Charlie Rose

winter  12/07/2011 06:48 PM Report

I think practically the whole country can see through Romney ...right? He's off on hiatus now on a lobbyist hosted soiree plotting how to top Newt. Mitt would make

Cheney and the Haliburton contracts look like the Gates Foundation if he has his way (ways). And his computer skills would make Fawn Hall and Oliver North look like

that monkey that you wouldn't want to hang around waiting for while he finishes typing anything of Shakespeares.

CJANS  01/13/2011 10:32 AM Report

Mr. Klien, thank you so much for being an independent thinker. As a democrat I've been very concerned by the lack of reason in this debate. I beleive I've learned this week who is a controlled by the "left-machine" and who can recognize a severly mentally ill man for exactly what he is. I will certainly be spending more time on your blog.

matthewjharris  01/12/2011 06:14 PM Report

I always enjoy Meacham's historical perspective. Good discussion from both guests.

duff  01/12/2011 02:12 AM Report

I was watching this episode when it aired and my jaw completely fell open when at 12:25 Mr. Rose asked if what drives the nature of the rhetoric in America is different from China.

China, where speech critical of the government potentially lands the speaker in prison.

The guests did not directly answer. Do Mr. Rose or his guests think that a government speech code would be just swell?

I do have to honestly say that I am growing weary of the one-sided nature of the guests on most of the PBS shows these days. Ezra Klein and Jon Meacham? Seriously. Even though in this clip Mr. Klein shocked me with some of his positions, he is no consistant centrist. Mr. Meacham performed by the left's book as expected.

KenjiWaha  01/11/2011 10:52 PM Report

We can speculate and theorize about topics like the connection between political rhetoric and violence and what kind of behavior ought to indicate that someone is prone to violence. However, if we want to improve political rhetoric it should be because it improves our democratic discourse, not out of fear that failing this we will feed the paranoia of a few emotionally disturbed people

Meanwhile, many of the signs being cited that the gunman was prone to violence are behavior that could indicate any number of behavioral problems, none of which might necessarily lead to violent actions.

The only thing you can realistically do to keep tragedies like this from happening is to lessen the opportunity a sick, violent person has to act on his or her violent desires.

If the young man in Tucson had difficulty getting a gun this may not have happened.

And if there was even one policeman at the event this may not have happened (or at least less people would have been killed or injured.)

winter  01/11/2011 09:40 PM Report

Our news comes to us as sensationalized as possible, like a gang rape where the hosts of the hours get to kick around the same topic in his or her unique way 5 nights a week, host after host. Folks, this isn't Frontline.

Chomsky alluded, "the mainstream media successfully marginalizes thorough enough examination of an issue by treating it in sound bites." Our attention spans are clipped, we're seeded with a lesson in how we should think before we can decide how to we're off to the next treatment. If you're going to editorialize everything

then at least do it without the kibitzing. With some hosts (Matthews,who I can't watch.) its like a free-for-all, interupting guests, fast and loud I find myself diverted by the lack of decorum. Its why I like Charlie's show, its about the last place where a guest is allowed to explain him or herself -- ahh sanctuary, think I'll read more.

robdverity  01/11/2011 06:05 PM Report

Oozi's, AK47s, Glock 9mms, et al with 31+ shells/clip will continue to be trafficked here - and particularly in and to the Mexican drug cartels - so the US banking can continue to skim and launder the drug/gun-sale money.

GregBownik  01/11/2011 04:58 PM Report

I was surprised by Ezra Klein's comments in regard to the supposed lack of connection between political rhetoric and violence. Although there may not be specific research to establish a causal relationship between acts of violence by lone individuals to political causes, there is certainly enough anecdotal evidence that supports the fact that disturbed individuals do become obsessed with politicians and political candidates for a variety of reasons depending on the type of mental health problem they are suffering from when they plan and commit their violent acts. Politicians and political candidates are constantly dehumanized and diminished by segments of the public and often there is no police protection available because political rhetoric is not against the law (no matter how outrageous it seems). Schizophrenics, for example, sometimes believe that they are receiving personal messages from their TV or radio. So it would not be too difficult, from a social intelligence perspective, to recognize a pattern and then be able to connect political rhetoric with the violent behavior of individuals suffering from mental illness. These individuals can always be identified beforehand as to their potential for violence but unfortunately they cannot be watched 24 hours per day. However, a return to civility among those who disagree may be the first step toward minimizing violence against our elected political representatives.

REMant  01/11/2011 02:45 PM Report

The shootings in Arizona, deplorable as they were, should not be amplified because they involved a member of Congress, a woman, a Democrat, an Arizonan, or a gun, but I suspect they will be. They might more sensibly be addressed by reconsidering our treatment of the truly mentally ill, as indeed they promised after the Virginia Tach massacre. ABC News last night, however judicious and circumspect on that score, nevertheless felt obliged to bring up this up giving Rep Clyburn a platform. They did better tho than the Post whose headline yesterday screamed "U.S. charges plot to assassinate Giffords" Now the OED defines the word plot as: "A plan made in secret by a group of people to do something illegal or harmful." Where is the group of people? The article, itself, and everyone else, said specifically there was no such group. But I was not surprised to find the subject resurrected, particularly in the wake of the swearing in of the new Congress. However, before we lay into conservative politicians, and move to create an American Guy Fawkes Day let us remember that John Grisham assassinates a good part of the Supreme Court in one of his books, and such things are not uncommon in the movies and various media, even applauded when the majority feels the act heroic. Plus, we have the president, himself, talking about just wars. From what I understand, Ms Gifford, herself, would be among the last to take up this cudgel.

But if we must discuss it, the frustration the right feels I believe lies in the kind of political correctness implied in Meacham's comments. The basis of that is found in the dismissal of original sin, so that one should accept all conduct as worthy of the same respect. One must therefore tolerate whatever anyone else does. It reflects, however, not an understanding of differences, but an elimination of their significance, which they hang on the figure of Christ. While it is the reverse of the Tory emphasis on heredity, it is no less skeptical, and both deny education and design of the kind republicanism is based on, which Jon reduces to Freudian family romance ala Herbert Butterfield. This has been common coin among historians in the 20th c, applied first ironically to "progressives" like himself, tho a case can certainly be made that many of today's evangelicals are worthy of the categorization. Like liberals today, Hofstadter felt his McCarthy-era paranoid politicians were simply unloved. But in the mid-19th c when a preacher like Lyman Beecher deplored the decline of society in the West, he was right, even if later Turner tried to make it into something of a virtue. The plain fact is that not only the Constitution, but also everything the Founders believed or exemplified, has been under sustained attack as tho it were National Socialism or Communism, even by the neocons, particularly the part about being white and Protestant. All the presumptions of natural law, of community, of labor, of honor, honesty and modesty. This attitude, BTW, began quite early, and is enshrined in the introduction to the first American edition of Blackstone written by a prominent Virginian Democrat. It said that all should be free to do whatever they liked, provided it did not restrain whatever anyone else did. A moment's reflection should tell you there is no room there for compromise, understanding or community. It is either atomization or conflict. Tolerance of this sort should be viewed as a kind of moral hazard, like easy money.

NB- You can find a transcription of Hoftadter's original magazine ariticle here: http://www.kenrahn.com/jfk/conspiracy_theory/the_paranoid_mentality/the_paranoid_style.html