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Group Demands Olbermann Apologize for Comparing Jewish Attorney to Nazi Collaborator

The Media Institute, a Washington-based non-profit, has called on Keith Olbermann to apologize for comparing one of its Jewish staff members to a Nazi collaborator.

During a January 21 screed regarding the controversial Supreme Court decision Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission -- in which the Supreme Court granted all companies the same rights as MSNBC's parent company GE -- Olbermann called the Media Institute's Floyd Abrams, a Jew, "the Quisling of freedom of speech in this country."

Vidkun Quisling, for those who don't know, was a Norwegian Nazi collaborator who aided in the Third Reich's conquest of his country by disclosing vital defense information to the Nazis. If Benedict Arnold had been complicit in genocide, we might consider Quisling his Norwegian equivalent.

The Media Institute wrote Olbermann an open letter yesterday calling on him to issue a public apology:

As members of The Media Institute’s First Amendment Advisory Council, we are writing to take strong issue with your “special comment” of January 21, 2010, in which you personally attacked one our members, the preeminent First Amendment attorney Floyd Abrams, for his role in the case Citizens United  v. Federal Election Commission.

Just to be clear at the outset, we are not concerned about the fact that you expressed a strong opinion about a Supreme Court case that has generated a great deal of public comment and controversy.  Quite to the contrary, we celebrate the fact that you are free to express your opinions without fear of government reprisal.  Many of us admire the fact that you emerged as a prominent critic of federal policies at a time when many others were still trying to find their voices.

But our admiration stops when confronted with the type of personal invective that you heaped upon Mr. Abrams for the fact that he represented a client whose position you dislike in Citizens United…

Floyd Abrams is the foremost First Amendment advocate of our time.  He also is Jewish.  For any Jew to be compared to a Nazi collaborator is vile, but in the case of Floyd is simply beyond comprehension.  But your offhanded inclusion of this ugly epithet points to a deeper problem that has degraded public discourse – the breakdown of civility…

Many of the freedoms you enjoy as a journalist exist because of the work of Floyd Abrams throughout his exemplary career.  Yet even if Mr. Abrams had not blazed important paths for the rights of the press, he does not deserve  to be personally insulted, which for you may have seemed like nothing more than a clever turn of phrase.

Of course, you have the right to say what you did in your “special comment.”  None of us questions that, and each of us would be willing to defend against any attempt to suppress your speech.  We do not doubt your rights – just your judgment.  It does not endanger free expression to counsel self-control and civility.
Reasonable minds can differ on the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision, and we fully expect it will be just the beginning of a continuing contentious debate on campaign speech and regulation.  We look forward to your contributions to that debate.  But we also look forward to your public apology to Floyd Abrams for your unwarranted personal attack.

If Olbermann does apologize, don't be surprised if it sounds somewhat like his apology to Sen. Scott Brown.

Olbermann has left us no reason to believe he has any interest in contributing to the ongoing debate over free speech in this context. Godwin's law has become his modus operandi.

Lefty Jon Stewart Hits Bush Speechwriter for Living in 'Selective World,' Tells Him to Respond on Internet

Liberal comedian Jon Stewart featured a rare conservative voice on Tuesday's Daily Show, former Bush speechwriter Marc Thiessen. As he often does during the occasions he talks to right-leaning guests, Stewart turned combative, attacking Thiessen for "living in a selective world."

The ex-Bush aide appeared to promote his new book Courting Disaster, which defends and advocates for the administration's CIA's interrogation program. After Thiessen argued that the tactics stopped another terror attack in the U.S. after 9/11, Stewart lectured, "The bombings in Britain, the bombings in Afghanistan, the bombings in a Iraq. It's a selective world that you live in and you must be lovely to live there. Things are not so clear cut."

At the end of the segment, Stewart started to go to break and added, "We'll go to commercial and then we'll keep talking." An incredulous Thiessen retorted, "So, you talk and we go to commercial?" He challenged, "I can't get my points on the air?" A sarcastic Stewart quipped, "Geez, I'm trying to think of a way can I remove what I said and just have you speak." He then offered Thiessen a chance for rebuttal on the internet.

This did happen, but very few people are actually going to go to Comedy Central's website and listen to the extended segments.

(Thanks to Ben Graham for transcribing the segment.)

A partial transcript of the March 9 segment follows:

JON STEWART: Let me get to the larger point here which I think is maybe the issue. The thing that I object to is the idea of safety. And I'll explain that. The idea that that can be a concrete certainty. This makes us safe. This doesn't. These are subjective realities. The idea of something that makes us safe, you can make the argument that Guantanamo keeps us safe because there are bad people in it. They can make the argument that by having Guantanamo open it allows easier recruitment for terrorists, which ultimately-

MARC THIESSEN: I disagree with that entirely.

STEWART: I know you disagree with it, but I'm saying that is a valid argument.

THIESSEN: Well, I don't think it is. There was no Guantanamo Bay when they tried to blow up the World Trade Center in 1993.

STEWART: It's not the only reason but it all goes into- What I'm saying is-

THIESSEN: Let me make my point-

STEWART: Let me just very quickly go. [Thiessen laughs in frustration.] It's a- As conservatives would like to say it's a complex adaptive system very similar to climate change.

THIESSEN: Except it's real. [Laughs.]

STEWART: And Republicans and conservatives are suggesting without any of the science that backs climate change that they know the equation, that they can solve the unsolvable, that Liz Cheney knows more about this than say Matthew Alexander who was doing the interrogating.

THIESSEN: Matthew Alexander interrogated people for three months. The people that --

STEWART: How long did Liz Cheney do it for?

THIESSEN: The interrogators that I talked about in this book, where you meet the interrogators who--

STEWART: Not all of them, the ones that you chose.

THIESSEN: The ones that-

STEWART: Not all of them.

THIESSEN: The ones that ran the program.

STEWART: Ali Soufan is not in this book.

THIESSEN: Actually he is in the book.

STEWART: Well, he wouldn't talk to you in the book.

THIESSEN: He wouldn't talk to me, but I talked about him.

STEWART: Oh, I know.

THIESSEN: Ali Soufan, the sainted hero of left who says we can get all this information.

STEWART: [interrupting] Sorry, sorry.

THIESSEN: I appreciate the enthusiasm. Ali Soufan the sainted hero of left who says we can get all this information with the FBI's techniques. He was put in charge of the interrogation of Muhammad Al Qahtani, the 20th hijacker in Guantanamo Bay and got nothing from him. Ali Soufan then threw him into the navy brig for two months. Told them that he could have no human contact, people had to wear masks. This is in the department of Justice report and got nothing still. It was only when the military took over his interrogation that they got interrogation reports out of him. Ali Soufan failed with his techniques to break. And on top of that Muhammad Al Qahtani said the worst thing that happened to him in Guantanamo Bay was Ali Soufan putting him in two months in isolation. This is not so clean.

STEWART: Absolutely. I think the point is that it's not clean. You can't know for certain.

THIESSEN: No you can't.

STEWART: And when these things.

THIESSEN: Jon--

STEWART: Yeah, sorry.

THIESSEN: Jon, when Khalid Sheikh Mohammed was brought into CIA custody he had information about terrorist attacks planned on the united states. We were not attacked for seven years after the 9/11 attacks. So there's a reason for it.

STEWART: We were not attacked for seven years after the first World Trade Center- on our homeland.

THIESSEN: Not on our home land. They blew up the World Trade Center, the bombings in east Africa, the USS Cole, then finally 9/11.

STEWART: The bombings in Britain, the bombings in Afghanistan, the bombings in a Iraq. It's a selective world that you live in and you must be lovely to live there. Things are not so clear cut. And the idea that you can state equivocally that these lawyers- Let me say this quickly. We'll go to commercial and then we'll keep talking.

THIESSEN: [Laughes wryly] So you talk and we go to commercial?

STEWART: That's right. Honestly when I come on your show I'd be delighted you to let you do that. But, the idea that you can castigate people as though they are purposefully making America less safe and in league with the terrorists that we're fighting because they disagree with your ideas about safety, I think what is offensive about that. We can talk about. It won't be on the show. It will be on the internet unedited.

THIESSEN: I can't get my points out on the air?

STEWART: I thought-

THIESSEN: You did most of the talking.

STEWART: I apologize then. I will let you- Geez, I'm trying to think of a way can I remove what I said and just have you speak. Honestly you feel like you I've not let you make any points.

THIESSEN: I think you talked right through me.

STEWART: I sincerely apologize. We will. We will come back. You can correct it on the web and people will judge how poorly you've been treated. I do apologize. It's techniques I learned.