Right-Wing Hypocrites: 10 Reasons Conservatives Should Shut Up About Letterman's Sarah Palin Gaffe

By Karl Frisch, Media Matters for America. Posted June 22, 2009.

He doesn't host his own syndicated talk radio show. That isn't his chair behind the desk of a cable-news program. You won't find his byline on the op-ed pages, discussing the ins and outs of President Obama's latest policy proposal.

He's a gap-toothed, late night comedian, and he's in justifiably hot water with conservatives for making some pretty vile jokes.

Earlier this month on CBS' Late Show, host David Letterman took aim at Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin's recent trip to New York City, offering up some off-color and patently sexist quips. During his opening monologue, Letterman said, "One awkward moment for Sarah Palin at the Yankee game. During the 7th inning, her daughter was knocked up by Alex Rodriguez." Then, later in the same broadcast, while presenting No. 2 on his famed Top Ten list, this time of "Highlights of Sarah Palin's Trip to New York," Letterman said the former Republican vice presidential nominee had "bought makeup at Bloomingdale's to update her 'slutty flight attendant' look."

Letterman did the right thing in apologizing twice for his tasteless attempts at humor, finally noting that the intention of his jokes was meaningless when considering the way any rational-thinking person would perceive his jokes. Ultimately, though, it is Letterman's future conduct that will determine the sincerity of his contrition.

Still, the right's fury rages on.

It is hard, however, to take conservatives seriously when one considers that each and every day, real players in the rudderless conservative movement -- powerful talk-radio hosts, cable-news hosts, pundits, columnists, and bloggers -- throw aside the reasonable boundaries of a civil political discourse by using wickedly divisive, cruelly insensitive, intentionally misleading, and downright hateful rhetoric. And the response from their followers? Hardly a peep.

Rank hypocrisy is nothing new for right-wingers -- or politics in general, for that matter -- but in a selfless attempt to help them avoid the "hypocrite" label this time around, I humbly present a Top Ten list of "Right-Wingers From Whom Conservatives Should Be Demanding Apologies."

10) Focus on the Family founder James Dobson, for falsely claiming a hate-crimes bill that adds gay, lesbian, and transgender Americans to the list of protected groups would also protect those who commit incest, necrophilia, pedophilia, bestiality, and a host of other perversions.

9) Fox News' Sean Hannity, for hosting "Internet journalist" Andy Martin, who once called a judge a "crooked, slimy Jew, who has a history of lying and thieving common to members of his race."

See more stories tagged with: obama, rush limbaugh, letterman, glenn beck, sean hannity, james dobson, pat buchanan, sarah palin, bristol palin, sonia sotomayor, andy martin, neal boortz

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