Accuracy in Media

MSNBC’s Chris Matthews thinks Al Gore should redirect his criticism on the lack of progress on climate change legislation from President Obama to the “evil” right wingers like Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck.

Gore, who penned a 7,000 word article for Rolling Stone magazine, said that while Obama understood that global warming is a threat to the planet and has appointed several environmental advocates to key positions, he has failed to act decisively on the issue.

“Yet President Obama has never presented to the American people the magnitude of the climate crisis,” he wrote. “He has simply not made the case for action. He has not defended the science against the ongoing, withering and dishonest attacks. Nor has he provided a presidential venue for the scientific community — including our own National Academy — to bring the reality of the science before the public.”

Matthews, though, preferred to downplay Gore’s attack on Obama and instead lay blame for climate change inaction squarely at the feet of the “evil” people in the “corrupt media on the right” who are lying to the American public about climate change:

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Matthews: But here’s a fact on the table, global warming, climate change. Rush Limbaugh says stuff that is just not true.  I never use the word lie but it’s appropriate here. People like Glenn Beck.  I heard him months, years ago on the radio before he was on TV, saying that there’s no climate change, playing, pandering to these business types.  Pandering to people that don’t want to deal with reality. These people are evil in what they’re doing.  I’m not saying their souls are evil but what they’re doing is really really wrong. And it’s not the president, it’s this corrupt media on the right. No it’s corrupt media. They’re making good salaries telling people what they know is not true.  Rush Limbaugh is not a stupid person. Glenn Beck is not a stupid person.  They’re saying it on purpose.

Joan Walsh of Salon largely agreed with Matthews but conceded that there has been a lack of leadership on this issue from Obama, which had Matthews sighing.

But Matthews wasn’t done with attacking conservatives on this issue:

Matthews: My belief is this and Churchill is my hero said this once. “I refuse to be impartial between the fire brigade and the fire.” The president is the fire brigade on this.  He may not be the greatest fire brigade, but damn it he’s not the fire.  Glenn Beck is. Rush Limbaugh is the fire. The Chamber of Commerce, The Wall Street Journal Editorial Page. They are the fire, let’s not forget it.

Once again Matthews has become the unofficial Obama apologist. Even when fellow liberals are taking the President to task for his failure to enact any substantive climate change legislation, Matthews has uncovered the real reason — those evil right-wingers in the media who have ignored the so-called facts and lied to the American people.

Well, he had to blame someone since blaming Bush has gotten a little old after two and a half years, and it doesn’t resonate with voters like it used to.

Matthews didn’t point out any lies from the right, he just accused them of perpetrating lies in order to make his point and deflect attention away from the prospect that their may be dissension in the ranks on the left.

It doesn’t matter how Matthews tries to spin this. The fact remains that Obama has failed on  pushing his climate policy through Congress, even though he had huge majorities in both houses of Congress for two years. Now he’s trying to achieve the same goals through the Environmental Protection Agency. If he is successful, it will be an added burdensome energy tax on business at a time that businesses are struggling to stay afloat, much less creating new jobs. It would compound the already damaging effects of his failed economic policies. Either way, it doesn’t bode well for him in 2012.

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