On the May 26 edition of Morning Joe, panelists Mike Allen, John Heilemann and Mark Halperin were all bullish about Hillary Clinton’s prospects for creating a wave that could carry down-ballot Democrats to their own election victories in 2016. Allen happily noted that Democrats were using “the historic element of her candidacy and the higher turnout that you traditionally get in a presidential year” to help propel down-ballot candidates in House, Senate and state races.
John Heilemann
By Mark Finkelstein | May 5, 2015 | 6:42 PM EDT
For all the good their Ivy League degrees did Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton—when you consider the smoking ruin that is their foreign policy record—you'd think John Heilemann would have the good sense not to make an Ancient Eight sheepskin the sine qua non for a presidential candidate.
But with his MSM elitism on full display,, on today's With All Due Respect Heilemann had the chutzpah to suggest that Mike Huckabee doesn't clear the Commander-in-Chief bar because he lacks a degree from Harvard's Kennedy School or Princeton's Woodrow Wilson School. Huck has simply picked up some foreign policy talking points from Fox News, huffed Heilemann.
Heilemann: Hillary is 'Running Against the Press,' Which She Rightfully Believes to 'Hostile' to Her
By Bryan Ballas | April 25, 2015 | 7:36 AM EDT Apparently the media’s overt sympathy for Democratic candidates is so taken for granted that anything less than glowing adoration and cooperation is viewed as hostile. That’s at least one explanation for John Heilemann’s odd evaluation of Hillary Clinton’s campaign launch.
According to Heilemann of Bloomberg Politics, Hillary is fighting a two front war. "She’s running against herself And she’s running against the press...the Clintons’ relationship with the press has never been great. She’s believes the press corps is incredibly hostile to her. She has some reason to believe that the press corps is unduly or disproportionately hostile to her...she is been subject to not that flattering of press coverage....[S]he got something in that week that I don't think I've seen her ever have before....[S]he had mockery."
By Mark Finkelstein | April 21, 2015 | 6:18 PM EDT
This was pretty funny. William Shaheen, Hillary's New Hampshire co-chair and husband of Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, appearing on today's With All Due Respect, boasted that he knows where Hillary stands on 10 different issues.
But when hosts Mark Halperin and John Heilemann put Shaheen to the test, asking him where Hillary stands on the Keystone Pipeline and the Trans Pacific trade deal, Shaheen had to sheepishly admit that he didn't know Hillary's view on either issue, despite his boast and having specifically said that he knows where Hillary stands on trade.
By Jeffrey Meyer | April 13, 2015 | 2:08 PM EDT
On Monday, CBS This Morning hosted several political analysts to help lay out a potential electoral strategy for Hillary Clinton’s newly announced presidential campaign. In two separate segments, John Dickerson, CBS News Political Director, and Bloomberg Politics’ John Heilemann offered up some free political advice to Clinton’s campaign as she looks to “change the perception people already have of her.”
By Mark Finkelstein | April 9, 2015 | 9:04 PM EDT
Are we talking Frequent Flyer Miles, Hillary's record of "success" in such places as Benghazi, Syria and Yemen, or just what?
On today's With All Due Respect, Bloomberg's Melinda Henneberger claimed that when it comes to foreign policy, none of the Republican presidential hopefuls "can possibly come up to the level of the former Secretary of State." Host John Heilemann had teed up the question by citing Hillary's "huge resume" in the area. Heilemann also indulged in some classic Upper West Side snobbery, saying that when Scott Walker goes abroad, he's either "selling cheese or buying cheese."
By Mark Finkelstein | April 7, 2015 | 8:44 PM EDT
Let's be clear: on today's With All Due Respect, Mark Halperin and John Heilemann were very complimentary about Kelley Paul's performance today in introducing her husband Rand at his presidential announcement speech. They described her as a big asset and anticipate seeing a lot more of her on the campaign trail.
That said, the duo said something that boggled my mind, claiming that as good as she was, Kelley was "not at Michelle Obama's level." Back in April, 2008, a full year later in that campaign cycle, this NewsBuster wrote about Michelle's shockingly angry performance on the stump [view the item and above all the video here], and asked if the MSM would report it. Of course they didn't. As I recall, Michelle was "disappeared" from big public appearances for some time after that fiasco. IMHO Kelley is light years ahead of Michelle at this stage.
By Geoffrey Dickens | April 7, 2015 | 9:43 AM EDT
Since newly announced presidential candidate Rand Paul first arrived on the national scene, as part of the Tea Party wave of 2010, the Kentucky Republican Senator has been depicted as a racist, sexist and heartless slasher of programs for the poor by the liberal media.
By Mark Finkelstein | April 6, 2015 | 6:16 PM EDT
I hadn't before seen Will Leitch, the Deadspin creator who now writes on politics for Bloomberg, in action. But on today's With All Due Respect, I found him funny and affable.
Even so, he made one left-leaning assertion so absurd it was too much even for show host John Heilemann. Running parallel with the NCAA tourney, Bloomberg has been running a bracket of 64 non-presidential candidates. In the Final Four, Jon Stewart defeated the Pope and Tina Fey took out Warren Buffett. Asked to explain the results, Leitch alleged that Fey and Stewart have a "universality that maybe not everybody has, frankly including the Pope."
By Mark Finkelstein | March 24, 2015 | 10:08 AM EDT
Morning Joe went on the air in 2007. Think of all the outrage-provoking people and events that have popped up in the ensuing eight years. Yet in the memory of this Newsbuster—who's been blogging the show since its debut—rarely has Mika Brzezinski seemed more upset than she was today on the subject of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Just what is it that drives Brzezinski so batty about Bibi? Mika gave a little hint when she challenged the integrity of her guests for declining to join in her blasting of Bibi: "I just want to know what you're all afraid of. I do." Hmm. Mika apparently thinks there's something about the Israelis, or their friends in the US, that frightens American reporters and pundits from speaking their minds. What might that be?
By Mark Finkelstein | March 17, 2015 | 7:39 PM EDT
Imagine the secret scene inside the White House if Bibi Netanyahu had lost tonight: President Obama popping the bubbly as Samantha Power and John Kerry danced an Irish jig? There's no denying that the Obama admin ardently davened [prayed] for Bibi's defeat. Top Obama campaign aides had been dispatched to Israel for that very purpose. Indeed, there are even allegations that the Obama admin had underwritten the effort to defeat Netanyahu.
But in a classic MSM bit of hypocritical hand-wringing, on this evening's With All Due Respect, John Heilemann lamented that he was "saddened" to hear that an adviser to Netanyahu said that his victory would be "a defeat for Barack Obama."
By Scott Whitlock | March 11, 2015 | 11:38 AM EDT
All three networks on Wednesday morning offered substantive coverage of Hillary Clinton's growing e-mail scandal. Yet, ABC's Good Morning America didn't bother to go to Republicans for response to the controversy. GMA boycotted the story on Tuesday. But on Wednesday, George Stephanopoulos trumpeted, "Hillary on the hot seat. The former Secretary of State finally answers questions about that private email controversy."