Horowitz admonished by MSNBC host for "call[ing] guests names on the air"
SUMMARY: On MSNBC News Live, host Contessa Brewer admonished right-wing activist David Horowitz for calling Citizens for Legitimate Government founder Michael Rectenwald -- appearing opposite Horowitz -- a "communist," "pro-terrorist," and "a menace." Brewer said: "All right. OK, here's what we're not going to do, is to call guests names on the air."
Appearing on the March 5 edition of MSNBC News Live to discuss the suspension of Colorado high school teacher Jay Bennish, who linked President Bush and Adolf Hitler during an in-class lecture, host Contessa Brewer admonished right-wing activist David Horowitz for calling Citizens for Legitimate Government founder Michael Rectenwald -- appearing opposite Horowitz -- a "communist," "pro-terrorist," and "a menace." Brewer said: "All right. OK, here's what we're not going to do, is to call guests names on the air."
From the March 5 editon of MSNBC News Live:
HOROWITZ: This teacher [Bennish], in this 20-minute rant, also said that the victims of 9-11 deserved their fate. He's much in sympathy -- first of all, let me point out I explicitly said it would be just as wrong to have right-wing views inflicted in this way on high school students as these extremist left-wing views. Rectenwald -- Rectenwald believes that there's been a coup d'etat in the United States, we live under a dictatorship. His website calls for armed revolution --
RECTENWALD: That's not true.
HOROWITZ: This is -- it absolutely does --
RECTENWALD: No, it is not.
HOROWITZ: -- just go up there --
RECTENWALD: It is not true. You know, if you read LegitGov.org you'll see that we --
HOROWITZ: I, look, I --
RECTENWALD: If you read what we say, we do not call for that --
HOROWITZ: You have no respect for any type of disagreement --
RECTENWALD: -- in fact, that's the thing we eliminate. We eliminate that possibility.
HOROWITZ: You have no respect for disagreement, like all totalitarians --
RECTENWALD: I'm sorry, you're the one that wants to get rid of difference --
BREWER: And just real quickly, Michael, I'll give you the last word on this teacher in Colorado.
RECTENWALD: Well, I mean, the teacher -- he's a young teacher, he needs more experience with bringing in various standpoints, but his standpoint is the most endangered one, and that's the one we need to protect --
HOROWITZ: This man is a communist. He is a pro-terrorist [sic], and he is a menace.
RECTENWALD: We need to protect unpopularity. That's what we need to protect in this country.
BREWER: All right. OK, here's what we're not going to do, is to call guests names on the air.
RECTENWALD: Thank you very much.
BREWER: That's not going to happen.
HOROWITZ: Yeah, all right, he called me a right-winger!
BREWER: David Horowitz, Michael Rectenwald --
RECTENWALD: Thank you very much.
BREWER: -- in a certainly lively discussion.
During the segment, Rectenwald never once called Horowitz a "right-winger."
Horowitz also appeared with Rectenwald on the March 2 edition of MSNBC's Scarborough Country, during which Horowitz claimed that "[t]here are 50,000 professors" who are "anti-American" and "identify with the terrorists," as Media Matters for America noted. Rectenwald called Horowitz a "right-wing professor" during that appearance, while Horowitz claimed that Rectenwald and Bennish "are anti-American, they're radicals, they identify with the terrorists, they think of them as freedom fighters."
BREWER: All right. OK, here's what we're not going to do, is to call guests names on the air.
RECTENWALD: Thank you very much.
BREWER: That's not going to happen.
HOROWITZ: Yeah, all right, he called me a right-winger!
So to Horowitz, calling someone a right winger is along the same lines as calling someone a menace and a terrorist sympathizer. You can't make this stuff up.
..except Horowitz was never called a right-winger on the show. So Horowitz did MAKE that part up. What a liar he is.
First, you criticize the right wing pundits for always bringing up the ghost of Bill Clinton, now your going to complain every time they call someone a Communist? How are they ever going to debate the liberal media without their two favorite tactics?
Whore-owitz *IS* a right winger, even if he did lie about being called that.
And it's the telltale sign of total desperation, to call an opponent a "communist."
"Tailgunner Joe" drank himself to death 50 years ago, but Horowitz and Annthrax Coulter just haven't had that sink in yet, that he was a fake, liar and grandstanding jerk.
As to Horowitz, he's aalso a stinking liar, making up wild charges about "conservatives being persecuted" on college campuses.
Horowitz has no credibility, no evidence, and has NO class. Like Coulter, he's just pandering to the suckers who still believe his drivel.
Hope you didn't think my post was serious. I agree with everything you said. Horowitz is a monster. He is a ranting sociopath. As is Coulter.
The worst part is there are too many suckers who actually but Horowitz's and Coulter's bullcrap, so those two can line their pockets, laughing at how stupid their fans are.
Calling Horowitz a right-winger is as much an insult, to him, really, as calling me a left-winger. Fine. I don't deny it for a second. Why would I? Along the political spectrum, that is how I am classified. But calling someone a communist (dated) or pro-terrorist (gasp!) is obviously inflammatory. Is this where we are headed again? Down the paranoid trails blazed by unscrupulous geeks like Joe McCarthy? Ah, but he was correct! cries Ann Coulter and other rightwing hit men, priming the public for the next incarnation of the Alien and Sedition Acts, the next set of witch trials.
That pressure you’re feeling is the slow-kill squeeze being applied to our freedoms, all in the name of vacuous concepts like patriotism.
Someone call Horowitz's wet nurse.
This guy's a creep...reactionary...unnecessary. There're a few good 'names' for him.
Why is this guy even on MSNBC? I realize MSNBC is vying for FOX's apparant corner on the cable news market (just ask Sorcerer). But...sheesh. Giving airtime to this guy is a damn shame.
Come on, give Horowitz a break. It's obvious he thought he was on Fox where the Right Wing can call the Left any and all names without ever having to worry about someone actually challenging them on it.
Sean Hannity has been railing on this topic. He's encouraged his college listeners to tape their commie professors and send him the evidence. Not only does the right make severe cuts in student aid, they also are attacking professors expressing viewpoints. They are simply mortified of smart people. While the intelligence slowly eeks out the country, fascism slowly but firmly sneaks in. Woo Hoo!!
You know, Whorowitz bears an uncanny resemblance to Lyndon LaRouche...and now Christopher "The Arrogant" Hitchens: They're former left wingers who've become right wing loons, off the right wing fringe in fact.
Lots of us have changed some of our attitudes as we get a little older. But they did compete 180s. I read just one of Whorowitz's books a few years ago hoping I'd note just a smidgen of "wisdom." I reviewed his book and said the he was infected with a McCarthy virus. Hmm. I wonder if he drinks as much as the proverbial tail gunner. If so, maybe we can bid him adieu soon as he falls to csirrohsis, just like his mentor. The world will be better off without those ideological morons who claim some perception of reality.
Or maybe we can just marry off Whorowitz and Rabies Coulter (Anthrax seems almost a little to benign for that wench!) They can settle down with their publishing contracts for, you know, the few who still take Limbaugh seriously. And the rest of us can live with each other in peace.
BREWER: All right. OK, here's what we're not going to do, is to call guests names on the air.
Comment: What does MSNBC expect bringing in Horowitz? Has Brewer not seen Horowitz on Scarborough Country? Has Brewer not seen MSNBC Hardball with Matthews? Horowitz' behavior isn't that out of line of MSNBC's format.
Hate to say it but I believe that Brewer and Mwdiamatters both screwed up. It's very obvious that Horowitz was refering to Bennish and not Rectenwald when he went on his rant.It does'nt make him less of a dick though.Jjust means that nobody at that interview was listening to anybody but themselves.Typical
Despite professing to advance tolerance on campus, David Horowitz consistently seeks to silence dissident voices. His Students for Academic Freedom sought to ban Barbara Ehrenreich's book Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting by in America from the UNC freshman reading list in 2003 - naming it anti-Christian" and anti-capitalist."
http://www.theopolitics.com/?p=11