Is anybody really surprised by this - "values voters" that don't have any values are hypocrites? Really? Is water wet, too?

Bozos.

Because these people were so rudely distracted by the MSNBC live report, I'm happy to tell them what they missed: Death panels, Kenya, Hitler, Socialism, Nazis, homosexual agenda, and Kenyan Nazi Homosexual Socialistic Death Panels.

Brian Mooar was the rude one here, Josh. The woman was very polite (and correct) when she said she paid to attend the conference and listen to the speakers, not to be disrupted by the press.

Surely there was someplace outside of the hearing distance of the attendees that Brian could have "reported" from.

The town halls have been a disgrace. And most of the disgrace comes from the right. But "the left wing media" caused this disruption, not the right.

Who is disrupting whom? I guess trying to take an newscaster's microphone isn't rude? So, so nutty.

So it would seem the values voters don't like having their values observed or reported.

Being way out in right field raises your paranoia.

The reporter was in the back of the room speaking in a low voice, he wasn't disrupting anything, it was just another couple of crazies trying to project power.

That's a crazy right wing group and all, but that reporter was being a douche bag. I would be pissed as well if I were sitting next to him trying to hear the speakers on stage.

It certainly doesn't compare to the insanity at the town hall meetings, but the newscaster comes off looking worse, IMO. It seemed like a smaller meeting room, and I can imagine if I paid to be at something and Fox were there, I'd be angry, too.

The media comes off looking smug here, especially when the lady communicated the complaint succinctly and politely. It doesn't matter if I don't have a shred of respect for her being there in the first place, given the content.

"I came here to listen, not to be disrupted," she said.

What absolute hypocrisy! These wingers spent all summer boorishly hollering and heckling and making loud jackasses of themselves at the Town Hall meetings, yet now expect peace and quiet at their event so they can "listen." These people are unbelievable.

Really, it's on the organizers. The organizers should have found a place for Mooar to do a live standup without disturbing the audience members.

And the "hecklers" don't come off as thuggish, simply as cranky and unlikeable. That they presume the press came in at random, without permission, is pretty naive.

It would almost be worth the admission price to be able to start shouting "Health Reform NOW!" at them, since they do so love the townhall thugs when they disrupt Dems

I gotta side against the MSNBC reporter.

He should have moved away from those trying to listen.
They were polite in asking him to please move away.

To those siding with the hecklers...

Members of the press consulted with conference organizers about where and when to shoot. Most likely they chose that place because they wanted a shot of the nature and tone of the event (i.e. people there were professionally dressed, no crazy signs and costumes, etc). The press just set up where they were told to.

Once they started the live feed, they couldn't exactly shut it down. The report was probably only going to be 5 minutes max, so in my opinion these people were impatient and waaaay more confrontational than what the situation called for.

And the organizers weren't very thoughtful in the way they set up the press area.

I so would've given Brian Mooar a dollar to shout "SOCILIZM!"

Should anyone be surprised by the heckler? the so-called Values Voters are extensions of the birthers, Tea gagger, and the conspiracy theorists.

The most interesting part of the Fox clip is at the end when the anchor gets offended and says, "we want to get word out" about the values summit. What, don't they just report and WE decide? The blatant promotion just removes another fig leaf from the fantasy that Fox is an unbiased news source (I realize it's not a revelation for most TPM readers).

As for the controversy itself, it looks to me like a logistics failure on the part of the organizers. The people in the audience have a right to hear the speakers, and the media, once invited, has a right to broadcast.

Maybe now we can get a glimmer of the true back story behind the Bush administration's policy of keeping GWB's events closed to outsiders. Here all along, we assumed it was because they wanted to create a firewall around the prez to keep dissenting views off of his radar. After all, if he had ever been exposed to the breadth and depth of arguments against his (Cheney’s) policies he might have had to question his own infallibility. This would have made him much more difficult to manipulate.

But noooo... perhaps the simpler explanation is that the higher ups just knew their flock better. They knew that if the outsiders got too close the players they would be revealed as idiots. It doesn't matter if the idiots are organizers or the crowd... the results are the same... bad press and the chosen are revealed to be chumps.

Right wingers are incompetent in setting up their event by not communicating effectively with their attendees how, approximately when and where the press would be making their reports? They were incompetent in choosing a place for the reporting to take place that allowed their attendees to fully participate yet, at the same time, allowed the press to give coverage of their event? And the surprise is?

This is exactly what you would expect.

These guys have been conditioned to respond to the media in this fashion. Because everyone knows all media is part of the left wing conspiracy to destroy America. Even Fox News got blasted.

Next!!

Why don't any of the commenters here bravely speaking up for the wingnuts have any reply to those pointing out that the conference organizers, through malice or incompetence, set this up to happen? (I vote for incompetence: otherwise, the security people would've acted to exacerbate the problem rather than minimize it.)

And why doesn't TPM update the story to include even more blatant media harassment?

Fox wants "to get the word out" about the Value Voters Summit? Why didn't the Fox reporter show the bouncer Rupert Murdoch's cancelled check paying for these valued voters? When democracy is bought, the buyers need to get going.

The reporters ARE being rude. They always take it for granted at public events that they are more important than anyone else and set up their shots with no regard for the people around them who are trying to listen to the speaker. I have witnessed this many times. They sweep in with a sense of entitlement that they are bigger than whatever they are covering. And they assume that everyone will go along with them because, well, "being on TV" is obviously the highest value in any situation. Well, guess what? Not everybody agrees. This isn't a right or left issue. It's about the arrogance of the news media. I say Right On to the people at this event for insisting that they are not just props at a photo op.

Clearly the values that the Values Voters represent do not include the value of freedom of the press.

And the attendees of this event ARE just props at a photo op, a show of force for the wingnut conservative agenda, and robots to echo the alarmism being spread by the megacorporate and megachurch right.