Fox and Friends distorts video clip to attack Rep. Keith Ellison

By Eric W. Dolan/Raw Story

The hosts of Fox and Friends lashed out at Rep. Keith Ellison (D-MN) on Tuesday, accusing him of having "Bachmann derangment syndrome" for claiming that Rep. Michelle Bachmann (R-MN) and conservatives lawmakers like her have a poor record on women’s issues.

"We live in an era of extremism," Ellison said July 6 at the 2011 Campus Progress National Conference in Washington, D.C.

"These same people who want to shrink government till you can drown it in a bathtub also want mom to get back in the kitchen and take her shoes off and get pregnant. You understand? They are offended by strong, powerful women. And here's the sad part -- some of them are women themselves. Michele Bachmann being an example."

Fox and Friends co-host Gretchen Carlson angrily responded to a clip of the speech, saying that as a strong woman herself, she was very offended by the comment.

"You don't know what she wants," she said. "You don't know that she thinks it's OK to be back in the kitchen and pregnant. Are you kidding me? She wouldn't be running for president unless she was a strong, powerful woman."

But Ellison was answering a question about women being consistently paid less than men, not accusing Bachmann of being a weak woman. Ellison noted that progressive Members of Congress had passed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act of 2009, allowing victims of pay discrimination to sue their employers. Bachmann and other conservatives voted against it.

Fox and Friends co-host Brian Kilmeade added that if Ellison was worried about extremism, "maybe he can focus on getting the burqa off" of Muslim women. Ellison is the first Muslim to be elected to the U.S. Congress.

In 2006, Bachmann reportedly urged women attending her local church "to be submissive to your husbands."

Watch video of Fox and Friends, as clipped by Media Matters, below:

Watch Rep. Keith Ellison's full speech below:

Memo To Sean Hannity: Fox News’ History Of Inciting Islamophobia And Racial And Ethnic Animosity

By Zaid Jilani

Last night, Rep. Keith Ellison (D-MN) appeared on Fox News’s The Sean Hannity Show. While Ellison was prepared to debate a variety of issues from current affairs, Hannity used the opportunity to confront the congressman about comments he had previously made accusing the network of inciting racial and ethnic animosity and Islamophobia. Ellison at first tried to say that he didn’t want to get into an argument about Fox News, but eventually said that the station tries to always associate terrorism with Muslims, failing to appease Hannity, who said it was “offensive” to say Fox incites religious or ethnic animosity:

HANNITY: Well, you actually called out Fox News. You said in a BBC interview, you said that I think that if you listen to Fox News, the station 24/7 is trying to incite and divide Americans along religious lines, scapegoating the Muslim community, and this is a sort of a well-worn, right-wing tactic. Can you give me a specific example?

ELLISON: Well you know Sean, I tell ya, you know you do this show, you know what you guys broadcast all the time, I mean, I stand by the statement. [...]

HANNITY: This is an incredible charge, this is a charge of bigotry! [...] I’m offended by what you say, and if that’s an accusation of religious intolerance, we’re scapegoating the Muslim community, nothing is further from the truth, and I’d like one example. [...]

ELLISON: I’ll give you one example. One example is that after the King hearings, the hearings that Peter King did, you referred to, you talk about, every time you talk about terrorists and radicalization, you always attached the word Muslim to it, or Islamic.

Watch it:

In response to Hannity’s claim that it is “nothing further than the truth” to say that Fox incites religious intolerance, here’s a far from comprehensive list of some of Fox News’s worst moments of inciting racial and ethnic animosity:

- Fox Host John Gibson Said We “Need More Babies” Because The Majority Of Americans May Be Hispanic In 25 Years [5/12/06]

- Fox Host Steve Doocy Claimed Barack Obama Went To A “Madrassa” And Was Possibly A Muslim Extremist [1/19/07]

- Fox News Managing Editor Said Barack Obama Had “Fairly Controversial” Views About “The White Race” [3/28/08]

- Fox News Host Brian Kilmeade Suggested “Special Screenings” For Muslim American Soldiers After The Fort Hood Shootings [11/7/09]

- Fox News Host Blamed Desecration Of A Tennessee Mosque On The “Stubbornness” Of Muslims Building A Community Center In New York City [8/24/10]

- Fox News Immediately Hired Disgraced NPR Commentator Juan Williams, Who Was Let Go For Making Insensitive Comments About Muslims [10/21/10]

- Fox Host Glenn Beck Said The 3/5 Compromise Was A “Way To Take A Step To Abolish Slavery” [1/6/11]

- Fox Host Sean Hannity Repeatedly Suggested That Middle East Uprisings Are Signs Of “World War III” [2/8/11, 2/10/11, 2/22/11]

- Fox Host Glenn Beck Claimed That The Pro-Democracy Movement In Egypt Was Evidence Of A Muslim-Marxist Conspiracy To Establish An Islamic Caliphate [2/11/11]

- Fox News Radio Reporter Todd Starnes Published Tweets About “Blacks Rioting” At A Burger King And Asking If Muslims “Will Stop Trying To Blow Us Up?” [3/24/11, 9/11/10]

Bill O’Reilly, Jesse Watters, and others at Fox News repeatedly refer to the “Muslim problem” in the world.

All of this racially and ethnically insensitive broadcasting may have had a negative effect on the views of the station’s audience. A recent survey from the Public Religion Research Institute found that there is a “a significant correlation between trust in Fox News and negative attitudes about Muslims.”

Ellison Stumps Republican On House Floor By Asking Him When Paul Ryan’s Plan Would Balance The Budget

By Travis Waldron

This morning, the House debated the budget proposal put forth by the Congressional Progressive Caucus, a response to the budget drafted by Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI). During the debate, CPC member Rep. Keith Ellison (D-MN) asked Rep. Todd Rokita (R-IN) when the Ryan budget would balance and create a surplus. After hemming and hawing for a few seconds, Rokita ultimately couldn’t come up with an answer:

ELLISON: When does the Ryan budget create a surplus?

ROKITA: The budget proposed and voted on by the committee — [...]

ROKITA: With responsible, gradual reforms to the drivers of our debt, like Medicare and Social Security, this budget will balance –

ELLISON: I asked the gentlemen when the Ryan budget created a surplus. He could have given me a year. He didn’t. That’s because he’s probably embarrassed about when that is. Let me tell you when the Progressive Caucus comes to surplus: 2021. That is known as a responsible budget.

Watch it:

The answer to the question is that the “courageous” and “innovative” Ryan budget would create a surplus for the first time in 2040, according to the Congressional Budget Office. An analysis by the Economic Policy Institute, meanwhile, determined that the CPC budget would indeed turn a $30.7 billion surplus in 2021, nearly two full decades ahead of Ryan’s “bold” plan.

After Congressional Progressives Ask ‘Where Are The Jobs?,’ GOP Rep. Biggert Says ‘Stop Talking About Jobs’

By Zaid Jilani

One of the mantras of congressional Republicans over the past two years has been to ask, “Where are the jobs?” House GOP leader John Boehner (OH) made this into atheme of the campaign last fall. As then-GOP chairman Michael Steele summarized the argument: “Americans are still asking, ‘Where are the jobs?’ … Washington Democrats still have no answers.”

This afternoon, Congressional Progressive Caucus co-chair Rep. Keith Ellison (D-MN) and other progressives took to the floor of the House of Representatives to turn this question back on their Republican colleagues. Ellison and the others asked where all the jobs-creation legislation was, excoriating their conservative colleagues for focusing on legislation like terminating the HAMP program, which would do nothing to create jobs:

– Rep. Keith Ellison (D-MN): “The Republicans’ no-jobs agenda has been exposed, Mr. Chair. The majority has done nothing to create jobs or protect homes. All they do is criticize programs that could use some improvement. Rather, they would get rid of them altogether.”

– Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-NY): “[The Republicans] have no plans of their own to address the foreclosure crisis that is hurting neighborhoods and disrupting lives throughout their country. Like the jobs bills they said they would have. We have yet to see them.”

– Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee (D-TX): “Your cities have been impacted positively by the HAMP program. Job growth is picking up. Investing and growing jobs should be the mindset of the American Congress for that’s what we were sent back to Washington to do.”

At one point, Rep. Judy Biggert (R-IL) took to the floor to respond to the progressives. She attacked the HAMP program, urging her colleagues to end it, and signaled that she would oppose progressive amendments to the GOP’s bill for ending the mortgage modification program. Then, she incredulously told her colleagues to stop talking about jobs and focus rather on the substance of the amendments:

BIGGERT: I would urge my colleagues to support — oppose this amendment. And stop talking about jobs, let’s focus on the substance of these amendments.

Watch it:

One would have to wonder what a certain congresswoman who asked at a hearing — on February 25, 2010 — “Where are the jobs?” would think about Biggert’s statement. That congresswoman was Biggert herself. Watch it: