Former Saturday Night Live star Jon Lovitz is learning the hard way that despite liberals' claims to love humor and comedy, they can't stand it when their own side is being criticized. The liberal comic is facing a huge amount of criticism on Twitter for taking exception to President Obama's continual assertions that wealthy Americans don't pay a "fair" amount of taxes.
While Lovitz has been bashed on Twitter, he clearly wasn't expecting to be accused of making some sort of violent threat against Obama. And yet that's exactly what happened last night on the HLN show Dr. Drew where the host, Drew Pinsky, seemed to genuinely believe that. Lovitz was clearly taken back by such a bizarre assertion, making for some very awkward television before a producer rescued Pinsky from embarrassment. Video and transcript below.
Lovitz was presumably primarily booked on the more pop-culture-oriented Dr. Drew to talk about his recent exposure on Twitter of an anti-semitic prank played on a friend of his daughter's by some schoolmates.
While he mentioned the prank story in his introduction to the segment, Pinsky switched gears once he began talking to Lovitz, speaking instead about the comedian's other Twitter mini-story, his continued defense of his idea that as an upper-income individual, he is already paying his "fair share" of taxes.
This background is important because when you see the interview below, it appears that Lovitz thought Pinsky was trying to tell a joke that the Secret Service, charged with protecting the president, is instead investigating a nasty junior high prank.
The comedian appears visibly shocked when he realizes instead that the woefully uninformed Pinsky actually seems to believe Lovitz had made some sort of death threat against Obama when all he had done is made a profane critique of the president's class warfare agenda.
After mangling what Lovitz actually was saying about Obama, Pinsky then tried to put a liberal spin on it, accusing Lovitz of being a "fat cat" who is "complaining" about his current tax rate.
Once again, though, Lovitz corrected him, stating that his issue was with Obama's characterization of wealthy taxpayers somehow not paying their "fair share" of taxes and that, in fact, they ought to pay more. Lovitz even correctly pointed out how by attacking rich people, Obama is "creating a class warfare in a country where there is no class structure."
Full transcript of the relevant segment of this interview:
DREW PINSKY: A news story that I, frankly, not so funny. He was drawing attention to some anti-semitic graffiti at a friend's house by using Twitter and he got some action. While some felt that this might have been a hate crime, the police report that we obtained say it doesn't fall into that category. We're going to find out why from Jon himself. Thank you for joining me.
JON LOVITZ: Yeah, my pleasure.
PINSKY: So it's good to know--
LOVITZ: I mean, doc.
PINSKY: Yes, thank you. That the Secret Service is now out looking for you.
LOVITZ: Yeah--
PINSKY: Did they come and talk to you?
(Lovitz pauses in disbelief)
PINSKY: The Secret Service?
LOVITZ: No!
PINSKY: Well you made some threats against the president
LOVITZ: No I didn't. I didn't make any threat.
PINSKY: No?
LOVITZ: No!
PINSKY: I thought you did.
LOVITZ: No!
PINSKY: Oh, you called him a name.
LOVITZ: Yes. 'Cause he's lying.
PINSKY: About taxes.
LOVITZ: About saying that people in a certain tax bracket don't pay their fair share of taxes. That's not true. 47% of the country doesn't pay any taxes because they can't afford it and they have deductions.
PINSKY: Right.
LOVITZ: So you have in a--$250,000 or more, you have a 35 percent federal tax and in California you have another 11 percent, that's 46 percent. You have property tax, you have city tax, you have FICA, you have sales tax--
PINSKY: What I hear is you're a fat cat--
LOVITZ: --And then you have deductions
PINSKY: You're a fat cat and you're complaining and that's what you're saying.
LOVITZ: No, I'm not saying that. I'm not complaining about the taxes I pay. What I don't like is him saying those people in that category who came from nothing and worked hard and made something of themselves are now, they're not paying their fair share of taxes. It's like the 1 percent versus the 99 percent.
PINSKY: Right.
And he's creating a class warfare in a country where there is no class structure. Anybody can go from being broke to being wealthy. And all the friends that I have that are considered--that are way beyond me--billionaires, came from nothing.
It's starting to seem as if Lovitz is turning into another liberal mugged by reality.
