Name That Party: Dem MA State Senator Charged in Sexual Assaults

The Associated Press has done it again, even beyond what Ken Shepherd of NewsBusters noted in a related post on June 4. In that post, Ken cited an AP report that did not identify the political party of Democratic Massachusetts State Senator and alleged serial sexual assaulter James Marzilli until the eleventh and final paragraph. AP Writer Denise Lavoie went one step further in her 300-word July…
Tom Blumer

Steph Shills for Obama on Blowing Off Townhalls

You'd think a guy who has demonstrated such flexibility on everything from campaign finance to NAFTA to the Second Amendment to the surge could find a way to wangle some townhall meetings with John McCain into his schedule. But gosh darn it, that would just be too tough for Barack Obama, explains George Stephanopoulos.  The "This Week" host made his excuses for the Dem candidate on today's Good…
Mark Finkelstein

NYT Columnist: Don't Test Olympians For Gender

The Cornell golf club championship is next weekend, and I had been planning [brag alert] to defend the senior men's title I won last year.  But now, I just might have to think about entering the women's division instead.  The field is much smaller, not nearly as tough, and playing from the red tees should give me quite an advantage.  But what if tournament organizers balk at my entry, you ask? …
Mark Finkelstein

Pulitzer-Winner Blames Those Who 'Refuse to Raise Taxes

Washington Post business columnist Steven Pearlstein, who won the 2008 Pulitzer Prize for commentary, on Friday contended “it is not the protectionists of the AFL-CIO or CNN who are primarily to blame for the erosion of public support” for free trade, instead:The blame lies squarely with a business community that continues to support Republican politicians who refuse to raise the taxes and spend…
Brent Baker

AP: 'Obama Backs Away From McCain's Debate Challenge

What's going on at the Associated Press?First, it publishes an article about how the McCain campaign feels the New York Times editors are like a blogger "sitting at home in his mother's basement and ranting into the ether between games of Dungeons & Dragons."Then, a few hours later, it publishes a piece about presumptive Democrat presidential nominee Barack Obama being afraid to debate McCain…
Noel Sheppard

McCain Campaign: NYT Editors Like Blogger In Mom's Basement

The battle between John McCain and the New York Times is getting very interesting.According to the Associated Press, the McCain campaign has struck back at two Times editorials this week highly critical of the Arizona senator. In fact, a campaign spokesman even went so far as to liken the editors of the Times to a blogger "sitting at home in his mother's basement and ranting into the ether…
Noel Sheppard

NYT's Krugman Explains 'the Reason to Hate Exxon

Brad Wilmouth

Flashback: Olbermann Gloated at 'B*****d' O'Reilly's Audience 'Dying O

In light of Keith Olbermann's recent mockery of elderly television viewers as being in the "65 to dead" demographic, two years ago on MSNBC's Countdown show, Olbermann seemed to rejoice at the prospect of O'Reilly's audience members "dying off," as Olbermann bragged about his viewing figures which had increased during the previous year, especially among viewers in the age range of 25-54 years,…
Brad Wilmouth

GOP House Revolt Over Oil Drilling Gets Ignored or Buried

On Friday, NewsBusters wondered how much attention media would pay to the Republican revolt that occurred after Speaker Pelosi adjourned the House for a five week vacation without allowing a vote on offshore oil drilling.It turns out that if you rely on the evening news programs of the three broadcast networks, you didn't hear about this extraordinary event at all (photo courtesy AP). And, if you…
Noel Sheppard

Olbermann Mocks the Elderly as '65 to Dead' Demographic

On Friday's Countdown, during the show's "Worst Person in the World" segment, MSNBC host Keith Olbermann tried to characterize the ratings of his show as more admirable than than those of FNC's highly watched O'Reilly Factor by narrowly citing viewing figures among younger demographics. Olbermann, who has a history of quoting the viewing figures for those 25-54 years old -- citing their value to…
Brad Wilmouth

Weekend Sports Open Thread

NB Staff

Open Thread

NB Staff

WaPo: Shocked By Its Own Pro Obama Bias

The Washington Post's Deborah Howell has a howeller in the Aug. 3 edition of the paper revealing how shocked and amazed she was that her own paper had a lopsided tally of Obama photographs compared to how many McCain photos appear in its pages. Of course, the amusing thing isn't that the Post had far more Obama photos than McCain pics but that, regardless of the raw numbers staring her in the…
Warner Todd Huston

VP: Hardball Says Hillary's History, But What If

There's no current wisdom more conventional than that which has Hillary Clinton entirely out of the veepstakes.  Take the opening of yesterday's Hardball, for example, with Mike Barnicle sitting in for Chris Matthews.MIKE BARNICLE: It didn't get much notice in the media and it didn't show up in any newspaper obituary pages, but the idea of a Democratic ticket of Obama and Hillary Clinton died a…
Mark Finkelstein