[More in the cross-post on the MRC's NewsBusters blog.]
On the 17 August 2014 edition of Reliable Sources on CNN, Dr. Gail Saltz blasted Fox News contributor Dr. Keith Ablow for his jab at Michelle Obama's weight: "To be criticizing people, kind of, willy-nilly is – I don't think meets the Hippocratic Oath." She played up how Dr. Ablow previously hinted that Vice President Biden might have dementia, and claimed that the psychiatrist violated "American psychiatric guidelines, which is not to diagnose someone that you have ever met."
Host Brian Stelter wondered if there's "this urge to be entertaining; to be provocative; to be outrageous." Dr. Saltz asserted that she tries "very hard every day to resist that," and that "any professional wants to express their opinion that has nothing to do with medicine, they have to carefully take off their doctor hat, and make it clear that they're doing so." The CNN guest should take her own advice, as she diagnosed conservative talk show host Rush Limbaugh in October 2009:
CAROL COSTELLO: Psychiatrist Gail Saltz says Limbaugh’s style appeals to those who feel they have no voice.
DR. GAIL SALTZ, PSYCHIATRIST: He’s essentially kind of operating like the bully, and if you’re on the playground, do you want to be the bully’s- you know, under the bully’s wing and go along with him and get, therefore, some power by proxy, too, or do you want to be like left out alone on the playground where- you know, who knows who’s going to take you out?
COSTELLO: Saltz says conservative talkers are more popular than liberal talkers because they attract the kind of person who likes strong, aggressive messages.