Hoffa Blusters...Tea Party Runs Behind The Screen Door

Right-wing bloggers misled by dishonest Fox News video editing are attacking Teamsters President James Hoffa for supposedly urging violence against Tea Party activists during a Labor Day speech. Conservatives are also attacking President Obama, who appeared at the event, for "sanctioning violence against fellow Americans" by failing to denounce Hoffa. But fuller context included in other Fox segments makes clear that Hoffa wasn't calling for violence but was actually urging the crowd to vote out Republican members of Congress.

During the segment that the bloggers have latched onto, Fox edited out the bolded portion of Hoffa's comments:

Quote:

HOFFA: Everybody here's got to vote. If we go back and keep the eye on the prize, let's take these son of a bitches out and give America back to America where we belong! Thank you very much!

In an initial report on Hoffa's speech at 1 p.m. on Fox News, Ed Henry reported that Hoffa said that "we'll remember in November who's with the working people" and "said of the Tea Party and of Republicans, 'let's take these sons of bitches out.'"

Henry made clear during that segment that Hoffa's comments were references to voting out Republican members of Congress, not to violence. And roughly 20 minutes later, he explained on Twitter that the "full quote" of the "take these son of a bitches out" comment is "Everybody here's got to vote. If we go back & keep the eye on the prize, let's take these sons of bitches out":

But in a second segment that ran at roughly the same time as Henry's tweet, Fox News dishonestly edited the speech in the manner seen above. Andrew Breitbart's Big sites, Real Clear Politics, The Daily Caller, the Media Research Center, and the Drudge Report have all highlighted that footage, using it to condemn "the violence emanating from union thug bosses" and demand that Obama "denounce" the comments.

In the Fox News segment that included the dishonestly cropped video, Republican consultant Brad Blakeman decried the comments as "thuggery at its best" and "the kind of remarks you'd expect out of Tony Soprano," and commented that "when a union president says 'let's take these sons of bitches out,' that usually means someone's legs are going to get broken, somebody's going to disappear." Meanwhile, anchor Megyn Kelly somehow did not mention Henry's previous explanation that the comments were references to voting Republicans out of office.

Andrew Breitbart operative and CNN contributor Dana Loesch quickly followed up the attack on Twitter, claiming soon after the Fox segment and Henry tweet that Hoffa "threatens tea party voters" and that if Obama "doesn't condemn then he is sanctioning violence against fellow Americans by silence":

In light of the past year, he should not have the used the words "take them out' in any context.

for them not to have harped on and on about 2nd. amendment solutions, being locked and loaded, etc. and then suddenly becoming shocked and indignant when someone addressed them in their accustomed manner would go a long way towards not thinking them pussies. I'm a little guy, not much to me physically and I've spent my lifetime dealing with people like that who think they can talk tough and try to impose themselves on me by it. In EVERY case, when I've pushed back they've backed down. I may not be a political analyst with a degree but I know a bully when I see one and I know they're like balloons. One pop and they collapse. In addition if the Tea Party is separate from the GOP then why do they enter GOP races and primaries and use the GOP organization to yell from behind? Why not just stand on their own like the big brave mavericks they style themselves as? I haven't seen a Tea Party box on any ballots.