Sean hannity breaks his promise, hates our freedom, helps the enemy, lets the down the troops, forsakes god

Sean Hannity (KVI m-f, 12-3p) is reneging on his bragadacious, blowhearty-har-har offer to be waterboarded as a charity stunt to benefit the troops.

It was his chance to prove his point that waterboarding is just a harmless frat-boy hazing trick as Rush Limbaugh says it is.  After all, if Hannity didn't have so much say-so, he'd be no more than just a harmless frat-boy

Despite his quite public promise, and that Keith Olbermann has generously offered to give $1000 for each second he lasts with the wet towel stuffed in his mouth, and wa-wa poured up his nose Sean Hannity, the selfish chickenshit who hates our freedom has flew de coop.

(Maybe in his dark heart, a Catholic schoolboy corner remains that knows that waterboarding is immoral, of dubious effect and specifically illegal. Millions across this great nation cheered at the very idea of the spectacle of Hannity being waterboarded. Many offered to help. "If face-slapping is not torture, maybe Sean would allow me to slap him," says an impartial observer, "It's a way old fantasy of mine.").

Hannity was shamed by actor Charles Grodin into agreeing to subject himself to waterboarding to benefit a charity for the families of U.S. soldiers. Actually, it was Hannity who came up with the idea for the charity for the troops.

Our favorite response to Hannity and his chicken-hawkish, bravado-sogged defense and euphemizing of torture was from political analyst Lawrence O'Donnell who told Olbermann Thursday: "The reason Sean Hannity thinks torture is a good idea, the reason Sean Hannity thinks it works, is because it would work on him."

O'Donnell says there are two kinds of people in the world: 1) warriors, who number less than 1% of all people, and 2) the rest of us. He said he's like Hannity: "[I'm] one of those cowards just like Dick Cheney who has refused to subject myself to anything more dangerous occupationally where I might lose even a tooth."

That's Hannity's approach to life, he says. Al Queda, (like our own military warriors) are different: They've devoted their lives to destroying their enemies, and are willing to die... "Sean Hannity thinks torture would work on them because he has never, never known the kind of commitment... Our enemies are more committed than Sean Hannity will ever be."

Christopher Hitchens is a non-committant as O'Donnell descibes as are so many of us including the Bushite warmongers, but he's no liberal wuss, either. He supported the Iraq war from the gate, and actually agreed when asked by his Vanity Fair editor to be waterboarded. He didn't last long. see that spectacle here. 

After the experience, his answer to the question, is it torture? was, "Yes, of course."

(Photo: Christopher Hitchens loves war, hates torture and God)

We extend  the invitation to any of these couch-fierce righties to take the true test as Hitchens did. (Hitchens of course is an outspoken atheist which makes him by definition having more guts than Hannity).

Author and TV Newser guy Michael Wolfe has written: "I once filled in for the hapless Alan Colmes on the Hannity and Colmes Show, and Hannity spent the whole show completely obsessed with the placement of every strand of his hair. That guy's not going underwater (even for a major ratings coup)."

Why conservatives and the Republicans continue to let a talking points-spewing tool like Hannity and an out-of-control, self-promoting bluster-blimp like Rush Limbaugh provide their public faces define their patriotism is beyond us.

Barry Goldwater must be roiling in his box.

Comments

[mrogi]

Hannity, Limbaugh, Savage, O'Reilly, Levin, Beck, and Medved all ducked military service. All of them are tough guys behind the safety of a radio studio. None of them got the balls of a US soldier.

[Puget Sound]

mrogi, i will agree.

it's why i like bryan suits for more than just his skills behind the radio.

put him on the air with the production staff/exposure that those other fellows have and he would kill.

bryan will actually have a thoughtful discussion on issues and bring in people to debate him. he'll be respectful but if you start lying he won't let it go until you say uncle.
i still recall the asskicking he delivered to congressman mcdermott.

[Billy Bob]

Military Service to their country?

Kirby Wilber. NO
John Carlson. NO
Peter Weisbach. NO
Ken Schram. NO
Mike Siegel. NO
Dave Ross. NO
Dori Monson. NO
Ron or Don. NO
Luke Burbank. NO
Jen Andrews. NO
Ron Reagan. NO

[Puget Sound]

Dave Ross served in the navy.

[Puget Sound]

ken schram also served in the military

[YellowPup]

Though he was full of crap on Iraq, I respect Christopher Hitchens a ton for being waterboarded. Before seeing that video, I didn't really understand waterboarding and how horrific it is.

The stunt also set a standard (as this post shows) against which all the pro-torture braggadocio should be measured. Hitchens deserves a public service award.

[Puget Sound]

Read Hitchen's book, God is not great.
It is a fascinating read for both atheist and non atheist alike.
There use to be a funny clip of Hitchens making Chris Matthews look to be a complete ass clown on Hardball and at the end Hitchens mutters, 'well i guess i won't be invited back will i? as the satellite feed goes to black.

[nevets]

"After the experience, his answer to the question, is it torture? was, "Yes, of course."

Whats your opinion of this Mack?

[Mack]

Hannity is just like his buddies Cheney and Bush, who conveniently dodged military service (Bush and Cheney dodging the draft during wartime!) I'm tuning into Countdown on Monday to hear what the next step against Hannity should be.

By the way nevets, are you NOT going to provide your source? I am balancing 3 projects right now, and your information on the Petersen death is being requested. No ambiguity on your part anymore- just the source.You do have that information, don't you?

[Mack]

Sorry nevets- you want my opinion on Hannity (the topic), or waterboarding, or Christopher Hitchens?

[Ro]

I think Dave Ross has said he never served in the military. Ken Schram served during Viet Nam. Cheney was too busy with more important things.

[Jerry]

The tragedy of Alyssa Peterson is revelatory. Peterson was one of the first female soldiers killed in Iraq. She was a 27-year-old from Flagstaff, Arizona. She spoke Arabic, and as an interrogator was assigned to a military prison. After objecting to the torture she was asked to participate in, she was reprimanded for showing too much “empathy” and reassigned. Not long after, she was killed by a gunshot. Her death was ruled a suicide. According to the official report, “She said that she did not know how to be two people; she … could not be one person in the cage and another outside the wire.”

We as a country cannot just forget about the torture that was sanctioned and carried out by the Bush administration. I am hoping that the photos that are soon to be released will jolt the country into realizing what was done.

The people who engineered this are without conscience. They are responsible for the murders of over two hundred largely innocent people in order to generate political propaganda. They are desperate and have nothing to lose. They enjoy the protection of people who still serve at the highest levels of government. They move freely within the National Security State. Dick Cheney has let it be known that he ran Death Squads out of the Vice President’s office. He has let it be known that he has a cadre of ’stay behinds’ still burrowed into the government. He has been out there clearly attempting to intimidate Obama from investigating this stuff. He has stated that he considers the limited actions Obama has taken to be a danger to U.S. national security. He has demonstrated that he will violate U.S. law in defense of his perception of U.S. national security. Which U.S. laws? The one about assassination? I think that the secret service needs to investigate this. We have lost one president this way. As the right is fond of saying. If they have nothing to hide, they shouldn’t mind an investigation.

[Mack]

Sooo, we were able to vote some of the fascists out of the White House, but not out of power. This call for an investigation into the war crimes of Cheney and Bush and all connected to that shouldn't just fall on the shoulders of Obama. It's time we all stood up and fought for justice.

[HoChiMIn]

Absolute bullshit! You don't even have a clue.

[Puget Sound]

Hey Jerry,
Throw in some talk about the 'stolen' elections in Florida and Ohio (00 and 04, respectively) and no doubt ol' ph(J)oanie will belly right up to that bar and drink deeply from whatever brew you're serving.
That's pure 92 Octane Randi.

Which is comedy Gold for those of us who are sane.

[Puget Sound]

Hey Jerry,
how many were up on the Grassy Knoll?

[Bone Moe]

I want some accountability on this moral and legal out rage, and I believe we're going to get it despite Obama's waffling. I am a Vietnam vet and remember quite well how swiftly the GI caught waterboarding a prisoner on the streets of Hue was court martialed after he was caught by a newspaper photographer. I am hardly a liberal, although I voted for Obama and am glad I did. This runs counter to the principals I signed up for in 1965. Yes, I enlisted.

[Mack]

Hahaha...Ho Chi Minh, defending the war crimes of the last administration.

[Jerry]

Puget Sound, I regret you find lawbreaking by the highest government officials "comedy." I think most thoughtful people would agree that one of the most signs that our nation is is serious trouble is the fact that we are determined not to hold our elites accountable for serious lawbreaking, particularly that which endangers the nation.

[Mack]

Certainly the rest of the world is watching to see if we do the right thing. We either take freedom and democracy seriously, or we don't. Obama needs to forget politics and do what's right by calling for and supporting an in-depth investigation.

[Mark C.]

I'm still praying for our national reovery from the last 8 years. I believe that their is redemption if this country truly is as "exceptional" as the right tells us it is.

[Mack]

Well, the "right" can be part of the recovery, or they can continue to stand in the way of it.

[Jerry]

I think even God needs a little help on this one, Mark.

Puts, what does the Grassy Knoll have anything to do with Jerry's post?

Jerry..as some of the boys like to say in here, your comment was "spot on."

[Mack]

Bone Moe- I'm really interested in your comparisons in our efforts in Iraq/Afghanistan, to those in SE Asia, i.e., what brought us to those places, and what gets us out.

[Mack]

Anyway, is Hannity walking away from his promise to help the troops and their families, or quietly abandoning his pro-torture stance? Or both?

[Puget Sound]

"The people who engineered this are without conscience. They are responsible for the murders of over two hundred largely innocent people in order to generate political propaganda. They are desperate and have nothing to lose. They enjoy the protection of people who still serve at the highest levels of government. They move freely within the National Security State. Dick Cheney has let it be known that he ran Death Squads out of the Vice President’s office. He has let it be known that he has a cadre of ’stay behinds’ still burrowed into the government."

The nutter ramblings by 'Jerry' above made the Grassy Knoll comment -Spot On- as it brings to mind those conspiracy types willing to believe made up crap.

[KS]

Stands on waterboarding aside; What do GW Bush and BH Obama have in common (as well as Theodore Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson) ?

They are progressives. Source: the book; "American Progressive".

Note: the similarities in the way Bush and Obama handled the bailout of lending institutions - they both used taxpayer money to loan them and make them indebted to the State. This may be difficult for certain posters to stomach. If you'd like to disprove the part about Bush, have at it. Note: Just because he is conservative about some issues doesn't take away the fact that he is a progressive (similarly for Teddy Roosevelt).

[Mack]

KrackSmoker- when Obama has to lie to get us into a war, or lie to keep us in a war, or "out" covert CIA operatives when their husbands aren't follwing the Faux News talking points, or hire unqualified people to head departments and agencies becuase they DO follow the party line, or fire USAGs when they refuse to follow a partisan strategy, or set the U.S. Constitution aside to promote the con's agenda, THEN you can attempt to compare Bush to Obama or T. Roosevelt and Wilson.

[KO]

Cross posting from the adjoining threads about Randi Rhodes. Lest you forget, she served in the miliary and has a bit more relevant experience than the majority of right wing talkers. Can't wait to hear her take on all of this.

[KS]

Hey Mack the clown, you are obfuscating wildly and sounding like a bonafide moonbat and whiny to boot. Ethics of this administration and the last one is a moot point. Moral equivalency is a typical progressive/regressive talking point.

You have been watching too much faux news from MSNBC, CNN and NBC and from Air "Hate" America.

[chucks, not some liberal piss-ant]

Am I the only one that thought that most of those at Guantanamo were waterboarded?
We only wet the faces of three of those sand crabs.
Now that is a disapointment.
Three?
This is not worth the whinning you all have been spewing. Really.
Three!!!!
Way too much restraint on the part of our CIA.
We should have done more.

[sinderella]

You assholes who think the Bushites should skate after blatantly breaking the laws of god and man, are the same people who gleefully impeached Bill Clinton for lying about a blowjob. you're disgusting.

[joanie]

"Khalid Sheikh Mohammed was waterboarded 183 times in one month.
Marcy Wheeler digs through the recently-disclosed Office of Legal Counsel memos authored by the Bush Justice Department and finds these startling statistics: Khalid Sheikh Mohammed was waterboarded 183 times in March 2003 and Abu Zubaydah was waterboarded 83 times in August 2002. Wheeler concludes, "The CIA wants you to believe waterboarding is effective. Yet somehow, it took them 183 applications of the waterboard in a one month period to get what they claimed was cooperation out of KSM. That doesn't sound very effective to me."

Now that's a powerful technique for getting to the truth. Wonder why we don't use it more often? (That's a question only chucks would ask.)

[Coiler]

183 times, what were they missing after 20 or 30?

[Puget Sound]

ph(J)oanie and the rest of your ilk.

can anyone name a person who has died or suffered a lasting injury from waterboarding?

if someone could take 183 doses of it and live without lasting injury does that not speak to the fact that while it may be 'torture' it is a 'torture' that can be used and should be used to extract information.
once you get that information then it is incumbent upon the agents to see if it is true and actionable information or if it is false.

yes, all of it is torture. putting a SINGLE caterpiller in a prison cell, making a terrorist keep his hands over his head, not letting 'em take a napey-poo, or putting some water in their nostrils to 'simulate' drowning is a small price to save people.

it will be interesting when we are hit again how all of the brave posters of this blog scurry away like the cockroaches they are off in to the corner as the lights come on. which side of the argument do you want to be on?

it will be the object lesson on why the Dems of this generation (Pelosi/Reid) can NOT be trusted with security.

I do NOT want it to happen as the cost will be lives here in this country as the people who survived the putative attack in LA that was uncovered on the 183rd waterboarding of klalid sheikh mohammed can attest. but it will. this will be Jimmy Carter all over again.

I lived through that once. not again.

[HoChiMInh]

What about the near 59,000 Americans killed in Viet Nam. And the millions of others. Whose mistake was that and should we persecute and/or prosecute any of those who were responsible for getting us into that quagmire. Or, are you selective about your targets of criticism.
You f'ers dont have a clue. You sit safely behind your computer screens and rattle on about what you dont even know and you think yourselves wise. I'm telling you, you dont have a f'ing clue. Try to make yourself useful.

[joanie]

f'ing

When did you get so elegant Ho?

[LucasFoxx]

"can anyone name a person who has died or suffered a lasting injury from waterboarding?"- that's a pretty ignorant comment.

After being waterboarded that many times, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed is probably not much more than a vegetable at this point; due to the lack of oxygen inherent with waterboarding. No wonder we only have the one picture of him in custody and none of the anecdotes that came with Saddam's captivity.

[HoChiMInh]

What about the msg, you conveniently avoided that.

[SAS]

Ho Chi Minh- glad you learned to spell your name right. Now that the basics of your education are out of the way, it's time to tackle some of the more difficult ones for you.

[chucks, not some liberal piss-ant]

I believe msg belongs on BlatherMangia.
If Bush had not used the inhanced interview techniques that were required to secure satisfactory answers from the three that had experienced the said interviews and The Bank of America building, or WaMu for that matter had fallen, you folks would be decrying Bush not connecting the dots.
We are, as usual, surrounded by a bunch of experts at "what should have been done". It is foresight where your expertise is lacking.

[Bill]

And why do the actions and non response of this little coward to the $1000 a second challenge surprise anyone?

Hanity reminds me of every bully I ever knew growing up. Big bluster, threats blah blah. Stand up to them, pop 'em in the nose once and they run to mommy.

[SAS]

Yes, that describes Hannity and every other Fixed News chickenhawk personality...thanks Bill

[Mack]

I wonder if nevets will ever come back and answer the question, or did HE run home to HIS mommy too?

[HoChiMInh]

And the content of the message keeps getting avoided.

[Mack]

Nope. The topic is Hannity backing out of his committment to be waterboarded to prove his theory that it's not torture. Predictably he has backed out. A lot like nevets. Today we have discovered the genetic link between all the neo-cons.

[HoChiMInh]

I didnt say topic I said subject of the post. We understand why you are avoiding and evading.

[HoChiMInh]

Posted by: Mack | April 26, 2009 at 07:05 PM"

You brought it up A-Hole, now what did THAT have to do with the topic. You are weak.

[Mack]

Okay, if you need that much help when understanding the framework of a blog, here ya go: Blog title-

Sean hannity breaks his promise, hates our freedom, helps the enemy, lets the down the troops, forsakes god

Not much else to be explained there. Unless you don't understand the difference between the topic and the comments that everyones puts up in those little boxes. Hehe. Pretty clear really. Did you go to a charter school or something??

[Mack]

Oh, wait- if you mean that thing with nevets, don't worry about that. That's something nevets will have to man up to. And it wouldn't be right for him to back out and make one of his toadies answer for him, would it? Besides, the answer must have been top-secret, since only he knew the answer, and he appears to have been spirited away to some undisclosed location.