Yesterday evening, I posted a thread on my general disdain for Elisabeth Hasselbeck, the young blond airhead on ABC's "The View". Not even 24 hours have passed and I feel I must once again express my discontent. I know Sean Hannity and Bill O'Reilly have made the Top 10 Conservative Idiot list numerous times, but I don't know if Ms. Hasselbeck has ever achieved the honor.
Today they interviewed filmmaker Rory Kennedy, the woman behind the upcoming HBO documentary (which I think we all ought to watch)
Ghosts Of Abu Ghraib. Once the preliminary questioning about the film's content was done, we learned the following facts.
1) The soldiers who abused and tortured the prisoners were ordered to do so from the very top echelons of the military, up to, and including the Pentagon.
2) The
specific methods of the torture are
documented. For example, the infamous "human pyramid" was an
actual order passed down the chain of command.
3) The people behind these orders have not been held to account. (The soldiers who carried out the orders, however, were easily scapegoated, as we all know).
4) Innocent people were tortured without charges and subsequently
released.
5) Children were held in the prison. (Whether children were tortured is something I did not catch).
During the dissemination of these facts, I watched in growing horror as Ms. Hasselbeck went into an apoplectic fit unlike one I've ever seen before. While denouncing torture from one side of her mouth, she simultaneously condoned it from the other, saying, in essence, that while she thought torture was "wrong", she wanted to know Ms. Kennedy's views on how far the government ought to go when "interrogating" "known terrorists". As Ms. Kennedy attempted to respond, Ms. Hasselbeck continued to interrupt, clearly seeing that Ms. Kennedy was not going to agree with the right wing talking point Ms. Hasselbeck undoubtedly picked up from Fox News the night before. (I suspected this even more when she referred to Khalid Sheikh Mohammed as "KSM", ignoring the fact that her bringing him up was entirely irrelevant to the subject at hand).
During this entire one sided exchange, the expression on Joy Behar's face was one of contained rage, while Rosie O'Donnell's expression was one of utter disgust with what she was witnessing. Eventually Rosie stepped in and essentially told Ms. Hasselbeck to shut up.
Paraphrasing:
"Elisabeth, you can't go on like this. You asked her a question, let her answer the question. You can't just keep spouting off your opinion."
Elisabeth (stammering): "I did ask her a question..."
Rosie (Cutting Elisabeth Off): "You asked her if she thought torture was right and she said no."
In hindsight I wish I had recorded this entire segment so I could have posted it on YouTube. Hopefully, someone else out there did, because I think you all need to see this. (Crooks & Liars, I'm counting on you!) I didn't intend to post another thread so soon about Elisabeth Hasselbeck, but I didn't expect her utter stupidity and ignorance to show itself in such spectacular fashion so quickly. Here she was, arguing for the torture of innocent human beings in the face of actual facts presented to her not 30 seconds before. It was as if her brain is connected to a vast right wing computer network, constantly updating her with instructions on what to say to anyone who goes against its predefined memes.
Printer-friendly format
Email this thread to a friend
Bookmark this thread
(1000+ posts)
Send PM |
Profile |
Ignore
