Tina Fey strode onstage at the Kennedy Center last week to accept the Mark Twain Award. During her acceptance speech, she blistered Sarah Palin.
She said: “And, you know, politics aside, the success of Sarah Palin and women like her is good for all women - except, of course –those who will end up, you know, like, paying for their own rape ‘kit ‘n’ stuff, But for everybody else, it’s a win-win. Unless you’re a gay woman who wants to marry your partner of 20 years - whatever. But for most women, the success of conservative women is good for all of us. Unless you believe in evolution. You know - actually, I take it back. The whole thing’s a disaster.”
Classy!
If you were watching the broadcast of the event on PBS Sunday night, however, you would not have heard those vicious remarks. Here’s what you would have heard instead:
“I would be a liar and an idiot if I didn’t thank Sarah Palin for helping get me here tonight. My partial resemblance and her crazy voice are the two luckiest things that ever happened to me. All kidding aside, I’m so proud to represent American humor, I am proud to be an American, and I am proud to make my home in the ‘not real’ America. And I am most proud that during trying times, like an orange [terror] alert, a bad economy or a contentious election that we as a nation retain our sense of humor.”
Milder, indeed. Less provocative and jerky too.
So: why would PBS edit Tina Fey by taking out her most pointed attacks on Palin? After all, PBS is a Far-Left outfit whose execs probably laughed up a storm when they heard Fey deliver those lines live. They claim they did it for time: the show ran 19 minutes over and they needed to trim to get it broadcast-ready.
Of course, the real reason they did it was because the Corporation of Public Broadcasting (CPB)—the parent company of both PBS and NPR—is under the gun after NPR’s absurd firing of Juan Williams. Newly empowered Republicans are gunning for the CPB, threatening to eliminate all of its public funding. (This, of course, should have been done long ago.) PBS didn’t want to give them any more ammunition, so they sliced and diced Tina Fey’s remarks to keep them as bland as possible.
Nothing to see here, Republicans! Move along.
If they’ve got any spine, the GOP will move to kill the taxpayer funding that goes to the CPB anyway. And if they don’t do it now, I’m sure President Palin will be happy to.
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