Imus called Mary Matalin a liar, Bushco "liars" and "war criminals" and for the hanging of Cheney

[rudy23]

(edited for subject line)

This is not to condone or minimize his insult. It was horrible, but that's not what he said to get 24/7 press coverage, and get run off the air. Here are some snippets of some of the things he's been saying on his show recently, that are the real reason Imus is toast:

*Don Imus said, regarding the Walter Reed scandal, that after they hang Cheney, they should court marshall all the generals linked to Walter Reed.

*"Forget about Bush and Cheney. We KNOW
they lied to get us in there and they are a bunch of war criminals, What have YOU
done." (to John Kerry))

*During the Plame trial, Imus called Mary Matalin a liar when she was a guest on his show. He then wrote a blog on imusblog.com called "Mary Matalin is a Liar", which you can't link to any more. Here's a quote:

“None of you can tell the truth, it’s insane. It’s like a disease you guys have.”

Here's the clip of what Imus really said to get him kicked off the air:

http://www.crooksandliars.com/2007/02/08/mary-matalin-is-dazed-and-confu sed/

Fast forward to 3:30 to see Imus rile up Matalin, and Matalin talk directly about how they complain to bureau chiefs when they criticize the White House. She practically threatens Imus with exactly what has just happened to him!

Fast forward to about 5:45 to see Imus call Bush, Cheney, Libby, and Rove liars who lied us into the war.

Imus, in recent months, has called Bush and Cheney "war criminals", called for the hanging of Dick Cheney, and called Mary Matalin and the whole administration "liars", even writing a blog entitled "Mary Matalin is a Liar", after catching her in a lie about facts in the Scooter Libby case.

So Imus, hands them his ASS on a silver platter. What do you think the notoriously vindictive adminstration is going to do?

[theoldman]

1. If it's political, it's more acceptable to insult the other person.

If it's racial, it's not acceptable especially if you are insulting a minority.

[EC]

2. I was thinking about this

last week and figured this had something to do with it, since alot of Red Staters listen to Imus and he was getting their attention, they just couldn't have that, because they can't scream that it is just more liberal hate...

[Norquist Nemesis]

3. Interestingly enough, I heard one of the regular 'analysts'

(Fineman maybe?) say that Imus was generally known to be from 'the Left'. That must've been an inside the beltway opinion, or maybe he simply had that attributed because John Kerry "was his guy!" in 2004. Ah ha!!! The ultimate treason to not support the Dear Leader Bush!!!

Funny thing though...any time I heard Imus say Kerry was "his guy", the statement was sandwiched between bashings of Kerry. But that was "his guy!" Go figure!

[KharmaTrain]

4. Some points to ponder

- Look at all the corporate media-types who came to Imus' defense. The chattering class inside the Beltway loved this dude cause he sold their books and make them "accepted". He was a part of the establishment...and thus his connections to the chattering class made him conduit for lots of talking points and "Conventional Wisdom". For years he served the DC Elite as their on-air water-cooler...the big reason he drew the biggest egos inside the beltway to his microphones. Now some of these people, like Tweety, are far more dangerous to Chenney, Inc. than Imus was.

Cheney's wife claimed Crashcart listened to Imus every day and surely the attacks by Imus had to have been heard around the morning Cheney ice-water tranfusion. From the margins of the Wilson article, we know Crashcart doesn't take kindly to having his mornings messed with and I think he sent Matalin to play attack dog. As we've seen, Crashcart hides behind proxies...but he's never too far from the surface.

Now did this lead to Imus' demise? I really don't think so. Imus big mouth finaly brought him down. Now, did the political side of things play into his ultimate fate? Maybe Caper or Moonvez got a call from a Russert or some other beltway blowhard who heard from Matalin who heard from Crashcart...and that's how the message was delivered, but it was in conjunction with a lot of other factors...most of them were green.

Lastly, if they were out to get Imus, it wouldn't have taken so long for this story to get into a media story. He made the crack on a Thursday, the shitstorm didn't hit until Monday...the build-up was primarily on the internet as the video got passed along. The Crashcart machine works a lot faster than that.

[rudy23]

5. I think once you offend Matalin, Carville, Cheney, and the black community

You have no friends left to speak of. In fact, that might be the fastest way to get yourself thrown off the air imaginable, while taking the fewest moves to do it.

[librechik]

6. looks like somebody removed his protective shield

mere weeks after calling out Matalin and Cheney he gets the axe.

Shield still protects Hannity, Bortz, Kimbaugh, Savage, Smerconish, Beck etc.

[WindRavenX]

7. And he's racist, so he's still scum

NT

[malaise]

8. We've been discussing these comments since last week

Imus made a crucial mistake when he insulted those Rutgers women, but those advertisers are Bush supporters. They found the perfect moment.

[treestar]

9. I can buy that, because otherwise, why hasn't Rushbo been fired?

Surely long lists of such comments from him could be developed.