Joe – Thank you. Your panel discussion of the Berkley/Antifa/Snowflake “controversy” reminded me why of I don’t watch morning news programs. It is too annoying to work all day while I’m debating with you in my head.

It is simultaneously humorous and frustrating that the newfound awareness of the “Antifa” is instant Republican fodder.

Conveniently, now in the “Summer of Trump 2017” – the conservative media is eager to focus on the very few liberals who are violent – picking up on the NRA’s narrative du jour. Now, thanks to the “Antifa’s” actions, Republicans can choose not to face the well-organized and entrenched evil of white supremacy in America or how it is now the true, active, and very public base of the Republican Party because of a very few liberals who gained notoriety.

I always denounce threatening words and threatening actions and physical violence regardless of the source. But I know that this white nationalist threat exists in every corner of the US. I don’t live in a bubble. The people who ignore this hateful reality are in the ones in a bubble. And the people who discuss it so glibly are the “mentally stunted”.

I’m 48 years old and in my lifetime, I have heard no condemnation of racism by Republicans that is backed up by action. Democrats haven’t done enough either. But I have never seen Republicans call for more thorough investigations and prosecutions when synagogues and mosques targeted and burned or when white pro-life activists threaten the lives of doctors and commit assault against legally operating abortion providers.

Republican politicians consistently turn a blind eye when it suits them – further infantilizing the white working class by not owning up to their support of systemic racism in our communities and our culture.

But I’m in a liberal bubble. Sigh.

A few Republican politicians have come forward to denounce the KKK, but have you debated on your show why they likely won’t change laws to actually protect people and why they certainly won’t change the policies that continue to keep people divided by race? Until they do that, violence will increase, because they are pitting us against each other.

Then, Joe, you talked about law and order. Again – do you hear that? That’s the echo of the right-wing echo-chamber messaging.

Did you care when, earlier this year, a 2006 Department of Homeland Security study was reported to find that “domestic terrorism investigations focused on militia extremists, white supremacist extremists, and sovereign citizen extremists often have identified active links to law enforcement officers”?  And that white supremacists were “avoiding overt displays of their beliefs” to gain “employment with law enforcement agencies”?

Did you or any other Republican object when Trump gave the DOJ direction to stop pursuing terrorism investigations by Neo-Nazis and only focus on Islamic terrorists? I heard crickets from my bubble. That was a clear-as-day green light for Neo-Nazis and a signal that law enforcement would once again turn a blind eye to crimes against minorities and our democracy.

It was a far cry from the small progress made at the DOJ to fairly represent people equally under the law during Obama’s administration, which Republicans were chomping at the bit to undo. Did any Republicans fight for racial equality during the confirmation process of Trump’s nominees? No. They stuck together and marched in almost perfect time, happy to remove so many African-Americans from leadership positions.

It’s a sad day for me when I realize that even my “moderate” Republican friends, who are similar to you, will ignore all that and just be glad to jump on Antifa actions and smear liberals, while only reservedly shaking their heads and give a quiet “oh, jeez, that’s terrible” at violence by bad white cops or atrocious white nationalists.

And, oh! The “free speech” hand-wringing from you and your panel about right-leaning speakers who were supposedly deprived of their first amendment rights and the fate of liberal college students.

Fake News Alert! A college cancelling a speaker is not “limiting their free speech.” These well-financed and well-represented speech-givers have ample media outlets, the internet, podcasts, and more. What the universities are taking away is money and promotion and their name. And that is within their rights.

The people and students protesting aren’t limiting free speech. They are rejecting the content of that speech. And that protest is their free speech!

Of course, there should be no violence – but your faux concern about free speech – please. Republicans just don’t like it when people tell them they aren’t wanted. They can’t seem to handle rejection (i.e. reality) as well as us liberal snowflakes.

And – it keeps making me laugh – your offer to send “some people” to help Berkeley protect the Alt Right demonstrators? Forgive me – I must have missed it – did you offer to send some people to Charlottesville to protect the Jews and Christians in their places of worship? Did you send “some people” to protect protesters in Ferguson? In Baltimore? Funny how you want to protect the Alt Right’s rights, isn’t it?

When the organizer of the Charlottesville “Unite the Right” march, Jason Kessler, wanted to give a press conference after the unfortunate events that weekend, he was provided a microphone and the press was waiting for him – with bated breath – ready to report his free speech to the world.

Kessler was shouted down by an opponent and then complained that free speech is dead. Someone stole the spot light during his moment of hateful glory. Boo hoo hoo! Talk about a snowflake. Racists and their supporters have been shouting down and taking away the mic from black people for decades.

Actually Joe, free speech is not dead in Berkeley because of liberals – it just doesn’t ONLY belong to Republicans.

I know, Joe, you are smarter than me – reading the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times – as a child. RME. You are more elitist than me. You are slicker than me. Your hair stands taller than mine. But I’m not living in a bubble because I don’t want to listen to right wing ideology. I hear it, I see it, and I reject it.

(Sources: NRA.com, Reuters, Intercept/IBT, Morning Joe)

The post Open Letter to Joe Scarborough appeared first on Occasional Planet.

Daily Kos called Joe Scarborough the “resident Republican blowhard on MSNBC.” Daily Kos and many other on the left-leaning outlets have taken Scarborough to task. Really. All Scarborough did was to assert that almost every mainstream news anchor or Sunday morning interview show is liberal. He cited a number: David Brinkley, Tom Brokaw, Walter Cronkite, Dan Rather, Tim Russert, and George Stephanopoulos. What he didn’t say was what kind of liberal they might be.

Think about those names: Brinkley, Brokaw, Cronkite, Rather, Russert, Stephanopoulos. Do any of them seem like flaming liberals? Hardly. Cronkite was frequently called “the most trusted man in America.” He was seen as fair and balanced before that term became so tarnished. What is it about the others that Scarborough sees as being so liberal? If he contends that they voted Democratic, he’s probably right, although we’ll never know. But for him to contend that they’re liberal because they might have voted Democrat is a bit of a stretch. These are all mainstream guys who may have voted Democratic because Republicans offered such poor choices. They may have been viewed as liberal because they had a certain element of inquisitiveness and curiosity. They were open to new information, something that is often not found in Republicans. It’s difficult to know how Scarborough himself can take in new information when he so frequently drowns out others by interrupting.

Scarborough, who once served as a Republican in Congress, overlooks a key reason why the aforementioned, as well as so many other mainstream journalists, are not liberal. It is because they present much of what is called news through the lens of false equivalencies. They report points of view that have little or no factual basis as being on a level with those that are solidly grounded.

A current example would be disagreement over what the hazards might be of increasing the size of the federal budget. For decades, Republicans have argued that deficit spending would lead to increased inflation. They argue that inflation is like a regressive tax on consumers. The problem is that, over the past ten years, the highest annual inflation rate we have had was 4.1 percent, as George W. Bush continued to drive us into two questionable wars while refusing to raise taxes. Under President Obama, inflation has risen to 3.0 percent only once (2011), and in 2014 was 0.8 percent. Statistically, our inflation is now zero.

Liberals favor programs that strengthen the federal safety net for all. The programs range from Social Security and Medicare to occupational safety and environmental protection. They also include huge infrastructure programs, the kind that produce jobs that cannot be outsourced overseas. They are clearly good for the economy. If the cost of a new and larger stimulus project is Bush-like inflation of 4 percent, it is a small price for providing so many well-paying jobs for Americans and producing a finished product that is of far more value to all of us than an engagement in war.

Yet the media prefers to present Republican arguments against increased spending on a par with progressive ideas to provide more security and jobs. The media also equates Republican arguments that reducing federal regulations (e.g. safety and health requirements) will create as many or more jobs than progressive ideas to have the federal government as “employer of the last resort.”

Cronkite, Brokaw, not even Rather ever reported liberal ideas as being more fact-based and reasonable than most conservative arguments. So I take issue with the contention that Joe Scarborough was criticizing real liberals. I also question the accuracy of the Daily Kos headline, “MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough Has On-Air Mental Breakdown Over Liberal Media Myth.” See for yourself:

The post Scarborough’s misconceptions about liberals in the media appeared first on Occasional Planet.