CNBC's Harwood Wonders if Obama Will Use Shutdown to 'Break the Fever
In an exclusive interview with President Obama on Wednesday, CNBC chief Washington correspondent John Harwood lobbed this softball on the political fallout of the government shutdown: "Before the election last year, you said you thought there was a possibility your re-election would break the fever within the Republican Party. Didn't happen. Do you see this moment as a chance, through this…
Carl Bernstein: Cantor, House GOP Are ‘Most Dangerous Demagogic For
Veteran journalist Carl Bernstein unleashed a tirade against House Majority Leader Eric Cantor and “his Republicans” on Wednesday’s Morning Joe. After co-host Mika Brzezinski read a passage from Thomas Friedman’s scathing indictment of Tea Party Republicans in The New York Times, Bernstein promised, “I’ll go farther than Friedman.” He certainly did: “Eric Cantor and his Republican Party are the…
CBS's Nancy Cordes Points the Finger at GOP Over Government Shutdown
For two straight days, Nancy Cordes strongly hinted on CBS This Morning that House Republicans were to blame for the ongoing government shutdown. On Tuesday, Cordes hounded GOP Congressman Robert Pittenger: "All the polls show that a majority of Americans don't want to see the government shut down over ObamaCare. How can you say the American people is on your side?"
The correspondent tossed a…
MSNBC's Wolffe: 'Spoiled Children' GOP 'Will Not Be Trusted' 'For a Ge
On Tuesday's PoliticsNation, MSNBC.com Executive Editor Richard Wolffe -- formerly of Newsweek -- predicted that, because Republicans embraced the Tea Party, setting up the path to a government shutdown, Republican party members are "destroying their brand" and "will not be trusted" "for a generation to come." Wolffe began:
NBC: 'Committed Core' of GOP Who 'Can't Be Conservative Enough' to Bla
On Tuesday's NBC Nightly News, anchor Brian Williams sneered that the government shutdown was "being driven by a committed core of Republican members of Congress who are all but assured of re-election in their districts, and just can't be conservative enough for many of the folks back home." [Listen to the audio or watch the video after the jump]
In the report that followed, chief White House…
AP Tries But Fails to Find a WWII Veteran Who Only Blames Congress for
Brett Zongker, the reporter the Associated Press assigned to cover the World War II Memorial story yesterday in Washington, apparently felt compelled to try to find someone who would exclusively blame Congress for the memorial's closure. He failed, but pretended that he succeeded.
For those unfamiliar with the story, in an overrecation to the partial government shutdown, the White House,…
Tina Brown: GOP Donning 'Suicide Vests,' Boehner a 'Rallier of These C
On Tuesday's AC360 Later, Tina Brown said that Republicans are fighting ObamaCare with "suicide vests" and that President Obama looks "statesmanlike" in talking to Iran but not the GOP.
"Maybe Vladimir Putin can break the logjam here," The Daily Beast co-founder quipped. She added, "it is just incredible to me to watch these Republicans putting on their suicide vests and thinking this is going…
New Republic's Advice to Obama: Roll in the Tanks and Blow Up 'Intrans
On Tuesday, Julia Ioffe, senior editor for the liberal New Republic publication, all but suggested that President Obama needed to use military force against Tea Party conservatives in Congress. Ioffe likened the current federal government shutdown to the 1993 constitutional crisis in Russia, where then-President Boris Yeltsin ultimately ended the impasse by dissolving the parliament, and had…
AP's Daly Hides Foiled Federal Energy Regulatory Commission Nominee's
On Tuesday, Ron Binz, nominated by President Obama to head the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, withdrew his name from consideration. Those who want to see the economy prosper should be relieved that the position described by Matthew Daly at the Associated Press as that of "the nation's top energy regulator" won't be occupied by a died-in-the-wool "renewable" energy radical.
The AP's…
Politico: Obama, in Govt. Shutdown, Puts on a 'Display of Resolve and
The folks in office administration at the Politico had better put in for extra janitorial help. With all the horse manure their reporters are slinging during the partial government shutdown, it's gotta be getting knee-deep in those hoary halls.
One of the more egregious examples of insufferable obsequiousness today came late this morning via Edward-Isaac Dovere and Reid J. Epstein. You see, in…
David Limbaugh Column: GOP Must Keep Up the Fight Against, Not Surrend
Why is it just assumed Republicans will automatically be blamed for any government shutdown over a budgetary impasse between Obama and his Democratic Party and Republicans?
More disturbingly, why do so many Republicans and right-leaning commentators surrender before we've even begun to fight?
WSJ's Paletta Blames Tea Party for Broken Congress, Omits Reid's Unwil
Corrected from earlier | "After three years of last-minute deals, delayed decisions, and acrimonious finger pointing, the process for one of Congress's most basic functions—spending money—finally buckled and broke down Monday night," the Wall Street Journal's Damian Paletta sighed in the opening paragraph of his October 1 story, "Breakdown Is New Norm in Spending Fights."
"Since passage of…
Woman on 'Today' Plaza: GOP to Blame for Shutdown, Obama 'Best Preside
On Tuesday's NBC Today, co-host Carson Daly turned to a woman on the Today show plaza for her reaction to the government shutdown. "Judy from Chicago" proceeded to bash Republicans and praise President Obama: "I think all of this amounts to is the Republicans are against President Obama. They don't want the President to be successful. I think he is the best president we have had in a very long…
ABC 'World News' Spins For White House On Shutdown, ObamaCare
Monday night’s edition of ABC World News was a double dose of advocacy as Diane Sawyer and her team essentially served as a mouthpiece for President Obama’s position on the government shutdown and his health care law.
Sawyer led the broadcast, of course, with the government shutdown, which was then only a few hours away. She stated President Obama’s perspective on the matter: “The president…
