Conservatives ‘kvetching, belly-aching, griping’ about ‘free stuff’ post-election

>>> we begin as hopes rise for a cease-fire in the middle east with negotiations continuing and with secretary of state hillary clinton just arrived in tel aviv aviv. we will bring you much more on the situation as it develops. and two weeks since his resounding re-election, the president is on board air force one returning to washington from east asia . he's just wrapped up a tour in which he juggled multiple complex issues, including efforts to broker that cease-fire in the middle east , encouraging early signs of democracy in burma, and, of course, a budget battle at home. but for the president's opponents, it's not two weeks since the election nor two months to the inauguration. no, it's the countdown to the end of the world . a disheveled mitt romney has surrendered the romney bus gassing up his car to ride off into the sunset. or maybe just park in the car elevator and ride up and down a few times humming " born free " gently to himself. but others, well, they just can't let it go.

>> american society is dependent on a giant federal nanny.

>> governor chris christie slobbering wet kiss on obama 's cheek.

>> the left is going to scream when you say that.

>> he was making out with the president.

>> how vial. he got to meet bruce springsteen . it's no reason for him to turn into chris farley .

>> the 30,000 crew didn't believe romney was going to help them.

>> hobby lobby is not a church and is not a religious organization so they're going to have to provide free birth control.

>> there are a few ckooks who with the abortion craziness and the gay marriage that became an important thing. i shouldn't call them kooks.

>> no, shouldn't call them kooks. that would be the woman who allegedly ran down her husband with her car for not voting for mr. romney . well, how about the kooky " wall street journal " which named chief justice john roberts liberal man of the year along with lena dunham, who is not a man. details, details. did we mention hobby lobby which tried to claim it was a religious organization to avoid covering employees' birth control . i'm afraid a federal judge ruled bedazzling kits are not a religion, at least not yet. the real kooks are those gearing up for the apocalypse on december 21st .

>> my countdown to doomsday.

>> okay. i am going to need a real check. let's bring in our panel, msnbc political analyst jonathan alter , columnist for the bloomberg view and an author. msnbc political analyst professor michael irkchael iraq -- iraq dyson. the only reason the president won re-election according to mr. o'reilly is because he drove around the country throwing dollar bills to anyone who would vote for him. that's right, isn't it?

>> i don't know if that happened, but i know the president stripped down them to a bare essence and the bare essence as he made it rain on their heads was the fact they had no particular agenda that was saleable to the american public. now they're looking for excuses. isn't it interesting --

>> no, no, no, he gave them free stuff. he gave them the government. he gave them health care . he gave them the air to breathe. he gave them free stuff.

>> wow, he sounds like a birth narrative from the bible because obama seems to be progenitor of the entire universe for those who are locked out. but i'll tell you this, what's interesting is they're looking for excuses. they're saying obama gave away the county store, so to speak. what he did was reinforced the practical agenda of democracy. that's the american government . there are no gifts. there are no extras. there are no goodies here. and i think the inability of the republicans to be gracious in the face of defeat shows that they're not truly committed as patriots to the broader project of making this country move forward. they're more narrowed and bigoted in their own beliefs. the president is the president of the united states of america . e pluribus unum , out of many, one. bill o 'reilly has to get on board and so does rush limbaugh . if they don't, they'll be left behind .

>> the president referred to mitt romney suffering with something he called romnesia. it appears a number of people are now suffering with dementia following the result of the election.

>> i'm going to be a little more charitable. they're in denial. you could argue this is kind of --

>> but it is two weeks, john.

>> the death rattle --

>> mitt romney was beaten.

>> right. what always gets me, and we've talked about this in several different contexts over the last several months, is the hypocrisy. essentially the structure of government largess we have in this country is the primary beneficiaries of that largess are whom? the elderly who voted overwhelmingly for mitt romney . they get more gifts --

>> and who spent their lives paying into the social safety net .

>> they get more and they get more than they paid in, by the way, much more, most of them. if they live long enough. they voted for mitt romney . they're the ones who are getting the bulk of the gifts that society bestows, not the children, the elderly. the other beneficiary, red states . this can be started out very easily. you can look in terms of which states pay the most in taxes versus which get back the most from washington . the states that pay the most that send the most of their money to washington are like new york, california, blue states . the states that get the gifts are the states that voted for mitt romney .

>> professor, i guess i should also be consoling you specifically since you must have voted for mitt romney because you work at an elite academic institution and i believe you earn more than $30,000 a year. so you can't have voted for mr. free stuff. you must have voted for mitt romney .

>> of course. i'm from michigan as well. i went to the same high school and his father was governor. so there's more damning evidence of my political pedigree. i think that what jonathan alter said is extremely important here. the very people who are talking about others being on the dole, no disrespect to the former republican leader, those who claim that people are not doing -- carrying their fair share , the very people who make these claims are the ones who receive the bounty. those are the people who disproportionately benefit from the laregess of the government. this kind of demonization of the other, younger people, african-americans, latinos and so on who got the gifts, no we didn't. who got the gifts continue to be corporate chieftains of america, that's who make $250,000 and above and those who have extraordinary incomes tied to wealth that's linked to conservative agendas. those are the people who made out like fat cats . the vast majority of americans have to struggle for what they have. they have to earn it and thank god they have a protector in the white house who understands that.

>> i was just going to add that the more bill o 'reilly and his ilk do this, the better it is for democrats over the long run because we've just seen what happened when the voters -- they had a straight up makers versus takers choice. they were familiar with these arguments. it's not like we're just hearing this for the first time. the voters rejected this. this is the death rattle of the old conservative media order. they can keep going down this road. they can keep making these arguments. they are talking to themselves, martin. if they want to win elections, they have to look deeply into their souls as we've just heard. they must come up with something that sells better with the american people .

>> professor dyson, i can understand that after such a pulverizing defeat one does tend to nurse one's wounds, but how is this helpful to the republican party for their wealthy supporters to be despising and blaming people who earn less than $30,000 describing them as grifters and parasites? how is that helpful as john alter just said to their political prospects into the future?

>> it's not helpful at all. to bring an analysis you gave and jonathan alter laid it out very clearly before us, the reality is these people are kvetching, they're belly aching --

>> i like the yiddish.

>> they're incapable of understanding what's going on with the broader agenda of america democracy and here is the real deal . people with far less do far better and far more with what they have than those who have a whole bunch. even if the bible that they love and can't esus said those who make use of it will have what little they have taken away from them. the reality is the republicans had an enormous universe of affection and goodwill given to them by people who actually don't even share their interests. the 47% that mitt romney was beating up on, a lot of these people voted for him. a lot of white women voted for mitt romney . a lot of the people in the red states voted for mitt romney and received the benefits. what are you complaining about? you're complaining about your mirror. shatter the mirror, look out into the real world , look through the window of reality that most of us have to grapple with, and then you get closer and more intimate with the kind of facts that will allow you to win another election in the future.

>> absolutely. professor michael eric dyson and john alter, thank you