Sen. Judd Gregg Lashes Out at MSNBC Anchors Melissa Francis and Contessa Brewer
Jan 29th, 2010 | 59 responses
This has to be seen to be believed — and having seen the whole thing, I still am having trouble believing it. You can watch the video at Crooks and Liars; John Amato’s text explanation is below:
Judd Gregg just had a meltdown on MSNBC that came out of nowhere. He’s been attacking everything Obama, almost from the minute he turned down a Cabinet post offer from the White House, but his performance today was really weird. The conversation was about spending and, as usual, Gregg was acting like the incredible deficit freak that he is.
Melissa Francis is a CNBC talker who believes just like he does, and for some reason he mistook her for a dirty f*&king hippy and claimed she was setting him up as a man who wants to cut all spending on education. …
Francis is actually talking over Gregg, protesting, “I’m all for small government, tell me how you’d do it….” She and Brewer wanted him to say what programs, specifically, the Republicans would cut, given their criticisms of the federal deficit and their insistence that spending had to stop. For some reason, he took their questions as a personal attack on him:
Contessa Brewer brought up the fact that many economists think that when FDR became a deficit hawk so soon after expanding spending that he helped stop the country’s economic growth. She asked him if he thought money from education should be cut, he went off and called them liars.
Gregg: First off, nobody is saying no money for schools, what an absurd statement to make. And what a dishonest statement to make. On its face you’re being fundamentally dishonest when you make that type of statement.
Brewer: Senator, you’re going to be asked to cut certain programs from government if you’re on the Senate banking committee. Which programs — just tell us — would you cut?
–Gregg: And then it gets misrepresented by people like yourself who say they are going to, if you do any of this stuff you’re going to end up not funding education. I mean that statement alone is the most irresponsible statement I’ve heard from a reporter probably in a month.
Brewer: It wasn’t a statement, it was a question.
Gregg deliberately misconstrued what they said, and the conversation went downhill from there. Gregg acted like a typical conservative bully around women, and if they were both men he would not have tried to call them liars. Meanwhile, Contessa ended the interview very professionally. He owes Brewer and Francis an apology for his behavior.
That’s for sure.
59 Responses to “Sen. Judd Gregg Lashes Out at MSNBC Anchors Melissa Francis and Contessa Brewer”
If you're going to criticize Leonidas for echoing right wing talking points, how can you not notice that a few other authors here regularly link favorably to sites like Talking Points Memo, a site which basically takes marching orders from Emmanuel, Axelrod, and Gibbs?
You have GOT to be kidding. TPM “takes marching orders” from Emanuel, Axelrod, and Gibbs? Are you joking?
Bravo, Prof.
It's Jake Tapper, not Jack. This is the second time you wrote “Jack,” so I'm assuming it's not a typo.
“Elected Politician who has espoused political positions shows up on a news show, Reporters asked pointed questions about stated positions and about the means necessary to pursue stated position… “
I think the point would be better stated if we replaced some words in that statement”
“REPORTER who has espoused political positions shows up on a news show…”
This is leading rhetoric – an old trick in debate. For example, “Are you against homosexual marriage and for hatred of gays?” You see what I did there? The reporter did the same thing with “cutting education”.
Senator Gregg called them on it. Once again, I probably wouldn't vote for Judd Gregg, but he was right in calling them on this attempt a question spinning.
You should be aware that Melissa is a pal of Larry Kudlow, and is a fiscal conservative (and so am I) and Judd was just talking past her assuming she was attacking him and making a speech.
Thanks, dduck. I had no idea who the two women were. I make it a point not to watch MSNBC.
I make it a point not to watch MSNBC.”
Interestingly, Melissa is mainly on CNBC- the business channel- and many on that channel are more to the right. Either way, I think a lot of us on this forum also guilty of assuming things about the other commentators and talk past each other, And, all those labels don't help.
“I think a lot of us on this forum also guilty of assuming things about the other commentators and talk past each other”
You are 100% correct, duck. I try not to do that very thing but I guess we all fail at times. Thanks for the pullback on the reigns in my case.
I like Judd Gregg but he was wrong on this one. He clearly took the question as an attack on him when it wasn't. Melissa Francis is right-wing, so it made no sense to attack her. Her views are inline with his.
Leonidas,
Melissa Francis doesn't even work for MSNBC. She is an economist turned anchor inline with rightwing Larry Kudlow who is a good friend of hers. All the partisan network bashing is ignorant at this point. First learn to stop defending people for no reason other than their political affiliation. Both parties can be wrong sometimes.