THE MIKIVERSE

Corporate Media Follows Government Orders, Runs Defense For Etheridge Assault

Neo-lib establishment petrified that a couple of college kids with a flip camera can change the course of a state election

Paul Joseph Watson
Prison Planet.com
Tuesday, June 15, 2010

Petrified that a couple of college kids with a flip camera can change the course of a state election, the corporate media and the neo-lib establishment has gone into overdrive in an attempt to spin the Bob Etheridge assault controversy, with some even trying to turn reality on its head in claiming Etheridge was the one being assaulted.

Despite the fact that Etheridge’s shameful reaction to merely being asked, “Do you fully support the Obama agenda?” by a couple of unknown college kids has enraged Internet viewers across the board, the corporate clowns at MSNBC and the rest of the libtard apologists immediately went to work in a lame effort to absolve Etheridge of blame, after being ordered to do so by talking points issued by a Democratic Party official.

The video shows the Congressman grabbing a young man by the arm, swatting away the camera and then grabbing him round the neck as he monotonously repeats the words, “Who are you,” in a stupefied and drunken drawl.

Despite the fact that Etheridge was forced to issue an apology for the incident, the Democrats sent out an official list of talking points to their media whores encouraging them to attack the source of the video and question its credibility, which is exactly what then happened.

“A national Democratic Party official e-mailed around a set of talking points about an hour ago, under the subject heading, “Etheridge Gotcha Video Background,” reports Politico’s Ben Smith.

“Push hard w/ blogs the lack of credibility inherent to anything Breitbart does/posts, given its role in the debunked ACORN videos,” states the talking point memo.

“Considering Congressman Etheridge has already apologized and said there was no excuse for his behavior, it seems like this may have been a battle the Democrats should have sat out. Too late now,” writes Alexander Marlow of Big Government.org, the website that put out the original video.

One would suspect that it would be an uphill struggle trying to defend Etheridge’s bizarre and embarrassing behavior, for which he had already apologized, but an assortment of mainstream media mouthpieces went ahead and had a go anyway.

MSNBC’s Chris Matthews, who makes a career out of demonizing his political adversaries as mentally unstable and violent lunatics, which is an apt description for how Etheridge behaved in the video, instantly leapt to Etheridge’s defense claiming he was “ambushed” by unknown activists who Matthews then undermines simply because they don’t wish to be identified.

The coordinated spin continued on the network when another MSNBC host gave credence to people “blasting the people allegedly behind this video,” without explaining why the kid who was assaulted by the shameful Etheridge should be blasted for anything except perhaps exposing the rampant hypocrisy of establishment news networks who constantly invoke violence when demonizing grass roots Americans but then go into spin mode when anyone from the left resorts to such behavior.

The host tries to use the fact that the guy who got the infamous Acorn scoop pleaded guilty to a trespassing misdemeanor (as if that had any relevance to the Acorn story anyway) as a conduit through which to imply that the college kids were somehow also engaging in criminal behavior by merely walking down the street and asking a question of an elected representative.

The host then parrots Matthews’ tactic of blaming the kid who was assaulted for engaging in “an ambush” of Etheridge, portraying the Congressman as a victim despite the fact that he engaged in a criminal act of assault.

Establishment neo-lib blogs went even further than MSNBC in trying to sell the notion that down is up, and that Etheridge was victim of the incident. The Politically Illustrated website ran with the headline, “Rep. Bob Etheridge Defends Himself Against Student Attack on Sidewalk”.That’s right, next time someone punches your camera, squeezes your arm and puts you in a half nelson just be hopeful that they don’t have you charged with ‘attacking’ them.

“A pesky student armed with a handycam tried to assault Rep. Bob Etheridge,” states the article. And no, this is not a spoof website, the article was later updated with a message saying the website maintained its defense of Etheridge, presumably because they were getting bombarded with emails pointing out that asking a question of an elected representative and then being manhandled by him does not constitute an “attack” on behalf of the person asking the question.

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The Washington Post completely misreported Etheridge’s assault of the college kid as “a hug”. Imagine if someone like Rand Paul, who the corporate media demonized for weeks because he expressed a nuanced philosophical position on the Rachel Maddow show, had punched a camera and assaulted someone for questioning his position on the Civil Rights Act – would the Washington Post report the incident as “a hug”? Of course not, the entire establishment would come crashing own on him and he would be politically lynched. Yet because Etheridge is an establishment lackey, he can rely on the dutiful protection of the castrated establishment press.

The establishment is running scared because Etheridge is one of their own, and he was seen as a safe bet to retain his North Carolina congressional seat. Due to the actions of a couple of anonymous college kids, this has all changed and Etheridge’s days of strutting around and assaulting anyone who questions him are about as finished as his political career.

The Etheridge incident is a sterling example of how in your face political activism combined with the power of the Internet truly can have a monumental impact on the course of the country. Establishment cronies like Etheridge are clearly not used to being confronted by people who they treat with such disdain, and their power trips are quickly being derailed and exposed for all to see.

Five or ten years ago the corporate media would have been able to bury this story simply by ignoring it, but now that the Internet and independent media has become the source for some of the biggest news stories that emerge, the establishment has lost its power to dictate reality. They are forced to cover the story and the best they can offer is a lame whitewash, clicking their heels at the behest of the government in following talking points spoon fed to them by the state.