News Hour

Like the other networks, the PBS NewsHour has been very slow to offer any stories or interviews to the midterm elections. In October, the closest thing to a candidate interview was a chat with Rep. Paul Ryan on October 1. On Tuesday, anchor Judy Woodruff promoted liberal Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.), a potential presidential candidate if you listen to the pundits -- but she's not on the…

Following President Obama’s speech on the economy on Thursday, the PBS NewsHour offered a 48-second news brief on the subject, in which co-anchor Gwen Ifill offered no opposing viewpoint to the President’s claim in his speech that “by every measure, the country is better off than when he took office.” The show then played a soundbite of the President, in which he lamented that “millions of…

Mark Litke hyped the "population explosion – what some are calling a crisis" in the Philippines on Sunday's PBS NewsHour Weekend, and played up how poor "families in Asia's most Catholic country...have had little or no access to contraception or family planning advice." Litke confronted a retired Catholic archbishop on his Church's teaching against birth control: "If the people of the…

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…

In the Friday PBS NewsHour, anchor Judy Woodruff lamented the current impasse in Washington: "I don’t know what else to call it, war between congressional Republicans and the president." She sounded shocked that Speaker John Boehner filed suit to protest the president's constant end-runs around Congress and legislating from the White House on Obamacare, immigration, and other issues. Shields…

Appearing on Wednesday evening’s PBS NewsHour to discuss her book with Gwen Ifill, Hillary Clinton was forced to again explain her comments regarding wealth. Ifill told Clinton that those kind of comments tend to “stick. Ask Romney.” The former Secretary of State shot back, “Well, that’s a false equivalency.” Gwen Ifill mentioned to Clinton that her husband “was forced to defend you at his…

For most of this week, the front page of The New York Times has been trying to dig out Team Obama on the Bowe Bergdahl scandal. So it might be unsurprising that pseudo-conservative Times columnist David Brooks is echoing his "objective" colleagues in a Friday column simply titled "President Obama Was Right." This isn't just a blatantly baked spin blossom for the Times. It might naturally spur…

On Tuesday night’s PBS NewsHour, a panel of journalists were exploring how Democratic candidates for the Senate were going to struggle with Obama’s new crackdown on coal plants. PBS anchor Gwen Ifill even said, “why then does the White House rub salt into the wound on this issue? Why make it so hard for Democrats especially?” Washington Post reporter Reid Wilson replied that Obama wants it…

On Thursday evening, former Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner appeared on the PBS NewsHour to discuss his new memoir. Not only did the taxpayer-subsidized anchor Gwen Ifill gently press Geithner from the left on policy matters, she failed to ask him about one of his most startling admissions – that Obama administration officials wanted him to lie during appearances on the Sunday morning TV…

What at times is worse than the Jurassic Press not covering something?  The Jurassic Press covering something. The all-encompassing government-Internet-power-grab that is Network Neutrality rarely gets outside-the-Tech-World media attention.  But Thursday the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) voted in Democrat Party-line fashion to begin its process of imposing it.  This was a big…

PBS NewsHour analyst Mark Shields started with an admission on Benghazi on Friday night: “Has the White House been transparent? Absolutely not.” But he lamented that the House special committee hearings “will be a disaster. It won’t be good for the country.” It’s only being done for the Tea Party and Fox News. Apparently, hearings are only productive and wonderful when run by liberal…

On Thursday’s NewsHour, PBS ran a full-length segment on the new special committee created by House Republicans to investigate the September 2012 Benghazi attacks. However, anchor Judy Woodruff and her guest, Robert Costa from The Washington Post -- formerly of the National Review --  pushed the idea that Republicans are exploiting the tragedy by fundraising off of it. The thing is, the network…

Donald Sterling, the beleaguered owner of the Los Angeles Clippers, has been banned from the NBA for life. But for some in the media, the league's disciplinary action is something that should be pursued against socially conservative owners by virtue of their political beliefs. [Video below. MP3 audio here.] Take Esquire political blogger Charlie Pierce, for example. Appearing as a guest on…

On Monday’s PBS NewsHour, anchor Judy Woodruff sat down for a conversation with former U.S. Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens, and she tried to get the amiable, elderly jurist to criticize his more conservative former colleagues. Stevens, to his credit, didn’t take the bait. [Video below. MP3 audio here.] The interview focused on Stevens’ new book about six amendments he would like to…