MS NOW (formerly MSNBC)

Even at MSNBC, which gets crushed of course by Fox News in every prime-time slot, Cenk Uygur manages to come in dead last in ratings among his liberal peers.   So when Cenk claims that he doesn't want to cover Donald Trump but is forced to do so by The Donald's popularity, the baloney-meter starts screaming. Uygur opened his show last evening with a long segment on Trump, all the while…

MSNBC anchor Chris Matthews on Thursday continued to obsess over his favorite issue, the birthers. He excoriated the Republican Party, smearing that the "haters" now "have a party to call all their own, the GOP." Painting with a broad brush, Matthews mocked, "How did the right-wing fringe manage to take over the Republican Party?" He later repeated the talking point, wondering, "Coming up,…

MSNBC's Chuck Todd rattled off a list of reasons to explain the sharp rise in the price of oil – none of which included Barack Obama's offshore drilling moratorium – and was "confused" about why anyone would blame the president for the prospect of $4 per gallon gasoline. On the April 28 "Daily Rundown," Todd suggested the Federal Reserve's quantitative easing measures and increases in global…

Both CBS Evening News anchor Katie Couric and MSNBC host Andrea Mitchell incorrectly asserted that President Obama is the only president in U.S. history who has had his citizenship doubted. In reality, both CBSNews.com and MSNBC.com posted a 2009 Associated Press article that detailed 21st President Chester A. Arthur having to deal with a similar controversy in the 1880 presidential campaign…

President Obama chided the news media Wednesday for continuing to focus national attention on the non-issue of his American citizenship. "Fascinating how many of Obama's birther remarks…were aimed at the media for stoking this," tweeted Howard Kurtz shortly after the speech. The birth certificate issue was a distraction, Obama stated, and the White House decision to release his long-form…

If you ask Al Sharpton if something is racist, what are the chances he's going to say yes? On Wednesday's "Ed Show," the host asked the civil rights leader, "If this had been a white president, would we be seeking his birth certificate the way they have been doing this on President Obama?" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

MSNBC's Lawrence O'Donnell abruptly ended an interview with queen birther Orly Taitz Wednesday after screaming at her for several minutes. Things turned ugly when "The Last Word" host refused to allow his guest to discuss President Obama's Selective Service certificate and Taitz responded by saying, "Your program is nothing but Obama propaganda machine" (video follows with commentary):

Meet the Press host David Gregory on Wednesday derided the Republican National Committee Chairman as "low-minded" for his response to the release of Barack Obama's long-form birth certificate. Jansing and Co. guest host Savannah Guthrie lauded the President for looking "like the most reasonable man in Washington." Appearing just minutes after the President completed a press conference on the…

One more sign the Age of Civility is over: an MSNBC host urging Dems to be more "vicious" toward Republicans. Oh, and to engage in more "name-calling." Apparently writing off any career ambitions of succeeding to the Miss Manners slot, Cenk Uygur issued his recommendations last night in the course of disagreeing with a Dem congressman who was insufficiently coarse for Cenk's taste. View…

Martin Bashir has dared go where even most congressional Dems won't: praising Britain's National Health Service and by implication the socialization of medicine it represents. On today's Morning Joe, Bashir said the National Health Service is "a wonderful idea."   For good measure, the British-born Bashir, who hosts a regular afternoon slot in the MSNBC line-up, also vastly overstated the…

Ed Schultz's pattern of accusing Republicans of lying moments before lying himself continued Tuesday evening. Just moments after calling House Speaker John Boehner (R-Oh.) and Congressman Paul Ryan (R-Wisc.) liars, the host of MSNBC's "Ed Show" misinformed his viewers about Medicare (video follows with transcript and commentary):

A few hours after PBS's Tavis Smiley predicted on MSNBC that the upcoming presidential race will be the most racist in American history, Ed Schultz said the Republican Party stands for racism. The host of the "Ed Show" also proclaimed, "I think Donald Trump is a racist" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Tavis Smiley on Tuesday said the upcoming presidential race is "going to be the ugliest, the nastiest, the most divisive, and the most racist in the history of this republic." When MSNBC's Lawrence O'Donnell asked his guest on "The Last Word" why he thought so, the PBS host predictably blamed it all on the Tea Party and Donald Trump (video follows with transcript and commentary):

For weeks MSNBC's Chris Matthews has been complaining about the lack of declared GOP presidential candidates. On Tuesday's "Hardball," former Republican National Committee chairman Michael Steele exposed Matthews' hypocrisy concerning this matter marvelously demonstrating that once any of the possible candidates formally enters the race, the avowed liberal commentator is just going to trash…