Politics | 04/17/2009 10:00 am

Janeane Garofalo to Keith Olbermann: Tea Parties About Racism, Not Taxes (Video)

By The Staff at wowOwow.com

Comedienne Janeane Garofalo held nothing back while discussing the "tea parties" with Keith Olbermann last night. Though the parties’ organizers claim they’re protesting taxes, Garofalo insists they’re nothing but "tea-bagging rednecks" who are simply motivated by "hating a black man in the White House." She went on to say that participants "will believe anything you tell them, as long as it’s not the truth." The truth, she claims, "confuses them."

Olbermann basically agreed.

Watch — Garofalo comes on at the three-minute mark:

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328 Reader Comments (so far…) Sign In or Register to comment

This lady said it exactly the way it is and most of us know that was the real reason for the tea parties. You would have to be blind, deaf and dumb not to realize that was the clear intention on Wed by those on the right and the Fox crew. They were in their element at their first big chance to oppose Obama on all fronts we know their game and I’m sure they felt better for doing it but the rest of the country saw it for what it was.

By cajp on 04/17/2009 10:15 am

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She did, she always does. And the Right will hate her for it, because we are supposed to be ‘pc’ and not say it out loud. But their signs said it out loud.

By DeBrcaobj on 04/17/2009 10:51 am

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Interesting. I actually thought we had intelligent people on this site. For anyone, from the left or right, to find any value or credibility from a few extremist demonstrators is breathtaking. The left have had their "embarrassments" and the right has had theirs. They, in no way, speak for the groups as a whole.

To even comment on these fringe demonstrators is ludicrous.

By deberB on 04/17/2009 11:00 am

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Did you watch the video to the end? There are videos of that sort of behavior all over the country, and photos of the signs, and interviews with people who have no clue why they’re there, they’re just mad about something and can’t articulate what it is because the FOX hacks aren’t there whispering it in their ears for the interview.

By DeBrcaobj on 04/17/2009 11:03 am

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Of course I watched it. These people are in the minority. They are extremists. They don’t speak for the republican party. The media "showcases" these nuts. Surely, you are smarter than that, DeBurca, to think that a small number of protestors speaks for the whole party!

By deberB on 04/17/2009 11:18 am

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Here’s a segment of Krugman’s take on the Tea Parties, just another one of those intelligent people who wanted to comment on these "fringe demonstrations."

But everything that critics mock about these parties has long been standard practice within the Republican Party.

Thus, President Obama is being called a “socialist” who seeks to destroy capitalism. Why? Because he wants to raise the tax rate on the highest-income Americans back to, um, about 10 percentage points less than it was for most of the Reagan administration. Bizarre.

But the charge of socialism is being thrown around only because “liberal” doesn’t seem to carry the punch it used to. And if you go back just a few years, you find top Republican figures making equally bizarre claims about what liberals were up to. Remember when Karl Rove declared that liberals wanted to offer “therapy and understanding” to the 9/11 terrorists?

Then there are the claims made at some recent tea-party events that Mr. Obama wasn’t born in America, which follow on earlier claims that he is a secret Muslim. Crazy stuff — but nowhere near as crazy as the claims, during the last Democratic administration, that the Clintons were murderers, claims that were supported by a campaign of innuendo on the part of big-league conservative media outlets and figures, especially Rush Limbaugh.

Speaking of Mr. Limbaugh: the most impressive thing about his role right now is the fealty he is able to demand from the rest of the right. The abject apologies he has extracted from Republican politicians who briefly dared to criticize him have been right out of Stalinist show trials. But while it’s new to have a talk-radio host in that role, ferocious party discipline has been the norm since the 1990s, when Tom DeLay, the House majority leader, became known as “The Hammer” in part because of the way he took political retribution on opponents.

Going back to those tea parties, Mr. DeLay, a fierce opponent of the theory of evolution — he famously suggested that the teaching of evolution led to the Columbine school massacre — also foreshadowed the denunciations of evolution that have emerged at some of the parties

By phyllisDoylePepe on 04/17/2009 11:34 am

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deber- I am so glad I found one of your posts. You made my point but obviously in a much better manner than I did. I was so out raged at this show and these 2 people. But the real disappointment were all the posts that followed. I am so angry, hurt, mad, and I just hate it. If this were turned around and this was said about any group of people, I know for a fact I would be So Outraged. What is happening? We have had divisiveness before, but I don’t believe so full of hate like this. I attended a tea party in Tampa and it just was not anything like some have assumed and I saw absolutely No racism, there were many black, white, asian, etc…. there. We all know there are exceptions for everything and to just focus on that and not what the American people were trying to say was just so wrong. Thanks for listening. Have a great weekend!

By DeborahKramer on 04/18/2009 10:40 am

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I’ve always been a bit left of center, and what you are describing is the feelings of my entire adult life, at least as far as politics are concerned. Stuff like this was said about liberals for years and no one else ever came to our rescue or defended our right to think differently. I too am sorely disappointed in the tenor and content of the current political dialogue, which is not helpful for anyone, but for the Right to be acting the victim here is more than a bit disingenuous.

…and if anyone can explain to me in mathematical terms how a tax plan that amounts not only to a tax cut for most American individuals and families as well as an overall reduction in taxes equates to a tax hike, I would very much appreciate it. This particular point of the Tea Parties continues to perplex me.

By RaugielReddel on 04/23/2009 2:55 pm

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Raugiel, thanks for your post. I am not the one to try to explain the math regarding the tax plan but I know a lot of people will have a hay day with this, explaining it to you. But even Geitner cannot explain it to the American people. I understand what you are saying and it is both sides, but That Does Not Make It Right. Do you remember the campaign President Obama ran? He ran on CHANGE! He ran on bringing us together and then he starts attacking unimportant talk radio host and economist on television and I am sitting here thinking OMG! What is the matter with this man. Doesn’t he have enough to worry about without personally going after specific people. That is when I really started having a problem. I attended the tea parties in 2 cities opposing the government as whole. the Reps. and the Demo’s. I am also against the rich paying for the poor by rasing their taxes even more. I do know this much: when the U.S. is bailing everyone out and nationalizing banks it is now beyond 3 trillion dollars, Somebody has to pay for it and get us out of debt. Now how do you propose that is going to be done?? There is only One Way-Taxes, Taxes, Taxes. Us, our children, grandchildren, and their children. They can start by taking out all of the crap out of the bailout. I am not sure what you mean by disingenuous. Even during the Clinton years CNN had shows on that slammed Republicans even back then. For the last 8 years I just could not stand to hear the hatred, making fun of President Bush, and constantly bashing him and saying "he is not my President" and now all of a sudden we are disingenuous, I really do not know what you mean. Heck, Bush could not even move into the White House right away because of the Clinton Administration trashed it so badly. President Bush was such a gentleman about it and said"it is not a big deal, just having a little fun!" Yeah! Thousands of dollars worth that you and I paid for! But anyway the tea parties represented so many different things for different folks. Maybe if the liberal news media covered them, you would have the information that perplexes you. Just so you know- I am Absolutely NOT A Obama Hater At All. He is my President, I respect him, and he needs much more time before I personally can form any opinion of him. But Raugiel I will gurantee you, unless you already do not pay taxes (because of being in the lower bracket) you, my dear fellow American will be paying a lot more taxes in the near future. That is just logic, unless the Congress. Senate, and the President decide to start donating their own money to get us out of this Huge Debt. Thanks for you post, it was very interesting.

By DeborahKramer on 04/23/2009 6:32 pm

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ok, I had to write, I was so relieved to find some logical person after reading the story. I think Janeane is funny, but wow, way possessed with hatred and ignorance. The tea parties had NOTHING to do with race, the notion of that is crazy!

By MiaPoehlmann on 04/24/2009 1:43 am

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Mia- I just had to reply and thank you! I was beginning to believe maybe I really need to be more mean, hateful, and start attacking people more. So Thanks so much for the back up and for speaking out!

By DeborahKramer on 04/25/2009 3:59 pm

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I agree to a point. I do believe much of it is racism, but not all of it. I have relatives or relatives of relatives in my life that will believe every nugget of so called news they pick up on the Fox "News" Channel simply because it has the word news in it. Many of these folks still believe that President Obama "dummied up" a birth certificate and that he is a Muslim terrorist in spite of the numerous times and ways in which this was refuted and actually proven to be a lie perpetrated by the extreme left. Oh no, they heard it on Fox news so it must be true. That they are blaming the man who has not been in office for even 3 full months for the situation in which we now find ourselves is beyond ridiculous.

Personally, I console myself by believing that there is a special place in hell for Rupert Murdoch, Sean Hannity and the like.

By LauriAnderson on 04/17/2009 10:55 am

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I know people like that too, especially older folks who grew up in an era when, if it said "News" it had to be true. So, since FOX puts ‘News’ in its title, they are misled. They don’t understand that entertainment has taken over for real news. Many of them even believe that of the National Enquirer, because they find it hard to grasp that something can be written in a ‘paper’ and not have to be a fact.

By DeBrcaobj on 04/17/2009 11:21 am

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Yes the Fox News have a lot to answer for with their stirring up anything that involves Obama!! Never seen such an incompetent bunch of so called news reporters and they have the nerve to call themselves "fair and balanced" is that a joke or what?

By cajp on 04/17/2009 2:35 pm

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So, if she’s so right, then what does that make my husband, who is black, voted for McCain and went with me to a tea party? You are SO wrong. It is NOT racial. Ok, so we got a tax "break" this year, if that’s what you wanna call it. I’ll give him that…we got a tax break. But, I want somebody to tell me just HOW they think these huge spending sprees Obama is going on are gonna get paid for. Our taxes WILL go up….mark it down. And if you don’t believe that, you’re idiots. How else is he gonna get the money? Take the blinders off people. I don’t care if he’s black, white or PURPLE…he’s bankrupting this country.

By NancyD2 on 04/17/2009 4:52 pm