Bob Schieffer Compares Harry Reid to Joe McCarthy

Townhall.com ^ | August 5, 2012 | Noel Sheppard

[Kaslin]

It's becoming fairly clear that even some of the Obama-loving media think Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) went too far last week with unsubstantiated and unattributed allegations concerning presumptive Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney's taxes.

On CBS's Face the Nation Sunday, host Bob Schieffer asked, "Isn't this kind of like Joe McCarthy back in the era when he said, 'I have here in my hand the names of 400 people in the state department who are communist?'" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Bob Schieffer Compares Harry Reid to Joe McCarthy

BOB SCHIEFFER, HOST: Let me go to you, Governor Strickland. You have been pounding Mitt Romney for not releasing his tax returns, and you have repeated what Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has been saying that Mitt Romney may have paid no taxes in all of, in some of those years. You know, this morning Reince Priebus who’s the chairman of the Republican Party, said I think over on Fox, that, that Harry Reid is a dirty liar. And I have to say, he has shown nothing, no evidence to substantiate that charge. He just says he heard it from somebody. Do you have any proof that Mitt Romney paid no taxes in some years?

TED STRICKLAND, FORMER DEMOCRATIC GOVERNOR OF OHIO: No, but Mr. Romney could give us the proof that he has paid taxes consistently. The fact is, Bob, Mitt Romney wants the American people to trust him with the presidency, but he won't trust us with his tax returns. All he has to do is release his tax returns. The question that I think is this: why is Mitt Romney refusing to give us his tax returns?

SCHIEFFER: Well, you know, I take your point, Governor, but isn't this kind of like Joe McCarthy back in the era when he said, "I have here in my hand the names of 400 people in the state department who are communist?" It turned out he didn't and he was saying the way to prove that they're not is for them to come forward here. I mean, asking somebody to come forward to, to just because there's been an unsubstantiated charge, that's a little thin to me.

STRICKLAND: That's not the reason, Bob. He should come forth with his tax returns not because there's been a charge, but because the American people deserve to know what is in his tax returns. His father, as we all know…

SCHIEFFER: So you're saying maybe that's not true that he hasn't paid any taxes but you have said maybe he didn't.

In recent days, we've seen numerous conservative pundits make this comparison. For the Face the Nation host to do so means Reid has really crossed an important line.

The next step would be for prominent members of the media to call for Reid to either provide evidence of his accusations or retract them.

Stay tuned.

[dfwgator]

Big difference, Joe McCarthy was right.

[fieldmarshaldj]

Vile insult to Joe McCarthy, a true patriot and hero.

[bigbob]

How about Joe Stalin, he just made crap up too

[Kaslin]

Correct

[KoRn]

Just damn! .... For liberals, them’s fightin’ words!!!!

Might as well called him Lucifer or something.

[SUSSA]

It’s disgusting to compare a deranged scumbag to a great American like Sen. McCarthy!

[Girlene]

I jwas surprised by Scheiffer this morning. He made a valid point (even though he had to trash McCarthy to do so, lol).

[muawiyah]

Yup, absolutely correct, and JFK knew it.

I've read some very negative comments about Joe McCarthy made by one of Romney's top aides.

We can't have that!

[Lakeshark]

For Shiefffer, he isn't capable of understanding McCarthy was right.

What's amazing is he has taken one of the biggest insults a leftie can give and applied it to one of the power brokers of the democratic party. I can't remember the last time a major network did this.

[VR-21]

Joe McCarthy was destroyed by politicians trying to cover their own asses. He has been very much vindicated by history, but evidently not by those who are supposed to teach it.

[muawiyah]

Romney’s boy Fehrnstrom started this ~ can’t Romney hire anybody who’s got some knowledge of Republican history? SEE: http://washingtonexaminer.com/romney-camp-attacks-reid-as-a-modern-joe-mccarthy/article/2503830

[muawiyah]

What we need to know is when did Ferhrnstrom first discover he had Commie tendencies?

[DrewsMum]

How dare he compare McCarthy, who was a HERO to that scumbag Reid!

[SUSSA]

I don’t care which liberal does it. It’s disgusting to compare a POS to a great Senator like Joe McCarthy.

[MachIV]

Amen. Obama is the culmination of everything McCarthy and the Birchers warned about, but too many RINOs including a few today(cough, Hugh, cough, Hewitt, cough) wanted to ostracize him and others like him(John Birch Society). McCarthy and the Birchers of that era look like prophets today.

[muawiyah]

Ferhrnstrom needs driven from American political life now. Bet Romney doesn’t have the stones to do it though ~ he’s beholden somehow to the commies.

[Ann Archy]

Fehrnstrom is ALWAYS wrong.......Mitt needs to dump his butt.

[Dogbert41]

The real question is who is illegally giving Harry Reid confidential information from the IRS? Isn’t that a felony for the IRS to do that and to give that information out to third parties and for the third party to use that information?

[Paladin2]

I compare Bob Schieffer to Brian Ross.

Schieffer could have more felony convictions though.

[Dogbert41]

It reminds me of when Obama was running for something in Chicago and a divorce judge allowed confidential information to be used against his opponent.

[SandRat]

The statement that Reid threw out sounds more like something LBJ is ledgered to have used:

Allegedly LBJ told his campaign mgr ‘release that my opponent (think foul description) has intercourse with pigs.’

Mgr replied: we can't say that!

LBJ replied: ‘ NO, but we can make him use up lots time & lots of $$$ answering it.’

[Terry Mross]

The American people deserve to know what grades obama made in college, who paid the tuition and lots of other things.

[Brad from Tennessee]

Reid and his family are also crooks:

http://www.lvrj.com/opinion/costs-conflicts-arise-in-reid-push-for-green-power-164858086.html

[crosshairs]

I compare Hairy Reed to a steaming pile of dog squeeze.

[SunkenCiv]

Thanks Kaslin.

• Reid Land Deal Under Scrutiny (story from 2006 - is Reid, rather than Romney, the tax cheat?)
• In Nevada, the Name to Know is Reid (2003)
• GOP to Reid: You're next
• A deal in the desert for Senator Reid? (Is Sen. Reid a Felon?)
• Harry Reid Insists Dude Who Told Him Romney Didn't Pay Taxes Isn't Imaginary
• Even New York Times Notes History of Harry Reid Viciousness
• Senate Majority Leader Democrat Harry Reid Sordid History
• Harry Reid's Office Responds To Rumors That He's A Pederast
• Form Deep Undercover in Obama's Justice Department Comes Molsterman Report III: Hints & Allegations
• Megyn Kelly: Harry Reid Beats His Wife, Steals From Lemonade Stand, Defunds Cancer to Fund Abortion
• Reid: My source on Romney's taxes is so incredibly credible that I won't say who he is
• Senator Harry Reid Must Release His FBI File To Address Allegations Over Mafia Connections
• VANITY - Did Sen. Harry Reid commit a felony by releasing information on a citizens taxes?
• Romney to Reid: 'Put up or shut up'
• Reid: Romney is guilty of tax evasion until he proves he's innocent
• Harry Reid: Paying Taxes Is Voluntary (Flashback)
• Harry Reid: Some Bain investor who I won't name told me Romney didn't pay income taxes for 10 years
• HuffPo: 'Soft-Spoken' Harry Reid Curses Out Fellow Democrat
• Reid:Taxes must be raised to avoid cuts
• The Current "Top Ten Least Intelligent" And "Top Ten Most Despised Democrats" Lists.
• Harry Reid refuses to hold floor vote on Obama tax proposal

[RightWingConspirator]

Fehrnstrom: Romney’s version of Karl Rove???

[RightWingConspirator]

Do you honestly believe that Reid has received ANY information that came from the IRS? I believe that Reid is lying and trying to bluff Romney out.

[swampfox101]

Thank you..! If you hadn’t said it, I would have...!

[G Larry]

Bob should have asked the Guv why he was NOT this curious about Obama’s past and his records!

[ozzymandus]

Pretty amazing for a commie like Schieffer to compare the RATS all-time villian to his hreo Harry. I’ll bet Scheiffer walks that moment of clarity back pretty fast.

[Marathoner]

It reminds me of when Obama was running for something in Chicago and a divorce judge allowed confidential information to be used against his opponent.

It's worse than that. It was when Comrade Zero was running for US Senator and the Marxist media had his opponent's (Jack Ryan) divorce records unsealed.

I dare say o's##thead has never won an election fair and square. He's always gone the Chicago thug way.

[Froggie]

As LBJ knew when he said “If I’ve lost Cronkite, I’ve lost the nation”...so too should Obama realize that since he’s lost Schieffer he will lose the election. Schieffer’s refusal to play dead on this one and call out Harry Reid signals in at least a small way the liberal press slowly realizing Obama is toast and it’s time to dissasociate! Of course with one finger in the air and the other one up Dickie Durbin’s posterior that may change. If so, Bob Scheiffer will issue a “clarification” or apology for misspeaking before he gets his next set of talking points from Axelrod!

[Gandalf_The_Gray]

"Isn't this kind of like Joe McCarthy back in the era when he said, 'I have here in my hand the names of 400 people in the state department who are communist?'"

Not to worry, by now the number of communists infesting 'Foggy Bottom' has grown to thousands, thanks to the liberal politicians and press who cooperated in a vicious smear of one of the few honest men in politics.

Regards,
GtG

[SaraJohnson]

Are Republicans too stupid to mention the real tax problem with evidence: Staff in White House are tax evaders and owe money.

[Oldeconomybuyer]

Harry Reid is a miserable piece of manure, unfit to be a dog catcher let alone SML.

[HarleyD]

Smoke screen to keep the story alive and focus on Romney. I don’t care if Romney didn’t pay taxes. If he parked his money in off shore accounts it’s legal, ethical, and it shows problems in our tax system-not with Romney. In fact it shows Romney is cleaver about getting around the tax system.

Why don’t they ask about Obama’s Fast and Furious emails or his college transcripts.

[driftless2]

I’ve read “Blacklisted By History” by M. Stanton Evans. Evans admits that McCarthy was occasionally reckless, but he was a lot more right than he was wrong. There WERE!! commies in the federal government. Those were also the days of HUAC and the Hollywood Ten (which McCarthy had nothing to do with), Alger Hiss, and the Rosenbergs. Communist infiltration of key government agencies was a real problem. The leftist press persecuted McCarthy for pointing out the problem. They’ll never forgive him.

[ripley]

“Big difference, Joe McCarthy was right.”

I wish I knew how to post a picture of a hammer hitting a nail right-smack-dab on the head.

[RummyChick]

Isn’t that guy old enough to remember that Mccarthy was taken down by the CIA/Media as part of Operation Mockingbird?

When weaving the threads to Obama- Wisner( who set the dogs on McCarthy) is linked to a former President of the American University in Beirut who is linked to Jessup/Dean Acheson/ Alger Hiss...who is linked to Obama’s girlfriend in New York.

What a small world.

[RummyChick]

btw, for those that follow along another path of history - and there are some of you out there -

Penrose - former President of that Beirut college -recruited Wisner
Penrose worked with Whitney Shepardson .

Dean Acheson recruited Wisner.

Penrose served with Helms.

The famous JAMES JESUS ANGLETON pulled a crazy stunt against Penrose that shows the depth of BS that the intelligence community pulls on one another. Helms , the gentlemanly planner of assassinations had a private intelligence network.
Just random connect the dots

[RummyChick]

btw, is the old man right about Mccarthy’s quote.

I find one with 57 names in his hand

http://coursesa.matrix.msu.edu/~hst306/documents/mccarthy.html

and 205 in his hand

http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/mccarthy-says-communists-are-in-state-department

[neverdem]

Nice catch!

[lentulusgracchus]

[Transcript]

SCHIEFFER: Well, you know, I take your point, Governor, but isn't this kind of like Joe McCarthy back in the era when he said, "I have here in my hand the names of 400 people in the state department who are communist?" It turned out he didn't and he was saying the way to prove that they're not is for them to come forward here. I mean, asking somebody to come forward to, to just because there's been an unsubstantiated charge, that's a little thin to me.

Big difference, Joe McCarthy was right.

Too bad Ann Coulter, who wrote Treason, was over on ABC's This Week instead. She could have corrected Bob Schieffer right away. McCarthy was right, he was being fed NSA material that he couldn't disclose source, and was trying to use the info to smoke out the Communists withouth compromising Venona. And Liberals like Schieffer have been calling him names in reliance on that reticence ever since.

McCarthy was wrong in this: He didn't have a long enough list.

[Lazamataz]

Bob Shieffer is such a liberal. Figures he’d go out of his way to say something nice about Harry Reid like that.

[Theodore R.]

The “Texan” Schieffer is so uninformed that he thinks McCarthy was wrong in the exposures.

[nascarnation]

I’d love to hear this on Schieffer’s show:

Bob, you’re 75 years old, making several million a year, and solidly in the one percent.

Don’t you think it’s time to retire and let the network hire a couple of struggling heavily indebted Columbia journalism grads to replace you?