"I disagree with you, but I'm pretty sure you're not Hitler."
So read the sign that Jon Stewart brandished from his Daily Show desk, on the day he announced the Rally to Restore Sanity. It struck a real chord with moderates and liberals everywhere, because we all recognized that, as comical as it was, it truly needed to be said. Someone needed to point out that you can disagree without demonizing, and that rabid extremism on both sides had made progress nearly impossible in this country.
Flash forward about 7 weeks. I glance over the comments section of an article I'm reading online, and I see some pretty harsh stuff. "Complete dumbass"..."lying lackey"..."unparalleled douchebag"..."he should rot for this"..."Nazi stormtrooper".
The ridiculous thing is that these comments were all made by liberals, on a left-leaning blog. What could get the left to forget about the lessons of the Rally for Sanity so quickly? Well, all these insults (and many more) were directed at Phil Griffin, the president of MSNBC, because he had suspended Keith Olbermann from hosting Countdown.
The saga of Keith Olbermann has had the left in a blind panic for days. With the announcement by MSNBC that he will return to his post on Countdown tomorrow night, liberals everywhere can finally unclench their asscheeks, wipe the spittle from their faces and calm down. I have to wonder, though, why they were so bent out of shape in the first place.
As I noted in an earlier post, I get why people feel that Olbermann should have been allowed to donate to the candidates of his choice without fear of punishment. However, the fact remained that NBC News did have a policy that expressly prohibited its employees from making such donations, and Olbermann did violate that policy. The policy seems unfair, in light of the many well-documented instances of both direct and indirect support provided to Republican politicians by the Fox News crew. At this point in time, it seems sensible for NBC News to allow its anchors, whose political loyalties are already abundantly clear, to spend their private money on campaigns and candidates they support. Still, the rule was in place and Olbermann broke it, so he got what amounts to a time-out, and now he may resume normal operations. This all seemed fairly reasonable to me. Even Rachel Maddow seemed to strike this same tone when she discussed Olbermann's suspension on her own MSNBC show.
According to the vast majority of liberal America, however, the 2-night suspension of Keith Olbermann was a major injustice, and it required an immediate and deafening response on Olbermann's behalf. Twitter was ablaze following the announcement that Olbermann was suspended; most tweets decried the move and promised boycotts, petitions and continued pressure on MSNBC to "Free Keith!". Phil Griffin was called every name under the sun and instantly became the left's Public Enemy #1. And liberals started exchanging information about how to protest by canceling your cable, and which sponsors to write to, and what Griffin's email address was.
I watched all of this with a combination of bemusement and mild concern. Why, I wondered, were my fellow left-wingers so enraged? Why the Chicken Little routine? Didn't they see that this was not exactly the coming of Armageddon for our side?
I feel that Keith Olbermann, as well as all other NBC News employees, should have the freedom to contribute legally to political campaigns without it being a violation of their contract. I think it made sense for viewers and fans to express their support and to let NBC know that they wanted Olbermann back. Beyond that, I thought it was more or less obvious that neither MSNBC nor Keith Olbermann wanted the suspension to go on for too long, and that the histrionics many liberals displayed were unnecessary. I know about the tensions between Griffin and Olbermann, but I didn't really believe that Griffin would let the centerpiece show in his prime-time lineup wither and die. Still, some worried that this suspension COULD BE THE FINAL STRAW that would SEND OLBERMANN OVER THE EDGE, and then WHAT WOULD HAPPEN TO COUNTDOWN, and WHAT WOULD WE ALL DO???
See, this is the sort of stuff that can make me a bit uncomfortable. I am a liberal, and have been for pretty much my entire adult life, even though "liberal" has recently become a dirty word for so many people in this country. I do not consider myself an extremist, however, and I feel this is why I was so out of step with other liberals on the whole Olbermann thing.
I never felt that it was necessary to go all torches and pitchforks on Phil Griffin. That guy is not Olbermann's staunchest supporter, not by a long shot, but he does know on which side his bread is buttered. If for no other reason than pure selfishness, the dude was not going to permanently axe Olbermann, because if he did it would be the end of MSNBC as we know it, and he didn't want that when all's said and done.
Still, people on the left had no problem whatsoever in dumping on Griffin, and going immediately into full panic mode. They started throwing out the hyperbole, the insults, and the moral indignation that, more often than not, comes from the mob on the right and not from the left. It was kinda icky.
I love Keith's show. I believe he is a vital voice for the left, and that he is one of only a handful of people on television right now who are both brave and intelligent enough to get the progressives' case out there before the American public in a clear and passionate manner.
However, I was not about to blindly freak out in his defense when he got suspended, nor did I assume that it would really change things too much if I did. I knew the punishment was going to be short-lived, a token of sorts to let the public know that even though its prime-time hosts are obviously liberals, MSNBC is still trying to maintain some official semblance of impartiality. Now that the exile has ended, I am hoping the drama has ended as well, so liberals can go back to being liberals and return to more left-wing pursuits, like being reasonable and not hurling insults at people when they disagree with them.
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