By Curtis Houck | October 1, 2015 | 12:19 AM EDT

During his segment on the Wednesday edition of MSNBC’s All In attacking Speaker of the House candidate Kevin McCarthy for his comments about Hillary Clinton and the Benghazi Committee, host Chris Hayes made quite the choice of liberal pundits in none other than failed Texas Democratic gubernatorial candidate Wendy Davis, who compared McCarthy and the panel to the “witch-hunt” against Planned Parenthood.

By Tom Blumer | September 30, 2015 | 11:59 PM EDT

Apparently, the establishment press is waiting for its marching orders on how to handle what an Investor's Business Daily editorial has already called a "scandal."

This one's a joint effort involving Hillary Clinton, Sidney Blumenthal, a recently deceased former CIA operative named Tyler Drumheller who worked with Blumenthal — and CBS News. As Mark Hemingway at the Weekly Standard reported Tuesday afternoon (i.e., now approaching two overnight news cycles ago), "Drumheller, the former chief of the CIA’s clandestine service in Europe who was working directly with Blumenthal as a member of Clinton’s spy network, was concurrently working as a consultant to CBS News and its venerable news program 60 Minutes." IBD's question, reacting to Hemingway's report: "Who is more corrupt, Clinton or the mainstream media?"

By Brad Wilmouth | September 30, 2015 | 11:51 PM EDT

On Wednesday's CNN Newsroom, anchor Carol Costello defended federal funding for Planned Parenthood in a segment which included conservative CNN commentator S.E. Cupp and liberal CNN commentator Marc Lamont Hill supposedly for balance, but was so slanted to the left that Cupp quipped that "I love doing your show because I know I'll get to debate two liberals."

By Curtis Houck | September 30, 2015 | 9:49 PM EDT

On Wednesday night, the CBS Evening News punted on the latest batch of Hillary Clinton’s State Department e-mails released hours earlier while their competitors at ABC and NBC did cover them, but only through the veil of defending Clinton against Speaker of the House candidate Kevin McCarthy’s comments on the Benghazi Committee that NBC’s Andrea Mitchell touted as “an unlikely political lifeline.”

By Tom Blumer | September 30, 2015 | 7:29 PM EDT

In three previous posts yesterday and today, I have noted obvious distortions and untruths in Cecile Richards' testimony this week before a House committee.

I didn't mean to save the best (really the worst) for a fourth post, but I came across an jaw-dropping item at LifeNews.com this afternoon. It covers an assertion Richards made during the House hearing that is either one of the biggest lies of the 21st century thus far or its most glaring example of hermetically sealed ignorance. Either way, the fact that it hasn't made its way into the establishment press virtually proves that their mission is to protect Richards and her organization, not to tell its readers, listeners and viewers what is really happening.

By Brad Wilmouth | September 30, 2015 | 5:13 PM EDT

On Wednesday's New Day on CNN, co-anchor Alisyn Camerota repeatedly fretted over the possibility that cutting off federal funding of Planned Parenthood would make it difficult for women to get abortions. In one segment, she asserted that, in doing so, "obviously it does take away a woman's right to choose."

In a later segment, she suggested that defunding Planned Parenthood would lead women to have abortions "in a more desperate way," and, speaking to GOP Rep. Diane Black, demanded: "Is that what you want for American women?" As he plugged the first segment on the issue at 6:16 a.m., co-anchor Chris Cuomo tagged Planned Parenthood's activities as "lawful," as if this characterization were not in dispute: Cuomo:

By Tom Blumer | September 30, 2015 | 1:57 PM EDT

Tuesday afternoon, Alan Fram laughably headlined his coverage of Planned Parenthood head Cecile Richards' appearance before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee at the Associated Press as follows: "FACING CONGRESS, PLANNED PARENTHOOD CHIEF REBUTS VIDEOS."

She did no such thing. Most notably, Fram quoted Richards making the following statement to the committee: "The outrageous accusations leveled against Planned Parenthood, based on heavily doctored videos, are offensive and categorically untrue." Not merely "heavily edited," but "doctored," which according to the dictionary in this context means "to tamper with; falsify." Unfortunately for Richards and her group's supporters, in a report released yesterday, forensic experts have concluded that the Center for Medical Progress videos she criticized are "authentic" (bolds are mine throughout this post):

By Tom Blumer | September 30, 2015 | 10:03 AM EDT

In Congressional testimony on Monday and Tuesday, Planned Parenthood head Cecile Richards twisted or failed to tell the truth in several instances.

As shown last night, one of them related to how many of its facilities are involved in the provision of fetal tissue for compensation. Her claim that it's "less than 1 percent" is only plausible if the organization has recently terminated such involvement at many facilities known to have participated in the practice in the recent past. A second more obviously untrue claim, whose falsehood has been completely ignored by the national establishment press, is her contention that "we've never stated" that Planned Parenthood performs mammograms at any of its facilities. Well, yes she has — and as will be seen later, an awful lot of people who you might think would know better still believe the lie.

By Curtis Houck | September 30, 2015 | 3:14 AM EDT

Not surprisingly, liberal MSNBC host Rachel Maddow led off the Tuesday edition of her eponymous show by opining on the House hearing featuring Planned Parenthood President Cecile Richards and lamenting how “the whole Republican Party is more unified to try to destroy Planned Parenthood than they are unified on anything else” with their “demagoguery” that she determined worked out “very badly” for them.

By Tom Blumer | September 29, 2015 | 11:37 PM EDT

In Congressional testimony Monday and Tuesday, Planned Parenthood head Cecile Richards twisted the truth in several instances.

One of them had to to with how many of its facilities are involved in the provision of fetal tissue for compensation. She may be technically telling the truth about how many are involved at this moment, but it's clear that far more have been — at least until recently.

By Matthew Balan | September 29, 2015 | 2:08 PM EDT

On Tuesday's CNN Newsroom, Carol Costello treated Planned Parenthood's own talking points about "three percent" of its services are abortions as "facts." Costello emphasized that "$500 million in federal funds goes to Planned Parenthood. None of that money...pays for abortions....Planned Parenthood says only three percent of their services are dedicated to abortion. The group says 97 percent of its services are for things like...breast exams...cancer screenings and contraception."

By Brad Wilmouth | September 29, 2015 | 11:58 AM EDT

As Representative Daniel Webster appeared as a guest on Tuesday's New Day on CNN to discuss his intention to run for Speaker of the House of Representatives, substitute co-host John Berman pressed the Florida Republican to vow to work against a government shutdown in the face of calls by some GOPers to defund Planned Parenthood.