Say What? 3/1/2011 edition [Reader Post]

Liberals:

John Kerry: “People are ripped. I’m ripped.  We’ve got to respond, we’ve got to make something happen.”

John Kerry, about the House Republicans: “What I saw on the floor in the last 48 hours of the House just made my stomach turn.  The lack of thought, the lack of consequence, the lack of connection to the real values of our country, as ideologue after ideologue comes to the floor to chew up the valuable time we have to address these problems.”

AFL-CIO boss Richard Tumka: “Democrats live in a fact-based world…they [conservatives] don’t.  We live in the reality that’s created by the facts; they create their own reality.  So they don’t care about truth.  They create a reality, they make all these assertions, and then we go around, supplying the facts that kills ‘em.  But, by the time, they already have two more realities out there.”

Headline, McClatchy Newspapers: “Is Obama Failing to Lead, or Leading in a New, Crafty Way?”  Could you imagine this same headline about Bush?

AFL-CIO boss Richard Trumka: “I’m at the White House a couple times a week.  Two or three times a week.  I have conversations everyday with someone in the White House or in the administration.  Everyday.”

Trumka: “We need a dedicated source of revenue to create infrastructure in this country…We need to create jobs. The best way to do that is through infrastructure development.”

Bob Chanin (NEA General Counsel): “Despite what some among us would like to believe it is not because of our creative ideas; it is not because of the merit of our positions; it is not because we care about children; and it is not because we have a vision of a great public school for every child. The NEA and its affiliates are effective advocates because we have power. And we have power because there are more than 3.2 million people who are willing to pay us hundreds of million of dollars in dues each year because they believe that we are the unions that can most effectively represent them; the union that can protect their rights and advance their interests as education employees. This is not to say that the concern of NEA and its affiliates with closing achievement gaps, reducing drop rate rates, improving teacher quality, and the like are unimportant or inappropriate. To the contrary these are the goals that guide the work we do. But they need not and must not be achieved at the expense of due process, employee rights, or collective bargaining.  That is simply too high a price to pay.”

Van Jones (former green jobs czar): “On Saturday, the powers-that-be (in both parties) should see a rainbow force coming together: organized workers, business leaders, veterans, students and youth, faith leaders, civil rights fighters, women’s rights champions, immigrant rights defenders, LGBTQ stalwarts, environmentalists, academics, artists, celebrities, community activists, elected officials and more — all standing up for what’s right.”

Rep. Keith Ellison (D-Minn.), said Governor Walker “is basically taking up the posture of a dictator.”

Mika Brzezinski to Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker: “You’re receiving a lot of criticism for only asking the other side to give, and they have given – on health care and pensions. Are you asking people in your state across the board, including the wealthiest, to give, to help deal with the crisis….and I mean tax increases for the wealthy, or in any way, has anyone else been asked to give?”

Randi Weingarten, former social studies teacher and now  head of the 1.4 million member American Federation of Teachers: “Let me take you back a step…the average pension in Wisconsin is $26,000/year; that translates to $500/month for a public worker who has worked 20, 30 years.”  Obviously, not a former math teacher.

LAWRENCE O’DONNELL (to Jennifer Granholm, former Democratic governor): Governor, I want you to listen to that last line of that Republican attack ad against President Obama one more time.

CLIP OF AD: Stop Obama and his union bosses today. The Republican National Committee is responsible for the content of this advertising.

O’DONNELL: The Republican Party is saying that the President of the United States has bosses, that the union bosses this President around, the unions boss him around. Does that sound to you like they are trying to consciously or subconsciously deliver the racist message that, of course, of course a black man can’t be the real boss?

Labor Secretary Hilda Solis: “The fight is on.  We work together. We help those embattled states right now where public employees are under assault.”

Senior advisor to the President Valerie Jarrett: “Let’s not turn what’s really a Wisconsin issue into a Washington issue.”

Mike   Papantonio (fill-in host for Ed Schultz): “That’s what you have here. Look, here, let’s not miss this, this is a generational war. You have students at universities that are showing up, you have these senile old boneheads that are ol-, I mean, check, look at the pictures, I don’t even have to say, look at the pictures, Rich. Run any film, who is there for the teabaggers?! The people that are being paid for by the Koch brothers are there for the teabaggers, but take a look at the age discrepancy. They’ve used our school system. They’ve used our infrastructure. So the American Majority is busing these old feeble nuts to there and so they’re called, do you realize there’s, there’s a, calling our teachers pigs. Calling our teachers pigs and the teachers take it and that’s OK, that’s what they oughta do because you know what? The more light you shine on these senile, look, you know (laughs) truthfully, they’re the last days of their lives, they really are, these old, fuddie-duddies or curmudgeons are at the last days of the lives and you have students there that are in the protest that say, well look, we want to have the same thing you have. We would like to have infrastructure. We’d like to be able to educate our children. We’d like the same quality of life that we gave you. And unfortunately, you know, I guess the bad news is they’re not moving through fast enough because we can keep people alive a long time with good medication. But that’s who you have showing up as teabaggers.”

Daily Beast reporter Rick Outzen, added, with a laugh, “[We are] Just a few funerals away from a good government.”

Sign at Washington D.C. rally:
“Keep your laws off my body, and I’ll keep my hands off your throat.”

Child (about 10 years old) holding sign in Washington D.C.:
“Don’t tea-bag me, bro.”

Union protestor to black TEA party demonstrator:”You’re on Koch’s plantation?”

Union demonstrator in Columbus, OH: “The Tea Party is a bunch of d**k-sucking corporate butt-lickers who want to crush the working people of this country.”

Pro-union supporter in Providence, RI, to citizen journalist: “I’ll f**k you in the a**, you faggot!”

There are a ton of these union quotations, here, most on tape.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QaiyD3HXH0s

Liberals from the past:

Larry Scanlon, the head of AFSCME’s political operations”We’re the big dog.  But we don’t like to brag.”  That means, they pay more money to support political campaigns than any other entity.

Liberals making sense:

Newsweek’s Evan Thomas: “Let’s look at the situation around the states. Public employee unions have disproportionate power because in a private situation, the shop owner, the store owner will push back because if they give away the store, they lose the store. In a public setting, it’s state legislatures who just want to get more contributions from unions. They’re happy to say yes, especially for the unfunded stuff down the road. We’ve gotten ourselves into a tremendous jam here by states saying, “Sure, you can have great pensions down the road, later. Yeah, that’s all fine.” So there’s like $3 trillion of these unfunded pensions. It’s a serious situation.”
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Andrea Mitchell: “You report that in fact there were a half a dozen cabinet members who had not heard from the president personally, had not gotten a phone call from the president or had an opportunity to be one-on-one with him in the first 2 years.”

Her guest: “…[a] half a dozen of them, have never had a single phone call from the president in the first two years up to that point.  That is a pretty dramatic thing because it tells you not only was the president not listening to people outside the administration, he wasn’t even listening to senior members of the administration. He was really only listening to a very small group of people.”

Crosstalk:

CHRIS MATTHEWS, HOST: Let me go to the Republican, Senator Grothman. My question of course is why does the Governor pick on the unions that didn’t endorse him in the last campaign but give a free ride to the firefighters and the cops who did and the localities? Why did they get off and are allowed to continue to negotiate collectively?

STATE SENATOR GLENN GROTHMAN (R-WISCONSIN): Well one more time you’re completely uninformed. The firemen’s union around this state have campaigned against Republicans, and the statewide police have repeatedly campaigned against Republicans. Governor Walker is doing this out of financial necessity. And out of financial necessity the state with a $3 billion budget deficit has to do something. Governor Walker as well as the cities, counties and schools which all rely on state money can either lay people off or have everybody take a mild reduction in take home pay. Myself with a mild reduction in take home pay is part of that. Now we understand.

MATTHEWS: Okay, you just said I’m wildly, once again I’m wildly out of, out of, wrong on the facts.

GROTHMAN: Absolutely.

MATTHEWS: You’re telling me that there aren’t local affiliates, there aren’t local union organizations at the county level, municipal level that didn’t endorse your governor candidate when he ran. Are you saying they didn’t endorse him, the firefighters and the cops?

GROTHMAN: I can think of two small locals. The vast majority, the Wisconsin Professional Police Association, the vast majority of firemen’s unions worked against Walker in this campaign and to say otherwise is completely to mislead your listening audience.

The truth is, some small groups supported Walker and others supported his opponent.

THE WPPA ENDORSES TOM BARRETT FOR GOVERNOR

Wisconsin State Senator Smacks Down Chris Matthews: ‘You’re Completely Uninformed’

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Jonah Goldberg: “Ya know, there are more people — more people watch ‘The Mentalist’ on Thursday nights on CBS than belong to labor union today.”

Bret Baier: “You couldn’t use a FOX number? You had to go with CBS?”

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MIKA BRZEZINSKI: So governor, explain to us how this is not an attempt to crush the unions, given that collective bargaining is the last thing on the table? What does collective bargaining have to do with deficits and spending?

(…)

Wisconsin Gov. SCOTT WALKER (R): It is about the budget. Everything we’re talking about’s the budget. I, for eight-and-a-half years before I was governor was a county elected official, and every time we tried to do things to balance our county budget at the local level, collective bargaining stood in the way of us making reasonable adjustments to pension and health care, and ultimately avoiding layoffs and furlough days. (…) That’s what this is all about, balancing the state’s budget now, into the future, but also making sure that the local governments, who are going to see state aid cuts in this next state budget, can also balance this budget as well without cutting core services.

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Pro-union protestor: “Fox lies; Fox lies; Fox lies; Fox lies; Fox lies; Fox lies…”

Fox reporter: “Those are apparently the only two words he knows.”

Conservatives:

Former governor and possible Republican presidential candidate , Tim Pawlenty: “[I’m not one to] question the existence of the president’s birth certificate, but when you listen to his policies, don’t you at least think, what planet is he from?  We don’t share President Obama’s world view.”

Ben Stein: “It isn’t clear why the public sector unions ought to be a pampered class.”

Ralph Peters: “He’s [Obama] really never understood foreign policy and was never taken an interest in it.”

Monica Crowley: “The mad dog of the east [Kadafy] just met the chihuahua of the west [Obama].”

Rush Limbaugh: “Folks, it’s time we realize that Wisconsin isn’t Egypt — Wisconsin is Greece.”

Rush Limbaugh: “Intellectually, I don’t understand how anybody claiming to be an advocate for African-Americans can sit idly by while half of black pregnancies in New York City are aborted.”

Rush: “So Barack Obama goes to Ohio and says we have to live within our means, and that’s when MSNBC cuts out. I guess they figured not even their pundits would be able to spin that with any kind of credibility.”

Rush: “By every and any measure, our public school graduates are as dumb as a bag of hammers. Now, if you or I failed at our jobs as badly as teachers in the public school system clearly have failed, not only would we be fired, we wouldn’t be talking about lifetime pensions and health care benefits paid for by somebody else.”

Taken From:

The Conservative Review #167  (HTML)   (PDF)