A federal judge in Pennsylvania ruled on Tuesday that portions of President Barack Obama’s presidential action on immigration were unconstitutional as “Congress's lawmaking power is not subject to presidential supervision or control” and that “congressional inaction does not endow legislative power with the executive.”
However, if you tuned into any of the Tuesday evening newscasts on the major broadcast networks, you would not have found any mention of the ruling.
Judicial Watch president Tom Fitton appeared on the Fox News Channel (FNC) Monday afternoon and informed viewers that a Department of Justice (DOJ) attorney admitted to his organization on Friday that the e-mails belonging to former IRS official Lois Lerner that were thought to be lost likely still exist. He declared to FNC’s Shannon Bream that the story of Lerner’s hard drive being damaged and destroyed and thus her e-mails were permanently lost has “all been a pack of malarkey” and “a big lie.”
When it came to the major broadcast networks covering this huge story on their Monday evening newscasts, there was no coverage to be found as ABC, CBS, and NBC all carried out the latest censoring of news surrounding the IRS. [MP3 audio here; Video below]
The latest bombshell in the IRS scandal has landed. On Monday, Judicial Watch’s president Tom Fitton told FNC’s Shannon Bream that a Justice Department attorney told them the missing Lois Lerner e-mails do exist.
Appearing on FNC’s The Real Story with Gretchen Carlson, Fitton announced: “A Department of Justice attorney told a Judicial Watch attorney on Friday that it turns out the federal government backs up all computer records in case something terrible happens in Washington and there is a catastrophe....So everything we’ve been hearing about scratched hard drives, about missing e-mails of Lois Lerner, other IRS officials, other officials in the Obama administration, it’s all been a pack of malarkey.” (video after the jump)
It looks like Shannon Bream of Fox News lost a friendly bet with Brent Bozell, the president and founder of the Media Research Center, NewsBusters's parent company.
On last night's Kelly File, the fill-in anchor argued that the liberal broadcast networks would have to devote time to covering John Walsh if he bowed out of his Senate race due to his plagiarism scandal. Bozell insisted otherwise and placed a dinner wager on the table [Watch that video in the embed below, fast forward to 2:48 into the video]. Well, this afternoon Montana Democratic U.S. Senator John Walsh did indeed announce he was dropping out of the race, and, alas, neither ABC's World News nor CBS's Evening News nor the NBC Nightly News even made a passing reference to the development.
As pressure grows on Sen. John Walsh (D-Montana) to drop out of his election campaign in light of his plagiarism controversy, the liberal media are largely ignoring the story, despite the fact that "the Senate hangs in the balance" and "any one race can make or break it," Media Research Center president and founder Brent Bozell told the audience of Wednesday's edition of the Fox News Channel program the Kelly File.
By contrast, Bozell noted, in years past, particularly crucial election years, the media have obsessed over scandals in years gone by that plagued Republicans, making them household names in a less-than-flattering manner [LISTEN to MP3 audio here; WATCH the full segment by pressing play on the embed below the page break]:
At a time when some businesses like Starbucks, Chipotle and most recently Target have discouraged responsible citizens from bringing guns into their stores FNC's The Real Story with Gretchen Carlson, on Thursday, showcased one Colorado restaurant owner who unashamedly lets her patrons exercise their Second Amendment rights.
When substitute host Shannon Bream asked Lauren Boebert if there had been any "pushback" to her restaurant's open-carry policy, the co-owner of Shooters Grill responded that they've enjoyed "broad support." Boebert then expressed gratitude to her customers, the Second Amendment, and her religion. Apparently not worried about being called a “bitter clinger” Boebert proclaimed: (video after the jump)
On Tuesday April 29, the Supreme Court ruled in a 6-2 decision that the Environmental Protection Agency has the authority to regulate air pollution from power plants that cross state lines yet NBC and ABC failed to cover the story.
Despite the unprecedented ruling by the court, only CBS bothered to cover it, with Scott Pelley giving it a mere 22 seconds on the CBS Evening News on Tuesday night. Unlike the EPA ruling, all three networks provided extensive coverage of last week’s Supreme Court ruling that voters could decide whether or not they want to limit the use affirmative action in their respective state. [See video of Fox News’ coverage of the ruling below.]
Despite the disturbing news on Wednesday that the Federal Communications Commission had developed a controversial plan to investigate television and radio newsrooms across the country, the broadcast networks of NBC, ABC, and CBS completely ignored the potential threat to press freedom.
In a February 10 Op/Ed for the Wall Street Journal, current FCC commissioner Ajit Pai warned: "Last May the FCC proposed an initiative to thrust the federal government into newsrooms across the country. With its 'Multi-Market Study of Critical Information Needs,' or CIN, the agency plans to send researchers to grill reporters, editors and station owners about how they decide which stories to run."
ABC, CBS, and NBC's morning and evening newscasts have so far punted on reporting the strong critique of the Obama administration's "disturbing retreat from democratic practices" with regard to the freedom of the press, according to Reporters Without Borders. The U.S. fell 13 places in the international group's annual "World Press Freedom Index" for the federal government's "increased efforts to track down whistleblowers and the sources of leaks."
The organization spotlighted the controversial leaks from Bradley Manning and Edward Snowden as examples, but also included the Department of Justice's seizure of the Associated Press' phone records as a "reminder of the urgent need for a 'shield law' to protect the confidentiality of journalists' sources at the federal level." Fox News' Shannon Bream devoted a brief to the Reporters Without Borders report on Wednesday's Special Report: [MP3 audio available here; video below the jump]
It really is wonderful having George Will on Fox News where we can see him more regularly than for a few minutes once a week.
On Monday’s Special Report, Will said of the revelation earlier in the day that people now had until Tuesday to sign up at Healthcare.gov, “ObamaCare now is a tapestry of coercions mitigated by random acts of presidential mercy announced in the most bizarre ways” (video follows with transcript and absolutely no need for commentary):
"Now this is a way to approach our healthcare problems: increase the number of tax collectors and decrease the number of doctors – brilliant!"
So said syndicated columnist Charles Krauthammer about ObamaCare on Fox News's Special Report Friday.
Author Reza Aslan was disingenuous about his biases in his weekend interview with Fox News Channel's Lauren Green, NewsBusters publisher and Media Research Center founder Brent Bozell told FNC's Shannon Bream on the July 31 edition of America Live. Aslan, as a Muslim, denies the divinity of Christ, and should have been straightforward about how his religious beliefs would necessarily color his view of Jesus, which he protests is purely a scholarly inquiry.
Besides proudly insisting he has no biases, Aslan got a number of basic things about Christ wrong, Bozell said, including the absurd claim that Jesus is never quoted in any biblical account as claiming divinity. Additionally, the MRC president noted, Aslan "also said, more than once, that he had a history degree in religion" when "in fact, he doesn't." [to watch the full segment, view the embedded video below the page break]