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Amazingly, Chris Matthews concluded Thursday’s Hardball by playing clips of how President Ronald Reagan reacted the Soviet shootdown of a Korean Air Lines 747 passenger jet in 1983 – even conceding, after a clip of Reagan charging the Soviets with terrorism and a “flagrant lie,” that “he was speaking for the American people.” Matthews – probably inadvertently – illustrated how Reagan, unlike…

Late this afternoon, I went to the Top Business Headlines page at the Associated Press's national web site to get today's new home construction news. Because the AP didn't have a story there (saved here for future reference), I knew it had to be bad, especially because to ignore it, the wire service made room in its Top 10 stories for an item on Toyota experimenting with fuel cells and aircraft…

On Thursday night's PBS NewsHour, anchor Judy Woodruff interviewed Donna Zaccaro, who has made a new documentary about her mother, Geraldine Ferraro and her historic nomination for vice president in July of 1984. Like Nancy Pelosi's daughter Alexandra, Zaccaro was a longtime producer for NBC News before becoming a filmmaker. In a film clip, NPR’s Cokie Roberts gushes about the moment at the…

According to American Prospect blogger Paul Waldman, movement conservatives live in a bubble, but in this case none of the cards therein say “Moops.” Rather, each carries the name of what righties (though usually not Waldman himself) consider one or another of the Obama administration’s scandals. In a Wednesday post, Waldman wrote that what he called “the IRS scandalette” is “an almost…

WASHINGTON — I have been vindicated! For years I have been comparing the Clinton family to the family of Warren Gamaliel Harding, our 29th president and a president of dark memory at least to most liberal historians. For me, Warren was sheer slapstick, as to some degree his modern-day equivalent was, Bill Clinton. And forget not their gruesome wives. I began my historical comparisons in the…

The U.S. Justice Department's Bureau of Justice Statistics reports that 2012 losses because of personal identity theft totaled $24.7 billion. The money losses from identity theft pale in comparison with the costs of paperwork, time and inconvenience imposed on the larger society in an effort to protect ourselves. According to LifeLock, while the laws against identity theft have gotten tougher,…

Of the Big Three evenings newscasts for Thursday, July 17, only ABC's World News failed to mention that President Obama was attending two fundraisers in New York City as previously planned despite the day's events: a downed Malaysia Airlines jetliner in Ukraine and Israel sending ground forces into the Gaza Strip. CBS's Major Garrett mentioned in passing the president flying to New York for a…

Texas State Senator and MSNBC heroine Wendy Davis is not doing that hot in the fundraising race as she pursues her shot for governor of the Lone Star state, the Daily Beast reported today. "As if things weren’t going badly enough for Wendy Davis, the Texas gubernatorial candidate got caught inflating her campaign’s finances this week by counting a Willie Nelson concert as a contribution,"…

Keeping in tradition of Comedy Central talk-show hosts giving Democratic politicians softball interviews, Stephen Colbert treated New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio to one on the July 16 edition of The Colbert Report. Colbert could have used some of his interview to make his subject uncomfortable, by say challenging the left-wing populist on his controversial efforts targeting popular and…

The Catholic League's Bill Donohue blasted "sick man" David Letterman for his Wednesday night sketch making light about Pope Francis's recent remarks about priestly celibacy. The segment repeatedly featured a group of young women screaming ecstatically over the news that the Pope is "now thinking about lifting the celibacy requirements for priests." He also aired a fake CNN news report…

NBC pulled reporter Ayman Mohyeldin from Gaza after the journalist witnessed an Israeli air strike that killed four children. Mohyeldin also made some derisive comments about Israel on his Facebook page, writing, "The #US State Department Spokesperson just said that #Hamas is ultimately responsible for #Israel shelling and killing 4 boys who were cousins aged 9-11 because Hamas didn't accept…

In an interview with Sergeant Bowe Bergdahl's attorney on Thursday's NBC Today, co-host Matt Lauer worried that the former Taliban captive and possible deserter was being unfairly investigated by the military [Listen to the audio or watch the video after the jump]: There was so much fanfare after his release. The President met in the Rose Garden with Sergeant Bergdahl's parents. Top…

Even after all these years, some people still fall for Howard Stern’s tricks. Reacting to the plane crash of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17, MSNBC’s The Cycle supposedly brought on U.S. Staff Sergeant Michael Boyd. He claimed to have seen the missile in the air hit the plane. Suffice it to say, Krystal Ball’s interview did not go as planned. Ball led off by asking “Boyd” what he saw on the…

Former congressman Todd Akin took his book tour to Chuck Todd's MSNBC show The Daily Rundown on Thursday morning. That came after a pretty rough Megyn Kelly interview on Monday night about the 2012 media feeding frenzy over his medically incorrect remarks about women's bodies often shutting down if there's a "legitimate rape." "I know you want to be mad about the media," Todd announced…