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The MRC Wants Jimmy Kimmel to Shut Up

The late-night host has some opinions on things near and dear to his heart, and the Media Research Center doesn't like it. At all.

By Terry Krepel
Posted 10/12/2017


Jimmy Kimmel

The Media Research Center thinks entertainers should only entertain -- especially if they're anywhere close to being liberal. (Outspoken conservative entertainers like Charlie Daniels, meanwhile, get their own column at the MRC's "news" division, CNSNews.com.)

So when ABC late-night host Jimmy Kimmel used his show to call out the Graham-Cassidy plan to dismantle the Affordable Care Act for, among other things, making it permissible for states to eliminate coverage for pre-existing conditions -- inspired to do so by his son's congenital heart condition -- it was not surprising that the MRC's first reaction was to send Nicholas Fondacaro to

pen a lengthy tirade attacking the "tirade" he claimed Kimmel made and declaring that Kimmel was "politicizing his son’s medical condition to push for socialized medicine." He also took Kimmel's self-deprecating joke about himself as only an expert on eating pizza and tried to turn it into an insult.

In the process, Fondacaro selectively edited out from the transcript he used much of Kimmel actually said about the Graham-Cassidy plan opening the door to elimination of pre-existing condition coverage, and Sen. Bill Cassidy's promise to him that any health care plan he backs would not do that.

Fondacaro also stuck to regurgitating Republican talking points about the plan, insisting that the millions who would lose coverage under it would be "primarily driven by people CHOOSING not to purchase healthcare." Fondacaro went on to rant:

In a cry of desperation for socialized medicine, he championed the health care systems of other countries: “It’s unbelievable. Somehow Japan, England, and Canada, and Germany, France, they all figured healthcare out. And don’t say they have terrible healthcare because it’s just not true.”

But the pizza eating expert was 100 percent wrong on what good health care looked like around the world. All one has to do was look at the case of newborn Charlie Gard. Because of healthcare rationing, a British court put him on a long path to death because they didn’t want to waste their resources on him or allow the family to take him to America for treatment.

We're still waiting to see if Kimmel agrees with that aspect of socialized medicine if that were his son.

Fondacaro didn't mention that Gard suffered from an extremely rare genetic disease for which there is no known cure; Kimmel's son suffers from a much less rare heart defect that can be repaired through open-heart surgery.

The clear intent of Fondacaro and the MRC here was to shut up Kimmel before his attacks on Graham-Cassidy gained any traction, but the whole MRC crew was soon reduced to whining about the attention it got:

  • Curtis Houck whined that CNN's Chris Cillizza failed to "fact-check" Kimmel.
  • Fondacaro once again huffed that Kimmel went on an "anti-GOP tirade" and "was willing [sic] politicizing his son’s medical condition."
  • Curtis Houck wrote a piece with the blaring headline "Ben Shapiro Eviscerates Jimmy Kimmel’s Health Care Tirades; ‘Egregious’ to Exploit His Son," complaining that Kimmel went on an "emotion-driven push to socialize health care."
  • When Graham-Cassidy failed after key Republicans failed to support it, Kyle Drennen attacked anyone who credited Kimmel for its failure.

Finally, Tim Graham whined that Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer was among those who helped Kimmel respond to Graham-Cassidy: "ABC is being used for Democrat propaganda, and then wonders: why won't people see us as fair and balanced? Why do people call us 'fake news'?" Not only does Graham fail to identify anything Kimmel said that was "fake" or "propaganda," he apparently thinks that a late-night talk show is "news."

Right-wing movie critic Christian Toto then popped up to talk about something other than reviewing movies, declaring that Kimmel working with Schumer is an example of how the entertainment industry "routinely works hand in hand with the Democrats to craft messages, embed talking points in their product and pray they change some hearts and/or minds in the process." Toto, however, doesn't disprove anything Kimmel said.

Round 2: Las Vegas

If the MRC was angry when Kimmel spoke out against that mess of a Republican health care plan, it was in full-on rage mode when Kimmel reacted to the mass shooting in Las Vegas.

As he did last time, the Fondacaro went on an unprofessional, random-boldface-laden tirade that was even more mean-spirited and personally insulting than the last:

The liberal media’s favorite late night shill and self-described pizza eating expert, Jimmy Kimmel used his show the day after the mass shooting in Las Vegas, Nevada to push for gun control while smearing Congressional Republicans for helping to cause the bloodshed. “They should be praying for God to forgive them for letting the gun lobby run this country because it’s so crazy,” the emotional Kimmel exclaimed to his audience.

“I’ve been reading comments from people who say this is terrible but there’s nothing we can do about it. But I disagree with that intensely because, of course, there is something we can do about it. There are a lot of things we can do about it. But we don’t,” he began.

SPOILER ALERT: Everything he claimed would have stopped the attack either wouldn’t have or was just him lying.

According to Fondacaro, Kimmel was "emotional," "ranting," told "lies," lives in a "warped reality," and "hadn’t done any actual research outside of ingesting and regurgitating Democratic Party talking points," ultimately whining that "There’s no doubt that the liberal media will hold Kimmel up as the darling sensible voice for tumultuous times." Well, there was certainly nothing sensible coming out of Fondacaro's mean-spirited mouth.

That was followed by Kristine Marsh bashing media praise of Kimmel's "emotional monologue," which was really a "political plea" that was "reciting the liberal media's gun control script," praising her colleague Fondacaro for "debunking the skewed facts and outright lies the comedic host helped spread to millions of Americans who may not know any better."Marsh concluded with a tirade of her own: "With the help of the media promoting his propagandizing on their own daytime news shows, it’s no wonder the entertainer is now treated as a policy expert rather than what he actually is, a comedian who is aiding the left-wing media's mission to mislead viewers on this difficult subject."

Neither Fondacaro nor Marsh mentioned the reason Kimmel had justification for being a little emotional: He's a native of Las Vegas.

Then, Curtis Houck dedicated a lengthy post to summarizing how "conservative star and podcast host Ben Shapiro obliterating [sic] the ABC late-night host on Tuesday for an 'abhorrent,' 'gross,' and 'nasty' gun control rant touting confiscation and mauling those against his views as monstrous."

And because they never miss an opportunity to sneer at a TV personality who declines to spout right-wing orthodoxy, Tim Graham and Brent Bozell huffed that Kimmel's monologue "might as well have been brought to you by speechwriters from the office of Senator Charles Schumer." Again, no mention of Kimmel's personal stake in the issue.

Graham then went solo to spew more hate at Kimmel, screeching at CNN's Bill Carter for calling Kimmel a reluctant everyman spokesman, highlighting his "estimated net worth: $35 million" and security detail and whining that "Having your own late-night show on ABC and using it for liberal sermons defines the Hollywood elite."

Marsh returned to cheer a right-wing artist's immature (or, according to her, "provocative") mocking of Kimmel for being emotional about the shootings and mockingly renaming his show the "Jimmy Kimmel Estrogen Hour" -- no mention, of course, of Kimmel's personal stake. Marsh lashed out not at the juvenile smear -- apparently, Marsh believes that real men don't get upset at the slaughter of dozens of people at a concert -- but at Kimmel for responding to it and making a "virtue-signaling" statement.

For some reason, loyal MRC apparatchik Dan Gainor also felt it was appropriate to attack Kimmel's manhood over expressing some emotion over the senseless deaths of dozens of people in his hometown -- that's apparently not permitted at the MRC -- sneering that "Jimmy Kimmel (D-Women on Trampolines) went on his show doing a remake of '9,999,999 Tears' and became the conscience of America because the press agreed with him."

Then Toto -- apparently taking an extended break to reviewing movies to peddle more right-wing hot takes -- returned to include Kimmel in his list of "Seven Dumbest Celebrity Reactions" (read: reactions that didn't regurgitate right-wing orthodoxy) on the Las Vegas massacre. Toto attacked Kimmel for purportedly being "disingenuous" in claiming he didn't really want to veer into politics the way he has: "Balderdash. Kimmel is loving every ounce of his pundit transformation. He gets to pontificate on the news of the day, bash his ideological enemies and bask in press adulation."

Toto didn't explain how he could read Kimmel's mind -- or, if he can't, why he is putting his own words in Kimmel's mouth.

If all the MRC has to offer against its ideological enemies is gratuitous and immature insults, what good is all that Mercer money?

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