Checking in Wednesday night from Tehran with Iranian reaction to what anchor Brian Williams described as the new intelligence assessment that “Iran is not developing nuclear weapons after all,” NBC correspondent Ali Arouzi held up a newspaper to show how it portrayed President Bush “as Pinocchio.” Arouzi described crowds cheering President Ahmadinejad's railing against lies spread by the U.S. and how the state media are calling President Bush “a liar and a warmonger.” On the upside for Iranians, Arouzi found the “many” who “have long been worried that the United States will attack Iran over its nuclear ambitions” now have “a sense of relief that that won't happen.”

Thomas Fingar, the Deputy Director of Analysis for the National Intelligence Estimate (NIE), is the media rock star of the moment.

Why? For the just released NIE assessment he co-authored that proffers with "high confidence" that Iranian nuclear weapon development came to a halt in 2003.

This lands him myriad press plaudits because it affords them yet another opportunity to bash President George W. Bush.

However, those with any sort of political memory recall a July 11, 2007 Congressional appearance by the very same Thomas Fingar. Just these scant four months ago, he gave the House Armed Services Committee a very different "high confidence" perspective on Iran and their efforts to develop the bomb.

Following the recent GOP debate in which CNN chose to air a YouTube question putting candidates on the spot as to their belief in the literal truth of the Bible, there was much breast-beating as to the inappropriateness of religious tests for office.

But that didn't stop Tucker Carlson's two liberal guests this evening from taking potshots on religious grounds at President Bush and Mitt Romney.

View video here.

Liberal talk radio shot host Ed Schultz was first, mocking President Bush's faith:

Tune in tonight for out interview with world-renowned
forensic pathologist Dr. Cyril Wecht.
His expertise has also been utilized in high profile cases involving
Mary Jo Kopechne, Sunny von Bulow, Jean Harris, Dr. Jeffrey McDonald, the Waco
Branch Davidian fire, and Vincent Foster.
Feel free to call in and talk to him on air. Check it out at 8 pm EST Wed. Dec. 5th at
thirdrailradio.com.

Between her tirades against White House press secretary Dana Perino, Helen Thomas granted an interview to the Huffington Post about how she has never made a major mistake. "I don't have any mistakes to tell you about," she said. The Huffington Post’s Seema Kalia replied: "You don't have any recollection of any time you didn't do something well?" Thomas said: "No, not that I know of. I don't say I'm perfect, and I do say I've made mistakes, but nothing that's colossal." This is not the standard she’s used to judge President Bush, writing at least two columns that lamented his answers to list-your-mistakes questions from the White House press corps.

Being a billionaire certainly has its advantages. You can throw your money around and get what you want, and in the case of leftwing billionaire George Soros, what he wanted was a proposed gold mine killed that would have brought economic prosperity to an impoverished village in Romania. Soros, who has investments in rival gold mining companies, organized opposition to the project via his Open Society Institute in Romania, working hand-in-hand with several non-Romanian NGOs against the project.

If Soros was a rightwing billionaire, his efforts and intervention in this matter would no doubt be scrutinized by the American media and held up as an egregious example of capitalism run amok and of undue Western interference in the affairs of another country.

But Soros is a primary funder of the American Left, and as such his activities get little scrutiny from a politically sympathetic American media. That's a shame. Because the shutdown of Gabriel Resources' mining project in Rosia Montana, Romania, means an immediate loss of hundreds of jobs and a long-term loss of perhaps thousands of jobs created at the mine and spillover economic growth in the impoverished region.

How often in the past couple of years have you heard a climate alarmist refer to a so-called scientific consensus concerning man's role in global warming?

Almost any time you see a report on the subject, correct?

Have you ever considered how this belief that a consensus exists came to be, and if it actually means anything?

Answering such questions is the Wall Street Journal's Holman W. Jenkins Jr, whose op-ed Wednesday should be must reading for citizens, media representatives, and especially politicians that actually believe an overwhelming majority of scientists around the world are drinking Al Gore's Kool-Aid (h/t NBer dscott, emphasis added throughout):

Here's something you don't see every day: the daughter of the President calling her dad while doing an interview on national television.

Yet, that's what happened on "Ellen" Wednesday (taped Tuesday) when host Ellen Degeneres didn't believe guest Jenna Bush could just pick up the phone and call her dad any time she wanted.

Marvelously, Jenna ended up being right.

What follows is the partial transcript of this absolutely charming phone call (video available here):

Joy Behar’s case of Bush Derangement Syndrome is so severe that she mocks them for what she herself it guilty of. It is no secret she hates the Bush administration to the point of calling them liars and murderers, comparing their former defense secretary to Hitler, applying a different standard to Bush than to Hillary Clinton, and even to the point of airing false charges on the administration. The December 5 edition of "The View" added some hypocrisy in her latest charge.

The Financial Times (FT) is reporting that an Iran-bound ship seized by the United Arab Emirates last month "contained materials banned by UN Security Council resolutions 1737 and 1747, while the purchaser of the materials has been barred by the same resolutions."

Those resolutions were put in place, FT writers Simeon Kerr and Najmeh Bozorgmehr noted in their December 5 article, "to curtail its [Iran's] nuclear development programme."

Although Kerr and Bozorgmehr's Emirati government source "declined to identify the contents of the cargo or the Iranian company" that ordered them, the development is newsworthy, particularly in light of the shift in the National Intelligence Estimate (NIE), that now concludes that Iran stopped its nuclear program in 2003.

A search of the December 5 Washington Post found no articles similar to Kerr and Bozorgmehr's, although it's unclear if the FT reporters have an exclusive scoop.

On December 4, the Post ran two above-the-fold front page stories about the 2007 NIE, including a news analysis piece by Peter Baker and Robin Wright entitled "A Blow to Bush's Tehran Policy."

On Wednesday's "Good Morning America," reporter Brian Ross's story on Mike Huckabee featured a misleading onscreen graphic that claimed the then-Arkansas governor pardoned a rapist who went on to murder two women in Missouri. In fact, Huckabee didn't pardon Wayne Dumond, the man in question. The ABC graphic read, "Huckabee's Pardon: Rapist Struck Again After Release." The inaccurate information appeared beneath the December 5 segment for two minutes and 50 seconds of a three minute plus segment. (Hat tip to NewsBusters reader TE.)

On "Fox and Friends," which got the story right, co-host Steve Doocy explained that the governor lobbied the Arkansas parole board to release Dumond. They did so. He then played a clip of Huckabee on FNC in November in which the governor pointed out, "I did originally support parole, but governors don't parole anybody." "The Early Show" on CBS also refrained from using the term "pardon." NBC's "Today" ignored the story completely.

According to Barbara Walters’ set of rules, Venezuela's socialist anti-American dictator Hugo Chavez does "positive things." Promoting her annual special "The Ten Most Fascinating People" on the December 5 edition of "The View," Walters discussed one of her top ten, Hugo Chavez. Walters, who recently gave a puffy interview to the anti-American zealot, noted his recent setback exclaiming she "was amazed that he...didn’t get to be president for life" and "he’s a charismatic character."

Joy Behar inquired if he’s "still fascinating even though he didn’t win the election." Walters quickly answered "yeah."

When Walters allowed the co-hosts to guess who her secret number one is, Sherri Shepherd guessed Britney Spears. Walters refuted it claiming "we try to have people that do positive things."

The transcript is below.

Following two days of positive coverage of Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee and his front-runner status in Iowa, on Wednesday the CBS "Early Show" decided it was time to tear down the former governor’s campaign: "He's being dogged by new reports that he had a much bigger role in the parole of convicted rapist Wayne Dumond while he was Governor of Arkansas than he had previously been claiming."

Compare that statement by co-host Harry Smith, with Smith’s previous assessment of Huckabee when previewing an interview with the candidate two days ago:

When he announced he was running for the Republican nomination, many people said Mike who? Hucka what? But Evangelical Christians, a powerful force here, have rallied to his support. Pro-life, traditional marriage, they have found their champion. But they have found something more, a candidate who is good on his feet...His thoughtful debate performances have set him apart.

Baltimore Sun reporter Arin Gencer gave readers of the December 5 paper a slanted treatment of a move by a Taneytown, Md., city councilman who wants to clarify that his city is not a so-called "sanctuary city" where illegal immigrants can count on local officials actively failing to report immigration violations to the proper federal authorities.

Gencer pitted resolution proponent Paul Chamberlain Jr. against Taneytown's Mayor Jim McCarron, who dismissed the resolution as "mean-spirited" and "a slap in the face to anybody that has ancestors who were immigrants, or is currently an immigrant."

The Sun reporter failed to allow Chamberlain to rebut that allegation, although he quickly moved on to a pundit who dismissed resolutions like Chamberlain's as political posturing, and later to an official from the National Council of La Raza (NCLR), which Gencer simply tagged a "Latino civil rights and advocacy organization."

Of course La Raza has taken stands that many argue help further illegal immigration, such as opposing tougher federal standards for driver's licenses:

ABC investigative reporter Brian Ross on Wednesday continued his habit of offering up critical takes on Republican front-runners and ignoring Democratic scandals. So far this year, the correspondent has featured four hard-hitting segments on GOP candidates and only one on a Democrat.

During a piece on "Good Morning America," Ross investigated a developing story of whether then-Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee used his influence to secure the release of a convicted rapist who went on murder two women. The story has received major play on the left-wing blog site Huffington Post, a point Ross mentioned, but he left out any attribution of the web page's very liberal leanings.

Former "CBS Evening News" anchor Walter Cronkite, much like his former colleague Bob Schieffer, appears to be dead set against the war in Iraq regardless of how conditions have improved in the past several months.

In an op-ed published at the liberal website Common Dreams, Cronkite made his strongest surrender appeal to date, whilst of course castigating the Bush administration.

Readers are advised to proceed with caution, and keep a trash receptacle handy in case of unexpected reverse peristalsis (emphasis added, h/t Dan Gainor):

Four reports today threw more cold water on Old Media's "The Recession Is Coming, The Recession Is Coming" chorus.

First, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) issued its revised Productivity and Costs Report for the third quarter, saying:

The Bureau of Labor Statistics of the U.S. Department of Labor today reported revised productivity data--as measured by output per hour of all persons--for the third quarter of 2007. The seasonally adjusted annual rates of productivity growth in the third quarter were:

6.7 percent in the business sector and
6.3 percent in the nonfarm business sector.

In both sectors, changes in productivity are higher than the preliminary estimates published November 7, and represent the largest productivity gains since the third quarter of 2003.

Updated with kiss photo (14:48 Eastern)

I highly doubt that readers of the Washington Post enjoying the morning paper over a steaming cup of coffee deserve to flip to the Style section only to be greeted by a huge photo of Dennis and Elizabeth Kucinich making out.

Of course the front page photo -- unfortunately, or fortunately depending on your perspective, I couldn't find it online -- wasn't the only sloppy wet one the Post planted on Kucinich in the page C1 article, "The Love Song of Dennis J. Kucinich." Staff writer Libby Copeland gave readers of the December 5 Post an article sopping wet with the magical fairy tale of the Kuciniches' unlikely romance, sprinkled with the Ohio congressman's political ramblings.

While Copeland did paint Kucinich as dopey and eccentric, in the process she puffed up Kucinich's far-left politics, as seen by the adoring eyes of equally left-wing better half Elizabeth, the statuesque redhead that joined Rep. Kucinich at the altar two years ago.

What's more, staff writer Libby Copeland spilled some ink to given ear to relay Kucinich's rant about "corporate media," and how he believes it's conspiratorially biased against him:

Back in September, when General David Petraeus reported that the surge in U.S. troops had improved the security situation in Iraq, the big three broadcast networks were openly skeptical.

"Insurgent attacks are down from 170 in January to 120 in August," ABC's Terry McCarthy noted on the September 9 World News Sunday, the day before Petraeus testified before Congress. "But that is still four attacks a day, on average. Iraq remains a very violent place....Life in central Iraq is still deadly dangerous."