The focus of the CNBC Republican presidential debate was supposed to be economic policy: taxes, trade, immigration and how to generate economic growth.
The two-part Oct. 28, debate, titled “Your Money, Your Vote,” focused on the broad categories of jobs, taxes and the deficit, the general health of the economy, and the financial freedom of Americans.
Vice President Joe Biden will wait quite some time until he formally endorses Democratic frontrunner Hillary Clinton, possibly even waiting until the last minute at the Democratic convention itself.
That was the prediction of veteran political journalist and Huffington Post Media Group editorial director Howard Fineman on the October 21 edition of MSNBC's Hardball. For her part, moderately conservative Washington Post columnist Kathleen Parker seems to agree.
On his Monday edition of Hardball, MSNBC host Chris Matthews, along with panelists Eugene Robinson, Howard Fineman, and Joan Walsh hit socialist Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders (Vt.) from the left for his voting record on gun rights, particularly a 2005 bill that granted civil immunity from gun manufacturers. At one point, Matthews even oddly compared Sanders to the late liberal-but-racist segregationist Sen. William Fulbright (D-Ark.), suggesting his vote on the gun immunity bill was unforgivable much like Fulbright's defense of Jim Crow.
On Monday’s Hardball, Stephanie Schriock, president of the pro-choice organization EMILY’s List, lamented that Hillary Clinton’s ongoing problems with her use of a private e-mail server have dominated the coverage of her campaign. The outspoken supporter of Clinton complained that the e-mails were “the only story that has gotten any significant coverage about Hillary Clinton for the last three months, despite the fact that she has rolled out some incredible policies.”
Prior to Donald Trump’s rally Monday night in Dallas, Texas, Chris Matthews and the panelists on MSNBC’s Hardball mocked Republican women and voters from “southwestern Virginia” of Scots-Irish heritage who’ve “got an attitude” and previously supported Democrats like Jim Webb. Matthews wrote them off as white people “like Pat Buchanan...the people that went to the mountains when they immigrated to the United States, they went right to the rural areas and they've got an attitude.”
After all these years, Chris Matthews still hasn't lost that lovin' feeling. The MSNBC host spent a total of two minutes and 12 seconds on Wednesday night hitting Florida Sen. Marco Rubio (R) for a line comparing Donald Trump to Barack Obama. "Look how he's lived his life. He's done everything right," Matthews began, going on to explain how Obama is "perfect" and "immaculate."
The hosts and journalists of MSNBC seem to have found a new Republican favorite, one in the mold of 2012 moderate Jon Huntsman. Daughter Abby Huntsman, a co-host on The Cycle, lamented presidential primary politics, sneering, "You have got to be an entertainer. You've got to feed the far-right what they want." Huntsman described the process, "You've got to sometimes say things you don't always agree with." Howard Fineman, perhaps using liberal journalist code, praised Jon Kasich: "He's a serious guy who thinks about issues seriously."
Veteran journalist Howard Fineman on Tuesday smeared conservatives primary voters, saying that Donald Trump's comments on immigration indicate "xenophobia" "sells in New Hampshire and Iowa." Appearing on The Cycle to discusses the rise of Trump, co-host Krystal Ball wondered what "it says about the Republican Party that this guy seems to have momentum?" Fineman, a former editor of Newsweek who is now with the Huffington Post, responded, "Even though Trump is getting in tremendous trouble financially and politically for his comments about Hispanics, that kind of xenophobic language sells in New Hampshire and Iowa."
On Monday's Hardball program, Chris Matthews and gang worked furiously to shield Hillary Clinton from legitimate scrutiny over foreign donations to the Clinton Global Initiative, with Matthews grousing that the former secretary of state was facing a GOP "firing squad" who were hoping to bring about the "crib death" of the Clinton presidential campaign.
While admitting that it was a shame that President Obama was a no-show for Sunday's unity rally in Paris, MSNBC contributor Howard Fineman offered that actor George Clooney's "Je Suis Charlie" speech at Sunday evening's Golden Globes award show was in some sense just as well as representation of America's solidarity with France.
Wildly spinning a recent NBC/Wall Street Journal poll showing just 38 percent support President Obama's planned executive amnesty while 48 percent oppose it, Huffington Post's Howard Fineman offered that it's possible "some" of those opposed are against it from Obama's left, thinking it doesn't go far enough.
On the November 17 edition of Hardball, MSNBC anchor Chris Matthews and MSNBC contributors Howard Fineman and Eugene Robinson offered some criticism, albeit pretty mild, of President Obama's veto threat for a bill which would greenlight the Keystone XL oil pipeline.