Posted on 05/02/2003 8:55:18 AM PDT by fight_truth_decay
Actress/anti-liberation of Iraq activist Janeane Garofalo went on a rant on Thursday's The View against Fox News, mocking the intelligence of their reporters and denying she has anything to apologize for after promising Bill O'Reilly she would apologize to President Bush if her predictions of disaster in Iraq did not come true.
"Just because a statue falls down -- that's a great photo-op - - doesn't mean that the war or the conflict is over," Garofalo argued, and the "Anglo-American conflict with Iraq" is "not going to end anytime soon, contrary to Fox News's idea of what the news is, their version of the news."
Garofalo charged that "some news anchors, apparently, at Fox aren't smart enough to understand" that "victory cannot be defined by a photo op of a statue."
She soon denigrated Fox News again: "I don't know what is more alarming over at Fox News. Is it that they know that, in the bigger picture, there's a lot of problems over there and they scrub the information or, B, they don't know because they don't watch the news."
MRC analyst Jessica Anderson took down some of the comments Garofalo uttered as a guest co-host, really a quad-host, of ABC's daytime show, The View:
Garofalo: "Well, there's also today in the news about a letter that is allegedly from Saddam Hussein, but there's another issue at hand here that goes with the anti-war thing that I think [sic]. Just because a statue falls down -- that's a great photo op -- doesn't mean that the war or the conflict is over. The truth is there's been, in the bigger picture, a conflict, an Anglo-American conflict with Iraq since 1991. It's not going to end anytime soon, contrary to Fox News's idea of what the news is, their version of the news."
Meredith Vieira: "But he's saying that it's not over."
Garofalo: "No, no, no, the President is saying the combat is over. Now the really difficult thing is really happening now. As you know, by some of the protesters that have been shot in Iraq, this is going to be a real big mess and also now, there's also talk of getting troops on the border of Iran. You know, so is Iran possibly next? I mean, the doctrine of preemptive strike, there's a real problem with that still, there's a real problem with what's going on in Israel and Palestine, so?"
Star Jones: "We had a girl here sitting in your seat, a young woman, who is, who has Iraqi family. She brought a whole lot of things home to us sitting here at the table, because we talk in a vacuum a little bit. You know, I've never been there, I don't know what oppression they talk about. But listening to her, and she told us some of the atrocities that were levied against her family, and women in general, and it was interesting to hear her say, 'I don't care what this struggle takes, but I'm glad that we're in this struggle, and I found it very interesting."
Joy Behar: "Well, I asked her if she thought the collateral damage that, you know, Iraqi civilians are dying -- and American boys, too -- if that was worth it, and she said yes, because the atrocities were so horrendous there."
Garofalo: "Okay, I agree with you, and of course, nobody defends the atrocities of Saddam, but what we also have to keep in mind is this is not ideal either, having Jay Garner and Chalabi, who is not accepted by the Iraqis. It is not ideal to be shooting protesters and it is not ideal to be seen as an imperialist entity."
Jones: "I agree with you on that."
Garofalo: "Yes, it's great that Saddam is gone, but the victory cannot be defined by a photo-op of a statue."
Jones: "Which is why I'm hoping that the speech tonight is to tell us where we're supposed to be going next."
Vieira: "Addressing the future, exactly."
Behar: "Americans, I think, are smart enough to understand that -- I think -- I hope."
Vieira: "We're smart enough, aren't we, to understand that? I think so." [Audience applauds, some crosstalk]
Garofalo: "Well, then some news anchors, apparently, at Fox aren't smart enough to understand that....But how we got into this war, by the administration's own admission, they did fabricate certain things that maybe they shouldn't have, they emphasized certain things that were not really that big a threat -- that's not acceptable in a democracy."
Behar: "Are you interested to go on O'Reilly's show and take him on? Because he's been after your ass, baby! He wants you on a silver platter!" [Audience applauds, laughs]
Garofalo, joking: "I know. He likes me! He likes me! He has a crush on me! He's very attracted to me."
Behar: "He wants you to apologize."
Vieira: "He wants you to apologize, that's right." Behar: "What does he want you to apologize for?"
Garofalo: "He wants me to apologize for, because in his world and Fox News's world, we won, it's great, everybody loves us, democracy's there, the domino effect of democratization is going to take hold, and aren't we the greatest? Well, again?"
Behar: "What do you have to apologize for? What do you have to apologize for?"
Garofalo: "Wait, wait, Joy, hang on, I don't have to apologize for anything."
Behar: "Don't interrupt me when I'm interrupting you. Remember whose show this is, Janeane!"
Garofalo: "What I want to say is, I don't know what is more alarming over at Fox News. Is it that they know that, in the bigger picture, there's a lot of problems over there and they scrub the information or, B, they don't know because they don't watch the news, 'cause I don't know how you can?"
Jones: "But then you don't have to watch them."
Garofalo: "No, I don't watch them, but since Fox is asking for me to come and apologize?"
Jones: "Ignore 'em."
Garofalo: "Well, yeah, I do."
Behar: "They're giving you so much publicity right now."
Garofalo: "I just want to say Bill O'Reilly has a crush on me."
The March 7 CyberAlert recounted her exchange with O'Reilly on the March 6 The Pulse on Fox: "Equal, in a different way," actress/comedienne Janeane Garofalo replied when, on Thursday's The Pulse on Fox, Bill O'Reilly asked her if she thinks "George W. Bush is more of a danger to this world than Saddam?" After she condemned Bush for his "with us or against us" rhetoric and claimed his "'axis of evil' speech was not helpful,"
O'Reilly shot back: "When you say that, people out there, they're gonna think you're a loon."
Garofalo did, however, promise that if she is proven wrong and Iraqis welcome U.S. troops who find stores of weapons of mass destruction, "I will go to the White House on my knees on cut glass and say, 'hey, you were right, I shouldn't have doubted you.'" But, she quickly added, "I think to think that is preposterous."
See: http://www.mediaresearch.org/cyberalerts/2003/cyb20030307.asp#6 Other CyberAlert items in Garofalo's pre-war pontificating:
http://www.mediaresearch.org/cyberalerts/2003/cyb20030502.asp
The 'Loon', as O'Reilly denotes Garofalo, is considered the 'spirit of the wilderness'...(Hollywood) threatened, unsettled and bewildered!
Or you are deluded, Janeane, because you believe what you read in "The Economist."
You can see how the rules tend to change when you're squirming, though. Note this howler: nobody defends the atrocities of Saddam, but what we also have to keep in mind is this is not ideal either, having Jay Garner and Chalabi, who is not accepted by the Iraqis. This is just about the oldest leftist wheeze of them all - if things aren't "ideal" they are all equally wrong, if Bush doesn't provide an "ideal" alternative, then he and Saddam are morally equivalent. Under these rules she defines what is ideal and her opponent will always be unable to measure up to them. Under these rules she's never wrong, and never has to apologize.
The bottom line is that she's transparent and not very bright.
Sure you don't mean "Us Weekly"?
Garofalo, of course, graduated from the Yoko Ono Institute of Self Absorption....
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.