Transcript from “Hannity & Colmes”

 
Nov. 18, 2008  

ALAN COLMES, CO-HOST: Let me ask you very quickly. You’ve said you were concerned during the campaign that Obama had anti-American views. You said the news media should do a penetrating exposé and take a look at the views of the people in Congress and find out if they’re pro- or anti-America.

MICHELE BACHMANN (R), MINNESOTA CONGRESSWOMAN: Actually, that’s not what I said at all.

COLMES: Well, I’m just — I’m reading your exact quote.

BACHMANN: Actually that’s not what I said. It’s an urban legend that was created. That isn’t what I said at all.

COLMES: We have — it’s on tape. I have the tape on my Web site, Alan.com.

BACHMANN: What I called on, Alan …

COLMES: Yes?

BACHMANN: … was for the mainstream media to do their job. They failed to vet Barack Obama the way that they had John McCain. And that’s what I was calling for.

COLMES: Your exact words were “take a great look at the views of the people in Congress, find out if they’re pro-America or anti-America.” Do you really want that kind of …

BACHMANN: Well, what I said is that I’m not qualified to say whether members’ views are pro- or anti-American. That’s not my job to do that.

COLMES: But you want it looked into by the media.

BACHMANN: The mainstream media needs — no, what I — that’s not at all what I said. What I was talking about is the mainstream media doing their job.

COLMES: Should the media do a penetrating exposé and take a look at the views of people in Congress, find out if they’re anti-America or pro-America? What would you say?

BACHMANN: Well, and what I said is do your job. That’s what it came down to.

COLMES: All right, Congresswoman.

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Related video

Hannity & Colmes interview with Bachmann (08:38)

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LOCAL REPORTS

Liberal in the Land of Conservative

Bachmann on Urban Legends (01:59)

Dump Bachmann

Strib printed story about Bachmann without SPIN! (03:20)

Star Tribune

Rep. Michele Bachmann Offers a New Explanation: ‘Urban Legend’

By Kevin Diaz
Nov. 20, 2008

Excerpts

Rep. Michele Bachmann, appearing Tuesday night on Fox News’ show with Sean Hannity and Alan Colmes, dismissed as an “urban legend” reports that she had suggested on a preelection cable show with MSNBC’s Chris Matthews that then-Sen. Barack Obama and other members of Congress may be “anti-American” and that the media should investigate them as such. …

Resident Fox liberal Alan Colmes, who read a transcript of Bachmann’s “anti-American” quote from her appearance on MSNBC, offered to have her watch the video clip of her remarks on his own website. …

Bachmann, who has become a regular conservative commentator on television talk shows in recent months, reserved some of her sharpest barbs for the Senate race recount process in Minnesota, where Franken has sought review of some rejected absentee ballots.

“He wants to stuff the ballot box with rejected ballots,” said Bachmann, adding that the dispute “calls into question what the record is and who’s watching the books.”

Her comments about the fairness of the recount seemed at odds with those of GOP Gov. Tim Pawlenty as well as with Coleman himself. They have both expressed confidence in the recount process in recent days, though some campaign and GOP officials have criticized Franken’s aggressive lawyering in the recount.

Bachmann’s appearance also represented a change in tone from her most recent remarks about President-elect Obama. On Nov. 6, two days after the election, Bachmann was quoted in Politico saying she was “extremely grateful that we have an African-American who won this year.” …

Those remarks were widely seen as an attempt to soften her preelection criticism of Obama, including her remarks on Matthews’ “Hardball” show that the Illinois Democrat “may have anti-American views” and that reporters should investigate whether other Democrats may be “anti-America.”

Reminded of those remarks by Colmes on Tuesday night, Bachmann suggested, as she has before, that she was baited and trapped by the media, which created an “urban legend” about what she says she really said. …

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TERRORISM UPDATE

Video

New al-Qaida tape criticizes Obama (MSNBC, Nov. 19, 2008) — A new audio message from al-Qaida’s No. 2 leader, Ayman al-Zawahiri, criticizes President-elect Barack Obama and his support of Israel. MSNBC terror analyst Roger Cressey discusses. (02:17)

Video

Al-Qaida terrorists don’t like Obama (MSNBC, Nov. 19, 2008) – Al-Qaida’s number two in charge described Barack Obama with racial slurs and questioned his honor. MSNBC terrorism analyst, Roger Cressey, examines the hidden meanings in the new message from the terror network. (04:49)

Al-Qaida No. 2 Insults Obama with Race Epithet

Nov. 19, 2008

CAIRO, Egypt — Al-Qaida’s No. 2 leader slurred Barack Obama with a demeaning racial term for a black American who does the bidding of whites in a new Web message posted Wednesday.

Ayman al-Zawahri’s speech was al-Qaida’s first reaction to Obama’s election victory — and it suggested the terror network is worried the new American leader could undermine its rallying cry that the United States is an enemy oppressor.

Obama has been welcomed by many in the Middle East who hope he will end what they see as American aggression against Muslims and Arabs under President George W. Bush. Some believe his race and Muslim family connections could make him more understanding of the developing world’s concerns.

Al-Zawahri … said Obama was the “direct opposite of honorable black Americans” like Malcolm X, the 1960s Muslim African-American rights leader, who is known among some in the Arab world and seen as a symbol of anti-imperialism.

Al-Zawahri also called Obama — along with secretaries of state Colin Powell and Condoleezza Rice — “house Negroes.” …

Malcolm X used the term to criticize black leaders he accused of not standing up to whites and discrimination. …

The 11-minute, 23-second video featured an audio message by al-Zawahri, played over a still image of the al-Qaida No. 2.

The video graphics underlined the contrast al-Zawahri aimed to show: On one side of the screen was a photo of Obama wearing a Jewish skullcap and meeting Jewish leaders. On the other side was a photo of Malcolm X praying in a mosque. …

Jeremy Binnie, an analyst with Jane’s Terrorism and Insurgency Center, said al-Zawahri’s message suggests al-Qaida leaders are worried “that Obama could be effective in rebuilding America’s image.”

“They hated Bush, but Bush was good for them in many ways because he was such a polarizing figure. But Obama seems at the moment to be a more uniting figure,” Binnie said. “Al-Qaida very much would like the U.S. to stay with its old policies that put it in opposition to much of the Muslim world.”

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“Bin Laden’s Brain”

The Abrasively Negativistic Personality
of Dr. Ayman al-Zawahiri

Aubrey Immelman and Kathryn Kuhlmann
Saint John’s University and the College of Saint Benedict
Unit for the Study of Personality in Politics

June 2002

Abstract

The report presents the results of an indirect assessment of the personality of Ayman al-Zawahiri.

Information concerning al-Zawahiri was collected from open-source media reports and synthesized into a personality profile using the second edition of the Millon Inventory of Diagnostic Criteria (MIDC), which yields 34 normal and maladaptive personality classifications congruent with Axis II of DSM-IV.

The personality profile yielded by the MIDC was analyzed on the basis of interpretive guidelines provided in the MIDC and Millon Index of Personality Styles manuals. Al-Zawahiri’s primary personality patterns were found to be Contentious/oppositional and Dominant/controlling, with secondary features of the Dauntless/dissenting and Ambitious/self-serving patterns.

The amalgam of Contentious (negativistic, or passive-aggressive) and Dominant (aggressive, or sadistic) patterns in al-Zawahiri’s profile suggests the presence of Millon’s “abrasive negativist” syndrome. For these personalities, minor frictions easily exacerbate into major confrontations and power struggles. They are quick to spot inconsistencies in others actions or ethical standards and adept at constructing arguments that amplify observed contradictions. They characteristically take the moral high ground, dogmatically and contemptuously expose their antagonists’ perceived hypocrisy, and contemptuously, derisively, and scornfully turn on those who cross their path.

The major implication of the study is that it offers an empirically based personological framework for conceptualizing Ayman al-Zawahiri’s antagonistic negativism, single-minded commitment to a cause, inflammatory rhetoric, and forceful persuasiveness — qualities instrumental in Osama bin Laden’s insidious campaign to propagate diabolical enemy images of the West as a catalyst for incubating a political culture contrived to inculcate religious extremism in the Islamic world.