# Republicans: candidate who assaulted reporter is fine with us! **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [May 25, 2017, 9:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-candidate-who-assaulted-reporter-is-fine-with-us/787443 "2017-05-25T21:36:10Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 13
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2017, 6:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-candidate-who-assaulted-reporter-is-fine-with-us/787443/241 "2017-05-27T18:04:53Z")
> [@Procrustus](#): > > You are the new poster boy for this outlook. Or the converse actually. One free assault is fine by people we politically support. Two assaults? Oh god no, that would be terrible. Just one. One is okay. > [@](#): > > EXETER, N.H. – Wise-cracking funnyman Al Franken yesterday body-slammed a demonstrator to the ground after the man tried to shout down Gov. Howard Dean. > > The tussle left Franken’s trademark thick-rim glasses broken, but he said he was not injured. > > Franken – who seemed in a state of shock and out of breath after the incident – was helped back to his feet by several people who watched the tussle. Police arrived soon after. > > “I got down low and took his legs out,” said Franken afterwards. > > Franken said he’s not backing Dean but merely wanted to protect the right of people to speak freely. “I would have done it if he was a Dean supporter at a Kerry rally,” he said. > > “I’m neutral in this race but I’m for freedom of speech, which means people should be able to assemble and speak without being shouted down.” > > The trouble started when several supporters of fringe presidential candidate Lyndon Larouche began shouting accusations at Dean. > > Franken emerged from the crowd and charged one male protester, grabbing him with a bear hug from behind and slamming him onto the floor. > > “I was a wrestler so I used a wrestling move,” Franken said. Just one. Franken’s a senator. I don’t like his politics, but I don’t mind his single assault. I don’t say it’s OK. I say it’s not disqualifying. That’s just what I say about Gianforte. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2017, 6:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-candidate-who-assaulted-reporter-is-fine-with-us/787443/242 "2017-05-27T18:06:36Z")
> [@drad\_dog](#): > > I thought All Lives Mattered. The two positions are not mutually exclusive. All live matter, and the term “pro-life,” in American political discourse refers to abortion. And you knew that. ---
**Author:** ![k9bfriender](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k9bfriender/32/3283_2.png) [@k9bfriender](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/k9bfriender)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2017, 6:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-candidate-who-assaulted-reporter-is-fine-with-us/787443/243 "2017-05-27T18:09:20Z")
> [@D\_Anconia](#): > > Herein lies the rub. People often post “news articles” that are clearly labeled “opinion” or “commentary”, and they (the posters) don’t seem to know the difference between commentary and fact. They come from the same newspaper or media outlet, and sometimes it is hard to tell whether a media outlet is presenting something as opinion or as fact. For instance, people who listen to fox or limbaugh think that they are getting facts. It does require some level of critical thinking (though I do not think all that much) to discern which is which, and the idea that there may be some who do not posses that sort of skill is not that far out there. In fact, in another thread, there is a poster dumb enough to be making the argument that because Pelosi made a snide remark about Trump’s priorities, that she is stupid and thinks that travel itineraries should be alphabetized. So, while it is obvious that there are posters here who do not posses the necessary critical thinking skills to separate the two, I do not feel that I fall into that trap so easily. And, keep in mind that opinion, in the form of editorial pieces, often contains quite a bit of fact as well. The editorial may contain opinions as to what those facts portend, but the facts themselves are solid. > [@](#): > > In fact, (heh) there is at least one poster who argued in another thread that opinion IS fact. > > :dubious: Yeah, I caught part of that, and while I kind of understood where he/she was going with it, found it to be more than a bit of a stretch. I don’t recall the specifics, but it was obvious that that poster was fairly alone in that sentiment. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2017, 6:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-candidate-who-assaulted-reporter-is-fine-with-us/787443/244 "2017-05-27T18:09:51Z")
> [@k9bfriender](#): > > You didn’t read me correctly, I said that a Democrat from Montana would be to the right of a _Republican_ from NY. No, I didn’t misread you. I was just approaching it from a different, more realistic angle. Frankly, your literal statement is [nonsense,](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jon_Tester) and I’m surprised you’re doubling down on it. > [@](#): > > In other words, yes, democrats can win seats in these sorts of states, but only if they are what many on the left would consider to be not “true democrats”. I guess I did read you exactly correctly, then. More importantly, though, I don’t accept that you can speak for the posters in this thread I was referring to. ---
**Author:** ![Richard\_Parker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/35a633/32.png) [@Richard\_Parker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Richard_Parker)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2017, 6:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-candidate-who-assaulted-reporter-is-fine-with-us/787443/245 "2017-05-27T18:13:52Z")
Bricker resting his argument on discredited right-wing tabloid reporting is _chef kisses fingers_ Sad to see the partisan virus raging so strongly. May the fever break soon. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2017, 6:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-candidate-who-assaulted-reporter-is-fine-with-us/787443/246 "2017-05-27T18:27:08Z")
> [@Richard\_Parker](#): > > Bricker resting his argument on discredited right-wing tabloid reporting is _chef kisses fingers_ > > Sad to see the partisan virus raging so strongly. May the fever break soon. Wait – you’re denying the Franken assault? From the [New York Times](http://www.nytimes.com/2004/03/21/magazine/al-franken-seriously-so.html): > [@](#): > > Sidestepping the cut-basketball issue, Franken still has a wrestler’s build, but more to the point he has kept his grappler’s mentality. As he enters the Palace Theater, 860 defiant Dean supporters have filled the seats. They’re on edge, eager to prove to Peter Jennings, Tim Russert and the rest of the national media that have ranged thickly around the perimeter that their man isn’t done yet. Onstage, Martin Sheen speaks first, then Dean’s demure wife, then the suddenly embattled former governor of Vermont himself. Sometime after Dean begins taking questions from the audience, a manic-looking heckler starts to heckle, accusing Dean of ‘‘covering up for Dick Cheney.’’ He gets louder. A couple of spindly members of Dean’s security team approach him uncertainly; he swings his arms and keeps shouting. It goes on for several minutes and seems to be veering toward actual violence. Dean, the media, the members of the audience: nobody knows what to do. > > At this moment Franken turns, cocks his head slightly, gives that well-known magnified, tortoise-shell-framed gaze and says: ‘‘I think the two of us can get him out. You wanna do it?’’ After a pause that is meant to be emphatic, I say, ‘‘No.’’ But it’s too late: he’s off, in rumpled jeans and a big down jacket, plowing up the aisle. > > By this time there is a confused scrum around the heckler, who is holding his ground and still ranting. Franken hits the floor, wedges himself among a couple dozen legs and puts the man in a wrestling hold, grabbing him at the knees. That destabilizes him, and others now quickly push him down the aisle and out the side door of the theater. Franken gets up, looking dazed; his glasses are snapped in two. He’s quickly swarmed by confused but excited reporters who want to know, like, what was he doing? ---
**Author:** ![Richard\_Parker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/35a633/32.png) [@Richard\_Parker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Richard_Parker)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2017, 6:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-candidate-who-assaulted-reporter-is-fine-with-us/787443/247 "2017-05-27T18:32:26Z")
Hey look, a reliable source! See how it differs substantially from your right-wing tabloid? Now try reading the Union Leader account, then come back and tell us what you think of the Post report you’ve been relying on. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2017, 6:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-candidate-who-assaulted-reporter-is-fine-with-us/787443/248 "2017-05-27T18:35:01Z")
And from the same Times piece: > [@](#): > > A couple of years before the O’Reilly altercation, after seeing Rich Lowry, the editor of National Review, declare on C-Span that Democrats had ‘‘sissified’’ politics, Franken called him up and challenged him to a fight in a parking garage – ‘‘like ‘Fight Club.’’’ ‘‘I have no idea whether he was serious or not,’’ Lowry told me. ‘‘But I felt that as someone who tries to be a serious journalist, I couldn’t take him up on it.’’ Franken had no book to promote at the time, but he got mileage out of the incident by devoting a chapter of ‘‘Lies’’ to it. (Lowry has written about it as well.) And guess what? That doesn’t bother me either. Good for Al Franken. Perhaps it’s not the most civilized response to the accusation of being “sissified,” but it’s a genuine one. I like it, and I have no problem with either his lunge at the Dean protester or his offer to fight someone in a parking garage. AND NEITHER DO YOU. Right? ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2017, 6:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-candidate-who-assaulted-reporter-is-fine-with-us/787443/249 "2017-05-27T18:38:02Z")
> [@Richard\_Parker](#): > > Hey look, a reliable source! See how it differs substantially from your right-wing tabloid? > > Now try reading the Union Leader account, then come back and tell us what you think of the Post report you’ve been relying on. I think both of those describe a criminal assault. From the Union Leader account: > [@](#): > > Franken told the New York Post he body-slammed the demonstrator to the > ground. > “I got down low and took his legs out,” Franken told the newspaper. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2017, 6:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-candidate-who-assaulted-reporter-is-fine-with-us/787443/250 "2017-05-27T18:44:37Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > And from the same Times piece: > > And guess what? That doesn’t bother me either. Good for Al Franken. Perhaps it’s not the most civilized response to the accusation of being “sissified,” but it’s a genuine one. I like it, and I have no problem with either his lunge at the Dean protester or his offer to fight someone in a parking garage. > > AND NEITHER DO YOU. > > Right? Clarification, are you really a lawyer that is telling here to others that fighting words or to set up what amounts to a duel are things that are recommended? ---
**Author:** ![Knowed\_Out](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/knowed_out/32/7380_2.png) [@Knowed\_Out](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Knowed_Out)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2017, 6:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-candidate-who-assaulted-reporter-is-fine-with-us/787443/251 "2017-05-27T18:48:16Z")
The Post article is dated 2004, 5 years before Franken took office, so if you’re saying a Democrat set the precedent of an acting congressman committing assault, that doesn’t hit the mark. ---
**Author:** ![Richard\_Parker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/35a633/32.png) [@Richard\_Parker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Richard_Parker)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2017, 6:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-candidate-who-assaulted-reporter-is-fine-with-us/787443/252 "2017-05-27T18:49:10Z")
What a misleading excerpt you’ve chosen. Here’s the relevant part of the Union Leader’s report, including your excerpt: > [@](#): > > MANCHESTER - Liberal activist and comedian Al Franken helped eject a boisterous heckler from a crowded Howard Dean rally at the Palace Theatre > Monday, the theater’s manager said yesterday. > > . . . > > Two members of Dean’s security team immediately moved in on the man, who > shoved and elbowed them, Ramsey said. “He was screaming. He was out of control,” Ramsey said. Ramsey said he went over to help calm the situation and also got elbowed and pushed. > > “All of a sudden, I looked to my right, and Al Franken was grabbing onto > this man’s back,” Ramsey said. “He (Franken) gave him a hefty Patriots block. He should be a Patriot,” Ramsey said. > > Ramsey said a news photographer later told him Franken reacted to being > elbowed by the protester, who knocked his glasses off. When a second heckler - apparently working in tandem with the first - emerged from the audience, Dean security men and Franken went over to deal with him while the first protester headed to the balcony, Ramsey said. > > While Ramsey pursued the first man to the balcony, he said, he saw Franken and three other men escort the second heckler out the stage door. > > . . . > > Franken told the New York Post he body-slammed the demonstrator to the > ground. “I got down low and took his legs out,” Franken told the newspaper. Franken said he is not backing Dean, but merely wanted to protect free-speech rights. “I would have done it if he was a Dean supporter at a Kerry rally,” he told the Post. If you cannot see the difference between that conduct and body-slamming a reporter for asking a question, then your bias is overwhelming your objectivity. Of course I would have a problem with Franken assaulting someone who was merely protesting. If you wouldn’t, then some decent part of you has broken and died. ---
**Author:** ![drad\_dog](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/aeb1de/32.png) [@drad\_dog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/drad_dog)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2017, 6:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-candidate-who-assaulted-reporter-is-fine-with-us/787443/253 "2017-05-27T18:50:38Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > The two positions are not mutually exclusive. All live matter, and the term “pro-life,” in American political discourse refers to abortion. > > And you knew that. “All lives matter” was a response to Black Lives Matter, and accompanied the accusations against them, complete with invective and fake news etc. Basically saying that _ **they** _ were mutually exclusive, and that it was racist to say Black Lives Matter. Was that you? In that case it was “you either believe that all lives matter or you don’t.” Someone could reasonably say that “pro-life” is the same kind of term that black lives matter was. In other words: in need of clarification. The term “pro-foetus” has been cited. I’m going to say that’s much more accurately saying what you are in this instance. Or you can admit that BLM was a legitimate response to events in the real world, to which “All lives matter” was a cowardly, inadequate and cruel taunt. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2017, 7:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-candidate-who-assaulted-reporter-is-fine-with-us/787443/254 "2017-05-27T19:13:33Z")
> [@Knowed\_Out](#): > > The Post article is dated 2004, 5 years before Franken took office, so if you’re saying a Democrat set the precedent of an acting congressman committing assault, that doesn’t hit the mark. “An acting Congressman?” No, no. You got me there. I was not saying anything about an “acting Congressman.” Who, in this story, exactly was the acting Congressman? ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2017, 7:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-candidate-who-assaulted-reporter-is-fine-with-us/787443/255 "2017-05-27T19:18:29Z")
> [@Richard\_Parker](#): > > What a misleading excerpt you’ve chosen. Here’s the relevant part of the Union Leader’s report, including your excerpt: > > If you cannot see the difference between that conduct and body-slamming a reporter for asking a question, then your bias is overwhelming your objectivity. > > Of course I would have a problem with Franken assaulting someone who was merely protesting. If you wouldn’t, then some decent part of you has broken and died. I do agree there is a difference. But I don’t agree that Franken’s conduct falls outside the line-in-the-sand standard that was proposed in this thread before Franken’s conduct was brought to light. Before, what was being said was that a physical assault was disqualifying. Now you’re adding in the motivation – okay to wrap a demonstrator by the knees and take him to the ground in a wrestling move, but not to do the same to a reporter for asking a question. I’d like to learn a few more of your rules. What if the reporter asked the same question over and over again in a heckling manner? Is there some point when he would transform into a heckler and become vulnerable to a future senator’s grappling takedown? ---
**Author:** ![Richard\_Parker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/35a633/32.png) [@Richard\_Parker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Richard_Parker)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2017, 7:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-candidate-who-assaulted-reporter-is-fine-with-us/787443/256 "2017-05-27T19:35:41Z")
I’m happy to let criminal law be the dividing line. Franken was privileged to use the force he used. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2017, 8:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-candidate-who-assaulted-reporter-is-fine-with-us/787443/257 "2017-05-27T20:08:14Z")
> [@drad\_dog](#): > > “All lives matter” was a response to Black Lives Matter, and accompanied the accusations against them, complete with invective and fake news etc. Basically saying that _ **they** _ were mutually exclusive, and that it was racist to say Black Lives Matter. Was that you? In that case it was “you either believe that all lives matter or you don’t.” I don’t recall taking a position on the issue. Perhaps reading my words on the matter would refresh my recollection as to my thinking. Can you provide a link to my words? > [@](#): > > Or you can admit that BLM was a legitimate response to events in the real world, to which “All lives matter” was a cowardly, inadequate and cruel taunt. I agree that “Black Lives Matter,” is a legitimate response to events in the real world. But I don’t necessarily agree that “all lives matter,” was a cowardly, inadequate and cruel taunt. Perhaps it arose from the same wellspring that believed “pro-life” should mean “pro-government health insurance,” which is simply the desire to parse the literal words and not the term of art that meant the movement. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2017, 8:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-candidate-who-assaulted-reporter-is-fine-with-us/787443/258 "2017-05-27T20:09:19Z")
> [@Richard\_Parker](#): > > I’m happy to let criminal law be the dividing line. Franken was privileged to use the force he used. Will you withdraw you critique of Gianforte if he’s not criminally convicted? ---
**Author:** ![Ramira](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ramira/32/344_2.png) [@Ramira](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ramira)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2017, 8:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-candidate-who-assaulted-reporter-is-fine-with-us/787443/259 "2017-05-27T20:09:49Z")
This is one of the most boring stupid gotchya game exchanges in a long time. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2017, 8:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-candidate-who-assaulted-reporter-is-fine-with-us/787443/260 "2017-05-27T20:16:03Z")
> [@Richard\_Parker](#): > > I’m happy to let criminal law be the dividing line. Franken was privileged to use the force he used. What do you mean by “privileged”? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-candidate-who-assaulted-reporter-is-fine-with-us/787443.md?page=12) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-candidate-who-assaulted-reporter-is-fine-with-us/787443.md?page=14)