Bernard McGuirk and Alan Colmes Duke it Out on Torture, Israel, and Sarah Palin

Filling in for Imogen Lloyd Webber this morning to take on righty Bernard McGuirk was lefty Alan Colmes, who just a few days ago engaged Bill O’Reilly in a “heated debate,” as Imus put it, on the subject of torture.
 
“People are trying to use getting Bin Laden to justify Bush’s policies,” Colmes said, already sounding angry. “And to say that torture A, had anything to do with getting him or B, works is just not true.”
 
Bernard strongly disagreed, noting that information gleaned as a result of harsh interrogation techniques allowed both the Bush and Obama administrations to “connect the dots” over a number of years.
 
“It just took some time,” Imus explained, seeming, for once, to represent the voice of reason. “How was Bush to know where the Pakistanis were hiding him all this time?”
 
Colmes’s point exactly. “Bush didn’t know anything!” he hollered. “He even said he didn’t care about Bin Laden, he didn’t think about him.”
 
What’s more, Colmes noted that civilian trials have been more successful at convicting alleged terrorists than have military tribunals, the preferred method of Republicans. “We’ve actually prosecuted—and in lower Manhattan—people from Gitmo, and nobody knew the trials were going on,” he said.
 
Continuing on his crusade to “piss people off” (and get paid for it by Fox News), Colmes insisted that despite what has been reported in the press, President Obama did not say last week that Israel should return to the 1967 borders with the Palestinians.
 
“He said we should use it as a basis for negotiation, and include land swaps,” Colmes said. “This has been misstated, misrepresented, he has been taken out of context, and he’s saying the same thing four or five former presidents said, and the same thing Netanyahu said in a joint statement with Hillary Clinton this past November.”
 
Regardless, Bernard believes Obama’s statement undercut any negotiating power on the part of the U.S. for a peace agreement, and that it emboldened the enemy. “If you pull back form those borders, it’s like taking the fences down around the White House and allowing the crowds to come right up to the window,” he said, and shuddered at the idea of what Obama would do about Israel during a second term in office, “when he doesn’t have to worry about reelection.”
 
Parameters for negotiations between Israel and the Palestineans must be laid out, in Colmes’s view, precisely because two are sworn adversaries. “You don’t negotiate with your friends,” he explained. “You negotiate with your enemies.”
 
Besides, Colmes added, Obama made clear his position during a press conference with British Prime Minister David Cameron earlier this week, saying that Hamas and Hezbollah, two of the ruling Palestinian political parties, must recognize Israel’s right to exist before anybody negotiates anything at all.
 
Seeking peace in the studio, Imus went to a topic he knew Colmes and Bernard would agree on: the insanity of Newt Gingrich’s decision to run for President in 2012. “Arnold Schwarzenegger’s housekeeper will be on the cover of Maxim magazine before this guy becomes President,” Bernard said, calling the former House Speaker “a disgrace,” and “an embarrassment.”
 
Colmes, on the other hand, is already thinking ahead. “I want a Palin-Bachmann ticket,” he said. “There’s going to be a cover and a two-drink minimum for that one.”
 
But Bernard was much kinder toward Sarah Palin, whom he thinks possesses the “balls” that other politicians lack. “She’ll bring the fight,” he said, adding, “She might not be the brightest person in the world, but then again they said that about Ronald Reagan.”
 
Flabbergasted at his esteemed producer comparing Palin with Reagan, Imus pointed out that unlike Palin, the Reagan at least finished his term as governor of California, something she did not do in her home state of Alaska.
 
Moving on, Colmes told Imus he cares little about Oprah’s last episode or the NBA playoffs, and declared John Edwards to be a bigger creep than Schwarzenegger. Bernard agreed, observing that Arnold’s biggest crime was not using protection.
 
Appalled, Imus replied, “How about we start here, Bernie: not cheating on your wife?”
 
Uh, that too.
 
-Julie Kanfer

Comments

[Doug]

COME On as Warner says...."TURN YOUR SETS OFF NOW!!!!!!"
If your going to replace the beautiful University educated Imogen
At Least....put a blonde wig on Colmes or Mc-Quirk Alan claims he's paid to
piss people off...well he suceeded..not seeing Ms Webber...sure pissed me off!!!!!!!!!!!!
Talk about using Torture, listening to these clowns, would make anybody divulge everything.
doug p
Canada