‘Income Envy!’ Schultz Goes Ballistic on Liberals ‘Attacking’ Him for Silence on NBC Protests
Tucked away in Salon’s in-depth report about MSNBC’s Chris Hayes meeting in private with Peacock Productions (a production outfit owned by NBC Universal) was a comment by Ed Schultz, in which he dissed the reporter who wrote the piece in question instead of saying whether he supported the protestors. Schultz is, rather famously, a big labor supporter, so people were more than a little bothered to see Schultz stay silent on this issue.
Schultz was unhappy with all the criticism he was getting, and fired back on his radio show Thursday, which was written up by the same Salon reporter, Josh Eidelson. Schultz was taken to task by a number of liberals, including David Sirota.
In addition, the blog Truth Revolt did some digging, and it turns out Schultz was paid roughly a quarter of a million dollars by union groups in the past two years.
This all played preface to Schultz’s radio show today, when reporter Mike Elk (hot off his Twitter feud with Eli Lake) called into Schultz’s show to get him to publicly comment on whether he supports Peacock Productions.
Firstly, Schultz angrily scolded Elk over the circumstances of his call. When Elk asked him specifically about the Peacock Productions protests, Schultz said, “I support collective bargaining everywhere.” He did not, despite Elk pressing him, get more specific than that. Schultz also swiped at Sirota, accusing the former Salon writer of having it out for him “for years.”
And when Elk brought up the money Schultz has received from union groups, that’s when Schultz really lost it.
“Where do you think the unions are going to spend their money for advertising? With you?! You don’t have an audience! You don’t have a reach! You’ve only got 12,000 Twitter followers! You’ve got income envy is what you’ve got!”
Schultz made it clear that he wanted to hash this out on the air because he wants his audience to hear his full answer rather than just letting reporters distort what he says.
Listen to the audio below, via The Ed Schultz Show:
[h/t Salon]
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