UPDATE: Costello apologizes. When video of Ray Rice punching and then dragging his fiancé around on the floor was released CNN’s Carol Costello justifiably called it “disturbing” and “insane.” But when Costello played the audio of a different woman recounting a similar horrifying experience of being assaulted and dragged around by a man, she told her audience: “Sit back and enjoy.” The difference? The woman in question happened to be the daughter of favorite liberal hate object and former Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin. 

Samuel Burke touted Amazon's new streaming TV series Transparent on Monday's CNN Newsroom as "groundbreaking," and underlined that it's "tackling a topic that TV has rarely touched." The main character in the series, "Moira," is an elderly father who begins to dress as a woman. Burke acclaimed that "this role of a 70-year-old trans-gender character might just give Netflix a run for its money."

On Tuesday's CNN Newsroom, Carol Costello refreshingly complimented Burger King's planned merger with Canadian restaurant chain Tim Hortons as a "very smart business move" that will "save the company money." Costello turned to CNN correspondent Christine Romans, who spotlighted how "corporate taxes are lower in Canada than they are in the U.S.," and that "the stock is up because everyone on Wall Street...thinks this is going to lower the tax bill for Burger King."

The anchor also brought on Curtis Dubay of the conservative Heritage Foundation, who underlined that "our tax code makes it uncompetitive around the world. And so, they're doing something to get out from under that burden. They're doing what's right for their shareholders and their owners....What has to be done is the tax code has to be reformed. We have to have corporate tax reform." This prompted Costello to lament that Congress probably won't do anything to reform the tax code: [MP3 audio available here; video below the jump]

While a nearly finished 72 hour cease-fire has at least temporarily stopped the war between Israel and Gaza, the media’s anti-Israel slant has been unrelenting. On the August 7 edition of CNN Newsroom, host Carol Costello welcomed radical pro-Palestine rabbi Michael Lerner to the program, and he placed all of the blame on Israel for the conflict.

Lerner did have the courage to label Hamas as a “terrible and oppressive force,” but throughout the segment he criticized Israel’s  “oppressive” occupation and blockade of the Gaza strip. And when Costello asked the rabbi who “is more to blame for so many casualties and deaths in Gaza, is it Israel or Hamas,” his answer revealed a distinctly anti-Israel bias: [MP3 audio here; video below]

The mainstream media has largely deflected criticism from the President on a number of recent crises, but CNN’s Carol Costello hit Obama for his frequent fundraisers in a discussion about his ability to prioritize the immigration crisis, Ukraine, and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Leading off the segment on the July 22 edition of CNN Newsroom, Costello questioned the White House’s logic that they can “walk and chew gum” at the same time: “But let's face it, he's got five, count them, five fundraisers in the next two days on the west coast. Wouldn't you agree at the very least this is an example of bad optics?” [MP3 audio here; video below]