2008 Congressional

Big 3 Nets' Evening News Audience Fails to Break 20 Million in Mid-September
By Tom Blumer | September 21, 2010 | 2:19 PM EDT
EveningNewsLogosThey're out of excuses.

Summer's over. It's after Labor Day. The kids are back in school. People are back into their routines. The trouble for the Big 3 broadcast networks is that those routines don't include watching their early-evening newscasts.

Beyond that, last week was a pivotal week in Campaign 2010, with key primaries in New York, Delaware, New Hampshire, and several other states. As far as I know, Brian Williams, Diane Sawyer, and Katie Couric were firmly ensconced in their anchor chairs all week long.

With all that, the Big 3 Nets' audience for the week was less than 20 million, almost 5% lower than the same week a year ago, when there were no key election races. The Big 3 are not recovering from what was an awful summer.

Here are the numbers (source: Media Bistro -- Week of Sept. 13, 2010; week of Sept. 14, 2010):

Lib Economist: Second Great Depression a Fiction Created by Wall Street for Bailout Funds
By Noel Sheppard | September 21, 2010 | 11:22 AM EDT

One of the Left's most esteemed economists, the liberal Center for Economic and Policy Research's Dean Baker, claimed Monday the "Second Great Depression," the term given to what many believed the country was heading for if drastic government action wasn't taken in the fall of 2008, was all a fiction created by Wall Street to get bailed out.

In Baker's view published at the unashamedly liberal Huffington Post, the Federal Reserve could have solved all the problems that ailed us at the time, and had some of America's largest banks been allowed to fail, their financial loss would have been "our" gain as their money was magically redistributed to Main Street.

Potentially most hysterical is that Baker never once mentioned how this all occurred weeks before Election Day, and never once mentioned Barack Obama who not only hyped the collapse to seal his ascendancy to the White House, but also continually reminds Americans to this day that his efforts averted the "Second Great Depression":

Media Heresy: Bill Clinton to Blame for Horrible Economy NOT Bush
By Noel Sheppard | September 15, 2010 | 4:03 PM EDT

Since the financial industry collapse two years ago, dishonest media outlets and their employees have continually blamed George W. Bush for the implosion that occurred in the fall of 2008 as well as the resulting recession.

NewsBusters has regularly pushed back on this historically inaccurate premise specifically pointing to two crucial pieces of legislation signed into law by former President Bill Clinton.

On Wednesday, a contributor to the Huffington Post - who is also the editor of the website TruthDig - published an article confirming what NewsBusters has been claiming, doing so in a fashion that must have shocked the economically ignorant proprietor of this perilously liberal online "news" outlet:

ABC's Crystal Ball: Defeat of 'Mainstream' Castle 'Eliminates' GOP Chances for Winning Senate
By Scott Whitlock | September 15, 2010 | 10:49 AM EDT

Good Morning America's Juju Chang switched into prognostication mode on Wednesday and proclaimed that, along with other Tea Party wins, Christine O'Donnell's upset victory in Delaware "pretty much eliminat[es] the Republicans' chances of taking back the Senate." [MP3 audio here.]

She trumpeted, "We begin with an upset victory for the Tea Party and maybe for Democrats." The news anchor announced, "Christine O'Donnell has defeated a mainstream Republican candidate for the Delaware Senate seat, thanks to help from Sarah Palin."

Mainstream? Mike Castle's lifetime American Conservative Union score is 52. He has an F grade from the NRA, supported cap and trade and is aggressively pro-abortion. These are generally not known as "mainstream" GOP positions.

Center for Responsive Politics: Journalists Give to Dems Over GOP By Nearly 2 to 1 Margin
By Lachlan Markay | September 14, 2010 | 9:00 PM EDT

Outrage over political donations by Fox News's parent company News Corp. always seemed like a bit of a stretch when it implied that those contributions affected Fox's political coverage.

Many news media outlets are owned by larger companies. Those companies' activities don't ipso facto affect news coverage at their media subsidiaries. So when NewsBusters pointed out that 88 percent of political donations from employees of the three TV news networks went to Democrats, it was really just to note the double standard at work (surely, numerous employees have nothing to do with the news operations).

New data revealed by the Center for Responsive Politics, however, suggests a real bias at play. According to Megan [spelling corrected - Ed.] Wilson, who writes for the Center's site OpenSecrets.org, 65 percent of donations from 235 self-identified journalists have gone to Democrats this cycle.

Another Fact Ignored in NYT Boehner Hit Piece: Pelosi Gets Far More Lobbyist Cash
By Lachlan Markay | September 13, 2010 | 2:03 PM EDT
"Mr. Boehner's ties to lobbyists seem especially deep," New York Times reporter Eric Lipton wrote of the House Republican Leader yesterday. Well, they're not, and therein lies the problem: Lipton apparently premised his article not on facts and data, but on what he thought seemed reasonable.

Had Lipton stooped to investigate some of the serious claims he was making, he might have discovered that Nancy Pelosi has raised almost twice as much money from lobbyists this cycle as has Boehner. He might also have revealed that Sens. Harry Reid, Chuck Schumer, and Blanche Lincoln all raised more money from lobbyists this cycle as Boehner has since 1999.

Washington Examiner columnist Tim Carney, who did the legwork on these numbers, also noted that Boehner's name does not appear on the Center for Responsive Politics's list of the top 20 recipients of lobbyist cash. Eighteen House Democrats have received more such money than Boehner has this cycle.

Lefties Upset By Murdoch Donation Take Note: 88 Percent of Network Donations Went to Dems
By Lachlan Markay | August 27, 2010 | 6:13 PM EDT
With liberals up in arms over News Corp's political contributions, here's an interesting fact worth noting: of the roughly $1.15 million network TV employees gave to political candidates in 2008, a full 88 percent of it went to Democrats.

Barack Obama received almost half a million dollars from those same execs, while John McCain received just over $25,000. The discrepancy between donations to the Democratic and Republican parties was also enormous.

Though the numbers are striking, the imbalance is not altogether surprising. But they do help to put in prospect the left's righteous indignation over the political activities of Fox News's parent company.

Jon Stewart Rips Fox's GOP Contribution, Ignores Viacom's Dem Donations
By Noel Sheppard | August 19, 2010 | 9:56 AM EDT

Comedian Jon Stewart on Wednesday bashed Fox News for parent company News Corporation's $1 million donation to the Republican Governors Association.

Unfortunately, Stewart failed to inform his viewers that Viacom, the parent company of Comedy Central, has so far given disproportionately to Democrats this year.

Also missing in the "Daily Show" host's attack of FNC and Glenn Beck was that News Corp. prior to this contribution had historically given more to Democrats than Republicans.

Such facts were unimportant Wednesday evening, for Stewart was on another in a long line of Fox News is the devil incarnate rants (video follows with commentary):

Ed Schultz Blames Republicans For All The Unemployed People In America
By Noel Sheppard | August 12, 2010 | 11:41 PM EDT

Ed Schultz on Thursday blamed Republicans for all the unemployed people living in America today.

As he began the most recent installment of the "Ed Show" on MSNBC, the host said, "The Republican Party has been on a crusade against the middle class and the poor for the last 30 years. We're now seeing the wreckage of that race to the bottom line culture."

He disgracefully continued, "Today a government report showed weekly jobless claims at a five-month high. 484,000 new unemployment claims were filed in the week ending August 7th. And you know what folks, you can lay this right at the feet, right at the altar of the Republican Party."

Sadly, he wasn't close to done, claiming, "The people you see flooding the streets begging for help, begging for an opportunity are victims of the Republican agenda just to make sure that President Obama fails" (video follows with transcript and commentary): 

At Crunch Time, Charles 'Paulson Put a Gun to All Their Heads' Gasparino Sided With Statism
By Tom Blumer | August 11, 2010 | 3:29 PM EDT
CharlesGasparino0810

Earlier today, NB's Lachlan Markey covered Bill O'Reilly's interview with the Fox Business Channel's Charles Gasparino.

In that interview, Gasparino confirmed what the New York Post reported in April of last year, namely that "GE Execs Encouraged CNBC Staff to Go Easy on Obama."

The suits at GE, including Chairman Jeff Inmelt, had a clear motivation for encouraging their reporters to lighten up, namely that "General Electric at the time was hoping to profit handsomely from policies that would benefit a few companies, including GE, at the expense of the majority of the economy"-- specifically cap and trade.

But speaking of motivation: What about former CNBCer Gasparino's?

The easy answer would be that sometime in the past two years he has seen the light and realizes his past reporting at CNBC was lacking in fairness and balance. Despite his move to Fox, there's reason to doubt that.

WaPo Puts GOP Donor Scandal on Front Page, But Buried Dem Donor Scandal
By Matt Robare | July 30, 2010 | 6:50 PM EDT
Some very persuasive evidence of a double standard at work in The Washington Post came to light today. Today's Post featured a front page headline about the Securities and Exchange Commission charging billionaire brothers Sam and Charlers Wyly with fraud.

The double standard came in when it became clear that the news a couple weeks ago about the conviction of Democratic fundraiser Hassan Nemazee had gotten almost no notice. The Post printed an Associated Press item on the third page. Nemazee had defrauded almost $300 million and was a major contributor and fundraiser to John Kerry's presidential campaign and Hilary Clinton's campaign to be 2008's Democratic nominee.

The Wylys have donated to Republicans and the Republican Party in the past, a fact The Post made very prominent both in its headline: "SEC charges billionaire Texas brothers who donate to Gop with fraud" and put in a quick reminder right in the story's first paragraph:

Sam and Charles Wyly, billionaire Texas brothers who gained prominence spending millions of dollars on conservative political causes, committed fraud by using secret overseas accounts to generate more than $550 million in profit through illegal stock trades, the Securities and Exchange Commission charged Thursday.
Further Confirmation: Despite Claims to Contrary, Political Operatives Used JournoList
By Lachlan Markay | July 29, 2010 | 12:49 PM EDT
The Daily Caller released a new JournoList scoop today, and this one's a doozy. It confirms that reporters on the liberal media listserv did in fact collaborate with political operatives and campaign officials to spin media coverage in favor of Barack Obama.

The latest piece further debunks JournoList founder Ezra Klein's claims - also taken on by this humble blogger - that the email list did not include campaign or government officials, and was not used to manufacture talking points.

In fact, two members of the Obama campaign, Jared Bernstein and Jason Furman, were JournoList members during the race. Jeff Hauser reportedly signed a number of JournoList emails "Campaign Manager, Shulman for Congress," while he worked on New Jersey Democratic congressional candidate Dennis Shulman's campaign.

And talking points were a much-discussed issue. "JournoList’s greatest challenge is to make sure an actual win by Obama translates into winning the battle for political impact," Houser stated on one occasion. It doesn't get more explicit than that.