Posted on 03/19/2006 1:57:21 PM PST by West Coast Conservative
According to actor and comedian Richard Belzer, American troops in Iraq and Afghanistan are too uneducated to be expressing support for the U.S. military mission since they're just "19 and 20-year-old kids who couldn't get a job" and "they don't read twenty newspapers a day."
Belzer, who's best known as Detective John Munch on NBC's "Homicide: Life on the Street" and "Law & Order: Special Victim's Unit," is a frequent guest on HBO's "Real Time with Bill Maher." On one previous appearance, he threatened to walk off the set when told columnist Ann Coulter was also appearing, calling her a "fascist party doll." On Friday night's live broadcast, Belzer attacked claims by fellow guest Florida Congresswoman Ileanna Ros-Lehtinen's that U.S. soldiers continue to express support for the war.
In the lively exchange, captured by the website NewsBusters, Belzer dismisses Ros-Lehtinen accounts of meeting with troops in Iraq and their credibility as "bull----."
Congresswoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen: "Having been in Iraq a few times, and Afghanistan, having met the troops one-on-one with free reign and asking them what they're doing, they're saying 'We're proud of our mission, we know what we're doing over here. We don't want you guys in Washington to lose it over there'. And there is a great sense of determination that what they are doing is making a difference. And yes, it has been an important mission what we're doing ... come on."
Richard Belzer: "Yeah, come on. Our soldiers now are at ..."
Ros-Lehtinen: "Are a volunteer force, a volunteer force."
Belzer: "Okay, fine. No one questions the nobility and the honor that these men and woman who are serving and what they're doing. No one questions that. But now they're targets, they're not going out. Now they're just protecting each other and they're in the middle of a civil war. So it's really not fair to have these people who volunteered their lives to protect our nation under false pretenses to now be a target ..."
[Loud applause for Belzer]
Ros-Lehtinen: "Ask them. Ask them if it's fair! Wait a minute, wait a minute. My stepson, wait a minute, my stepson ..."
Belzer: "That's bull----: Ask them! They're not .. they don't read twenty newspapers a day. They're under the threat of death every minute. They're not the best people to ask about the war because they're going to die any second."
Ros-Lehtinen: "Wait a minute! You are talking about my stepson, my stepson who just finished last week eight months of duty ..."
Belzer: "God bless your stepson. Doesn't mean he's a brilliant scholar about the war because he's there. And God bless him."
Ros-Lehtinen: "Oh, you are though! You are though? Okay."
Belzer: "Well I have more time, I'm not there. My life is not under threat."
Ros-Lehtinen: "Thank you. Thank you. I'm glad."
Bill Maher: "I think the point he's trying to make is that a 19-year-old who is in that army because he probably couldn't find other employment ..."
Ros-Lehtinen: "He's a college graduate. He's a Marine officer. He volunteered for the Marines."
Belzer: "He's the exception for the rule."
Ros-Lehtinen: "He's not the exception for the rule. I've been there ..."
Belzer: "You think everyone over there is a college graduate? They're 19 and 20-year-old kids who couldn't get a job ..."
Ros-Lehtinen:"Yeah, you know because you've been there and ..."
Belzer: "What, I don't f---ing read!? Don't do that!"
Maher [to Belzer]: "Woe, woe, woe. Come on. Wait, wait, wait. That ... Don't."
Belzer: "Pardon my French."
Maher:"Yes ... that was over the line and now you're going to lose ..."
Belzer: "It's this patronizing thing that people have about if you're against the war everyone's lumped together. You know, the soldiers are not scholars, they're not war experts ..."
Maher: "You're going to lose even me like Michael Moore did when he came down on Charlton Heston in Columbine."
Belzer, a conspiracy theorist who once hosted several conspiracy-themed specials for the Sci-Fi Channel, is the author of the 1999 book, "UFOs, JFK, and Elvis: Conspiracies You Don't Have to Be Crazy to Believe."
To view the exchange between Richard Belzer and Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, click here [Note: Contains vulgar language].
Previous discussion, same topic:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1598766/posts
And here's another one...
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1598660/posts
Actors, is there anything they don't know?
this guy is a case wherein ones backside has slipped around
to take the place of his face.
That, Dickie Belzer, will turn your brain to mush.
Well...one more show I won't watch...these arrogant, elitist snobs in Hollywood..... I keep waiting for end times because they will finally get whats coming to them.
Another overpaid know-it-all actor with no brains. Nothing here, move on.
Belzer is an intellectual cut above Dice Clay, no doubt. He's an angry, impatient man of the world.
Hey, Belzer...step outside my hubby wants a word with you..
What's a common nickname for detectives? Dang. I can't quite think of it. Someone help me out here.
I love 'Law and Order', and Belz does a good job with his character.
But God help us if we start giving a rat's behind about anything that a clueless, drug-toasted clown like Belzer says about politics or international affairs. Really.... who cares?
And many Freepers still watch the liberal spew from the 'Law and Order' shows
What a difference this story is to the one you just pinged me to....
Born in Bridgeport, Connecticut, he grew up with his parents and older brother. He worked as a paperboy and became known for his uncontrollable wit, which caused him to be kicked out of every school he attended. After high school he was a reporter for the Bridgeport Post. He unsuccessfully attended junior college and later enlisted in the Army. He soon realized it was a mistake and tried to get out.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Belzer
I have the great saving grace of being able to learn something from everyone, and knowing that everyone, right down to the cashier at McDonald's knows something that I do not.
Dear Richard,
Thank you for teaching me the meaning of humility and honesty once again.
Best regards,
Opus
He played an annoying TV reporter during the short-lived series, "The Flash". In one episode, he was bound and gagged by the psychopathic criminal "The Trickster" (played by Mark Hamill).
I'll relish that a bit more now.
Regards, Ivan
Hollywierd always has contempt for soldiers. They really belive people join the service because they couldn't get a job elsewhere, as though acting is a skill only for a PhD.
At Least Law & Order's Fred Thompson is still on board with the War.
Incredible. What a horrific slam on our troops!
My son was smart enough to know not to believe anything a leftist says at the age of 18 when he got his deployment orders. And he's smart enough to know it now that it's been 3 years since he went to Iraq.
This is disgusting, mystery. What a blatant attack on your husband and son, and my son. Disgusting!
How low can these bottom dwellers sink, anyway?
That's right, Belzer. This is the first war in our history where our soldiers have been fired upon. The British didn't do that in the Revolutionary War, or the Germans or Japanese in WWII. Just this one.
Idiot.
Something I couldn't resist transcribing from last night's Boston Legal. Alan Shore is defending a woman for evading $400.00 in federal income taxes.
Alan Shore:
“When that ‘Weapons of Mass Destruction’ thing turned out not to be true, I expected the American people to rise up. Hah. They didn’t.” Then, when the Abu Ghrab torture thing surfaced and it was revealed that our government participated in ‘rendition,’ a practice where we kidnap people and turn them over to regimes who specialize in torture…I was sure, then, the American people would be heard from. We stood mute. Then came the news that we jailed thousands of so-called ‘terrorist suspects,’ locked them up without the right to a trial or even the right to confront their accusers. Certainly we would never stand for that. We did.”
“And now it’s been discovered that the Executive Branch has been conducting massive, illegal, domestic surveillance on its own citizens. You and me. And I at least consoled myself that finally, finally the American people will have had enough.”
“Evidently we haven’t.”
“In fact, if the people of this country have spoken, the message is: We’re okay with it all.”
“Torture, warrantless search and seizures, illegal wiretapping, prison without a fair trial--or any trial, war on false pretenses…We as a citizenry are apparently not offended. There are no demonstrations on college campuses. In fact, there‘s no clear indication that young people even seem to notice. Well. Melissa Hughs noticed. Now, you might think instead of withholding her taxes she could have protested the old fashioned way: Made a placard and demonstrated at a presidential or vice-presidential appearance but we’ve lost the right to that as well. The Secret Service can now declare ‘free speech zones’ to contain, control and, in effect, criminalize protest.”
“Stop for a second and try to fathom that. At a presidential rally, parade or appearance, if you have on a supportive t-shirt, you can be there. If you’re wearing or carrying something in protest, you can be removed.”
“This in the United States of America. This in the United States of America. This in the United States of America.”
“Is Melissa Hughs the only one embarrassed?”
Aside to judge: “Long speeches make me so tired. Actually, I’m sick and tired. And what I’m most sick and tired of is how ever time somebody disagrees with how the government is running things, he or she is labeled ‘Unamerican.’
Interrupted by the DA: “Evidently it’s speech time.”
“And speech in this country is free, you hack. Free for me, free for you, free for Melissa Hughs to stand up to her government and say, “stick it.’”
Interrupted by the DA: “Objection.”
“I object to government abusing its power to squash the Constitutional freedoms of its citizenry. And God forbid anybody challenge it, they’re smeared as being a heretic.”
“Melissa Hughs is an American. Melissa Hughs is an American. Melissa Hughs is an American.”
“Last night I went to bed with a book. Not as much fun as a 29-year old but the book contained a speech by Adelai Stevenson, the year was 1952. He said,
‘The tragedy of our day is the climate of fear in which we live. And fear breeds repression. Too often sinister threats to the Bill of Rights, to freedom of the mind are concealed under the patriotic cloak of anti-Communism.’
“Today it’s the cloak of anti-terrorism. Stevenson also remarked, “It’s far easier to fight for principles than to live up to them.” I know we are all afraid. But the Bill of Rights… we have to live up to that. We simply must.”
And many Freepers still watch the liberal spew from the 'Law and Order' shows
I watch ony to see Marika's Hagitty's sweater puppies
"...they don't read twenty newspapers a day.""
Dear Richard,
Are there that many different comic strips in the print media?
Love,
Opus
Stop!
This is making us look like idiots!
Screw this idiot. Not one more word about him.
No, Richard. They're smart enough to know that of the 20 newspapers they might read, 19 of them are saying the same thing, and ALL OF THEM ARE LYING ABOUT IRAQ!!!!
There. Now I feel better. :)
Seems as though many of them don't know when to shut up.
LOL!
First off I was not speaking of Belzer allthough he is also a boob
"Beneath contempt". Perfect way to express what I feel....
He and Hillary have the same name.......
After 35 years in the military, I hate to say I've seen this kind of treatment before of our brave military....I was hoping I'd never see it again, but alas, I'm once again wrong.....
That explains a lot. He's seems to be projecting his own education, job and military experience on every person who joins the service; which makes his patronizing remark almost laughable. He actually thinks reading twenty newspapers a day makes one smart? How does reading the same left-leaning "reporting" over and over again accomplish any sort of scholarly pursuit?
And what does it tell one when even leftist-crazed Bill Maher disagrees with such drivel?
Why is it that libbies insist on characterizing our soldiers as "children". It sounds as if we have sent a herd of babies over there to fight a war. My 15 year old son has more knowledge and moral fortitude than any hollwood fool whose only means of support is to mouth other people's words and playact all day, omg.
JMO, belzer sounds like such microphone and laptop generals on the right, such as weiner(savage), hannity, levin, and malkin.
And, most of these creeps are the same garbage filled traitors who spewed the same bile 35 years ago. They are eaten up inside by their hatred.
The young men and women in the military that they revile are so far above them in character, integrity and strength that these old maggots aren't worthy to clean the bottom of their shoes.
They will be punished for this, mystery. They WILL.
American troops in Iraq and Afghanistan are too uneducated to be expressing support for the U.S. military mission since they're just "19 and 20-year-old kids who couldn't get a job" and "they don't read twenty newspapers a day."
What's a common nickname for detectives?
Do the name "Dick" Tracy help?
about my least favorite actor anyway.
To think my son changed units so he could go to Iraq and then I read this bile.....I will not let *people* like Belzer demean what my hubby and our sons are doing....
His audience is very small, and the vast majority of those who agree with him are brain dead............No. Make that ALL of them.
Think about it ....these people do not live in the real world they have lived all their lives pretending to be someone else, dreams of glory as kids on the stage...then they grow up and their job where they make millions is still pretending to be someone else....no reality there
They
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