Gibbons apologizes on camera for aired 'communist' remark

[NVMojo]

Our Nevada Republican Congressman who wants to run for Nevada Governor next year ...

Rep. Jim Gibbons, R-Nev., stared straight into a television camera Wednesday and apologized for referring to opponents of corporate-funded presidential inauguration parties as communists, a remark that was aired nationally last month by NBC.

In an interview on "Face to Face With Jon Ralston," which was broadcast on Las Vegas ONE Cox Cable channel 19, Gibbons said he shouldn't have made the remark that aired Jan. 19 on NBC's "Nightly News With Brian Williams."

NBC reported on critics who have said that corporate donations for inaugurations represent a way to buy influence with President Bush and the Republican Party. On the subject of corporate donations for inaugural parties, Gibbons told NBC reporter Lisa Myers: "Anybody who is against that obviously must be a communist."

At the time critics blasted the remark, with one calling it "absurd" and "ridiculous."

Gibbons hadn't directly addressed the criticism himself until Wednesday when he told Ralston that while he shouldn't have made the remark, it was also taken out of context.

"Well, should I have said that? You know, no," Gibbons said. "I mean it was a statement that wasn't actually played properly back because we were talking about those people that supported democracy and I said, 'If you're opposed to democracy and these people are opposing democracy, then they must be communists.'

more....

http://www.lasvegassun.com/sunbin/stories/sun/2005/feb/24/518346204.html

[BrklynLiberal]

1. sputter, sputter, out of context, blah blah blah. Riiight.

[uhhuh]

2. Another Non-apology Apology

And not everyone opposed to democracy is a communist, and most communists are in favor of democracy.

People who oppose democracy:

Monarchists

Theocrats

Fascists

Oligarchs

Communists, not so much.

[MissMarple]

3. Eww.. politicians shouldn't be throwing around those labels like that.

Fascist, communist, liberal, etc. It's just going be a hornet's nest. Now regular folks, we can call them as we see them. And he sounds like a little fascist twit, or maybe he's just a dimwit, or even an old whore.

Now was that name calling? Well, perhaps he just isn't thinking clearly. If I didn't believe people aren't for hitting, I say he needs a whack up side the head.

What is wrong with Nevada?

Many apologies to Harry and his supporters. We are grateful you live in Nevada.

[Judi Lynn]

4. The man's an idiot. Quick grab from google names him "Porker of the Month"

Rep. Jim Gibbons is Porker of the Month for December '03



(Washington, D.C.)-Citizens Against Government Waste (CAGW) today named Representative Jim Gibbons (R-Nev.) as its December 2003 Porker of the Month for throwing a life-preserver to a hometown project by earmarking $225,000 in the fiscal 2004 Consolidated Appropriations Act for a local swimming pool. The spending bill, known as the Omnibus, combines seven of the 13 spending bills, totaling $820 billion. It passed the House filled with thousands of earmarks, but none that floated to the surface as quickly as Rep. Gibbons' request.

Rep. Gibbons requested the money to help repair a 61-year-old public swimming pool a block from where he grew up in Sparks, Nevada. In the 1950s, he and some of his friends clogged the drain with tadpoles which caused the pool to temporarily shut down. Rep. Gibbons finally admitted responsibility for the incident, known as the "Polliwog Caper," last year. If only every American had the opportunity to spend federal tax dollars to appease their guilt and atone for the sins of their childhood.

Diving head first into the deep end, Rep. Gibbons defended his pork by telling the Associated Press, "I cannot think of a better way to spend $225,000 than to give the children of Sparks a swimming pool." Apparently, Rep. Gibbons has forgotten about the record budget deficit and the war on terror.

Rep. Gibbons further justified his actions by claiming that if he did not request money for the pool, federal money would just go to a pool in a different part of the country....
(snip/...)

http://www.cagw.org/site/News2?JServSessionIdr012=g0ubvcjcl1.app23a&page=NewsArticle&id=8110

[DRoseDARs]

6. The city of Sparks probably could have raised the money themselves...

...seeing as they've engaged in a revitalization project of sorts over recent years ... and Reno is busy digging a big trench. :eyes: While I understand Mr. Gibbon's gesture, that money definitely could have been better spent elsewhere.

[NVMojo]

7. That is too true! This was done because this jerk wants to run for Guv

and his wife wants to run for his seat ...The Dems in Nevada had better get their heads out of the dark place soon or we get him for Governor. He adores George W. and still comes to our towns and spews out how there were WMD and he has photos showing them leaving Iraq just as we were arriving for our invasion....

[Vladimir]

5. Getting called a communist shouldn't be seen as an insult... n/t

[librechik]

8. crook and con man

reading lines from the National Encyclopedia of Koolaid.

These greaser dinosaurs are right out of 1955.

[gratuitous]

9. Gee, it only took him five weeks

And then he "apologized" for the show taking his comments out of context. "Ignore that videotape. See, what I really meant was . . ."

Two-faced candy-ass ignoramus. But it's probably a sure ticket to the governor's mansion in Nevada, where they voted another term for Stupidhead after he lied in their faces about the nuclear waste repository.