In a contrast of how two network late night comedy hosts addressed the Hillary Clinton email scandal on Monday, CBS’s David Letterman whined about the attention and effort being devoted and given to the scandal while NBC’s Jimmy Fallon took to mocking Clinton’s long-winded, confusing responses during her press conference as to why she used just one account and one phone.
David Letterman
By Jack Coleman | March 11, 2015 | 12:55 PM EDT
If this was intended as a defense of discredited NBC Nightly News anchor/fabulist Brian Williams, ex-MSNBC ringleader Keith Olbermann should have bitten his tongue instead.
Appearing on Late Show with David Letterman last night, Olbermann described Williams as a friendly acquaintance of nearly 20 years and scrupulous newsman who takes "personal responsibility" for errors in his newscast, even if someone else makes them.
By Matthew Balan | February 13, 2015 | 1:52 PM EST
Thursday's Anderson Cooper 360 on CNN spotlighted another set of questionable accounts by Brian Williams regarding a supposed relationship with Navy SEAL Team Six. Williams claimed that he traveled with the unit into Iraq just three days after the 2003 invasion; that SEAL "friends" of his sent him a piece of the wreckage from the helicopter that crashed on the 2011 raid that killed bin Laden; and that a SEAL once sent him his knife. Two guests cast cold water on Williams's claims.
By Curtis Houck | February 8, 2015 | 7:32 PM EST
Late Sunday afternoon, CNN’s Brian Stelter reported the latest information in the ongoing Brian Williams controversy with the news that the NBC Nightly News anchor has cancelled an appearance on CBS’s The Late Show with David Letterman after reports initially suggested that he was planning to use it to clear the air and answer the many questions surrounding him.
The cancellation comes a day after Williams issued a statement announcing that he will be removing himself from the anchor desk “for the next several days” after realizing that it had “become painfully apparent to me that I am presently too much a part of the news due to my actions.”
By Jeffrey Meyer | February 5, 2015 | 11:03 AM EST
On Wednesday night, NBC Nightly News anchor Brian Williams apologized for falsely claiming to have been shot down over Iraq in 2003 but failed to inform his viewers that he had repeatedly promoted this lie in the past, including during an appearance on CBS’s The Late Show with David Letterman on March 26. 2013. Williams proclaimed that while in Iraq “two of our four helicopters were hit by ground fire including the one I was in. RPG and AK-47s.”
By Tom Blumer | February 5, 2015 | 11:03 AM EST
As Curtis Houck at NewsBusters reported last night, NBC Nightly News anchor Brian Williams is in serious trouble after he, in Houck's words, "admitted to not being aboard a helicopter that was shot and had to be rescued following RPG fire during the U.S. invasion of Iraq in March 2003." Williams's apology, also carried at Houck's post, only refers to the "mistake" he made "on this broadcast last week" — as if it was the only time in 12 years he has recounted the incident. It's not; his "war story" was relayed several other times, including in 2013 on David Letterman's show (video here; note the level of detail now effectively admitted as having been fabricated).
In his apology attempt, Williams also told America that he was in "a following aircraft." That's very misleading. Larry O'Connor at Truth Revolt noted, that Williams "neglected to explain that he was in an aircraft that followed the one hit by RPG fire by an entire hour," which "makes it sound like he was right behind the copter in question." It seems more than fair to compare what we've learned in recent days to how NBC promoted Williams on the tenth anniversary of his presence in NBC's anchor chair last year.
By Jeffrey Meyer | January 27, 2015 | 1:54 PM EST
On Monday night, Nicolle Wallace, former Communications Director for President George W. Bush and senior advisor for the McCain-Palin campaign, appeared on CBS’s The Late Show with David Letterman and proved once and for all that she loves to criticize Sarah Palin. During her discussion with the liberal comic, Wallace mocked Palin’s intelligence and insisted that she “gave a speech this weekend in Iowa where again on full display were all the gaps in her knowledge and that’s what became obvious not just to the public but to us, and that was sort of chilling.”
By Matthew Balan | January 6, 2015 | 4:51 PM EST
David Letterman couldn't resist taking a jab at the Catholic Church on Monday's Late Show on CBS. Letterman highlighted how Pope Francis recently appointed forty bishops to be cardinals, and noted how the pontiff personally calls each of the new designees. The host jokingly claimed to have video of one of the clerics receiving the phone call. He then played the much-hyped footage of former NFL player Michael Sam receiving word that he had been drafted, and then tearfully kissing his boyfriend.
By Brent Baker | December 20, 2014 | 11:25 PM EST
David Letterman’s impending May retirement meant two holiday traditions came to an end on Friday’s Late Show: the last time Darlene Love would sing “Christmas (Baby, Please Come Home)” and the final time actor/radio host Jay Thomas would recite what Letterman calls “the greatest talk show story of all time.” Since the mid-1990s, on Letterman’s last show before Christmas, Thomas has been telling the story of what happened in the early 1970s when he was a local radio DJ in Charlotte and broadcast, with the “Lone Ranger,” from a car dealership.
By Jeffrey Meyer | December 17, 2014 | 9:16 AM EST
On Tuesday, former Florida Governor Jeb Bush announced that he was exploring the possibility of running for president in 2016 and predictably CBS Late Show host David Letterman had a field day with the Republican’s announcement. During his Tuesday evening show, the CBS comedian announced the “questions Jeb Bush is asking himself while actively exploring a run for president.” Unsurprisingly, Letterman’s 10 “questions” were merely liberal attacks on Bush such as “Am I sure I won’t embarrass the family?” and “If I run who will rig the election in Florida?”
By Jeffrey Meyer | October 12, 2014 | 9:57 PM EDT
On Friday night, liberal late night host David Letterman mocked President Obama over is handling of ISIS. The CBS comedian joked “the administration now has a name for the war against ISIS. Have you heard the name?" The CBS host continued by pointing out that "every military operation has to have a name so people can get behind it and they now have a name for the war against ISIS: “Operation Hillary's Problem.’”
Bill Maher Compares Mitt Romney to a Jellyfish; ‘Future Looks Bright If You’re a Spineless Glob of Goo’
By Curtis Houck | September 9, 2014 | 8:38 PM EDT Appearing on Monday night’s Late Show with David Letterman, liberal talk show host Bill Maher joked with David Letterman and the audience about the drought in California (where he lives) and after suggesting that global warming was killing off fish and allowing jellyfish to thrive, he drew laughs from the audience when he declared that “[t]he future looks bright if you’re a spineless glob of goo. Which is why I say, Mitt Romney in 2016, ladies and gentlemen.”