Eric Cantor

MSNBC's Bashir Tag-teams with Rep. Keith Ellison to Bash GOP: They'll Cause Kids to Shiver with Heating Oil Cuts
By Ken Shepherd | October 4, 2011 | 5:30 PM EDT

"Grab a blanket, kids. Congress wants to cut your home-heating benefits," MSNBC's Martin Bashir teased viewers of his October 4 program as he went out to a commercial break with Dean Martin's "Baby It's Cold Outside" playing in the background.

Upon his return from break, Bashir tag-teamed with Congressional Progressive Caucus co-chair Keith Ellison (D-Minn.) to bash Republicans are heartless bastards who want children to shiver through the coming winter (video follows page break; emphasis mine):

Go Figure, Ed Schultz Provides Most Inane Hoffa Apologia So Far
By Jack Coleman | September 8, 2011 | 6:42 PM EDT

It's official -- I'm an Ed Schultz fan.

OK, well, "fan" isn't exactly the right word. Let's just say I'd be crushed if MSNBC canceled "The Ed Show." After all, nowhere else on cable does one find such a consistent stream of idiocy that never fails to amuse. Not even from Schultz's colleague Al Sharpton, though the man is certainly a contender. (video after page break)

MRC Study: ABC, CBS and NBC Cast GOP as Debt Ceiling Villains
By Geoffrey Dickens | July 27, 2011 | 9:46 AM EDT

On Election Day 2010, then-CBS Early Show anchor Harry Smith posed a hypothetical question about newly-elected Republicans to Ann Coulter: “There’ll be a routine vote, for instance, to increase the debt ceiling and the Tea Party guys are going to say, ‘Over my dead body,’ and the government comes to a screeching halt. Then what happens?” The conservative author confidently predicted: “Well, the media will blame the Republicans.”

And that’s precisely what has occurred. A Media Research Center study of the Big Three network evening and morning programs finds that, when it came to assigning blame for lack of a debt ceiling resolution, ABC, CBS and NBC’s coverage has placed the overwhelming majority of the blame on Republicans’ doorstep.

MSNBC's Wolffe Suggests Obama 'Reasonable' & 'Grownup,' GOP 'Irresponsible Children'
By Brad Wilmouth | July 24, 2011 | 10:20 PM EDT

 On Friday’s Last Word on MSNBC, as host Lawrence O’Donnell brought up his belief - explored more thoroughly earlier in the show - that President Obama had succeeded in a strategy to appear to be the "reasonable man willing to make compromises" without actually having to make those concessions, MSNBC political analyst Richard Wolffe at first seemed to buy into O’Donnell’s "cynical" theory of Obama’s true intentions, but the MSNBC analyst also suggested that Obama was indeed being "reasonable" and "the grownup in the room." He went on to suggest that Republicans were not being "responisible’ or a "serious party about deficits," and that they were behaving as "irresponsible children."

MSNBC's O'Donnell Theorizes Obama 'Manipulated' to Block Budget Deal While 'Pretending' to Want Compromise
By Brad Wilmouth | July 24, 2011 | 9:45 PM EDT

 On Friday’s Last Word, MSNBC host Lawrence O’Donnell advanced his belief that President Obama never had any desire for Republicans to accept the plan that he himself proposed because his strategy was to "manipulate" the process and appear willing to compromise, while at the same time insisting on tax increases to ensure that Republicans would never agree to his offer. O’Donnell further theorized that, because Republicans were about to agree to a tax increase similar to Obama’s proposal, the President changed his demands to deliberately derail negotiations.

During a segment with NBC correspondent Kristen Welker, O’Donnell observed:

Fareed Zakaria Blames Tea Party for 'Extraordinary Polarization in Washington Today'
By Noel Sheppard | July 24, 2011 | 4:23 PM EDT

Fareed Zakaria on Sunday blamed the Tea Party for the "extraordinary polarization in Washington today."

"It's ideologically extreme, refuses to compromise, and cares more about purity than problem solving," Zakaria told viewers of the CNN program bearing his name (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Politico's Allen: Tax-Hiking 'Grand Bargain' Would Be Laudable 'Historic Achievement'
By Mark Finkelstein | July 24, 2011 | 8:13 AM EDT

One more data point demonstrating the leftward tilt of the purportedly non-partisan Politico:

In his Playbook of today, Politico's chief White House correspondent Mike Allen depicts a "grand bargain" on the credit ceiling, which inevitably would include huge tax increases, as an "historic achievement" for which President Obama and House speaker John Boehner would "rightly get credit."

In contrast, Allen suggests that Republican leaders Eric Cantor and Kevin McCarthy are refusing a grand bargain out of petty political ambition.

Read more after the jump.

CNN Poll Finds Media on Wrong Side of 'Cut, Cap and Balance'
By Noel Sheppard | July 21, 2011 | 5:24 PM EDT

In the past week, you couldn't swing a debt cat without hitting a press report about how irresponsible the "Cut, Cap and Balance" bill passed by House Republicans is.

A new CNN/ORC poll released a few hours ago finds the media very much on the wrong side of public opinion concerning this issue:

ABC Notes Dem Refusal to Budge on Medicare, CBS Gives Impression Dems Willing to Cut
By Brad Wilmouth | July 16, 2011 | 5:12 AM EDT

 On Friday’s World News on ABC, correspondent Jonathan Karl took a moment to go beyond the budget debate between House Republicans and President Obama with the GOP unwilling to support a tax increase, and noted that House Democrats have also been just as resistant to voting for cutting the growth of Medicare spending. But the same night's CBS Evening News focused on Republican reluctance to support some of the budget proposals and even gave the impression at one point that congressional Democrats were willing to curtail Medicare growth.

On ABC, after recounting some of the Republicans who have resisted voting for budget plans that have been brought up, Karl continued:

NBC Washington's Vance Treats Obama to Softball Interview
By Ken Shepherd | July 15, 2011 | 4:22 PM EDT

Kicking off the NBC4 11 o'clock news last night, veteran Washington, D.C. anchor Jim Vance touted an exclusive interview he had earlier that day with President Barack Obama.

Vance then aired an excerpt of the interview, comprised of two softball questions. Afterwards, he informed viewers they could find the full interview at the station's website, nbcwashington.com.

Unfortunately, the rest of the interview was just as disappointing. As you'll see, Vance practically portrayed Obama as needlessly inconvenienced by pesky Republicans on the debt ceiling issue and the economy at large.

[You can watch the full video in the embed below the page break]

 

CBS’s Cordes: ‘Ambitious’ Eric Cantor ‘Has Given His Opponents Plenty of Ammunition’
By Brad Wilmouth | July 15, 2011 | 6:32 AM EDT

 On Thursday’s CBS Evening News, correspondent Nancy Cordes filed a report on House Majority Leader Eric Cantor as a "lightning rod" for sharp criticism from Democrats because of his role in budget negotiations with President Obama. After beginning the report with a clip of Democratic Senator Chuck Schumer asserting that Cantor "has yet to make a constructive contribution," and after recounting that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid had called the Republican leader "childish," Cordes seemed to legitimize the insults as she asserted that Cantor had provided "plenty of ammunition":

MSNBC's Martin Bashir: Obama Didn't Walk Out of Debt Talks, 'Childish' Cantor 'Had a Tax Tantrum'
By Alex Fitzsimmons | July 14, 2011 | 6:14 PM EDT

It has been widely reported that President Barack Obama walked out of Wednesday night's debt limit meeting, but MSNBC's Martin Bashir on Thursday was in complete denial that the Democratic president, who's merely "exasperated by Republicans playing this dangerous game," would conduct himself in such a way.

During his daily "Clear the Air" segment, Bashir offered mounds of incredulity but not a shred of evidence to contradict numerous reports of Obama abruptly and prematurely terminating the meeting:

Hmm, I'm not so sure about that...The president losing his temper, abruptly, and rudely cutting short the conversation? Running from a room inside the White House? Does that sound the like president that we've gotten to know during the last two and a half years? Or is that the kind of behavior we've now come to expect from Eric Cantor over the last few weeks?

Video follows break