Ann Coulter v. Keith Olbermann

It's not pretty, folks. It's worse than the trash-can beat-down Sonny Corleone gave to Carmine in The Godfather.

PARENTAL ADVISORY: CONTAINS SCENES OF INTENSE GORE:

Somberly reporting that "all this data here is from the office of Florida's secretary of state," Olbermann listed five Florida counties where the registrations are majority Democratic -- and yet (!) the counties went for Bush.

A quick glance at the Congressional Almanac indicates that all five counties in Olbermann's conspiracy theory are in the Florida Panhandle, where most people have been registered as Democrats since their grandfathers registered them to vote shortly after the Civil War....

As if anticipating Olbermann's idiotic conspiracy theory two years ago when he wrote the most recent almanac, Michael Barone specifically notes that these Panhandle counties -- though still majority Democratic in party registrations -- have been voting for Republicans for president for many years. This would include the 2000 presidential election when the three voting districts at the centerpiece of Olbermann's conspiracy theory voted for Bush by 69 percent, 66 percent and 57 percent. The only way Barone could have made this any clearer to the "Countdown" host would have been to begin the chapter, "Dear Keith Olbermann ..."

...

The only scandal is that a purported news program would raise insinuations of vote fraud based on the party registration of Southern Democrats living in the Florida Panhandle -- without anyone at the show checking the Congressional Almanac. (It's especially attractive to be promoting a theory based on a lack of basic information, in the self-righteous, smug manner of Keith Olbermann.)

No election in the United States can be discussed intelligently without reference to Michael Barone's Congressional Almanac. At any half-serious television news station, the Congressional Almanac is as common as a phonebook.

But at MSNBC, Keith Olbermann can go on air with the major breaking story that five conservative Democratic Panhandle counties voted for Bush, without one person on the show: (1) consulting the Congressional Almanac, (2) looking at the results of the 2000 election, or (3) apparently ever having heard of "Southern Democrats." (They're all Republicans now!)

In case you needed more on the genius theories being hostaed on MSNBC's "Countdown With Keith Olbermann," even if every one of these counties went unanimously for Kerry -- count them up, Keith! -- that's still, at most, about 50,000 votes. Bush won by 350,000 votes in Florida.

So I guess we can add "math" to Keith's growing "I Don't Do" file, along with "Reading the Congressional Almanac," "Basic Show Prep," "Getting My Attitude in Line With My IQ" ... (By the way, shouldn't Keith Olbermann be avoiding "time is running out" motifs wherever possible?)

Memo to Olbermann: "Smug" is hard one to pull off. You have to have something to at least partly back that attitude up. When you're a borderline imbecile, it's very difficult indeed.

Smug, lazy, and stupid is no way to go through life, son.

posted by Ace at 10:43 PM

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