O'Donnell in context

    O'Donnell is by no means an ideal candidate: she appears, at this state of the campaign, to need training in handling the press. She seems to have a flighty temperament and she definitely has had difficulty handling money in the past, which is particularly troublesome because our nation's greatest problems are fiscal.

  O'Donnell represents a vote to control the direction of the country in the Senate of the United States. This MSM sudden need for purity among politicians is mystifying, particularly when one studies the shrill behavior of Boxer or Patty Murray or the loon Al Franken or the ridiculous Pete Stark (raving mad).

  The current meme about O'Donnell is that the Bill Maher clip of her has finished her off.
   Malkin says no and context, context, context. 

  Michelle Malkin deals with the witchcraft references O"Donnell makes in the Maher video. She puts the remarks in context: 

At 1:03 in the video, one of the panelists on the show criticizes O’Donnell for criticizing Halloween — “Wait a minute, I love this, you’re a witch, you go ‘Halloween is bad,’ I’m not the witch, I mean wait a minute.” She responds by explaining that she opposes witchcraft because she has had first-hand experience with what they do.

So, she tried it. She rejected it. And she learned from it.

  It's pretty disgusting that the same people who screamed context during the Shirley Sherrod kerfuffle are now perfectly willing to judge a Republican without context (as usual).
  The emergence of revealing video is one of the problems with our cameras-everywhere, 15 minutes of fame, Facebook, Youtube culture; we can expect more of this kind of exposure, particularly as younger people who have participated in social networks and the use of technology start to run for office. 
  That is not to say that there isn't more to come on O'Donnell, because there is. Only time will tell if she can withstand the storm.
  Maher says she appeared on 22 episodes of the haplessly and inaccurately named Politically Incorrect.  (Who was she then anyway? Unclear.)
  Politicians are adept at covering up their previous or private behavior. The MSM also keeps a lid on questionable/racy liberal/democrat behavior. 
  Think this is an exaggeration or rationalization? 
  Take a look at the history of Charlie Crist here at Hillbuzz and here who, according to the guys at Hillbuzz (who should know),apparently has a reputation for wearing certain items of clothing not customary for male politicians. This seems to be public knowledge. 
  This is not meant to rationalize O'Donnell's comments. It's just hard to figure why her basic Christian philosophies are so appalling to people who believe in not believing anything. These are and were her beliefs and she has a right to them.
  Just sayin.'
  Another example. 
  Congressman Keith Ellison, a Muslim convert, has some interesting connections, including known terrorists and the execrable Louis Farrakhan (over at Powerline). From Atlas Shrugged:

Minnesota Congressman Keith Ellison, infamous for his pro-Hamas rallies (here) and his pilgrimage to the Hajj in Saudi Arabia, paid for by the Muslim Brotherhood (here), is attacking defenders of freedom and democracy.

Clearly, my work and that of Spencer is a threat to a stealth jihadist like Ellison, advocate of the sharia. So they do what they do best, pathologically lie.

  Now how often have you heard Ellison questioned about these connections? How often have you ever heard that he has these connections, other than in the alternate press?  


  The other O'Donnell incident wilding that is out there in the blogosphere is that O'Donnell claimed human brains were being grown in mice. Jacobsen at Legal Insurrection points out that it was one word, ONE WORD, that O'Donnell omitted that has caused this particular conflagration:

Tell me that O'Donnell, during the course of an O'Reilly interview, should have stated "fully functioning human brain cells" instead of "fully functioning human brain" -- and I'll say fine.  Tell me that O'Donnell should have indicated that the request to create mice with 100 percent human brain cells was an ethics opinion request not a planned experiment, and I'll also say fine.

Such nuance, as we know, always takes place during television interviews.  And of course, TPM's headline itself inaccurately characterized O'Donnell's comments because she mentioned experiments, not results. 

  Now, imagine that Keith Ellison had omitted one word. 
  Would such a fuss be created over it? 
  Would Ellison have to "explain" his religion the way O'Donnell is being required to? Here she is over at the L.A. Times:

"Yes, I have my personal beliefs," she said when asked about her views. "These are questions from statements I made over 15 years ago. I was in my 20s and very excited and passionate about my newfound faith. But I can assure you, my faith has matured. And when I go to Washington D.C., it will be the Constitution on which I base all of my decisions, not my personal beliefs."

  Or say, for example she had something stupid like there are 57 states in the US? Hot Air has a whole slew of Obamateurisms. 

  What does the media do with a huge gaffe like that (and there are many, many more)? Of course! He was TIRED!

  Or maybe let's look at Al Gore.

  Or maybe Joe Biden.

  These people are known for making ridiculous gaffes, yet they are excused or ignored because the gaffers are democrats.

  In fact, O'Donnell's competition is a self-professed Marxist who led his county to near bankruptcy. As Fenig at the American Thinker points out, if O'Donnell had only drunkenly driven her car off a bridge and killed someone in the process, she could probably survive this wilding season if she were a democrat.

  Here're the real reasons these incidents are happening. 

  Control of the Senate is at stake.
  And you have a group of people who are running for office who are not politicians, who have not hidden their backgrounds and who do not have the MSM covering their backs. 
  They have no experience with the media; they are inexperienced at politics. 
  Of course, their opponents, both in government and the press, are trying to make this inexperience a negative, as if those learned in the ways of slickery are a benefit to the taxpayer.
  Nuh-uh. I'll take the inexperience, if with it comes a commitment to the country, to the Constitution and smaller government.
  We need people in government who really don't want to be there. 
  Who don't love power for power's sake. 
  Who want to do the best they can in government and move on, back to private business.
  This is not meant to be apologia for O'Donnell, but to point out that these incident wildings need to be taken in context.
  That is, apparently, too much to ask for the MSM, but it shouldn't be for thoughtful conservatives.