Civility was in short supply Wednesday on the Dylan Ratigan Show, as the
MSNBC anchor after which the show is named used words and phrases such as
"moronic" and "dog's ass" to demagogue the GOP's proposal to trim the federal
budget.
"How can you be serious about cutting spending when your spending proposals
are truly a flea on a dog's ass?" howled Ratigan, who went on to demonize
Republicans as "nasty" frauds who want to "get rid of all the food for poor
people."
The plan Ratigan derided as "a flea on a dog's ass" is to cut $32 billion for the remainder of FY2011, about eight months. As a comparison, reports earlier this week [1] suggested President Obama would propose budget cuts for all of FY2012 equalling just $775 million, or less than 1/60th of the proposed GOP cuts.
Ratigan's spurious logic that cutting federal subsidies for food stamps is
akin to letting poor people to starve to death on the streets is reminiscent of
Alan Grayon's mischaracterization of the GOP health care plan, which the former
Florida congressman said was to "die quickly."
Toward the end of his bombastic tirade, Ratigan insulted House Republicans
for proposing "moronically small" cuts that, by "depriving poor people of food,"
should be dismissed as "sensationally devastating."
While the $32 billion list of proposed spending cuts does not address
entitlement reform, the recently elected Republican majority cannot be expected
to undo years of fiscal malpractice in a matter of weeks.
Ratigan also accused Republicans of not taking serious steps to "reform the
tax code," even though the House Ways and Means Committee, led by Chairman Dave
Camp (R-Mich.), started holding hearings on tax reform in late January.
"We're going to do tax reform and it's going to ruffle some feathers," Camp
told The
Hill [2], a congressional newspaper.
When Ratigan directed his wrath toward Doug Heye, a Republican strategist,
his guest rejected the premise of his vacuous argument: "I think your questions
are insulting and I don't take them seriously."
Heye, the former communications director for the Republican National
Committee, added, "I've heard you talk about an era of new civility and now
you're calling people morons."
After being interrupted repeatedly, Heye implored the unhinged Ratigan to
"talk about positive issues."
To his credit, although perhaps too little too late, Ratigan confessed, "I
get a little worked up, I apologize."
A transcript of the relevant portions of the segment can be found below:
