Hardball provides another Bush 43 surrogate a platform from which to assault reality

Ok, just a few days ago we saw Ari Fleischer - here and here - on Hardball shamelessly attempting to revise reality in order to spin the legacy of George W. Bush. The most outrageous lie pushed by Fleischer, among many, was his slimy insinuation that Saddam Hussein was behind the 9/11 attacks and that the invasion of Iraq prevented Hussein from attacking the United States again.

That was Wednesday. On Thursday, Matthews had on Frank Gaffney who proceeded to spread the neoconservative conspiracy theory that Saddam Hussein was the mastermind of the Oklahoma City bombing, as well as the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, and just about every terrorist attack on the United States over the last 20 years. This was the same drivel that fanatical liar Michael Ledeen was busy spreading four hours after the 9/11 attacks to start the propaganda case for war with Iraq.

Why is Hardball giving someone like Gaffney a platform in the first place? Shouldn't promotion of outright falsehoods - especially falsehoods that have contributed to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people - earn someone a timeout from serious political discourse? It's long been clear that Gaffney is a propagandist whose appearances on tv or elsewhere only serves to promote reality revision.

Also: shouldn't generating lies in order to argue for putting political opponents to death also merit a tv timeout? Why is such extremism and dishonesty rewarded with more tv time?

Frank Gaffney, one of the country's most influential and well-connected neoconservatives, has a column in today's Washington Times in which he argues that the debate taking place in Congress over the war in Iraq constitutes treason. Gaffney specifically argues that the condemnations of Douglas Feith from Sen. Rockefeller Levin "really should be a hanging offense."

Gaffney begins his column by purporting to quote Abraham Lincoln. Gaffney claims that Lincoln said:

Congressmen who willfully take actions during wartime that damage morale and undermine the military are saboteurs and should be arrested, exiled, or hanged.

This quote has become a favorite weapon for those who want to criminalize criticism of the Leader and the War. Jack Murtha's opponent in the last election, Diana Irey, cited this quote while discussing Murtha's opposition to the war.

But this quote is completely invented. Lincoln never said it. This "quote" was first attributed to Lincoln by J. Michael Waller in Insight Magazine, in a 2003 article revealingly entitled: Democrats Usher in an Age of Treason. But as Waller himself now admits, the quote attributed to Lincoln is completely fraudulent.