The Media Research Center lets its hypocrisy on taking people out of context show again.
A Sept. 1 NewsBusters post by Rusty Weiss carries the headline “Liberal Media Takes Quote Completely Out of Context to Paint Romney as Out of Touch.” Weiss complained that a quote of Mitt Romney telling Hurricane Isaac victims could “go home and call 211” “has been taken grossly out of context.”
But the MRC complains only when conservatives and Republicans are taken out of context and actively works to take liberals, and especially President Obama, out of context — most recently Obama’s “you didn’t build that” remark.
That happened again in an Aug. 29 MRC TimesWatch item by Clay Waters that ridiculed a New York Times writer for doing what Weiss did — put words in their proper context.
Waters complained that the Times writer accurately described Obama’s remarks as being “selectively edited” by Republicans and that Obama was actually talking about “roads and bridges.” Waters responded by playing the grammar card he has previously played: “If eloquent Obama meant ‘roads and bridges,’ why did he employ the plural ‘those’ instead of the singular ‘that’?”
Slate’s David Weigel has previously shot down the grammar-police argument, which requires, yes, putting Obama’s words in their full context.