Sean Hannity had Niger Innis and Leo Terrell on his Fox show last night in order to discuss his faulty belief that Dr. Ben Carson was being denied the right to freedom of speech because the left hates black conservatives. The words “double standard” appeared behind him, as if irony were dead.
Terrell, a civil rights attorney and talk radio host, is no shrinking violet. After getting fed up with the whinging of Hannity and Innis, he loudly proclaimed that Innis (chief strategist for the Tea Party Net) was a “Fox apologist.”
The fighting led to Hannity cutting his guests’ mics at one point, and finally to Terrell ripping his ear piece out in disgust.
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Hannity remained clueless throughout.
Watch here:
Hannity opened the show with a sad ode to Dr. Carson being protested by Johns Hopkins University students who don’t want him to speak at their commencement because he says super offensive things, such as, “It’s a well-established, fundamental pillar of society and no group, be they gays, be they NAMBLA, be they people who believe in bestiality.”
Hannity played Carson’s “apology” (in part): “It was certainly not my intention to equate those groups – they are obviously not comparable.”
Hannity complained that the negative reaction to the bestiality comments means that black conservatives have no free speech. No, really, “If you’re African-American and you’re a conservative, you are vilified. You are demonized, you are called names, you are attacked. That is the ongoing epidemic that goes on. There’s no freedom of speech for African-American conservatives in America.”
There was zero awareness on Hannity’s part that he is the first to use his national platform to attack black Americans who say things he doesn’t like (Rev. Wright ringing a bell?). But of course, he is allowed to do that, as is everyone else in America. Therein lies the rub for Hannity et al.
Leo Terrell was having none of it. He shouted right over Hannity, blaming Hannity for creating a “monster” with Carson and letting him ruin his good name on Hannity’s show. Allowing conservatives to ruin themselves on his show may be Hannity’s one very special talent. Terrell accused Hannity of elevating Carson “to 15 minutes of fame and he has ruined his good name.”
Hannity tried to talk over Terrell to no avail, which seemed to confuse him into moments of blessed silence.
Terrell wasn’t leaving it there. When Innis began tearing into the “litany of horrors” that is the left, Terrell called him a “one-trick pony” and a “Fox apologist” for only appearing on Hannity and Fox News. Innes claimed he’d be on more shows but for the “censorship” of conservatives (also known as market demand being low).
In the end Terrell ripped out his ear piece in disgust, but that was only after he cleverly managed to communicate over the typical bully-fest that is Fox News by using the visual medium of TV to his advantage. Yes, he took his own shoe off and brought it up to his mouth while explaining loudly that Dr. Ben Carson put his foot in his mouth.
“Dr. Ben Carson put his size 12 foot in his mouth!”
None of this seemed to make even the slightest dent in the dense cavity where Hannity stockpiles his resentments for not being allowed to do and say whatever he pleases with no consequences. Oh, the world is so unfair, mommy. If only Dr. Carson had been a liberal doctor, no one would have cared when he compared gays to bestiality and pedophilia!
To translate this into the real world, Ben Carson destroyed his name by comparing homosexuality to bestiality and pedophilia on Hannity’s show. So Hannity is doing what all conservatives do when they make a mistake: Blaming liberals and whining about the reaction to conservative hate.
In Foxland, conservatives frequently fail to understand the two-way nature of freedom of speech, so naturally they get confused when others engage in it in order to disagree with them. We can hardly expect them to be accountable for the consequences of their irresponsible use of freedom of speech.
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