 2004:
KEITH OLBERMANN: "Where, is there a line that could be crossed, though, John? I'm just thinking about what we saw in the last hour. Larry Thurlow said, and we just played a clip of it, that his belief was that John Kerry had arranged for not only his heroism in Vietnam but also his early out, which is a code word for being sent home, and you get sent home usually because you have been injured, meaning he arranged his own injury in some way. And this woman, Malkin, who made a fool out of herself on this network about an hour ago, basically said in what she was reading, the book that accompanied the Swift Boat ad, that Kerry, at least somebody asked whether or not pKerry should be asked in that, sort of, 'let's step away from actually making a statement, let's just put it as a question about a question about a question,' whether or not Kerry shot himself. If that is the gist of the next Swift Boat ads, is that something that damages more the Republican Party and George Bush than it could possibly damage John Kerry?"
