Allen West: Bashir Was Forced to Apologize to Palin

MSNBC political commentator Martin Bashir apologized for making crude remarks about Sarah Palin only because he was forced to and was not sincere, retired U.S. Army Colonel and former Florida U.S. Rep. Allen West says.

"The only reason he apologized is because he caught heat for it," West told "The Steve Malzberg Show" on Newsmax TV.

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"MSNBC has allowed him and [fellow MSNBC commentator] Ed Schultz — in his despicable reference to Laura Ingraham as a 'talk slut' [on the air].

" They reward these guys and they give them their shows and they keep them on these shows, and really that's the essence of the progressive socialist mind . . . This is who they are and they can say they apologize, [but] they don't mean it," West said Wednesday.

He said the MSNBC hosts are a textbook case of "Rules of Radicals," the manifesto written by controversial community organizer Saul Alinsky, who is said to have inspired both President Barack Obama and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

"It was all about the tactics about destroying your opposition, destroying their character, freezing a target, eliminating it. That's what Saul Alinsky's 'Rules for Radicals' is all about, and that's what they will continue to use," West said.

West said he thinks the Obama administration is out to destabilize the U.S. insurance industry with the Affordable Care Act.

"They've got to have someone to blame. They set up the insurance industry to blame," he said.

"The president is looking for a lifeline anywhere where he can find one, but again, it comes back to one simple thing: his lack of leadership, his lack and ability to understand anything as far as the operations of this government."

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