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People magazine gave prominent play on the front of its Books section in the latest edition (dated October 3) to two Palin-trashing books, by Joe McGinniss and Levi Johnston. They weren't officially reviewed, since there was no rating of how many stars they had earned. The headline was "Seeking the Real Sarah? Two dirt-dishing bios of Sarah Palin play fast and loose with the facts but transport…

On Thursday, Washington Post media reporter Paul Farhi honored commentator Fred Fiske of Washington’s NPR station WAMU as he retired in his 90s like Andy Rooney. Farhi helped Fiske chronicle “his absurdly lengthy career as an announcer, pop-music DJ, talk-show host and gently insistent, moderately liberal commentator.” Later in the piece, he said Fiske offered “what he describes as ‘moderate’…

Here's another sign the rules against campaign donations/fundraising at MSNBC are toast: Ed Schultz was the star attraction at a $50-a-plate fundraiser for the Kosciusko County Democrats in Warsaw, Indiana on Saturday night. (Some paid $250, apparently, to be even closer to Big Ed.) Daniel Riordan of The Warsaw Times-Union reported Schultz asked if there were any Republicans present. "When…

No one thinks Barack Obama is sitting pretty in this race for the White House. The Real Clear Politics average of the mid-September approval-rating polls measures him at 43 percent approval, 51 percent disapproval. With these numbers, they should be measuring his political coffin. But to listen to the networks talk, it’s the Republican field that is a mess in desperate need of new talent, and…

Everyone was well-behaved when Fox's Bill O'Reilly came on NPR's Morning Edition Tuesday to promote his new book Killing Lincoln. NPR anchor Steve Inskeep was no hardball-throwing Terry Gross, and O'Reilly was wearing his pox-on-both-houses centrist hat and tried to say nice things about Obama. He denounced the media as a "bunch of guttersnipes," but when Inskeep nudged him about whether he was…

Apparently there's no audio or video of North Carolina Governor Beverly Perdue's Tuesday humdinger, namely that "I think we ought to suspend, perhaps, elections for Congress for two years and just tell them we won't hold it against them, whatever decisions they make, to just let them help this country recover." -- yet. If none surfaces, that will be too bad, because the guess here is that the…

What if I told you that the government put out a report today which would lead one to infer that the economy might barely have grown last year, and that it even may have contracted -- and that the reporter who appears to have been the only one who covered it didn't grasp its potential significance (or, conceivably, chose to ignore it)? Today the Department of Labor's Bureau of Labor…

CNN's Jack Cafferty smeared entire crowds of people who attended recent GOP debates when he asked on Tuesday if they were "bloodthirsty." "For the third time in as many debates, crowd members have either booed or cheered at what some say are highly inappropriate moments," Cafferty stated. He slammed both the crowd behavior and the Republican candidates for not denouncing such antics. […

As NewsBusters reported Monday, Newsweek featured an in-depth look at Fox News and chairman Roger Ailes in its most recent installment. When this subject came up on MSNBC's "Morning Joe" Tuesday, after the guests predictably carped and whined about FNC's conservative leanings, host Joe Scarborough observed, "People are shocked and stunned at the blurred lines when Roger Ailes and Fox does it…

In an interview with Vice President Joe Biden, ABC's The View co-host Joy Behar brought up rogue crowd members at a recent GOP debate who booed after a gay soldier asked a question of the candidates. After Biden condemned the action, Behar slammed the Republican candidates for not rebuking the audience members. "I thought it was reprehensible," Biden said of the booing, to which Behar added "…

Former CNN congressional producer Evan Glass announced on his Twitter account on Tuesday that he was "thrilled to be joining the board" of Equality Maryland, the main group pushing for the legalization of same-sex "marriage" in the Mid-Atlantic state. Glass added in his Tweet, "With growing support, we will have marriage equality in 2012!" The self-proclaimed "recovering journalist," who…

While running through his usual litany of attacks on anti-Obama conservatives, MSNBC's Chris Matthews on Tuesday included the National Rifle Association as part of the "crazy far-right" who "hate" Barack Obama. Matthews began by wondering, "What is it about Obama that inspires this kind of weird, zealous hatred?" He later added, "Well, here's something, another strain of the crazy, far-…

Rachel Maddow should never be put in charge of crowd control. Not until she learns to count. Maddow is clearly flummoxed by what actually constitutes a crowd, as can be seen in her commentary on audiences at Republican presidential debates. (video after page break)

During an appearance on Morning Joe, Tuesday, Newsweek editor Tina Brown made an off-hand remark about Barack Obama, conceding that the politician "wasn't ready" to be President. Brown has previously attacked Rush Limbaugh and other conservatives for daring to oppose the Obama administration. While discussing whether New Jersey Governor Chris Christie will change his mind and run for…