Lawrence O’Donnell just moved to the front of the line of the next MsNBC cable news hosts who will be fired for being “too liberal” last night when he essentially accused NBC executives of enabling Donald Trump’s racist gambit to garner as much attention for himself as possible.
Here, go watch the video at Mediate.
Here’s the transcript from MsNBC of O’Donnell calling out NBC executives. Excerpts below (spelling not corrected as I have medical appointment to get to and am already running late):
NBC has created a monster. And it is called Donald Trump. […]
There are executives at nbc, both here in new york and in burbank, who shall for this hour anyway remain nameless who know whether donald trump is already committed to appearing on his fake reality show next season.
If donald trump has committed to do that, he is obviously not running for president. And all of this, every bit of it, is as fake as donald’s fake reality show where he pretends to fire some very sad people.
Those nbc executives should not be allowed to survive another day of involuntary entanglement in the trump hatred campaign without being asked everything they know about donald trump’s professional commitments and performance obligations to nbc.That now is important news. Nbc will announce its full schedule for the coming season IN NEW YORK ON MONDAY, MAY 16th, But they don’t have to wait UNTIL MONDAY, MAY 16th, TO TELL Us what is going to happen to donald trump’s fake reality show, and donald trump’s personal employment with nbc. […][
Nbc has created a monster who is using his nbc fame to spew hatred, wreaking with racist overtones and undertones about the president of the united states.
Nbc can no longer stand idly by, not for one more day.
Good luck Lawrence. I suspect Keith Olbermann is holding a job open for you.
I haven’t seen a response from the NBC Entertainment Executives yet. Have you?
give it a few days… took a bit before they went after Olbermann, too…
When watching it I assumed that he didn’t care about the consequences. The Birthers are maddening — it’s their strategy.
Chris Matthews was shockingly good on the subject:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21134540/vp/42788792#42788792
I nicked this from another site, but it’s so powerful that I had to share. Great video response to Trump and the Birther nonsense.
http://m.youtube.com/#/profile?desktop_uri=%2Fuser%2Fbaratunde&sort=p&channel_id=0&lives
treaming_tutorial=False&ytsession=%7B%7D&start=0&user=baratunde&autoplay=True&gl
=US
Left me in tears.
Your link doesn’t go to a video. Did you mean this one?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vX5ueEKsSWc
Lawrence was so righteous, I felt like I was in church.
MSNBC link doesn’t work. Can you fix?
And then he went on to shout down Orly Taitz when she tried to do a bait and switch on him.
I think he’s daring them to fire him.
When Keith O did his first ‘comment’ it was so heartening in its telling truth to power. I thought he would be fired on the spot because he broke the holiness persona of allowing facts to replace the garrish ‘fair and balanced’ habit of big news.
He changed the news perspective that day. Not by 180 degrees but by perhaps 90 degrees in that he shed light for the world to see about the timidity of broadcast news.
I’m with Whoopi on the issue itself when she said that we’ve all been tiptoeing around and it’s time to call the Birthers and their Trump out as rascists, pure and simple. Time to play that rascist card, every time they open their mouths.
O’Donnell was harsh. But apparently that’s what it takes. I have no doubt that if there is silence from NBC that he will be at it again. It is a lesson of morality & perhaps patriotism vs bucks and a debate that the new owners would be wise to do on air vs the boardroom.
yours truly, PollyAnna
I really applaud LOD’s bold, damn-the- career consequences outspokenness. And his grabbing the racist bull by the horns and not letting go actually has more clout, coming from the former insider establishment white center-left guy who’s putting his current gig on the line, than it does coming from the rather more emotional entertainer Whoopi who might be expected to say that and who also runs no immediate job risk for speaking out that way.
He called it plain, and the ball is now in NBC Entertainment’s court.
Landmark moment in American television.
I wondered if he already had been fired. It sounded like some kind of damn the torpedoes, last words of the condemned man speech. I emailed every address I could find at msnbc expressing my support for Keith. I quoted Orwell and commended Keith’s courage for speaking truth to power night after night.
That is the only time I have ever written to any network about anything. I’m not the sort who writes fan letters. But I’m thinking it may be time to speak up for Lawrence.