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Ever since MSNBC launched its sister website MSNBC.com, writer Zachary Roth has been obsessed with new voting laws, and has consistently demonized GOP-sponsored legislation as a form of voter suppression. Roth’s latest piece, published on January 28th, continued MSNBC’s scare tactics surrounding popular voter ID laws.
The title of Roth’s article fretted that the “GOP wants to change Missouri constitution for voter ID” and the MSNBC author made it clear once again where he stood on the issue of requiring voters to show a photo ID to vote.
There’s a new “New Normal” racing towards primetime on NBC.
Entertainment Weekly recently reported that NBC requested the pilot for “One Big Happy,” a comedy produced by Ellen DeGeneres and Warner Bros. TV. The official logline is as follows: “When gay and straight best friends decide to have a baby together, things get complicated when one of them finds the love of their life.” And who says Hollywood is out of ideas?
In a shocking declaration on her 1 p.m. ET hour MSNBC show Tuesday, host Andrea Mitchell asserted that one of America's fiercest enemies was actually a friend to the U.S. before George W. Bush came along: "Up until that moment, Iran was cooperating with the United States on the border of Afghanistan, it was post-9/11, Iran was more or less an American ally. By being included in the Axis of Evil, it turned the Iranian government in a completely different direction." [Listen to the audio or watch the video after the jump]
The topic came up when The Washington Post's Chris Cillizza told Mitchell that the last "memorable and impactful" State of the Union address was President Bush's 2002 speech labeling Iraq, Iran, and North Korea to be an "Axis of Evil." Mitchell interrupted: "No, let me challenge you on that....Colin Powell and the State Department did not focus enough on those words and get them taken out of the State of the Union."
‘The New Normal,’ well, wasn’t. What about ‘One Big Happy?’
The New York Times carried this nauseating headline on Tuesday: “Obama's Puzzle: Economy Rarely Better, Approval Rarely Worse.” Times reporter Jackie Calmes found “never during his time in office has the state of the economy been better — yet rarely has he gotten such low marks from the public for his handling of it.”
An accompanying chart shows Obama under 40 percent approval on the economy, but the actual number never appeared in the story.
Previewing Barack Obama's State of the Union on Tuesday, Good Morning America's Jon Karl hyped the President's move to unilaterally act "where he can without Congress." [See video below. MP3 audio here.] Eight years ago, however, ABC hit George W. Bush for being unwilling to compromise.
After noting that Congress has failed to raise the minimum wage, Karl touted, "...The President will announce that he is increasing by nearly $3 an hour the minimum wage on all new federal contracts, acting where he can without Congress." According to Karl, this is an example of Obama "promising to work with Congress where he can but showing there are things he can do on his own, as well." In his report, the journalist failed to wonder if it was the President who should move. In contrast, previewing the January 31, 2006 State of the Union, Charles Gibson asked the liberal Ted Kennedy, "Do you get a sense that this White House is truly willing to compromise on anything?"
Looks like Cosmo is running out of sex tips – and the end result isn’t pretty.
As a “Special Report” for February’s issue, Cosmopolitan published Liz Welch’s piece entitled, “Our Choice: How Abortion Changed Our Relationship.” Welch introduced her article, which profiled couples who chose abortion, by speculating, “Abortion can test a relationship, cement it, or end it as Cosmopolitan discovered in speaking to the four couples here.”
On Tuesday, both NBC's Today and CBS This Morning interviewed White House chief of staff Denis McDonough about President Obama's upcoming State of the Union address and fretted over the commander-in-chief failing to push his liberal agenda in 2013. [Listen to the audio or watch the video after the jump]
Today co-host Savannah Guthrie pressed: "I looked at last year's State of the Union. He called for a hike in the minimum wage, for immigration reform, for gun laws to be revamped. By the way, he also said the government shouldn't shut down. None of that happened. So when he calls for those things tonight, how can the American people believe that they really will come to pass?"
There was another appearance of the dreaded U-word ("unexpectedly") this morning at Bloomberg News.
The Commerce Department's advance report on December durable goods orders and shipments showed a seasonally adjusted 4.3 percent decrease in orders from November, while November was revised down from a positive 3.4 percent to 2.6 percent. Economists' median prediction for December was for a 1.8 percent increase. Bloomberg's Victoria Stilwell had an excuse at the ready, and as will be seen, chose to use it even though she knew it was a stretch (bolds are mine throughout this post):
If liberals have their way the State of the Union will be all about income inequality. That kind of speech would be cheered by many in the press, including several hypocritical millionaires who love to complain about the one percent.
The broadcast networks already took up this banner, promoting left-wing complaints about inequality and arguing for liberal solutions, in recent years. Well-paid, big name network news anchors, like Diane Sawyer and Brian Williams personally know a whole lot about wealth, since they make millions of dollars every year. At least two are worth $60 million each.
Within the past four years, these multi-millionaires have attacked the “mega-rich,” complained on air about “dangerous” income inequality, and promoted President Barack Obama’s “responsibility” to raise taxes and promote tax “fairness.”
(video after break)
Leftist actor-director Robert Redford laid into Republicans in a Sunday interview on CNN’s “Reliable Sources.” Try not to notice this journalism show began with a Justin Bieber segment and included a Redford interview. Host Brian Stelter first asked how Redford felt about Obama. "I think he's a good human being. That's, I think, clear," Redford replied. "He's a humanitarian at heart, and that's good. He's trying to manage an extremely difficult situation. I mean, it's -- it's almost too much for one person."
He wouldn't say the same for the GOP: “When you have one half whose only motive is to destroy the motives of the president of the United States, then you have a diseased system. And I don't think that's his fault. I think it just makes his job tougher.” Redford lamely claimed there was bipartisanship in getting to “truth” in Watergate: [See video after jump.]
CNN's Piers Morgan used a Kinder egg to make an analogy about the absurdity of lax gun laws on Monday, but it backfired when his conservative guest didn't take the bait.
Morgan pointed to "your constitutional right to have guns, but I can't eat this chocolate egg, does that strike you as strange?" However, Oklahoma state senator Nathan Dahm agreed that Kinder eggs should be legal and the federal government would be "intrusive" to ban either Kinder eggs or guns.
Joe Strupp at Mediamatters.org on Monday was claiming that an anonymous spokesperson for CBS News was allegedly “knocking down right-wing media claims that an interview with Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) was edited for political reasons, explaining that the one-on-one just went too long and was also shortened for breaking news on the Maryland mall shooting.”
Seriously? Anyone can watch the show online and see CBS didn’t spend more than 30 seconds recounting the shooting in Columbia. Why was it so crucial for CBS to announce the name of this shooter? It never came up again after the first few minutes.
On Monday's Nightly News, NBC's Brian Williams fretted over "personal" shots at Hillary Clinton from Republicans, and correspondent Andrea Mitchell suggested that the GOP has an ongoing women problem.
"[T]he attacks are already underway in case she [Clinton] joins the race. And it's indeed already getting personal," said Williams, referring to Sen. Rand Paul's remark that Bill Clinton's sex scandal should "complicate his return to the White House as a spouse." Paul wasn't even referring to Hillary, though, and said as much to Meet the Press host David Gregory.