On a truly idiotic segment of the July 29 edition of Ronan Farrow Daily, the host of the Lean Forward network’s “next-generation news show” discussed the current state of emojis with linguist John McWhorter, CNet’s Maggie Reardon, and journalist Dave Cullen. Farrow commented how the popular emoticons are “becoming more and more the fabric of the kind of communication you see,” and truly out-liberaled himself with his question to McWhorter, who happens to be black.
After wondering whether emojis, which originated in Japan, could alter “tech-driven communication across international lines,” Farrow asked McWhorter, “do you think there's a limitation we're suffering from in terms of the racial diversity of these emojis?” [See video below]
Media Diversity
While Chris Matthews avoided the National Review coverage of Democratic Senate hopeful Michelle Nunn’s leaked campaign strategy, the panel of Morning Joe gave the story a brief three minutes during the three-hour morning news show. MSNBC contributor Willie Geist appealed to Daily Rundown’s Chuck Todd to brush the controversy aside, stating “these plans exist on every campaign” and “it’s just that we have got one in the spotlight this morning.”
The plan in question confronted Nunn’s need to appeal to minorities in the Atlanta area, especially African Americans and Hispanics. Strategists also recommended that the Maryland native tap into the financially viable minorities, such as the “very tight” Asian community, the Jewish population that holds “tremendous financial opportunity”, and the gay community. While Todd did have enough time to compare Nunn’s strategy to “that scene in the Simpsons where Montgomery Burns starts running for governor,” the panel only chose to mention her appeal to the Jewish population.
On the July 28 edition of NewsNation, anchor Tamron Hall did her part to push the alarmist liberal narrative about how radical Republicans are itching to impeach President Obama. The news hook for this was how “the new incoming House GOP whip, Tea Party backed Louisiana congressman Steve Scalise will not rule out impeaching the president over his use of executive orders.” This despite the fact there’s much “unfinished business” and “that urgent do list” of “the border crisis” and “funding for the nation’s highway and infrastructure project” on Congress’s plate.
The Today show co-anchor aired a clip from Fox News Sunday of host Chris Wallace repeatedly asking the Louisiana Republican if he would “consider impeaching the president.” Wallace responded that “it might be the first White House in history that is trying to start the narrative of impeaching their own president.” Of course, nowhere in the clip did the Louisiana representative insinuate that he was angling for impeachment. Instead Scalise called out the White House for stressing impeachment talks in an attempt “to fundraise off of that” and “change the topic away from the president's failed agenda.” [See video below. Click here for MP3 audio]
According to MSNBC, Republicans are always making things worse. On the July 25 edition of Ronan Farrow Daily, the cable host began a segment entitled “Kinder, Gentler GOP?” after playing a clip of Rand Paul at the National Urban League annual conference speaking of the “poverty problem.” Farrow asked his guests a stream of leading questions insinuating that Republicans are “catering to a demographic that may have lost Republicans the last general election” rather than actually working to aid low income individuals.
While the president of the National Urban League Marc Morial tried to avoid being too overtly political, MSNBC analyst and former DNC communications director Karen Finney made it clear that Republicans “tend to be policy ideas that actually make things worse, not better.” They oppose “things like an increase in the minimum wage or equal pay for women that we know could actually help communities of color.” (See video below)
While Stephen Colbert usually regulates his humor to bashing Republicans, on the July 24 edition of The Colbert Report the Comedy Central comedian actually made a joke both his liberal and conservative audience could enjoy.
As Colbert’s faux conservative personality expressed his outrage over the “transparent Hollywood attack on Republicans” in HBO’s latest episode of the explicit vampire series True Blood, he joked “we should not be surprised at all that vampires are Democrats. After all, they scream when they see a cross.” (See video below)
From numerous softball interviews to free publicity for her memoir Hard Choices, it is plain to see that the liberal media adores Hillary Clinton and pines for her to run as a Democratic presidential candidate in 2016. Except, of course, for the panelists on Morning Joe. On the July 25 edition of the MSNBC morning show, Mika Brzezinksi and her guests Mark Halerpin, David Gregory, and Donny Deutsch lamented the “horrible coverage” Clinton is “destined” to receive “if she runs for president.”
Brzezinksi began the segment by recounting former New York Time’s executive editor Jill Abramson’s statement that “the former first lady expected the press, especially female journalists, to be loyal to her” and Clinton’s response that “I'll have to work on my expectations.” While it is true that Clinton expects the liberal media to fawn over her, the Morning Joe panel forgot that usually, they do.
On the July 23 edition of The Ed Show, host Ed Schultz and guest Michael Eric Dyson took turns attacking former NFL coach Tony Dungy for stating that he “wouldn’t want to deal” with the media attention that followed the drafting of Michael Sam, the NFL’s first openly-gay draftee.
While the other guest, national sport columnist Terence Moore, attempted to defend Dungy, Dyson compared his “attempt to justify prejudice and bigotry under the rubric of having questions about distractions” to the “light, racist viewpoints that were promoted by many white people who were not in the Ku Klux Klan” but still “resisted the progress of African-American people by undermining it.” Forget “light racism,” later in the interview Dyson compared the coach to an infamous Southern segregationist who employed police dogs and fire hoses on peaceful protesters. [See video below. Click here for MP3 audio]
Rather than dismissing Rula Jebreal’s laughable claim that American media is “disgustingly biased” in favor of Israel, on the July 22 edition of All In, host Chris Hayes was determined to prove to his guest that MSNBC is “doing a good job” being more impartial in the current Gaza conflict.
In Hayes’s eyes, “doing a good job” meant ensuring that “Israelis are losing the media war for the first time.” [See video below. Click here for MP3 audio]
MSNBC is nothing if not consistent. On the July 23 edition of Andrea Mitchell Reports, the NBC News Chief Foreign Affairs Correspondent invited David Remnick of The New Yorker on to discuss Putin and his propaganda machine.
Much to Mitchell’s delight, the Pulitzer prize winning journalist did so by comparing ruthless authoritarian Vladimir Putin to none other than the popular conservative radio host Glenn Beck. [See video below. Click here for MP3 audio]
The July 22 edition of Morning Joe boasted an exclusive interview with Democratic House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.). But before Pelosi came on set, MSNBC anchor Thomas Roberts featured his own slobbering interview with the politician in their shared hometown of Baltimore. Much to co-host Mika Brzezinski’s delight, Roberts delved into “Pelosi’s political roots” which “run deep.”
The segment featured Pelosi quipping with aging Baltimore residents because, Roberts explained, “Pelosi still recognizes the power and charm of retail politics.” According to the Way Too Early host, being “the only daughter of one of Baltimore's longest serving mayors, Thomas D’Alesandro,” it was “Pelosi's childhood, answering the door at her family home, trying to help the people who came to see her dad that proved to be her political training ground.” [See video below. Click here for MP3]
MSNBC has truly outdone itself. On the July 21 edition of Ronan Farrow Daily, the MSNBC host invited Eli Lake from Huffington Post and Italian-Palestinian journalist and MSNBC contributor Rula Jebreal onto the show to discuss how Secretary of State John Kerry’s off-air comments about Israeli operations in Palestine revealed a gap between “American officials’ public versus private thoughts when it comes to Israel.”
When Farrow asked Jebreal, “Why can't American leaders be more honest?” she responded that because of “AIPAC and because of the money behind it and because of Sheldon Adelson and because of all of us in the media,” American political leaders are forced into a pro-Israel stance. [See video below. Click here for MP3 audio]
John Oliver used the Sunday July 20 edition of HBO’s Last Week Tonight as a platform to condemn the privatization of the American prison system. Rather than describing both sides of the issue, Oliver told horror stories from prisons that outsource healthcare and food provision without mentioning similar stories from publicly run prisons. According to Oliver, the verdict is straightforward: “private prisons are bad.”
The British comedian spent 18 of his 30 minute show decrying the “drug laws that do seem to be a little draconian, and a lot racist,” as well as the “dismantling of our mental health system” that lead to America having “more prisoners at the moment than China.” Of course, he failed to mention that the Chinese government usually chooses the death penalty over imprisonment, and according to CNN, “executed more people than any other country last year.” [See video below. Click here for MP3 audio]