Friday, May 11, 2012

Choosing up sides...Tamron Hall smacks down another bully.

The Mitt Romney bully story is striking a nerve no matter what the right wing wants you to believe. It's something like #4 on Google search right now- for a number of reasons.
Many of us behaved badly as teens. Lots of us can blame our bad behavior on drugs or alcohol- and even more of us were on the receiving end of some pretty hateful stuff. I believe there's a process that helps humans grow into fully formed adults. Some of us remain works in progress, despite our age- but the operative word here is progress. The part that creates the change in outlook and behavior happens when we allow ourselves to look at, and feel responsibility for the hurtful things we've done. Sometimes this never happens, and behavior never changes. Parties causing the harm live in a constant state of denial. That's what Mitt looks like to me. I don't see or hear empathy or compassion when I hear him speak, whether it's denying a bullying incident, talking about firing people, or not caring about poor folks. I hear a cold, calculating corporate kind of guy who can hand out pink slips and sleep like a baby because it was a good call for his shareholders. I hear a guy who thinks it's his 'turn', and doesn't comprehend the difference between sitting in the corner office and holding the oval office. He doesn't get that he can't fire the American population when they don't fit into his short-term plan. I hear a guy who thinks we'll work for him, not the other way around. I hear a guy who tries to sound remorseful for past bad deeds, but never seems sorry about a wrongdoing, he only seems sorry he got caught. I know it's presumptuous, but I see the kind of bully who would have folded like a pup tent if someone with some character stood up to him, and called him out.
The bullying report has brought forth a flood of emotions for a lot of adults. Some are re-living the horrors of being victimized, some are dealing with the guilt of callously causing anguish to others; some are simply feeling empathy. The right wants you to have none of this. They want to push this under the carpet and tell you it doesn't matter. They're used to getting their own way. That happened on MSNBC today- on Tamron Hall's show, when she delivered an epic smack down to Tim Carney, who came on to defend Mitt Romney. Here's a link to Huffington Post, which has video.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/05/11/tamron-hall-tim-carney-mic-msnbc_n_1510311.html
It felt good to watch. It felt like a couple of things were happening; Tim Carney is a guy who is used to calling the shots; when he attempted to spin and not answer her questions, she wasn't having it, and took control away from him. If David Gregory, Chuck Todd or any of the news talking heads had this kind of backbone, we'd be better off. If any of the network media had the courage to shut down the interview as soon as a subject refuses to answer the questions they agreed to pre-interview - we would have fewer bullies, and a population not filled with so many low information voters.  Go Tamron!

1 comment: