2012 Presidential

Clinton Speechwriter: Bush 43 Is the One Who 'Was Inarticulate Off the Cuff'
By Tom Blumer | October 13, 2014 | 10:58 PM EDT

Apparently the folks at Vocativ, who took a look at over 600 presidential speeches going all the way back to George Washington, were a little reluctant to document what their "scientific" analysis of those speeches told them about this nation's two most recent chief executives.

After finding that there is very little difference between the "sophistication" of speeches made by President Obama and former President George W. Bush, the former Clinton speechwriter the firm enlisted to comment on the results couldn't resist taking a gratuitous and I believe false swipe at Bush 43, one which I daresay most readers here will find absolutely hysterical.

Wow! Chuck Todd Says Grimes 'Disqualified Herself' By Refusing to Say If She Voted for Obama
By Mark Finkelstein | October 10, 2014 | 9:00 AM EDT

Whatever liberal leanings he might have, sometimes the political animal in Chuck Todd just can't contain itself.  Take today's Morning Joe, where Todd absolutely annihilated Alison Lundergan Grimes, Dem candidate for senator from Kentucky, for her refusal to say whether she voted for Barack Obama for president.  

Todd ripped Grimes as "ridiculous," then twice declared that she had "disqualified herself."  Ouch!  Even Mika Brzezinski was embarrassed by Grimes' cringe-worthy performance, as you'll see in the screengrab.

MSNBC's Thomas Roberts: Panetta Criticizing Obama For Bucks and Hillary Brownie Points
By Mark Finkelstein | October 9, 2014 | 8:08 AM EDT

Elite Dems across America might be scuttling away from Barack Obama.  But the president can count on at least one man to stand by him: MSNBC's Thomas Roberts.  On today's Morning Joe, Roberts accused Leon Panetta of criticizing President Obama for base motives: "getting paid" off his book, and currying close ties with Hillary Clinton.

Roberts' lame attempt to undermine Panetta came after Joe Scarborough and Mark Halperin [citing Ron Fournier] said Panetta's criticism of Obama echoes what elite Dems from Washington to Hollywood are saying in private—but are afraid to express in public.

Public-Radio Professor Cornel West Tells Time He 'Couldn't Vote for a War Criminal' Like Obama In 2012
By Tim Graham | October 7, 2014 | 5:46 PM EDT

In an interview with Time for 10 Questions in the October 13 edition, Time’s Belinda Luscombe asked Marxist professor (and for a while, Tavis Smiley’s public radio co-host) Cornel West whether he voted for Obama in 2012. 

West replied "I couldn't vote for a war criminal. He's tied to war crimes and drones dropping bombs on innocent people."

Megyn Kelly Rips State Department's Psaki With Panetta's Claim That Obama Wanted Out of Iraq
By Tom Blumer | October 4, 2014 | 12:13 AM EDT

On her Thursday Fox News show, Megyn Kelly interviewed the State Department's Jen Psaki.

Psaki's thankless and impossible task was to defend the administration against former Defense Secretary Leon Panetta's assessment that U.S. troops completely left Iraq too early. Video and the damning portions of the transcript follow the jump:

Gayle King to Paul Ryan: 'Some People Don't Think' The Country 'Needs Saving'
By Matthew Balan | September 29, 2014 | 5:54 PM EDT

Open Obama supporter Gayle King made sure she got her liberal viewpoint across on Monday's CBS This Morning as she interviewed Rep. Paul Ryan. King spotlighted an excerpt from the congressman's new book: "You said, 'In order for the Republican Party to save the country' – some people don't think it needs saving, by the way – but you said the GOP has to change from within. What do you mean by that?"

Eric Holder's Fast and Furious Fiasco Was Media Scandal, Too
By Rich Noyes | September 25, 2014 | 4:08 PM EDT

Thanks to his stonewalling of the House of Representatives investigation into the Fast and Furious scandal, in 2012  Eric Holder became the first Attorney General held in contempt by Congress. Maybe his resignation on Thursday will revive the story for the three broadcast network evening newscasts, but don't count on it. With Sharyl Attkisson no longer working at CBS News, there is no broadcast journalist who has shown any interest in pursuing this disgraceful story.

Politico's Gerstein Thinks Both Obama and Bush Had 'Zig-Zag' Foreign Policies
By Tom Blumer | September 24, 2014 | 9:43 PM EDT

The Politico's Josh Gerstein wants readers not to have a problem with President Barack Obama singing the praises of American exceptionalism when in front of U.S. audiences but deep-sixing it when speaking at the United Nations. Though Obama has almost always avoided actually using the E-word, he has recenlly taken to speaking of this nation's "unique" abilities and capabilities, and for some time has described the U.S. as "the one indispensable nation."

But Gerstein, in his column today, indicated that it's okay that "Obama watered down his noble-America rhetoric" at the U.N. today. Oh, and in the Politico reporter's fantasy world, Obama's back-and-forth foreign policy postures — it's hardly accurate to call them genuine "positions" — are really no different than what we saw under George W. Bush. Excerpts follow the jump (bolds and numbered tags are mine):

Hillary Rips Off Elizabeth Warren's 'Fighting Chance' Line
By Mark Finkelstein | September 21, 2014 | 9:44 AM EDT

Should Fauxcahontas be flattered . . . or furious?  The title of Elizabeth Warren's new book is "A Fighting Chance," a "rabble-rousing" rant by the populist from the Harvard faculty lounge.

So here comes Hillary Clinton, who in a speech this week just happened to say "I want every one of our children to feel that they are inheriting the best of America ... that this country is on your side; that this country will give you the fighting chance, the fair shot you deserve." Pure coincidence? Not when it comes to American's most calculating politician.  Not when Hillary lifts the line from the woman whose name is bruited about as potentially offering Clinton her most serious challenge for the Dem nomination.

Will the Press Notice Panetta's Contention That U.S. Left Iraq Too Early?
By Tom Blumer | September 20, 2014 | 10:48 PM EDT

On Sunday, CBS's "60 Minutes" will broadcast Scott Pelley's recent interview of former Defense Secretary Leon Panetta.

In CBS's promotional tease, which was broadcast on Friday, in response to Pelley's question about whether he was confident that the U.S. troop withdrawal "was the right thing to do" at the time it was done, Panetta said, "No, I wasn't." That's big news. How big? So big that, based on searches on Panetta's last name, the Associated Press and the New York Times have yet to cover it. In other words, it's fair to contend that these two leading icons of American journalism are waiting for an administration response before they run the story, so they can then turn it into a "White House denies" piece. The video follows the jump.

Gingrich — and Reality — Also Humiliated Jay Carney on CNN Wednesday Night
By Tom Blumer | September 11, 2014 | 10:55 AM EDT

As the midnight oil-burning Curtis Houck at NewsBusters noted last night, John McCain ripped into Jay Carney's attempts to rewrite history Wednesday evening on CNN. Among other things, he reminded the former White House Press Secretary that "We had it (the Iraq War) won, thanks to the surge." In other words, our military and Iraqi government had achieved victory. Barack Obama and his administration, perhaps until last night, have seemed indifferent at best and dismissive at worst at what has happened in Iraq since then.

After McCain got in his rips, it was Newt Gingrich's turn. The former House Speaker, whose assertion, as will be seen later, is supported by contemporaneous reporting by Tim Arango at the New York Times, took apart Carney's hypocrisy in whining about how a status of forces agreement with Iraq with the number of American troops our generals believed would be necessary to maintain the peace would have meant our presence there "in perpetuity":

Bill Maher Compares Mitt Romney to a Jellyfish; ‘Future Looks Bright If You’re a Spineless Glob of Goo’
By Curtis Houck | September 9, 2014 | 8:38 PM EDT

Appearing on Monday night’s Late Show with David Letterman, liberal talk show host Bill Maher joked with David Letterman and the audience about the drought in California (where he lives) and after suggesting that global warming was killing off fish and allowing jellyfish to thrive, he drew laughs from the audience when he declared that “[t]he future looks bright if you’re a spineless glob of goo. Which is why I say, Mitt Romney in 2016, ladies and gentlemen.”