Budget

For weeks Americans have been told that if Congress and the White House didn't agree to a Continuing Resolution to fund the government when the new fiscal year started on October 1, an economic calamity would befall the nation. Well, the government officially shut down at midnight Monday, and markets all around the world don't seem to care.

Seems the shutdown is already frazzling folks.  Though some of it might have been for show, tempers seemed to truly flare on today's Morning Joe. An on-air spat broke out, with Joe Scarborough in one corner, and Mika Brzezinski and the Washington Post's Eugene Robinson in the other.   Fed up with what he described as a "paid advertisement for Obamacare" by Brzezinski and Robinson,…

"One reason people think Republicans are to blame for government shutdowns is that so much of the media keep telling them that that's the case." So marvelously stated Brit Hume on Fox News's Special Report Monday (video follows with transcript and absolutely no need for additional commentary):

On Monday's NBC Today, co-host Savannah Guthrie acknowledged the liberal spin that congressional  Republicans were punished electorally after the 1995 government shutdown was more a matter of faith than fact: "I mean, for 17 years it's been an article of faith that Republicans paid at the polls after the shutdown in the 90s. But these new House Republicans aren't so sure that's true." [Listen to…

If you listened to Obama-loving media members in recent weeks, the end of the world happens midnight Monday if Republicans don't agree to immediately fund the government. Yet with a shutdown only hours away now, the financial markets clearly don't seem to be at all concerned that what is happening in Washington will have much of an impact on the economy.

Bob Woodward broke free from the liberal media template on Monday morning, partially blaming President Obama for the current impasse over government funding and the debt ceiling. Appearing on MSNBC’s Morning Joe, the veteran journalist claimed that a potential economic collapse or downturn would fall on Obama’s head. Former George W. Bush staffer Nicolle Wallace and Obama acolyte David…

As NewsBusters previously reported, Tea Party Congressman Raul Labrador (R-Id.) on Sunday's Meet the Press made a fool of MSNBC's Chris Matthews over his lack of knowledge regarding how many times the government shut down when his former boss Tip O'Neill was Speaker of the House. As it turns out, the Washington Post also mocked Matthews for his ignorance last Thursday in a piece deliciously…

Why do Dems need Debbie Wasserman-Schultz when they've got Andrea Mitchell?  There was no mistaking Mitchell's anger on her MSNBC show today as she scolded Republican Rep. Jason Chaffetz .  "Get real," reprimanded Mitchell, twice telling Chaffetz the Republican bill delaying the implementation of ObamaCare was "dead on arrival." For good measure, Mitchell put the onus on Republicans to cave…

In its 40-year history, the liberal media never really cared for the Heritage Foundation. But now that the think tank has been more assertive in its engagement of Capitol Hill, the liberal media are rewriting history to depict the move as something that is threatening the organization's respectability inside the Beltway. In July, I noted the Wall Street Journal's stab at the concern-trolling…

The list of things on which Barack Obama has been wrong goes on to the crack of doom.  But there's one thing on which the President is surely right. In devising his strategy for dealing with the shutdown, the prez can count on the MSM to blame Republicans. Mark Halperin bared the president's calculus on today's Morning Joe, saying the Obama admin has little incentive to negotiate because it…

Chris Matthews has a new book out about his former boss the late Speaker of the House Tip O'Neill. Despite this, the MSNBC host was made a fool of on Sunday's Meet the Press by Tea Party Congressman Raul Labrador (R-Id.) concerning how many times the government was shut down when O'Neill ruled the House (video follows with transcript and commentary):

ABC is reporting that it is now almost certain Congress and the White House will not reach an agreement to avoid a government shutdown. On Sunday’s This Week, ABC’s chief White House correspondent Jonathan Karl said, “I would now put the chances of a government shutdown at 99.9 percent” (video follows with transcript and commentary):

It's a classic example of the MSM's use of sympathetic individual anecdotes to manipulate public opinion in favor of more and bigger government. Today's Good Morning America segment on the looming government shutdown, narrated by former New York Times reporter Jeff Zeleny, offered the stories of just two people, both African-Americans, both of whom might be hurt by a government shutdown. And…

The Little Sisters of the Poor sued over ObamaCare's birth control mandate on Tuesday, claiming the law forces them to violate their consciences. However, CNN ignored these nuns after boosting the liberal "Nuns on the Bus" tour last year that slammed the Ryan budget. "We cannot violate our vows by participating in the government's program to provide access to abortion inducing drugs," said…