Presenting the Media Research Center's Best Notable Quotables of 2009
Published: 12/21/2009 4:22 AM ET
Discover Magazine's Melissa Lafsky Wins "Quote of the Year"
Regarding Mary Jo Kopechne being killed in a car accident by
Sen. Ted Kennedy: "Who knows - maybe she'd have thought it was worth it."
Regarding Mary Jo Kopechne being killed in a car accident by
Sen. Ted Kennedy: "Who knows - maybe she'd have thought it was worth it."
"[One wonders what] Mary Jo Kopechne would have had to say about Ted's death, and what she'd have thought of the life and career that are being (rightfully) heralded. Who knows - maybe she'd have thought it was worth it."
For reference, Kopechne died in the backseat of Kennedy's car after he drove off a bridge in Chappaquiddick in 1969, an accident the Senator did not report for several hours.
In razor-close balloting, the runner-up for MRC's "Quote of the Year" went to Newsweek's Evan Thomas for making this absurd comparison on MSNBC's Hardball on June 5: "In a way, Obama is standing above the country, above the world. He's sort of God." Thomas later posted a statement on Newsweek's web site: "I was not being literal."
MRC President Brent Bozell:
"2009 was the first year of the liberal media's God, President Barack Obama. The biased coverage and blatant praises the media lavishly bestowed upon the golden boy and his cronies aren't bad for laughs. But laughter isn't what Americans are really after from the news media - We'd like some news."
The winners were selected by a panel of 48 judges, including nationally syndicated talk radio hosts Neil Boortz and Mark Levin, columnist Cal Thomas, George Mason University economics professor Walter E. Williams and American Spectator Editor-in-Chief R. Emmett Tyrrell, Jr. To read the complete issue of The Best Notable Quotables of 2009: The 22 Annual Awards for the Year's Worst Reporting, access full quotes, or watch video clips of the broadcast quotes, please visit www.MRC.org.
Other highlights include:
The Coronation of the Messiah Award for Fawning Inaugural Coverage
"Never have so many people shivered so long with such joy. From above, even the seagulls must have been awed by the blanket of humanity." - ABC's Bill Weir on World News, January 20.
Damn Those Conservatives Award
"The Republicans lie! They want to see you dead! They'd rather make money off your dead corpse! They kind of like it when that woman has cancer and they don't have anything for her." - MSNBC's Ed Schultz on The Ed Show, September 23.
Media Hero Award
"I'm honored to be joined today by the Godfather of Green, the King of Conservation: Former Vice President Al Gore." - Katie Couric opening her November 2 "@KatieCouric" CBSNews.com webcast.
The Poison Tea Pot Award for Smearing the Anti-Obama Rabble
CNN analyst David Gergen: "Republicans are pretty much in disarray....They have not yet come up with a compelling alternative, one that has gained popular recognition. So-"
Anchor Anderson Cooper: "Teabagging. They've got teabagging."
Gergen: "Well, they've got the teabagging....[But] Republicans have got a way - they still haven't found their voice, Anderson. They're still - this happens to a minority party after it's lost a couple of bad elections, but they're searching for their voice."
Cooper: "It's hard to talk when you're teabagging."
- CNN's Anderson Cooper 360, April 14. "Teabagging" is a vulgar slang term for a certain variety of oral sex; Cooper later apologized.
With awards also in the following categories:
• Master of His Domain Award for Obama Puffery
• The Crush Award for Loathing Limbaugh
• Spread the Wealth Award for Socialist Sermonizing
• The Half-Baked Alaska Award for Pummeling Palin
• The Un-Fairness Doctrine Award for Slamming Media Conservatives
• Let Us Fluff Your Pillow Award for Obsequious Obama Interviews
• Barry's Big Brain Award for Journalists Bedazzled by Obama's Brilliance
• The Obamagasm Award for Seeing Coolness In Everything Obama Does
• Michelle, the Media Belle Award
• The Barbra Streisand Political IQ Award for Celebrity Vapidity
