Culture/Society

On Wednesday's New Day, CNN's Chris Cuomo repeatedly tried to get Republican presidential candidate Dr. Ben Carson to attack conservatives, as well as his competitors, on the Confederate flag controversy. Cuomo asked, "Isn't it a part of leadership saying to people who don't want to call what happened in this Charleston church a hate crime – calling them out on that, and showing them that that is…

Bill Kristol has supported the removal of the Confederate flag from the South Carolina capitol grounds for 15 years. But when he took to Twitter yesterday to criticize the left's "frenzy of self-righteousness" in the wake of Charleston, he brought down on his head a deluge of ugly criticism. On today's Morning Joe, Jonathan Capehart and John Heilemann eschewed the kind of scatalogical…

Racial issues, not gun issues, understandably have been at the forefront of most media coverage of the Charleston massacre, but Adam Gopnik suggests that in any such mass shooting, the firearm is the salient factor. “Mental health, the enduring structures of racism—these are issues that we have to deal with, too,” wrote Gopnik in a Tuesday column. “But they are not at the heart of the tragedy.…

CNN's Chris Cuomo zeroed in on five state flags that have supposed "strong Confederate references" on Monday's New Day. Cuomo cited unnamed experts on flags and symbols who claim that the state flags of Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, and Tennessee – along with that of Mississippi and Georgia (which incorporate two different Confederate flags) have such "references." He later wondered, "Do all of…

In a Tuesday piece for Salon, Stanford comparative-literature professor David Palumbo-Liu alleged that Fox News “surely planned to furnish [accused Charleston mass-murderer Dylann] Roof with an alibi regarding the exact nature of his heinous crime,” and declared that “if Roof is convicted I suggest we regard Fox as an accessory after the fact.” Palumbo-Liu also claimed that Fox News “provides a…

On Monday, the Washington Post's Express tabloid ran a blatantly anti-Catholic ad on its front page. The full-page advertisement from the far-left "Catholics For Choice" group spoofed the famous World War I-era "I Want You" military recruiting poster, and evoked the worst of 19th century Know-Nothingism. Instead of Uncle Sam, a caricature of a Catholic bishop with a miter on his head points at…

In a bizarre move, Angel Soft toilet paper ran an ad this past Sunday wishing moms a “Happy Father’s Day.” The ad featured men and women telling their stories, through tears, of how their moms had to be “both parents” while raising their family by themselves. It’s hard to fault the sweet stories told in the commercial of single moms raising their kids, but surely this ad could’ve been run on…

Group loyalty is a big part of politics on both sides of the fence, but as far as lefty pundit Marcotte is concerned, it’s become so inflated on the right that it often crowds out crucial things like “basic common sense.” In a Friday Talking Points Memo column, Marcotte asserted that “conservatives are going way too far with this knee-jerk tendency to believe ‘their’ people can do no wrong and…

In 1968, ABC News tried to improve on its lowly third-rank status by bringing on some rock-em, sock-em commentary around the two party conventions  from two intellectual heavyweights: William F. Buckley Jr. On the right, and author Gore Vidal on the left. A new documentary – from the left, considering it carries a tag from Independent Lens, a leftist documentary series for PBS – explores the…

Anger, sadness, and disgust have been nearly universal responses to Wednesday night’s apparent act of racist terrorism in Charleston, S.C., but Jeb Lund doesn’t think such reactions make sense coming from conservatives. In a Friday screed, Lund argued that the Charleston shootings shouldn’t have surprised anyone, given that “American movement conservatism has already made these kinds of killings…

This Father’s Day, Dove's marketing has come under the influence of the PC Police. It’s unfortunate, as their Men+Care ad is sweet and heartwarming – and gay. On the plus side, it delivers wonderfully positive messages about men that are rarely told on TV. Dads have an important role, showing emotion is good, and fatherhood begins from conception. In the words of the ad itself, “Real strength…

In a Thursday item on NBC News's web site, Chuck Todd, Mark Murray, and Andrew Rafferty asserted that "just like the issue of gay marriage, the Pope and the Catholic Church have gone from being wedge issues that benefitted the GOP in 2004 to ones that now favor Democrats." The three journalists cited Associated Press's reporting on Pope Francis's new encyclical on the environment, and concluded…

The broadcast news shows have hyped climate change in Pope Francis’s new encyclical – but did they hint at his arguments on abortion and gender identity? Short answer: No. The Vatican released the pope’s media-hyped encyclical, Laudato Si’, on June 18. Out of the three broadcast networks, only NBC and ABC commented on the “climate change” publication from the “popular pope.” They also emphasized…

On Wednesday's CBS Evening News, Jan Crawford hyped the latest "dust-up between the musician and the politician," and underlined that "rare is the Republican candidate who isn't told to stop the music – even if...they paid licensing fees." She asked a GOP strategist, "Why is it it's always Republicans who are getting slammed by the musicians for using their songs?"