‘No Regrets’: Hoffa Defends ‘Son of a Bitches’ Speech Before Obama Address

It is the hot clip of Labor Day -- but if you haven't watched it yet...click here.

Teamsters President Jimmy Hoffa warmed up the audience for President Obama in Detroit by declaring a labor war on the Tea Party and Republican legislators.  “President Obama, this is your army, we are ready to march,” Hoffa said. “But everybody here’s got to vote. If we go back, and keep the eye on the prize, let’s take these son of a bitches out.”

Well that kind of comment will get some attention!

But now Hoffa is defending his speech.  Talking Points Memo says, "He'd say the exact same words all over again":

"I would because I believe it," he said. "They've declared war on us. We didn't declare war on them, they declared war on us.We're fighting back. The question is, who started the war?"

The speech came shortly before President Obama took the stage in Detroit -- and Hoffa's remarks certainly overshadowed Obama's on Fox. But the Teamsters chief said he was just matching fired-up conservative rhetoric when it comes to organized labor and Obama with some fired-up rhetoric of his own.

You may not be surprised that Media Matters found the Fox News editing of the Hoffa video clip to be deceptive.

Here's the clip:

Media Matters:

Right-wing bloggers misled by dishonest Fox News video editing are attacking Teamsters President James Hoffa, Jr. for supposedly urging violence against Tea Party activists during a Labor Day speech. Conservatives are also attacking President Obama, who appeared at the event, for "sanctioning violence against fellow Americans" by failing to denounce Hoffa. But fuller context included in other Fox segments makes clear that Hoffa wasn't calling for violence but was actually urging the crowd to vote out Republican members of Congress.

During the segment that the bloggers have latched onto, Fox edited out the bolded portion of Hoffa's comments:

HOFFA: Everybody here's got to vote. If we go back and keep the eye on the prize, let's take these son of a bitches out and give America back to America where we belong! Thank you very much!

Media Matters, however, does not cite or link to any "right-wing bloggers" who construed Hoffa's comments as an actual call to violence.  There may be some...but my guess is the vast majority took the comments for exactly what they were -- a call to political conquest made in terms rather uncivil.

Talking Points Memo notes the call by one Tea Party group for President Obama to condemn Hoffa's remarks.

And US editor of the Daily Telegraph raises that point...and adds the issue of Vice President Biden's comments today painting Republicans as "barbarians":

I enjoy political hardball as much as the next reporter. It’s barely concealed truth that campaign journalists, like the operatives we cover, love negative campaigning and revel in OTT insults and martial rhetoric. Even candidates often lapse into the language of “rip his throat out”, “tear his eyes out” or “drive a stake through her heart”.

It’s no secret either that many Republicans despise Democrats with a passion and vice versa. Just as British MPs hide their contempt of their opponents by referring to them as “the honourable member’, American politicians have their own, albeit less formal, ways of masking their true feelings with anodyne language for public consumption.

But the statements today by Jimmy Hoffa Jr and Vice President Joe Biden demean the presidency and, tactically speaking, are stupid own goals.

For a definition of an "own goal" click here.

Here is the Biden clip:

(h/t -- the diligent HotAirPundit)