Keith Olbermann Condemns Michael Bloomberg, Occupy Wall Street Raid (VIDEO)

Keith Olbermann lit into New York mayor Michael Bloomberg in a Special Comment on his Tuesday show, condemning Bloomberg for his raid on the Occupy Wall Street encampment.

Olbermann has been a devoted supporter of the Occupy movement, so it was not surprising that he took issue with Bloomberg's decision to clear the encampment in Lower Manhattan, arresting hundreds in the process. He went further, though, placing Bloomberg in a long line of people whose "limitless stupidity," as he put it, had only served to hand victories to protest movements. He included on this list Joseph McCarthy, former Chicago mayor Richard Daley and former Alabama governor George Wallace, and he compared the raids to the violence against civil rights protesters in Selma in 1965 and to the Kent State and Jackson State massacres. None of those officials, he said, "ever understood that suppression...always creates the opposite of the effects desired."

But Olbermann wasn't finished. He went on to call Bloomberg a "cliché," an "archetype," a "cartoon" and a "putz," and labelled him the "most irreplaceable man" to the Occupy protesters. The mayor's raid, he said, had taken a movement that was "beginning to grow a little stale" and made it relevant again. "No such a living and breathing embodiment of all that is wrong and all that is stupid in the establishment of this country could be ordered up from fiction," he said.

Olbermann also hit out at Bloomberg for the rough treatment meted out to reporters -- at least ten of whom were arrested trying to cover the raid.

He then said it was time for Bloomberg to go. "You should resign," he said, calling Bloomberg "a smaller, more embarrassing version of the tin-pot tyrants who have fallen around the world."

Comments

[Eagleman]

12:20 PM on 12/16/2011

You are still around...!

I had to search for the news about you...
I don't see you much on the normal HuffPo site... I feel sorry for your pathetic ratings...

Let me see what I can do .. Have you tried applying at NPR Or Faux News ?

[Dan Slander]

11:30 AM on 12/16/2011

If KO was a devoted supporter he'd let people unwind at his near bye digs to refuel and energize. Devoted suporter! What has he done besides yap off in solidarity on his show (watched by all of 3 dozen people)? Keith at the barricades, how laughable.

[seatheworld1]

07:31 PM on 12/09/2011

Keith is all that is wrong with the far left.

[SisterAnn]

01:27 PM on 11/22/2011

Good for the protesters and McDonalds.

[SisterAnn]

01:23 PM on 11/22/2011

If you think the pepper spray was over the top, you should watch tazering on the Cop shows. They tazer them five times when one time would do it. They keep telling the tazered to hold still while their body is involuntarily responding to another hit from the tazer.

[SisterAnn]

01:17 PM on 11/22/2011

I don't think the protesters will have much impact if they can't even set in protest without getting pepper sprayed.

Bloomberg says there are laws to stop the protesters. Odd, how all the laws are set up to protect the rich and their businesses.

If they keep making laws against people who are protesting, then the rule of law won't be followed.

[Gailsunday]

02:39 PM on 11/22/2011

SisterAnn, the "rule of law" isn't being followed NOW!

And lawmakers continually set up laws which are deceiving....if you look at the laws we have they are designed to be to benefit those in power, be it in those with wealth, or in political power....every law we have just about is tilted toward those in power, to maintain it, and increase it....for instance the Anti-Trust Laws...squelch the small business to benefit the BIGger business, the new laws governing Wall Street financiers and the banksters are very limiting in their effect...no teeth, the special tax laws all favor the benefit of these groups....the laws preventing investment and trading of stocks thru inside info.....leaving an opening for our Fed. Legislators to get rich while they are in office, as they do!!! Denying TERM Limits!!!

I could JUST GO ON AND ON! The structure of our government needs to change if we ARE to have an effective rule of law, by that I mean FAIR, JUST, uncorrupted laws. I think the best way to assure this....Term LIMITS ON Congress....POWER corrupts.

Besides, why should a PRESIDENTIAL term be limited, AND CONGRESSIONAL terms NOT?

For that matter let's extend that term limiting to THE SUPREME COURT

[SisterAnn]

05:50 PM on 11/22/2011

Especially the supreme court should be limited.

I used to think the government and the courts would become wiser the longer they were there. Not so. They grow lazy and thoughtless.

[J D Drew]

06:34 AM on 12/29/2011

I say the only hope for our system of government is to petition for term limits for our senators and congressmen. If we continue to reelect the same people term after term ,with very few exceptions,they all become the puppets of big business and their money. They all get sucked into it . Take away their re election prospects and you take away the hold business has over them and they might just might do what is right for the country and not what will get them reelected .

[jgmambo]

11:51 PM on 11/20/2011

He gave enough lead way to those people, At the end you got to obey the law ,You brake it you should pay the price. Mob mentality is only in the mind of the weak and the left.

[SisterAnn]

01:28 PM on 11/22/2011

Have you noticed our laws have been set up for the rich against even protesters?

[jgmambo]

04:44 PM on 11/22/2011

NO, as long at they obey the law ,they don't have anything to worry about. Stop been a victim.

[Endogenous Light Nexus]

02:33 AM on 11/23/2011

Not really the brightest bulb on the tree, are you? Picky little laws and rules selectively enforced for the specific purpose of squelching First Amendment rights is not a valid way of doing things in the United States, DUH. And pretending they're doing it for other reasons is just plain deception. I think perhaps you'd be much happier as a control-freak Taliban, why don't you convert and grow your beard so you could go live in Afghanistan and get your jollies seeing people's rights squelched even worse than they are SO FAR in the U.S.? Or if Afghanistan isn't your first choice then there's always Iran, which benefited so much from the crimes of Ronald Reagan who I'd guess is one of your heroes. After all, Islam isn't any uglier than Christianity and you could fight American values DIRECTLY that way like a man instead of wrapping yourself in red white and blue and INDIRECTLY eating away at America from the inside, like a tapeworm.

[jgmambo]

04:59 PM on 11/25/2011

You Pompous piece of excrement ,The same way you like to stipulate your sence of gradeur , the rest of us, Americans , got the freedom to express our own opinion and great disdain about your decadent and low morals Party. By the way I serve my country in Vietnam (Disabled Veteran) "What had you done for your country lately beside regurgitate your self center Patriotic want to be".

[jgmambo]

11:21 PM on 11/20/2011

I was in Woodstock , OWS is most of the same ,self gratification, party ,depravation,and a lot of lazy young people looking for a way to get high on drugs and petty shallow self absorbing relationship. Looking for meaning in their life . Not much on been Patriot.

[Endogenous Light Nexus]

02:48 AM on 11/23/2011

Did you get some bad acid at Woodstock or something? Something has injured or destroyed the frontal lobes of your brain, which normally process empathy and conscience. You don't seem to have too much of either going, and that meets the definition of a pyschopath (synonymous with sociopath). Let me guess: you'd rather see your fellow Americans suffer and die without healthcare like wounded animals in the woods, than pay an extra dollar in taxes each year, right? Psychopaths ALWAYS answer that question in the affirmative, because they really don't care about anyone but themselves.

[jgmambo]

03:32 PM on 11/23/2011

You people are such whiners, All that melodrama ,Nobody is going to take anything away from you trolls. They are going to try and make it better, Social Security ,medicare , Healthcare ,economy .I am a Disabled Veteran ,on SS,Medicare and a Pension ,I am a independent voter ,Sure not going to vote for that Puppet ! I really thing you are the sociopath ! ,living in your fantasy world and believing in people like Keith .

[jgmambo]

11:02 PM on 11/20/2011

If Keith feel their pain,, why he don't go and join them on the littering, smell, rape , drug trafficking ,striking naked and all the other depravations.

[SisterAnn]

01:20 PM on 11/22/2011

As far as I know there was one rape and it was reported to the police and the police didn't do anything about it. It was not someone who was part of the OWs movement unless they walked in off the street.

Would you walk NYC streets without being afraid of rapists? Don't blame it on the OWs.

[jgmambo]

04:49 PM on 11/22/2011

A true liberal , only see what your weak mind want to see. Stop drinking the Kool- Aid and come back to reality.

[Endogenous Light Nexus]

02:34 AM on 11/23/2011

Hey I recognize you! You're that Teabagger who's always holding up his misspelled signs, aren't you?

[jgmambo]

03:11 PM on 11/23/2011

You are confusing me with the OWS illiterate crowd.

[Bloggerrogr]

05:10 PM on 11/20/2011

There's something happening here
What it is ain't exactly clear
There's a man with a gun over there
Telling me I got to beware


I think it's time we stop, children, what's that sound
Everybody look what's going down


There's battle lines being drawn 

Nobody's right if everybody's wrong 

Young people speaking their minds
Getting so much resistance from behind

I think it's time we stop, hey, what's that sound
Everybody look what's going down


What a field-day for the heat
A thousand people in the street
Singing songs and carrying signs
Mostly say, hooray for our side

It's time we stop, hey, what's that sound
Everybody look what's going down

Paranoia strikes deep
Into your life it will creep
It starts when you're always afraid
You step out of line, the man come and take you away

I think it's time we stop, hey, what's that sound

Everybody look what's going down

FWIW

[Endogenous Light Nexus]

02:35 AM on 11/23/2011

It's as beautiful and apropos a song today as it was when it first came out. Thanks for the reminder.

[james rivet]

12:17 PM on 11/20/2011

You Go Keith . . ..

[jgmambo]

11:53 PM on 11/20/2011

Obscurity?

[Endogenous Light Nexus]

02:14 AM on 11/19/2011

Keith you are AMAZING, I swear to God you will be remembered in history alongside Patrick Henry for your eloquence and passion for your country. You make me proud to be an American dude, and that takes a lot these days.

[jgmambo]

12:09 AM on 11/21/2011

The Kool Aid is working.

[Endogenous Light Nexus]

02:13 AM on 11/23/2011

Whatever you've been drinking has obviously had its effect on you, but when you can't actually muster a rational thought and have not a single fact or reason to refute something, you actually don't. Namecalling and snide remarks do not substitute for fact or reason except in the dim mind of a rightwinger who knows nothing else. Sound familiar?

[hershykershy]

09:32 PM on 11/18/2011

Bloomburg is a corporate hack! May I also add a tyrant.

[jgmambo]

11:55 PM on 11/20/2011

Your mob mentality show IQ ,low.

[Endogenous Light Nexus]

02:38 AM on 11/23/2011

Your Fascist rightwing mentality show IQ, negative.

[Left Hook]

12:38 PM on 11/18/2011

When you pizzoff Olbermann you're in a world of hurt fer shure...Besides, Bloomie has it comin'.

[jgmambo]

11:27 PM on 11/20/2011

Olberman , WHO ?

[lynn1219]

11:49 AM on 11/18/2011

Bloomberg is one of the 1%. He had to do something to solidify his membership in "the brotherhood".