John Ziegler, voracious defender of Sarah Palin against all media criticism, has turned his sights from the liberal news to conservative politicos.
In his movie "Media Malpractice: How Obama Got Elected and Palin Was Targeted," Ziegler went after the mainstream media for perceived liberal bias and slights against the Alaska governor. This weekend at the Western Conservative Political Action Conference (WCPAC), Ziegler went after a target closer to home: David Keene, chairman of the American Conservative Union. In the end, the documentarian gets cursed at and kicked out of the conference. In response he's put video of the entire encounter on Mediaite.
Ziegler was after Keene for criticizing Palin, but he also attacked the conservative leader for supporting Sen. Arlen Specter (pre-party switch) and reportedly trying to sell his group's support to FedEx.
Keene initially agreed to a sit-down interview, but he tried to leave when the questions turned aggressive. After offering a few rebuttals he quickly gave up and resorted to name-calling. "I'm not gonna hit you, but I'd like to, because you deserve it," Keene said at one point. Before finally freeing himself of Ziegler, he added, "You're an asshole. You got that on the air? Asshole."
Keene says he would like to hit Ziegler at around 1:35 and calls him an "asshole" a little after the three minute mark. Watch:
Ziegler was scheduled to appear on a panel; after the altercation with Keene he was "fired," and security was told not to let him enter. He elaborated on the encounter in his blog post.
I am sure that there will be those who will wrongly think that I did this for personal attention. Those that know anything about me understand this is not the case. I will gain absolutely nothing from this and will likely lose quite a bit. My only goal was to try to shine light on the issue of whether David Keene as individual should be a leader in the conservative movement as well as this broader issue of far too many members of the conservative establishment being motivated by the wrong factors.