Iran

For Iran, Mike?  On today's Morning Joe, reliable Obama fan Mike Barnicle managed to keep a straight face while lauding the Iran deal as an "extraordinary feat." He did so despite poll numbers displayed showing that a huge majority of Americans don't think the ayatollahs will keep their promises. Let's see: sanctions lifted while centrifuges keep spinning and nuclear scientists beaver away in…

While CBS This Morning and ABC's Good Morning America both covered the latest problems with the Iran nuclear negotiations on Thursday, NBC's Today skipped the story altogether in favor of touting how President Obama "plays tourist" in Jamaica.

Too bad the "framework" of a nuclear weapons deal with Iran didn't come four days earlier on April Fools' Day. It would have been more appropriate.

The networks on Monday night and Tuesday morning minimized Barack Obama's casual dismissal of the idea that any nuclear deal with Iran include an acknowledgment of Israel's right to exist. On Good Morning America, Amy Robach quickly touted the President's rejection: "[Obama] is not buying Israel's latest demand concerning the nuclear deal with Iran. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says any…

Much of today's Morning Joe was devoted to a discussion of Rolling Stone's failed journalism on the UVa story. Maybe Mika Brzezinski should look in the mirror: she began her interview of Wendy Sherman, the chief US negotiator on the Iran deal, by offering her "congratulations."  Even Sherman herself had the sense to suggest that congratulations were not yet in order. In contrast, Joe Scarborough…

During its coverage of the Iran framework on Monday, NBC Nightly News touted the hopes of proponents and the Obama administration that the “details of a deal may be changing” the minds of “some” critics as President Obama and Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz began selling the agreement in press conferences, interviews, and calls with world leaders. Lester Holt began by promoting Obama’s recent…

On CBS This Morning: Saturday, reporter Elizabeth Palmer did her best to channel the sentiments of Iran following the preliminary nuclear agreement between them and the United States. The CBS reporter proclaimed that “at Friday prayers there was the usual chant of death to America, but more habit than conviction."

Would you want to cite someone who has been thoroughly discredited in the very field he is supposed to be an expert in? Well, that is exactly what several news organizations did yesterday including Charlie Rose on PBS, the New York Times, and Bloomberg when they cited Gary Sick as an expert on Iran in stories about the nuke "deal" which was actually more of an agreement on the framework to…

The favorable coverage of the agreed framework for future talks over Iran’s nuclear program continued on Friday morning as the network newscasts hailed the “legacy defining moment now within reach” for President Obama and compared Iranian “hardliners” to deal skeptics in the U.S. and Israel. Today co-host Savannah Guthrie began the program’s coverage by hailing the “landmark deal” with NBC's…

The Washington Post’s editorial board slammed the Obama administration Thursday evening over the framework for additional negotiations with Iran concerning its nuclear program that “fall well short of the goals originally set by the Obama administration” and would allow Iran to “instantly become a threshold nuclear state.” Set to run in the Friday print edition of the newspaper, the editorial…

On Thursday night, ABC and NBC cheered the “historic” agreement of an outline for continued talks with Iran and declared that “the United States could be entering a new era in its relationship” with the world’s leading state sponsor of terrorism. NBC's Andrea Mitchell reflected on the “18 months of tough negotiations” that “end[ed] with an all-nighter” with the possibility that “the United States…

On Wednesday’s CBS Evening News, anchor Scott Pelley devoted a few moments after a news brief on the Iran deal negotiations to explaining the centuries-long divide between the Shia and Sunni branches of Islam and, in the process, also took time to reflect on President Barack Obama’s 2009 speech in Cairo. After noting that the negotiations are taking place “against a backdrop of a disintegrating…

"I think he's smarter than anybody here right now. And I think he will know that, I hope he knows that." That was MSNBC's Chris Matthews's admittedly "hopeful" thinking that President Barack Obama has got the Iranian nuclear negotiations under control and is hammering out a workable deal which will prevent Iran from getting nuclear weapons and pave the way for long-term regional stability.

Sometimes you just want to shake the TV and say "enough with the cutesy facial expressions, already: spit it out, Mika!"  Morning Joe mavens will know what I mean: Mika Brzezinski has the annoying habit of letting a series of sighs, raised eyebrows and facial tics substitute for a clear articulation of her position on a given issue. There was a prime example of the phenomenon on today's show,…