CNN’s Erick Erickson: Video Of Occupy Protestor Getting Tasered “Made Of Awesome”

Erick Erickson, a controversial conservative CNN contributor and founder of the radical right wing Tea Party website RedState, on his WSB radio program Sunday said a video taken that depicts police tasseling an Occupy Wall Street Movement protestor was “made of awesome,” and added, “Watching a hippie protester get tased just makes my day!”

http://cloudfront.mediamatters.org/static/flash/pl55.swf

The video, below, which we located despite Erickson’s inability to correctly identify the television news station website that featured the YouTube video (Erickson calls it repeatedly “WTPO.” It’s actually WTOP,) shows a man wearing what appear to be pajama bottoms and a tee shirt in McPherson Square in Washington, D.C., the home of an Occupy Movement camp, asking police, “why are you coming at me?” several times.

The officers do not appear to comment at all, based on the audio in the video, but surround him, force him to the ground, and taser him, despite the obvious fact that he did not appear to be armed or violent. The man did appear to be agitated.

Police did not appear to warn him nor did they appear to instruct him to get on his knees, nor did they appear to ask him questions; they merely saw him, followed him, forced him to the ground, tasered him, then handcuffed him.

Frankly, disgusting, and I fail to see how this is legal. It certainly is immoral, and a violation of our understanding of what America is supposed to be.

All this is hysterical to Erick Erickson, the homophobe and racist possibly best-known for saying he would “pull shotgun” on a census worker if they came to his door. The New Civil Rights Movement first wrote about Erickson in 2008, for this comment he wrote at RedState:

Yes, I know about Goodwin’s law, but comparing gay rights activists to the Nazis is fitting. They’ve gone from being persecuted to persecuting. Of course, they’ll say it is all in the fight for their civil rights — much like the Nazis needed to go after people to make things right.

At the time, we responded,

Ignore the fact that there is no “Goodwin’s Law”, it’s Godwin’s Law, which states that “overuse of Nazi and Hitler comparisons should be avoided, because it robs the valid comparisons of their impact.” (Yes, Mr. Erickson is a lawyer.)

So, person A says: “You are gay, therefore you do not deserve to be protected by The Bill of Rights.”

Person B, who is gay, says: “You are incorrect. The Bill of Rights applies to all citizens in the United States.”

This simple exchange, according to Mr. Erickson, means you are acting like a Nazi.

Go figure.

Go figure pretty much sums up our feelings about Erick Erickson anyway, but the man is a menace.

Perhaps Erickson would offer to be tasered to see for himself how truly amusing it really is?

Caution: video below uses NSFW language, primarily the “F” word, a lot. It is also graphic and disturbing. Unless you’re Erick Erickson, then it’s just hysterical.

Go figure.

Thanks to rget=”_blank”>Media Matters for the audio recording.