New York Times congressional reporter Carl Hulse delivered a balanced column Tuesday recounting why reformist, Tea Party-minded conservatives have aligned against more traditional Chamber of Commerce Republicans. But it was marred by Hulse's contemptuous tone ("the anti-chamber crowd") and labeling habits, with Hulse making not one, not two, but six references to "hard-right" conservatives in a 1,050-word story, with two "hard-line" labels for good measure. Yet the Times' uses of the term "hard-left" in U.S. political stories are vanishingly rare.
Double Standards
By Tom Blumer | November 2, 2015 | 10:49 PM EST
On June 30, the Washington Post announced that it would be "compiling a database of every fatal shooting in the United States by a police officer in the line of duty in 2015." The Post has been "tracking more than a dozen details about each killing — including the race of the deceased, the circumstances of the shooting, and whether the person was armed."
The paper's work thus far has been a revealing exercise which should be getting far more attention than it is. I believe would be getting the needed attention if the revelations were different. You see, the analysis of fatal shootings thus far shows that, in layman's terms, the overwhelming majority of them were wholly justified (HT to an Investor's Business Daily editorial).
By Curtis Houck | November 2, 2015 | 8:53 PM EST
In his first interview with President Barack Obama since taking over as NBC Nightly News anchor, Lester Holt gave the President a friendly platform on Monday to promote criminal justice reform and his decision to send a small group of U.S. troops into Syria. Holt served up a fawning question to the President if he viewed it as “your defining moment” considering the fact that he’s the first African-American President with “[s]o many hopes and aspirations were placed on you.”
By Erin Aitcheson | November 2, 2015 | 12:52 PM EST
A friend who defends your crazy anti-police comments is a friend indeed. At the Hollywood Film Awards, Django Unchained star Jamie Foxx defended and encouraged his buddy Quentin Tarantino’s anti-cop remarks made at a police brutality rally in New York recently.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, while presenting an award for Tarantino’s upcoming film, Hateful Eight, Foxx said: "Keep telling the truth, keep speaking the truth and don't worry about none of the haters."
By Tom Blumer | October 31, 2015 | 10:47 PM EDT
On Thursday, the government reported that the nation's economy turned in yet another quarter of poor economic performance, estimating that its gross domestic product grew at an annual rate of 1.5 percent in the third quarter.
The business press almost universally downplayed the news, and told readers that the fourth quarter will be better. No one talked about how much the tepid growth of the past six-plus years since the recession officially ended has been sacrificed in the name of misguided and dangerous Keynesian stimulus. As is so often the case, an editorial at Investor's Business Daily did that, performing a job the press has consistently refused to do.
By Clay Waters | October 31, 2015 | 10:21 PM EDT
The election of a new Speaker of the House had the New York Times firing up its reliably crooked labeling machine. On Thursday, reporter and repeat offender David Herszenhorn lamented that "Many Republicans, including members of the hard-right House Freedom Caucus who had hounded Mr. Boehner from the speakership, accused him and other party leaders of betraying them with a late-hour deal that was negotiated in secret." Veteran congressional reporter Carl Hulse interviewed former Speaker John Boehner and took his side against his allegedly irresponsible opponents: "Mr. Boehner...eventually became the power structure, only to be forced out by hard-line conservatives he deems 'knuckleheads' for their inability to recognize that compromise is sometimes necessary in politically divided government."
By Mark Finkelstein | October 31, 2015 | 9:13 AM EDT
Politico Magazine runs a long article by Alex Thompson today with the provocative headline: "Could America Elect a Mentally Ill President? Yes. In fact, we probably already did." The story discusses the possible mental issues, and documented consumption of drugs used to treat mental illness, of numerous politicians, including several presidents, among them JFK, LBJ and Nixon.
But here's the—excuse the expression—crazy thing. To illustrate the story, Politico features a large photo of Barry Goldwater. He is shown holding a finger to his lips, as if perhaps to suggest he wants to keep a secret. But of all the many politicians discussed in the story, Goldwater is one about whom no serious suggestion of mental illness or the use of drugs used to treat mental illness is made.
Moderators at CNBC, Which 'Graded' Debaters' Speech Patterns, Scored At or Below Every GOP Candidate
By Tom Blumer | October 30, 2015 | 9:34 PM EDT People in glass houses shouldn't throw stones. And people who ridicule the level of others' speech patterns should check theirs first.
CNBC didn't do that. Instead, on Thursday, as I noted in a previous NewsBusters post, it childishly rushed out a grade-level evaluation of the Republican presidential candidates' speech patterns during the first three debates, including the Wednesday train wreck it rudely hosted, and created a graphic with the title, "Are you smarter than a GOP candidate?" Payback is sweet (bolds are mine):
By Michael McKinney | October 30, 2015 | 12:01 PM EDT
Friday's Morning Joe featured a discussion by the roundtable on the subject of the debates and the fairness needed for them. While Newsbusters previously discussed Morning Joe's discussion on the bias of moderators, Morning Joe also discussed their surprise and support of Dr. Ben Carson, who has come out leading the change to reform these debates.
CNBC Rates Grade Level of GOP Candidates' Speech Patterns; Childish Moderators Not Taken Into Account
By Tom Blumer | October 29, 2015 | 3:50 PM EDT It would appear that CNBC isn't going to take the criticism of its debate panelists' awful conduct last night lying down.
In what appears to be an all too predictable immature response to the dressing-downs several Republican presidential candidates administered to certain of their moderators as a result of their juvenile behavior and insulting questions — particularly John Harwood and Carl Quintillana — the network has rushed out ratings of the top ten GOP candidates' speech patterns during the first three debates, with an obvious undertone: Ignore these candidates; they're just a bunch of dummies.
By Tom Blumer | October 29, 2015 | 2:37 AM EDT
Wednesday night, an Associated Press reporter told us that it's the press's job to ask "tough, impertinent" questions like the ones moderators at Wednesday night's CNBC-hosted Republican debate were asking.
Ken Dilanian, who is apparently the AP's Intelligence Writer — seriously — really needs to consult a dictionary before he makes such a complete fool of himself. Here is what Dilanian tweeted at 10:32 p.m.:
By Clay Waters | October 28, 2015 | 10:01 PM EDT
Wednesday's New York Times featured "Ted Cruz as Beowulf: Matching Candidates With Books They Sound Like," in which the Times measured the candidates’ debate rhetoric by complexity and eagerly forwarded some unchallenged stereotypes of "simplistic" conservatives: "'Trump has the language of the board room, the language of entertainment,' [professor Sharon] Jarvis said. 'He really speaks to the conservative base who would prefer not to hear complex arguments.'"