On Tuesday's Morning Joe, the Washington Post’s Eugene Robinson attacked the Republican Party for “going way, way, way to the right on abortion.” The columnist based this opinion on Marco Rubio’s refusal to rule out voting for a bill that wouldn't have exceptions for cases of rape or incest. No word from Robinson about a move to the left in the Democratic Party despite a surge in the polls from self-avowed socialist Bernie Sanders.
Immigration
By Connor Williams | August 6, 2014 | 5:35 PM EDT
In a discussion about Rand Paul’s presidential chances on MSNBC’s The Last Word, a panel featuring Josh Barro and Richard Wolffe managed to hit Republicans for being anti-immigrant while also accusing Paul and conservatives – not the Obama administration – of misleading on Benghazi. Paul has received media criticism for supposedly fleeing a dinner with Rep. Steve King when the Iowa Republican was approached by two so-called “Dreamers” regarding his opposition to the President’s DACA program. Paul says he got up from lunch to conduct a pre-arranged interview with reporters a few feet away.
The New York Times’s Barro, who recently caused a stir for suggesting on Twitter that socially conservative attitudes need to be ruthlessly “stamped out,” had unkind things to say about those who support more border security as well. He whined that “so much of the Republican base...is just very strongly anti-immigration.” He elaborated further on the subject: “And when Republicans talk about these immigration issues, they come off as sort of nasty.” In Barroland, it’s “nasty” to want the President to enforce the nation’s immigration laws, but perfectly civil to daydream about society blackballing social conservatives for their religious beliefs. [MP3 audio here; video below]
Lawrence O’Donnell Falsely Claims Republicans Want to Repeal Immigration Law Protecting Children From Sex Trafficking
By Connor Williams | July 24, 2014 | 1:15 PM EDT
On the July 23 edition of The Last Word, in an apparent effort to demonize conservatives as being uninterested in protecting children who were victims of sex trafficking, Lawrence O’Donnell deliberately misinterpreted the Republican position on the 2008 immigration law signed by President Bush.
O’Donnell played a clip of Congressman Mo Brooks (R-Alabama) expressing his support for sending illegal immigrant children back to their home countries. Brooks elaborated further by saying, “Now, if in fact some are, for example, being trafficked for slavery or sex purposes, that's a different issue.” Despite this clear statement, the host of The Last Word claimed that “one of the positions that these Republicans are holding is that they want to repeal the law that President Bush signed, which is about protecting children from sex trafficking. So they want to be on record as not wanting to protect children from this kind of sex trafficking.” [MP3 audio here; video below]
By Curtis Houck | July 21, 2014 | 5:10 PM EDT
On the Monday edition of his MSNBC show, Jose Diaz-Balart rolled out the red carpet for liberal activists in favor of amnesty by broadcasting from the National Council of La Raza’s (NCLR) conference in Los Angeles. This included inviting an illegal immigrant activist to promote her agenda and pushing another guest to blame House Republicans for the lack of immigration reform. Oh, and he failed to mention that the NCLR was giving him an award at the conference’s closing gala.
Towards the end of a second segment on immigration (more on the first later), he was congratulated by the NCLR’s Clarissa Martinez de Castro for something neither Diaz-Balart nor his guests mentioned. What was the "congratulations" for? Well, turns out, the congratulations was for the NCLR selecting him to receive the Ruben Salazar Award for Communication, which is given “each year to an outstanding communications professional dedicated to portraying news relevant to US Hispanics.” With this being the only mentioning of it on his show (and a vague one at that), talk about a major conflict of interest. [MP3 audio here; Video below]
By Connor Williams | July 10, 2014 | 11:45 AM EDT
In his defense of President Obama last night, MSNBC’s Chris Hayes made the bizarre case that too much security is the real problem at the border. The All In host used his opening segment on the July 9 edition of the program to hammer Republicans for their critique of the President's response to the border crisis.
Hayes first cited a few liberal talking points arguing that Obama really is tough on immigration. He contended that “the border has never been more secured than it is now. In some ways, the humanitarian crisis along the southwest border is actually a result of that security.” [MP3 audio here; video below]
By Connor Williams | July 7, 2014 | 1:30 PM EDT
After introducing his political panel on the July 7 edition of MSNBC’s The Daily Rundown, host Chuck Todd chose to mock Brent Bozell, Media Research Center President and NewsBusters publisher, after realizing he had three titans of the mainstream media on his program at the same time.
Todd described the panel, consisting of The New York Times’ Carolyn Ryan, Dan Balz of The Washington Post, and Susan Page of USA Today as “really a nightmare scenario for Brent Bozell. This is like the mainstream media all in one place, the Times, the Post, USA Today, NBC. Oh my God! Heads are exploding!” [MP3 audio here; video below]
By Connor Williams | June 11, 2014 | 12:15 PM EDT
In the aftermath of House Majority Leader Eric Cantor’s shocking defeat Tuesday night to economics professor Dave Brat, the folks at Morning Joe discussed what this would mean for the Republican Party going forward. Chuck Todd, host of the Daily Rundown, suggested that immigration is an issue that consistently divides the right: “how much more evidence do we need that immigration will absolutely tear the Republican Party apart whenever they're dealing with it as an issue inside their party?”
Morning Joe host Joe Scarborough hinted that the real issue when it comes to immigration is the lack of leadership from the Republican Party: “They're going to have to have a strong leader that knows how to articulate the vision, and why we need comprehensive immigration reform.” [MP3 audio here; video below]
By Clay Waters | December 3, 2012 | 2:09 PM EST
The New York Times continued to push for amnesty for illegal immigrants, this time on Saturday's front page, courtesy of its most reliable pro-amnesty reporter, Julia Preston, reporting from New Haven, "Young Immigrants Say It's Obama's Time to Act." For the umpteenth time the paper boasted of illegals emerging "from the shadows" (although for a such a frightened group, they sure do get their pictures in the Times a lot).