NewsBusters Archive

Liberal MSNBC anchor Thomas Roberts on Friday used the dumb tweets of a Republican Senator's teenage son to prove GOP homophobia and racism. In a segment on Marco Rubio's comments about not including gays in the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, Roberts sneered, "Marco Rubio going on the record that he is not interested, really hasn't even looked at the employment nondiscrimination act, but isn't interested in being able to look out for people based on sexual orientation." 

Roberts then somehow connected Jeff Flake's 15-year-old son, Tanner. The younger Flake tweeted about the "faggot" who stole his bike. Roberts wondered if this reflected "an entrenched homophobia on the right, that they're not willing to recognize there's a sea change in this country?" The activist/journalist concluded, "Are they just unwilling to look at how this country is changing?" [See video below. MP3 audio here.]

CBS's Sharyl Attkisson revealed on Twitter on Friday morning that her computer was, indeed, hacked, as she had alleged back on May 21, 2013. Attkisson quoted from her network's own statement about the finding:

"A cyber security firm hired by CBS News has determined through forensic analysis that Sharyl Attkisson's computer was accessed by an unauthorized, external, unknown party on multiple occasions in late 2012. Evidence suggests this party performed all access remotely using Attkisson's accounts."

"The media finally recognized a[n] [Obama] scandal, but then slowly but surely they took their foot off the gas," Fox News Channel's Sean Hannity noted of the media's treatment of the IRS/Tea Party scandal as he opened the "Media Mash" segment with NewsBusters publisher Brent Bozell on Thursday's Hannity. As Hannity opened the segment, an on-screen graphic [embedded below the page break] displayed data collected by Media Research Center (MRC) deputy research director Geoff Dickens which showed the broadcast media's waning interest in reporting on developments in the scandal.

"Look, the first two weeks of this scandal, 96 stories. The second two weeks, 31 stories. This week: one story. It's over," as far as the media are concerned, the MRC founder noted, even though the MRC's own CNSNews.com division broke some damning revelations related to the IRS scandal this week. For example, Bozell noted:

When the signature publication of the nation’s most elite journalism school hosts a panel discussion on how reporters cover the gay marriage debate, you’d expect the same level of thoughtful balance the media generally gives the topic. Which is to say none at all. And the June 12 Newseum event hosted by the Columbia Journalism Review (CJR) and sponsored by the ACLU didn’t disappoint. 

Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism is America’s most prestigious journalism school, and its graduates can be found throughout the establishment and left-wing media. Columbia established the CJR in 1961 to “encourage excellence in journalism in the service of a free society.” The publication “monitors and supports the press as it works across all platforms.” 

The Washington Post raised eyebrows Friday by investigating something the president’s backers would consider lowly “Drudge fodder” – the high costs of Obama’s travel, especially in less developed nations.

The headline was “Presidential travel, kingly sums: Document details staggering logistics of Obama trip to Africa.” Reporters Carol Leonnig and David Nakamura added broad details:

On Wednesday's The Lead, CNN's Erin McPike touted Hillary Clinton's speech at the Clinton Global Initiative and hyped her prospects for 2016. She ignored any controversies from Clinton's tenure as Secretary of State, like Benghazi and new accusations of a cover-up of sex scandals abroad.

"[T]here's no question that the big star here was a very relaxed Hillary Clinton," McPike reported. "The political world is abuzz over a potential race for the White House in 2016." A CNN headline trumpeted "Here Comes Hillary." [Video below the break. Audio here.]

According to Chris Matthews, pro-Second Amendment Americans are weird, not "normal," "obsessed" and probably racist. In a segment on Thursday's Hardball, the cable host played a new National Rifle Association ad attacking Democratic Senator Joe Manchin. Matthews lectured, "The gun people, they think about nothing else. And they never change their minds, never change their attitudes and never change the frickin' subject."

Talking to fellow liberal Ron Reagan, the anchor mocked, "How do you keep an interest among normal people that keeps up with that intense, almost, well, obsession that the gun people have?" Unsurprisingly, Matthews jumped to tarring pro-gun-rights Americans as racist. The new NRA commercial features clips of Michael Bloomberg and Barack Obama. The MSNBC host judged, "Ron, do you think there might be a soupcon of ethnic gaming in this, the pictures they put in there? Obama and Bloomberg?"

The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) announced Wednesday it would not provide additional funds to help the town of West, Texas rebuild after a fertilizer plant explosion killed 15 and injured 160. MSNBC’s Alex Wagner seemed positively gleeful over the news.

The daytime host treated the development as a political defeat for Texas Governor Rick Perry (R), implying on Thursday’s Now that the tragedy – and FEMA’s denial of funding – were “the seeds” the governor sowed for his opposition to excessive federal spending and regulation. Wagner introduced Perry’s plea for federal funds by pairing it with a sound bite of the conservative governor’s opposition to excessive spending:

John Dickerson downplayed most of the recent scandals surrounding the Obama administration on Thursday's CBS This Morning, asserting that the White House was "trying to get something done on immigration....they're trying to stay focused on the things that really matter to this presidency, and only trying to spend a small amount of time putting out these little fires."

This came mere moments after Dickerson acknowledged the potential for the scandals to affect the President's legacy: "At the worst end...you get a feeling it's a scandal a week related to the administration, and if that idea sets in – that there's a kind of, rot....that affects the President's legacy." [audio available here; video below the jump]