1) Some Republican hack tries to make excuses for the "magic negro" song "satire" on MSNBC, but host Tamron Hall lets her know that it wouldn't be funny if someone called her "Tamron Hall the magic negro anchor lady."
2) Also from MSNBC: Mika's daddy insult's Mika's boss. Or, for those of you who don't watch Morning Joe: while discussing the Israel/Palestine conflict, Zbigniew Brzezinski tells Joe Scarborough, "You have such a stunningly superficial knowledge of what went on that it's almost embarrassing to listen to you."
3) From CNN on New Year's Eve: Kathy Griffin (co-hosting with Anderson Cooper) responds to a heckler on air with "I don't go to your job and knock the dicks out of your mouth."
4) And also on New Year's Eve, Fox News allows "magic negro" message to be broadcast on crawl at bottom of the screen.
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1 comment:
Ahh, the magic of live TV.
I have to say, I always thought of Zbigniew Brzezinski as a light weight, a Kissinger wanna-be (and that's not much of an aspiration, considering Kissinger). But he was exactly right (in my opinion, based on my recollection) about the middle east, and therefore about Scarborough. Pity so few people will understand that, although I expect some of those who don’t will never the less be swayed by Brzezinski’s accent.
As for the “Magic Negro”, jeez, what can I say? No really, as a white male, what can I say? Limbaugh points out he read about the “magic negro” in the LA Times, but he held it up immediately and without discussion as an example of Democratic/liberal hypocrisy. Well, according to the Wikipedia entry on “magic negro”, the term may have been coined by Spike Lee, talking about film in 2001 at University talks (the entry, cited in the LA Times piece, now includes information the LA Times, Limbaugh and Saltsman, in a neatly circular symmetry). I come away with two thoughts. First, there is no serious topic that the left advances that the right will not leap on and point out the hypocritical mote in the eye of left while ignoring the beam in their own. Yes, as Ruth Ann Dailey likes to point out, Republicans helped get the Civil Rights Act passed (they were essential). And so then the GOP started it’s “Southern Strategy” and lured Dixicrats into the GOP and became the party of code. Which flows neatly into my second thought. Paul Krugman had a good column the “Southern Strategy” and Saltsman (http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/02/opinion/02krugman.html). At the moment it is all the Republicans have, a reminder to racists that they are angry about the election of Obama. They have no solutions, only criticism and monkey wrenches. “Socialism”, “magic negro”, “a crisis that will test Obama” (never mind that Bush is leaving Obama with plenty). Yet the Republicans, as the “loyal” opposition, only offer more problems as solutions. Gut labor in the auto bailout. Slam Hamas in middle east. But the “solutions” they do offer, and the election technique of “Chip” Saltsman, are designed to whip up and encourage their only remaining electorate. Using the code.
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