Below is the exact quotes from a conversation taken from Bill Maher's show "Real Time"on March 2, 2007. Now that you've read it how does what Maher really said jive with the onslaught of statements that the right wing bloggers and talk show hosts are saying about Bill Maher? The commentators on the right are having a field day attempting to put Maher in the same category as Ann Coulter who is more and more being seen by many as a mouthpiece on the far right fringe of reality. I disagree totally with this perspective that tries to even the score by making Maher a scourge of the decade eventhough I agree I am very biased against Cheney as is Maher. All Maher really said at first was "But I have zero doubt that if Dick Cheney was not in power, people" and only when pushed by Scarbourough, if one takes Maher's later quote at face value, and they should is that "if Cheney did die, ---more people would live. Cheney is a major architect of the Iraq Wari, a failed corrupt War in which 655,000 Iraqis have died and more than 4000 of our troops have died and they continue to die and thousands get and continue to get maimed. I'm glad someone said it like it is. Besides all this, it was Joe Scarborough, hardly a lefty who brought the whole issue up and actually used the words " if Dick Cheney had been blown up and you didn't say"( cut off) attempting to lead Maher into his right wing trap. If anyone is culpable of starting a "fire in crowded theater", it is Scarborough, Right? Comments!!!!
Sharon Raphael
from Bill Maher's show "Real Time"on March 2, 2007.
"MAHER: [overlapping] But I have zero doubt that if Dick Cheney was not in power, people wouldn’t be dying needlessly tomorrow. [applause]
RIDLEY: Okay, but—[voices overlap under applause]
SCARBOROUGH: But, let’s talk – let’s talk about your show for a second, very quickly. If somebody on this panel said they wished that Dick Cheney had been blown up, and you didn’t say—
FRANK: I think he did. [laughter]
SCARBOROUGH: Okay, did you say--?
MAHER: No. No, I quoted that.
FRANK: You don’t? Oh, you don’t believe that?
MAHER: No, I’m just saying that if he did die—
SCARBOROUGH: [laughter] Okay, but if – oh, let’s just say—
MAHER: [overlapping]—other people – more people would live. That’s a fact."
Now on that site, Maher writes: "On Saturday, the Web site NewsBusters.org posted a story under the headline ‘Bill Maher Sorry the Assassination Attempt on Dick Cheney Failed.’ "There’s just one problem: As a fair reading of the show’s transcript makes clear, I never said those words... "Don’t get me wrong: I’ve never joined the Dick Cheney Fan Club. But what I said Friday – and what I believe – is that the Vice President has presided over a bungled execution of a war in which thousands of our bravest continue to die. And I believe that were he not in power, our troops would likely come home sooner. But I don’t wish him dead.”
