Budget

CNN's American Morning co-hosts tried to lecture those opposed to voting to raise the debt ceiling on the error of their ways on Friday morning. When a guest GOP congressman tried to explain why he was voting no, and complained of being "vilified" for his stance, Romans showed him no mercy. The American Morning co-host accused the dissenting Republicans who voted "no" to Boehner's plan…

Appearing on MSNBC this afternoon, Time Magazine's Michael Scherer set out to debunk a non-existent Republican red herring on the debt ceiling debate on Friday's News Nation. "The President has been negotiating behind the scenes, has put forward a number of proposals and he's gone public with the outlines of a proposal he is willing to accept," said Scherer.

Bloomberg's Margaret Carlson on Friday accused the Tea Party of wanting "to burn the place down" and having figuratively "strapped explosives to the Capitol" during debt ceiling negotiations. Sitting beside her on PBS's "Inside Washington" was Charles Krauthammer who smartly replied, "I thought post-Tucson we weren’t supposed to accuse our political opponents of being terrorists" (video…

In a "Fareed Zakaria GPS" segment to be aired on CNN Sunday and posted at the network's website Thursday, the host flat out lies about the current debt ceiling debate as well as when and why credit rating agencies began expressing concern about our nation's finances. "Please understand that none of these things are happening because the United States is running deficits," Zakaria falsely…

It is one matter if a president stakes out a smart position within a heated political debate, but it is another matter when members of the press believe so and shower him with positive coverage. CNN's John King complimented President Obama on Thursday's Anderson Cooper 360 for having "positioned himself smartly here in the middle" on the debt ceiling debate. King painted the president as a…

Yesterday on "The Fix", a politics blog of the Washington Post, Chris Cillizza and Aaron Blake wrote "Five Members to watch in the House debt ceiling vote."  One of the five is Rep. Jim Matheson (D-UT).  He's described as a potential "yes" vote for Speaker John Boehner's (R-OH) debt ceiling bill: Matheson, a Democrat, has managed to keep his Republican-leaning Utah seat by voting very…

A trend is emerging on MSNBC's "Morning Joe," whereby guests make inflammatory statements likening conservatives to terrorists, and none of the co-hosts insist on a more elevated level of dialogue. Following in the footsteps of Newsweek's Tina Brown and Rep. Steny Hoyer (D-Md.), two MSNBC analysts called conservatives in Congress "economic terrorists" and "crazy" on Friday, yet none of the…

This morning, Christopher Rugaber's coverage of the news from Uncle Sam's Bureau of Economic Analysis about the growth in the nation's Gross Domestic Product (GDP) at the Associated Press appropriately characterized it as indicative of a "sharp slowdown" and "extremely bad" (via a quoted economist). Today's report carried an advance estimate of second-quarter growth of an annualized 1.3%. As…

MSNBC's Joe Scarborough on Friday took some well-deserved shots at New York Times columnist Paul Krugman. After "Morning Joe's" Mika Brzezinski read bits of Krugman's most recent rant against "Republican extremism," her co-host responded, "If you’re a blogger, and you’re still living in your mom’s basement, and you got Cheetos all over the keyboard, you type in your underwear...you look at…

 Appearing as a guest on Thursday’s Last Word with Lawrence O’Donnell on MSNBC, the Huffington Post’s Sam Stein suggested that the budget plan that the House Republican leadership is trying to pass would harm the economy, and, as if the government did not take in lots of tax revenue already, referred to the absence of a tax increase as "no revenues." Stein:

Running a brief excerpt from his Sunday night Dateline special, “Taking the Hill: Inside Congress,” Brian Williams on Thursday evening showcased one and only one question he posed to Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell. He demanded: “Why shouldn't rich folks pay more?” Williams insisted on NBC Nightly News that’s “a hot topic, no tax increase in any of these plans being discussed” in “…

On three occasions between July 22 and July 26, 2011, CBS's Bob Schieffer carried water for President Obama when he echoed the Democrat's inaccurate claim about Social Security: "Millions of Americans...may not get their next [Social Security] check if the debt ceiling crisis is not resolved." In reality, there is enough federal revenues and authorized expenditures to pay for the program [audio…

Even Socialist Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) believes the government can still pay out social security checks if the debt ceiling is not raised, but CNN highlighted disgruntled seniors Thursday who fear the opposite. CNN correspondent Sandra Endo reported live from a senior center and emphasized that the citizens were "scared," "worried," and "angry" about possibly not receiving their Social…

After only his third day on the job, Fox News senior White House correspondent Ed Henry was accused by White House Press Secretary Jay Carney of intentionally "creating" a dispute to please his new employer. "I know you're creating a thing here for Fox," charged Carney toward the end of a testy exchange with the former CNN correspondent during Wednesday's press briefing. As members of the…