New York Magazine

Scarborough Panel Mocks NY Times for Ignoring IRS Commissioner Donations to Obama and Other Dems
By Brad Wilmouth | June 27, 2014 | 8:54 AM EDT

On Friday's Morning Joe program, MSNBC host Joe Scarborough complained about the absence of media attention to the fact that IRS commissioner John Koskinen, in charge of an organization currently embroiled in an investigation into whether it has unfairly targeted conservative groups during the Obama administration, is himself a "big Democratic donor" who has donated to President Barack Obama twice and, over the years, almost $100,000 to various Democrats.

Regular panel members Mark Halperin of Time magazine and John Heilemann of New York magazine joined in as Scarborough called out the New York Times in particular and imagined how the Times would have reacted if the roles had been reversed during the George W. Bush administration. Scarborough asked:

Liberal Says Hillary’s Money Gaffes Less Offensive Than GOP’s Support for Plutocracy
By Tom Johnson | June 26, 2014 | 6:35 AM EDT

Hillary Clinton is touring to promote her State Department memoir “Hard Choices,” but most of the news she’s made along the way relates to her personal finances, not her tenure in Foggy Bottom. On Tuesday, New York magazine’s Jonathan Chait examined Hillary’s “dead broke” comment and other recent remarks and revelations about the Clintons’ money with an eye toward whether or not they’ll hamper her presumed presidential campaign.

Chait opined that while some of the Clintons’ “buckraking” constitutes “both a problem of perception and a problem of substance,” Hillary nonetheless has two big economic things going for her heading into 2016: voters’ memories of the strong economy during Bill’s presidency, and the near-certainty that if she becomes the nominee, her opponent will represent “a Republican Party still wedded to the upward redistribution of income as its central policy goal.”

E.J. Dionne: 'Reform Conservatism Is Better Than the Conservatism We Have Had'
By Tom Johnson | June 1, 2014 | 1:09 PM EDT

So-called reform conservatives such as David Frum, Michael Gerson, and Ramesh Ponnuru often get relatively favorable attention from liberal journalists -- relative, that is, to Tea Party types, which in turn reinforces the Tea Party's belief that the reformers aren't really conservatives.  

Two lefty pundits recently examined the state of reform conservatism. Washington Post columnist E.J. Dionne penned an article for the spring issue of the quarterly Democracy in which he analyzed the work of certain reformers and discussed how they might pull the Republican party toward the center. He also denounced the GOP's current message discipline in the service of its supposedly extremist agenda -- or, as Dionne put it, "the right’s version of political correctness."

'Can Conservatives Be Funny?' Frank Rich Says No, Insists The Free Market Proves It
By Tim Graham | May 26, 2014 | 1:09 PM EDT

Frank Rich, the cultural leftist that used to write Broadway reviews and then opinion columns for The New York Times, writes for New York magazine now. He’s just launched a new 4,000-word opus on the question “Can Conservatives Be Funny?” His cheeky verdict? The free market says no.

Spurred into this task by Rush Limbaugh’s attack on rising CBS late-night star Stephen Colbert, Rich had to admit it’s a desert out there. “Conservative comedy is hard to find on television once you get past the most often cited specimen, Dennis Miller.” Indeed, some Americans haven’t figured out that Colbert’s satirizing a conservative moron.

New York Magazine 'Observes' Memorial Day Weekend by Posting Photos of Nude Servicemen
By P.J. Gladnick | May 24, 2014 | 6:19 PM EDT

Memorial Day should be observed by honoring the men and women in the military who have fallen for America. New York Magazine has found another way of observing the Memorial Day Weekend while at the same time pushing a certain political agenda. They have invaded the privacy of World War II servicemen and their families by publishing nude photographs of them: 10 Intimate Photographs of World War II Soldiers in the Buff.

Writer Christopher Bonanos can barely contain his excitement over the photos as he practically drools over himself while eagerly pushing a socio/political agenda at a time when those who have fallen should be honored:

Former NY Times Columnist Claims Fox News Is 'Dead,' And Liberals Should Stop Protesting It
By Tim Graham | February 1, 2014 | 11:09 PM EST

Former New York Times columnist Frank Rich wrote a long attack piece on Fox News for New York magazine theorizing that the Left pays too much attention to “waning” Fox News and gives them too much cachet by opposing them fiercely. It's called "Stop Beating a Dead Fox."

Fox never succeeds on its own. Liberals have the power to make it succeed:

Surprise: CBS Actually Presses 'Liberal-Leaning' Journalist on New Roger Ailes Bio
By Matthew Balan | January 11, 2014 | 10:28 AM EST

On Friday's CBS This Morning, Charlie Rose and Norah O'Donnell refreshingly departed from their usual softball treatment of liberal guests, and pursued New York magazine's Gabriel Sherman about his new biography of Fox News's Roger Ailes. O'Donnell spotlighted how "critics...[are] saying...you're a younger, liberal-leaning journalist."

Both anchors also hounded Sherman for a political accusation in the very title of the bio – The Loudest Voice in the Room: How The Brilliant Bombastic Roger Ailes Built Fox News – and Divided A Country: [MP3 audio available here; video below the jump]

Heilemann: President's Reelection Wasn't a Mandate for ObamaCare
By Noel Sheppard | November 10, 2013 | 10:12 PM EST

A consistent talking point from Democrats and their media minions is that the 2012 election was about ObamaCare and that as a result of the President's win, the American people gave the program a mandate to be fully implemented.

Surprisingly breaking with this trend Sunday was New York magazine's John Heilemann who said on ABC's This Week that because Mitt Romney was the Republican challenger, given his ties to Massachusetts' healthcare program, he couldn't make that the central theme of his campaign, and as such, ObamaCare was not litigated as the President and his allies claim (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Heilemann Warns Dems Against Rejoicing Over 'Horrible Candidate' Cuccinelli Losing
By Brad Wilmouth | November 6, 2013 | 3:26 PM EST

Appearing as a guest on Tuesday's The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell, New York magazine's John Heilemann described Virginia GOP gubernatorial nominee Ken Cuccinelli as a "horrible candidate" as he cautioned Democrats that Cuccinelli still might have triumphed over Democratic nominee Terry McAuliffe if the Virginia Republican had had more money and if the government shutdown had not occurred. Heilemann began his analysis:

Heilemann: Obama's 'Disdain' for Romney's 'BS' to Blame for Bad 2012 Debate Performance
By Kyle Drennen | November 4, 2013 | 3:00 PM EST

Promoting his new book about the 2012 election, Double Down, with co-author Mark Halperin on Monday's NBC Today, New York Magazine national affairs editor John Heilemann offered Obama campaign spin to excuse the President's disastrous performance in the first debate against Mitt Romney: "...[Obama's] disdain for Romney, his contempt for Romney, he couldn't figure out how to deal with that. He would say, 'What am I supposed to do when he starts spewing his BS?'" [Listen to the audio or watch the video after the jump]

Heilemann laughably added that Obama also had "contempt for the theatricality of politics," which, "all got mixed up together and he gave this horrible practice session performance that left them totally stymied about how they were going to fix it" before the second debate with Romney.

New York Magazine Fawns Over the Clintons: 'Most Celebrated Political Marriage in American History'
By Scott Whitlock | September 23, 2013 | 6:27 PM EDT

Several media outlets have eagerly picked up the political gossip coming out of a New York magazine story on Hillary Clinton and her possible 2016 run. The article itself is a fawning profile of the former of Secretary of State and her husband. According to writer Joe Hagan, Bill and Hillary are "the most celebrated political marriage in American history." (Apparently, couples like John and Abigail Adams don't qualify.)

Although it wasn't until paragraph 40 of the nearly 6000 word article that Hagan seriously discussed the terrorist attack in Benghazi, he heaped cotton candy-style praise on the 42nd president: "Bill Clinton is also a legendary politician, a brilliant tactician who won two presidential elections and reigned over the most prosperous years in America in recent memory." The journalist seriously suggested that "some" think " he single-handedly won Obama reelection with his extraordinary takedown of Mitt Romney at the Democratic National Convention last year."

New York Magazine Writer Prat-Fawns Over Mrs. Weiner
By Tim Graham | July 16, 2013 | 6:53 AM EDT

Isaac Chotiner at The New Republic exposed New York magazine writer Mark Jacobson as a Huma Abedin shoe-polisher. “Abedin always gets good press, but this piece takes it to a new level. As a public service, I have chosen the four silliest/creepiest tidbits.”

 1. “She approached in a knit white top and navy-blue business skirt, her dark, almost black hair down to her shoulders. She wore bright-red lipstick, which gave her lips a 3-D look, her brown eyes were pools of empathy evolved through a thousand generations of what was good and decent in the history of the human race.”