If you're not familiar with GRITtv or Laura Flanders, you will be because her far-left, antagonistic, attack dog style is starting to become all the rage to liberal hosts especially on MSNBC.
On Friday, as part of the panel discussion on HBO's "Real Time," Flanders in her own aggressive style impolitely went after fellow guest conservative publisher Andrew Breitbart feeling the need to bring up last year's Shirley Sherrod affair after which she called him a con man (video follows with transcript and commentary):
LAURA FLANDERS, GRITtv: The only record I want to see here, the only thing I want to see here is Andrew Breitbart apologize to Shirley Sherrod. That's what I want to see. I mean, this has got to be stopped by all of us.
For those wondering, the subject at that moment was Barack Obama and his birth certificate, but Flanders had an agenda to be driven Friday evening, and nothing was going to stop her:
ANDREW BREITBART: Can I answer that?
FLANDERS: This has got to be stopped and it’s got to be stopped by all of us, Bill.
BREITBART: Can I answer that?
FLANDERS: Otherwise it’ll never end.
BREITBART: Can I answer to that?
FLANDERS: Go for it.
BREITBART: Okay, good. You want to hear the truth or are you just going to use your talking points?
FLANDERS: I don't have talking points.
BILL MAHER, HOST: Because Republicans never have talking points.
FLANDERS: Yeah, really.
BREITBART: In my article, I wrote eventually her basic humanity inform her to help the white farmer. The media ignored that. Okay?
FLANDERS: You admitted…
BREITBART: Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Secondly, in the actual video that was there, it said, it had the epiphany where she said it's not about black versus white. It’s about rich versus poor, and the only person who defended me on that was Chris Matthews. Thank you, Chris Matthews. And so what happened was is that Glenn Beck threw me under the bus. It happened and he did it on the radio, and he cut out the part on his radio show where she said it's not about black versus white, it's about rich versus poor. And he went on television and said Andrew Breitbart needs to apologize. He’s the one that cut up. People listen to Glenn Beck, they don’t read Andrew Breitbart.
FLANDERS: Are you, is anybody buying this?
FLANDERS: I mean, you yourself told Newsweek that you took Shirley Sherrod out of context. You said it yourself.
BREITBART: No I didn’t. No. What I just said is true.
FLANDERS: If this wasn't your agenda, if you weren't doing this on purpose, why don't you just apologize?
BREITBART: When I said, when I write, you know what?
MAHER: Let’s get on to the racism of today.
BREITBART: Alright.
MAHER: Because, you know, okay, you do not believe that Obama wrote his own book? I have you…
BREITBART: No, I think it's a plausible argument by Jack Cashill.
MAHER: I have your tweet. It says…
BREITBART: It's probably the most controversial thing in my entire…
MAHER: Wait, wait, wait, I have your tweet. You said, “I'm sold. Jack Cashill's compelling arguments…
BREITBART: But it is. Yes.
MAHER: …on authorship of Obama’s book.
BREITBART: Have you written all your books?
MAHER: Yeah.
BREITBART: Really? I have, no.
FLANDERS: Horror.
BREITBART: Having a ghost writer, having a ghost writer, having a ghost writer is not that extraordinary. I think that in his first book he clearly wrote it. The second one has a completely different tone and different writing style. It’s just an opinion. I have an opinion on that
MAHER: But the implication is…
BREITBART: No, it isn't.
FLANDERS: It is important.
BREITBART: No it’s not.
MAHER: I haven’t even said, “But it is.”
BREITBART: He's a very smart guy, and I bet he got a 4.0 at Harvard and Columbia.
FLANDERS: It’s just an opinion, but you're not a journalist or a commentator. You're a con man, and that's your job.
MAHER: That’s…
BREITBART: Well, you got in your…
MAHER: No, no, no. Okay.
BREITBART: It's a wrestling match.
MAHER: Yeah.
BREITBART: I answered her question, and she didn’t want to hear the truth.
MAHER: I know. Let’s save the real mean stuff for the end of the show.
Reminds me of the scene from "Sixteen Candles" when Molly Ringwald's girlfriend said "Get the hell out of here" to Anthony Michael Hall, and he quickly responded, "Nice manners, babe!"
Even Maher seemed a bit put off by Flanders behavior, but his audience loved it, so that's probably all that counts.
