This clip starts out discussing the Florida movie theater shooting by a retired LEO who hates texting. But scroll forward to about 2:15, because this is where CNN’s talking pie-hole (and disgraced former News Of The World editor) Piers Morgan starts to beat his civilian disarmament drum. When his hyperbolic questions fail to elicit a compliant response from Pasco County (FL) Sheriff Chris Nocco, Jolly Old Piers stops even pretending to interview him, and simply interviews himself for the rest of the clip.

I’ve really got to hand it to Piers Morgan. Not only has the disgraced former News Of The World editor dodged questions about his possible involvement in the UK phone hacking scandal (with all of the credibility of Barry Bonds’ steroid denials,) he’s also managed to find safe harbor in the United States, where it’s easier to avoid pesky searches and interrogations by the London Metropolitan Police.

Morgan presided over Rupert Murdoch’s obliterated News Of The World enterprise in the mid-1990s. In this story and video, he appears to acknowledge that he knowingly ran stories based on hacked telephone calls and texts.

Morgan left News Of The World in 1995, but his gutter journalism hardly ended there. He jumped ship to a rival tabloid newspaper, where he was eventually forced out after (you’ll never guess) another scandal, this one involving the British military and faked photographs.

Morgan has as little respect for people’s privacy as he does for their right of self-defense. Or self-defence, as the Brits would spell it. Why CNN keeps a disgraced alleged former tabloid ‘journalist’ like him on their books is beyond me. Either way, it’s all kinds of awesome to see him completely flummoxed by a plain-spoken Florida sheriff, exactly the kind of ‘little people’ Piers Morgan despises.

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66 COMMENTS

  1. When you watch some pin head like Piers Morgan getting kicked around the octagon for long enough you slowly start to really wonder if he’s just a masochist.

    • I think he’s simply a tool, not a masochist. A tool with a bevy of bodyguards. I got mine, so eff you.

    • That “245 people hit per day” figure. Does that include suicides, negligent discharges, justified self-defense hits, justified police hits? (did I forget any?)

      Always assume that Peers Morgin is lying or deceiving.

      That sheriff is one of the very few people talking about the root of the issue, mental health.

        • …yep…he represented his POV very well..and really humiliated the host…and BTW…his POV about mental health and abuse issues is spot on..as well as the manner in which we raise our kids…screw Piers…

          RJ O’Guillory
          Author-
          Webster Groves – The Life of an Insane Family

      • The whole “245 people hit by gunfire per day” is an out-and-out lie. Not only is that figure deliberately inflated by him by a factor of 10+, but he also conveniently forgets (and entirely for his own sake) that the 24 people per day being hit by gunfire are mostly (upwards of 22 of those people) are in fact gang-bangers and career criminals that are both not only pulling the trigger but getting shot. The others are made up of negligent discharges (1 of those 24 people) and incidents like this (the last remaining 1 of those 24 people).

        Works Cited:

        CDC National Vital Statistics Reports, Vol. 61, 2011.

        FBI National Gang Threat Assessment, Uniform Crime Reports.

  2. Le sigh. I swear he knows he’s becoming irrelevant and will do whatever it takes to stay in the light.
    I’m surprised he hasn’t pulled a Paula Abdul and been drunk on air.

  4. How many times is this guy going to try to argue his liberal opinion regarding gun laws/crimes against those who’s entire job revolves around enforcing/investigating these very same issues.

    What scares me the most is that there is probably a very wide audience of sheeple nodding along with Piers. “Piers is right, I mean what could that cop possibly know about guns that Piers doesn’t?”

    • Exactly.

      I loved the part where he admitted so many LEO’s he’s interviewed said guns are not the root of the problem, “but…” then dribbled on like HIS opinion mattered at all, much less more.

  5. Not even sure I can watch this; I’m so sick of hearing Piers’ voice. I’ll have to take the title of the video’s word for it.

    • I reached this point a year or two ago. While I might enjoy hearing what the guest has to say, nothing is worth listening to Tears Morgan’s stupidity.

    • I can’t listen to him anymore either. I find him irrelevant, which is bad enough, but also annoying.

      “A fanatic can’t change his mind and won’t change the subject.”

  9. you don’;t get it guys! He has pictures of CNN big-wigs with either kids, farm animals, or knows where bodies are buried. . . . it is that simple.

    • That is a really good point. If a douche bag like Morgan can hack anyone’s phone and eavesdrop on their conversations and text messages, wouldn’t he first use that technology to get “leverage” on some very wealthy people? That leverage would guarantee a lot of income. Then go on to “expose” lower level public figures and make money on them through the tabloids. But the first use of his hacking, to get “leverage” on wealthy people, is the retirement plan. And he did that first in case “exposing” lower level public figures would lead to law enforcement finding out that he illegally hacked people’s phones and listened to their conversations.

    • Don’t be silly; the only way Piers could meet his match is if CNN decides to host the Special Olympics.

      No, I’m sorry, that’s unfair to those fine competitors. They overcame their handicaps to succeed, while Piers has done the exact opposite.

  11. Piers should really shut up about this topic because he keeps getting owned. Emily Miller, Ted Nugent, Larry Pratt, Sheriff David Clarke, the list goes on and on of him constantly getting embarrassed on his show. What a failure at life!

  12. I don’t know if Pier’s is a US citizen or a Permanent resident. If he is a US citizen, then he had to take an oath to defend and support the constitution. Therefore, when people say things about intolerance regarding immigration, etc, we as a nation will not (and should not) tolerate those who do not embrace and support the constitution. Quite simply, if they do not support the constitution and our culture of freedom then they shouldn’t be taking the oath to begin with. Call me intolerant if you want – it is there in the oath – and it’s there for a reason.

    • I’ll bet he’s a Resident Alien. From another planet I suspect.

      I hope against hope that if immigration reform ever becomes a real thing, he’s not included.

    • He’s not a citizen, and pretty sure he’s not a resident alien. He most likely just has a work visa.

  13. Piers was far over matched here. Lots of honor and common-sense in that LEO, as I observe in most I’ve come across with any street experience.

    Something to remember when we get carried away picking on the exceptions here…

    • I’ll take my own vasectomy any day. If I’m going to waste time watching a cartoonishly gigantic dick, I’d rather it be mine.

  16. The bigger question here is why is anyone watching CNN let alone Piers?

    They ceased being a source for news a decade ago.

  17. Piers is not likeable. He’s not a gifted journalist and he doesn’t have the charisma to overcome his shortcomings. Why is he a highly paid TV personality again? I honestly don’t get it.

  18. Nice job by the sheriff … Only minor complaint is that it would have been nice if he had mentioned the CDC study stats when Morgan started in with his statistic. According to the CDC study there are a minimum of half a million dgu’s every year (and possibly several times that many). That’s over 1300 a day, well more than the 245 that Piers mentioned.

    • I was going to say something similar, the thing is that Piers has this tendency to resort to a single number to throw out again and again per day/interview/show, but really its easily refute by people like us (TTAG readers).

      Then again, he’d never let someone in the show that he knows would trounce his BS with irrefutable points like counter statistics and good logic paths.

  19. Finally. The logical sense of the Sheriff was what I wish Morgan could be faced with constantly. The problem is, Morgan so biased he’ll NEVER get it.
    We need to lock him in a room with Shannon Watts and let them emotionally rhetoric themselves to death. “Do it for the children!”

  22. Sheriff Chris Nocco did a terrific job. Impressively sensible.

    When I heard the “245 shot each day” I had to ask myself, “did he leave Detroit and Chicago out of the numbers?”

    • I think that number is pretty accurate; rounding it comes to 90,000 people shot each year, with some caveats. First, 30,000 of those are self-inflicted, so we are really talking about 60,000 that have some association with violence. But since fewer that 10,000 die each year, that means that 5 out of 6 people who are shot survive. Finally, applying the same ratio of gangland murders to “other” murders of 8 out of 10, that means that 48,000 of these people inured or killed by gunfire are killed by gang or other criminal violence (e.g., armed robbery) violence. That drops us down to 12,000 people shot for “domestic” reasons. In a population of 300,000,000, not a terribly large figure.
      And when it comes to aggravated assault, the figures break down pretty evenly between guns, knives, clubs, other weapons, and “personal” weapons (hands, feet). In simple terms, 80% of aggravated assaults do not involve firearms.

  23. I’m sorry, I couldn’t make it past 1:45. “…feared for his safety because the victim threw popcorn at him” I threw up a little in my mouth.

  26. “Morgan left News Of The World in 1995, but his gutter journalism hardly ended there. He jumped ship to a rival tabloid newspaper, where he was eventually forced out after (you’ll never guess) another scandal, this one involving the British military and faked photographs.”

    In other words Morgan is a douche bag with no morals, scruples, or concern for fellow human beings. Clearly this guy only cares about himself and his bank balance. Is it any wonder that he stands on the civilian disarmament soap box to add to his bank balance?

  27. Two comments:
    1) If Piers Morgan believes American is so dangerous, then why doesn’t he leave and go somewhere else? The only people that would miss him would be Harvey Weinstein, Michael Moore, Michael Bloomberg and Diane Feinstein. Perhaps they could pool their vast financial resources and buy a private island somewhere. We’d all be better off.

    2) Sheriff Nocco answered Morgan’s comments (were they really questions?) very rationally. I’m surprised Morgan didn’t get emotional and raise his voice and talk over Sheriff Nocco, as he has with others in the past.

  29. First, before my main point, right around 0:40 is great: “What do we know about the facts?” as if he gives a flying fornication about facts….

    The response from the Sheriff is an epic smackdown, but something didn’t sit right with me when this was posted last night. I had to re-rewatch it to get a handle on what was bothering me. There’s something off in the Sheriff’s responses. I AM NOT saying it’s a bad thing, but the impression that I got is that he prepared those responses knowing who he was going to be talking to. Very rarely in a natural conversation will you hear someone repeat their point in the exact same wording as many times as he did.

    Again, not saying it’s a bad thing, just something I noted…

  30. I wish that the sheriff had pointed out that if you excluded firearm-related deaths from crime statistics, the US would STILL have a much higher rate of murder than the UK. Americans just kill each other more often than Brits do. That statistic strongly suggests that we are a more homicidal culture, regardless of the tools we choose to do it. Our suicide rates are lower than those of places such as Scotland, despite the prevalence of firearms.

    Of course, the UK has higher rates of most crimes and Brits are much more likely to fear going outside at night. (It is difficult to produce an “apples to apples” comparison of crime rates, as the UK tends to sweep crimes without convictions under the carpet before assembling their statistics.)

  31. It would have been amazing if the sheriff told Piers that given the way those statistics are collected, there is a very good chance that some of those 245 people per day hit by gun fire were on the receiving end of it because they were the ones breaking into somebody’s home or trying to harm somebody. Of course we have all seen the statistics to know that the other major portion (about 66%) of that 245 people per day hit by gun fire is due to suicide.

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