Old O'Donnell bought the farm

The dark before the dawn? Hindrocket at PowerLine notes something we happened to catch during early-morning reruns:

Many readers have emailed us to say that on tonight's Scarborough Country, MSNBC "Senior Political Analyst" Lawrence O'Donnell went more or less insane. John O'Neill was on the program, and Pat Buchanan was subbing for Scarborough. Apparently O'Donnell went completely nuts, screaming "Liar! Liar!" at O'Neill, who kept his temper despite O'Donnell's raving. Our readers say it was the most bizarre incident in a frequently surreal campaign season.

It occurred to us that O'Donnell had seen the light -- the blinding light -- of a Bush landslide and was unable to deal with it: Gasp! Oh, no. Not that. Being unable to reconcile such a turn of events to his world view -- "No one I know would ever vote for Bush" -- he short circuited, revealing for all to see the robotic Kerry shill that he and his MSM fellow travelers are, pre-programmed to reduce everything to the anti-Bush mantra of "Lies and the lying liars who tell them."

Update: The blogosphere is all over this story:
O'Donnell vs. O'Neill at The Jawa Report
Lawrence O'Donnell and Liberals Unhinged at Michelle Malkin's
The O'Donnell Factor at Right on Red
Lawrence O'Donnell lost it at PoliPundit
Lawrence O'Donnell is losing it at Wizbang

Guest host Pat Buchanan made a joke about how O'Donnell was an MSNBC analyst -- at least until the end of the show. Our guess is that the network will use O'Donnell's self-immolation -- just as they did Chris Matthews's implosion when Zell Miller challenged him to a duel during the Republican National Convention -- as sound/graphic bites in their next ad campaign.

Comments

[Jack Deth]

I'd read about Mr. O'Donnell's extremely un-professional and peruile shout down attempt last night at FreeRepublic.

Then I watched the late night repeat of 'Scarborough Counrty'.

Mr. O'Donnell's vein bulging behavior just goes beyond words!

Throughout his loud uncivil screed, I did not hear Mr. O'Donnell mention a single name, date, newspaper or show that claimed credit for 'debunking' Mr. O'Neill and the SwiftBoat Vets' claims.

To Mr. O'Neill's splendid credit. This was an exemplary case of the old lawyer's adage "When you have the facts. Pound the facts. When you don't have the facts. Pound the table!"

Jack.

[Sissy Willis]

I LOVE your old saw! Thanks for stopping by, Jack.

[Hunter]

- The Dem majority understand they've been bamboozled into backing a total left wing-nut feckless loser from the 70's. They're panicky because they just don't want to face the situation and they don't know what to do about it. They thought this was going to be "their year" after what they saw was a massive screwup with Gore in 2000....

- The wheels are coming off their wagon, and its a bitter pill to swallow. I wouldn't be surprised to see some protestor actions that get so far over the line there will be voter-booth rioting and mob scenes along with police barricades and mass jailings. The left needs to be brought back down to earth and into the American mainstream again. They have spent too much time snarfing on bongs and reading their own braindead rhetoric....

- Some of it has already started with raids on Republican headquarters ( some 18 occurences at last count ) and bullying and in-your-face interference at early polling places...

- Might have to think about taking a ballbat with you when you vote and going as a group for safety...Sad sad situation that we are acting like this. Must be looking pretty bad in the eyes of the world....

[Harvard classmate]

And they say that male menopause is a myth! It is interesting to note that the words and invections that Madame O'Donnell used against Mr. O'Neill only highlighted the character gap between the two. Even if you just landed on this planet, you could assess the arrogance and the fear on the part of Mr. O'Donnell. The arrogance that he, a fifty-year-old enlightened opponent of Vietnam could ever learn ANYTHING from a man stupid enough to go to war, reduced him to juvenile name calling; yet the fear that the audience might have a different opinion, predicated on his own subconscious evaluation of the merits of a good and humble man, John O'Neill, made him UNABLE TO STOP. The person who could not bear to listen to John O'Neill was Lawrence O'Donnell. Mr. O'Donnell must not have heard the noise from the World Trade Center as it fell or the sobs of their families. He may not have visited the Arizona and imagined the sounds of a long ago Sunday; he wanted the words and the noise and the sounds to go away. But those of us who are fifty and not so burdened by menopause, male or otherwise, know that our children hear them, and remember. It is our children who painted flags on their dormroom walls, sent packages to our troops and had goodbye parties for their friends who volunteered, headed to a place that Mr. O'Donnell openly scorns, but secretly fears. Our children will fight for this country. Every generation believes that war is something to study from the past and avoid at all cost, but this generation knows they must be ever vigilant. John Kerry's appeal is that he gives the coward stature
and confirms to the weak that no war is ever worth the cost of war. But John Kerry forgets that the sounds of torture in the prisons in the seventies were sounds that he helped with his words from home, just like John Kerry scorns the loss of those ever so young Iraqis executed in the dirt today, blaming it on poor military planning. They too are dying by the words uttered by Kerry, now the political candidate, that this is the wrong war, thereby encouraging terrorists to step up the terror to prove him right. Think of their parents, Mr. Kerry and Mr. O'Donnell, who will cherish them for trying to free their country from torture, and see if both of you can drown out the sounds of the John O'Neills of this world, who will not be silenced.

[jhow66]

Typical bootlicking,apeasing asskissing,whining, cowardly far left "libby" reponse. All "libbys" must be taught from the same script (somebody has to tell them what to say!) as they all sound like a broken record.

[Carol Hoffman]

I watched the show that evening when O'Donnell went ballistic and immediately emailed Joe Scarborough and MSNBC so if they got enough complaints, maybe someone will finally see O'Donnell for what he is - a tyrant who interrupts, talks over the tops of guests and is rude, rude, rude.

The show where he got outrageously snotty about Mary Cheney having been dropped into the debate was so bad I wondered if O'Donnell is gay himself and again wrote to Joe, pondering about it. He continued to scream that Mary was fair game and what was all the hallaballoo about. O'Donnell claimed it was perfectly okay for Kerry and Edwards to "use" her.

O'Donnell got the job via relatives, etc. I'd be happy if he got fired.