The Big Three networks still can't get enough of Texas State Senator Wendy Davis, nearly a week after her extended filibuster against pro-life legislation on June 25, 2013. All three brought on Davis during their Sunday morning talk programs, and continued hyping the supportive response on social media that Davis received in response to her "epic eleven-hour filibuster", as NBC' s Janet Shamlian sympathetically labeled it on Monday's Today.
ABC's Jeff Zeleny conducted a beyond softball interview of the liberal politician on This Week, and was awed when the liberal politician showed off the pink running shoes that she wore during the filibuster [audio available here; video below the jump]. Bob Schieffer touted Davis' "wonderful biography" on Face the Nation, and added that "few outside Texas knew of her until last week when she became an overnight sensation." NBC and CBS each devoted another full report to Davis on their Monday morning newscasts.
Rick Perry
On Sunday's Disrupt show on MSNBC, host Karen Finney wondered by Texas Republicans are "trying to harm the health of women in the state" by passing laws against abortion instead of dealing with other issues, as she hosted Texas Democratic State Senator Leticia van de Putte to discuss fellow State Senator Wendy Davis's filibuster in support of abortion.
Later in the show, as she hosted Dr. Rani Whitfield of the Association of Free and Charitable Clinics for a discussion of Republican governors resisting the ObamaCare expansion of Medicaid in their states, the MSNBC host charged that the Republican party's "ideology is basically endangering the health of their citizens."
On Saturday's Melissa Harris-Perry show, MSNBC host Harris-Perry ranted against Texas Governor Rick Perry, tagging him as the "evil archenemy" of "super-heroine" Wendy Davis, and comparing the Republican governor to the Snidely Whiplash cartoon character known for leaving a woman tied down in the path of an oncoming train. Harris-Perry:
On Wednesday and Thursday, as seen in this search result at its national site, the Associated Press devoted six stories and a morning "10 Things" tease to the death-penalty execution of Kimberly McCarthy.
Make that seven, as an unbylined AP story which appeared at USA Today the morning after McCarthy died appears to have been replaced at the wire service's national site by another during revisions. The "significance" of McCarthy's execution was that it was the 500th in Texas since the Lone Star State reinstated the death penalty in 1982 -- and of course, that a potential GOP presidential contender in 2016 happens to be the state's governor. Maybe I missed them, but I'm unaware of any AP stories in the past few years marking the one-millionth U.S. abortion in any calendar year, or the 500th murder in any state. Excerpts from the report appearing at USA Today, complete with "grim milestone" language seen so frequently during Iraq War coverage, follow (bolds are mine):
Latest dispatch from the Department of Pot-Meet-Kettle. On today's Face the Nation, Texas state senator Wendy Davis, who overnight went from being a national unknown to a rising star who today appeared on count-em three Sunday talk shows, has accused politicians of using the abortion issue "to boost their own political aspirations."
Davis also accused Texas Governor Rick Perry and Lt. Governor David Dewhurst of putting thousands of Texas women "in harm's way in order for them to step up the political ladder." Bob Schieffer never called Davis on her hypocrisy. View the video after the jump.
On Thursday's The Last Word, MSNBC's Lawerence O'Donnell hosted an all liberal panel to complain about Republican efforts to curtail abortion in Texas and Ohio, with O'Donnell trumpeting that Texas State Senator Wendy Davis "rocketed to political stardom" via her famous 11-hour filibuster.
Guest Ana Marie Cox of the Guardian mocked the GOP's "re-branding" effort and observed that the Texas legislature was "dominated by white men" who were "trying to put down the women in front of them." She went on call Republican behavior "reprehensible" and Texas Governor Rick Perry "ignorant." Cox:
In the wake of her filibuster in the Texas state senate on Tuesday, NBC, ABC, and CBS all expressed their outrage at Texas Governor Rick Perry daring to criticize their anointed abortion "folk hero" Wendy Davis. On Friday, Today co-host Matt Lauer announced: "The battle over abortion gets very personal as Governor Rick Perry takes on a female senator whose filibuster helped block a controversial bill." [Listen to the audio or watch the video after the jump]
On Thursday's ABC World News, anchor Diane Sawyer attached the "folk hero" label to Davis as she fretted over "Perry creating a kind of high noon between the two of them." In the report that followed, correspondent David Kerley hyped Perry's mild critique of Davis as setting up "a true Texas showdown" and exclaimed: "Today, Perry made it personal."
On Thursday's All In show, MSNBC host Chris Hayes suggested that Texas Governor Rick Perry should feel a "burden" because he has presided over the execution of more death row inmates than any other governor in modern history, and then seemed to mock the Texas Republican for being both pro-life and pro-capital punishment as he noted that Perry had addressed the National Right to Life Conference after pushing a "draconian" law against abortion.
Hayes began the show on a cheerful note by playing up the possibility of a resurgence of the Texas Democratic Party. After teasing the show, the MSNBC host began:
On Wednesday's All In show, host Chris Hayes celebrated a filibuster by Texas Democratic State Senator Wendy Davis to thwart the passage of a bill restricting abortion, calling her 11-hour filibuster "absolutely-epic" and "one of the most remarkable acts of political leadership that I've ever seen."
Hayes plugged the segment recounting a Twitter response to the speech from President Obama, as the MSNBC host added:
The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) announced Wednesday it would not provide additional funds to help the town of West, Texas rebuild after a fertilizer plant explosion killed 15 and injured 160. MSNBC’s Alex Wagner seemed positively gleeful over the news.
The daytime host treated the development as a political defeat for Texas Governor Rick Perry (R), implying on Thursday’s Now that the tragedy – and FEMA’s denial of funding – were “the seeds” the governor sowed for his opposition to excessive federal spending and regulation. Wagner introduced Perry’s plea for federal funds by pairing it with a sound bite of the conservative governor’s opposition to excessive spending:
Politico's Katie Glueck must have been really desperate for something newsworthy as a Saturday column topic.
She apparently believed it was worth devoting over 1,500 words to a writeup whose key point was that "at least one Republican" doesn't like Texas Governor Rick Perry's aggressive attempts to persuade companies in other states to relocate to or expand in the Lone Star State. She cited only one. Even that person person's criticism was very mild, and it came from someone who, because of his position, couldn't say that what Perry is doing is great even if he wanted to without risking his job. Despite the overdose of verbiage, Glueck also never provided any details of Texas's outsized contribution to the nation's overall mediocre post-recession job growth.
On the Friday, May 3, Politics Nation, MSNBC host Al Sharpton fretted over the video that was played at Friday's NRA convention in Houston to introduce Rick Perry which shows the Texas governor firing at targets with an AR-15. Sharpton began the segment: