Conservatives & Republicans

As President Barack Obama and Governor Jerry Brown continue to extol the wonders of the alleged economic recovery of nation and the Golden State, respectively, stories of significant growth in homelessness continue to rain on their parades. The latest example comes on the heels of reports on Seattle's burgeoning problem and the city's apparent willingness to allow officially sanctioned outdoor…

Georgetown professor Aaron Hanlon argues that Stewart’s foul-mouthed rants in response to conservatives are appropriate given that “his objects of critique aren’t interested in reasoned dialogue, clever jabs or unveiled truths.”

New York magazine’s Jonathan Chait writes, “If a candidate for a managerial job at your office insists that two plus three equals seven, it wouldn't matter how well-qualified this candidate may be at any other aspect of the job,” and that similarly, “even if you agreed with everything else the Republicans stood for” other than climate-change denial, “how could a party so obviously unhinged be…

The Rachel Maddow Blog never disappoints. On January 22, Maddow producer Steve Benen published a blog that, in typical MSNBC fashion, attempted to portray a Republican politician as a radical racist. This week’s choice: Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee (R).

On Tuesday, just as President Obama was putting the finishing touches on his State of the Union address, MRC President Brent Bozell assessed the “State of the Media” in 2015. He warned of four trends that could be expected in the coming year: the continued media cover-up of Obama’s scandals and his many policy failures; positive coverage for left-wing initiatives such as Obama’s executive amnesty…

After years of virtually always failing to file a print news report on the March for Life, the New York Times this year ran a full half-sentence on the rally of tens of thousands in Washington, in a Jeremy Peters' report that used the march's existence solely to embarrass the Republican Party over its mishandling of an abortion bill.  

On Thursday's All In With Chris Hayes, MSNBC's Irin Carmon bewailed the apparent inevitability that the Republican-led Congress would reintroduce a proposed ban on abortions after the twentieth week of pregnancy: "I think even if this bill were to come back and it would have a broader rape exception, it would still be an attack on all of the women who need abortions after twenty weeks."

In his State of the Union address — perhaps, based on the recommendations for government involvement and control he made therein, better described as his Statist of the Union address — President Obama referenced the "growing" U.S. economy at least three times, but "recovery" only once. Specifically, he claimed that "thanks to a growing economy, the recovery is touching more and more lives." The…

A week ago, Seattle Mayor Ed Murray, a Democrat, called homelessness in his city and the rest of King County a "full-blown crisis." Based on the numbers presented in coverage of the area's situation, we can certainly add the Emerald City to the list of areas where homelessness has been on the rise. Odds are that many readers here didn't know that, because the national press hardly ever pays…

Elias Isquith contends that “after eight years of George W. Bush,” America “was in such rotten shape that Obama had little time to do more than stave off the next crisis,” but that by this past Tuesday night, favorable economic developments gave Obama “an opportunity to boast of changing the ‘trajectory’ of the country like few presidents before him and none since Ronald Reagan.”

On Wednesday night, ABC’s World News Tonight and anchor David Muir restarted the media promotion of Chelsea Clinton’s new baby with Bill and Hillary Clinton as grandparents by spending 24 seconds informing viewers of the competition between Bill and Hillary for “who gets to read to Charlotte.” Muir also took particular interest in how Hillary spends her time with the newest member of the Clinton…

Jim VandeHei sees dead people. On today's Morning Joe, the Politico honcho agreed with Joe Scarborough's suggestion that Chris Christie is like Bruce Willis in The Sixth Sense: [politically] dead but doesn't know it. Ironically, Scarborough distanced himself from his own suggestion, twice saying that he didn't believe it. But when he asked his guest if the characterization was fair, Vandehei…

NBC News senior White House correspondent Chris Jansing did her best to provide some White House spin during Wednesday’s NBC Nightly News, hailing President Obama as “an energized, combative President” whose policies made for a “carefully choreographed, populist message with the details generally panned by Republicans.” Also within her report, Jansing found time to chide House Speaker John…

On Tuesday night, NBC News anchor Brian Williams charged that “a lot people hope” a reality check by Meet the Press moderator Chuck Todd was wrong in asserting that most of President Obama's initiatives proposed during his State of the Union address won’t become law. “Some people hope you’re right, a lot of people hope you’re wrong,” interjected Williams following Todd’s brief outlook on whether…