OpinionJournal.com's James Taranto on Wednesday proposed that New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg is the preferred presidential “candidate of the media, ideologically as well as professionally,” a supposition demonstrated by media excitement over his separation from the Republican Party in preparation for a possible independent bid. “The presidential race just got a whole lot more interesting,” gushed Today co-host Meredith Vieira in plugging Wednesday's top story while, on CBS, Early Show co-host Harry Smith excitedly relayed how “we want to get right to our top story, and that's a bombshell from New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg.” On ABC's Good Morning America, Diane Sawyer enthused about how “the hugely popular Mayor of New York City ditches the Republican label and declares independence, asking if other Americans are ready for a change.” Robin Roberts insisted that “many are asking now whether he is destined to be a contender.”

All day Wednesday the cable networks were full of speculation over Bloomberg and in the evening all three broadcast network newscasts ran full stories on his possible candidacy. An on-screen graphic on ABC's World News asked “Will He Run?” and the NBC Nightly News looked at the possibility of three candidates from New York. But the CBS Evening News was the most promotional. Katie Couric highlighted how a poll “found more than one out of three Democratic primary voters and more than half of Republicans want more choices. So how about an independent? Today a certain Mayor of New York was the talk of the town and a lot of the country.” More likely, the talk of America's newsrooms. Noting how Bloomberg is “sparking imaginations,” Jim Axelrod recited some of Bloomberg's liberal positions: “So no one really knows what this 65-year-old billionaire who favors gun control, gay marriage, and abortion rights is up to, aside from sparking the imaginations of those uninspired by the current field.”

Could it possibly be that the mainstream school of thought surrounding climate change has it all wrong? While the media continues its love-fest with the alarmist non-scientists like Al Gore, climatologists and other atmospheric scientists continue research that may turn the conventional wisdom on its head. The author offers a great opening abstract of his research:

The mud at the bottom of B.C. fjords reveals that solar output drives climate change - and that we should prepare now for dangerous global cooling

Earlier this year, I examined the connections between solar variability and climate change in great detail (On Solar Variability and Global Warming). Further research into the sunspot activity and terrestrial climate change is revealing some astounding correlations, as published recently by the Financial Times: Read the Sunspots. Written by R. Timothy Patterson, the chief researcher of the project, the article starts out by summarizing the well-known and universally-accepted variability of the Earth's climate nicely:

Chris Matthews couldn’t contain his giddiness, first noted here, when he praised Michael Moore’s Sicko movie on tonight’s Hardball. After he sent his correspondent, MSNBC’s David Shuster, to chase down Moore on Capitol Hill and get an exclusive rant from Moore against the "rackets" that are American health care companies Matthews yelped: "You know I gotta agree with him on this stuff. I gotta agree with him. He's got a case and health care in this country is not working."

The following is the full segment including Shuster’s interview with Moore as it occurred on the June 20th edition of Hardball.

Environmentalism is hip, green celebrities are “very sexy” and saving the planet is “simple,” according to the media.

It is certainly not “extreme” as far as journalists are concerned. The deluge of celebrity books, films and even rock concerts is making green look good – because journalists leave out the cost to individuals, businesses and the economy.

“Going green” is all the rage – from Live Earth to “green” weddings and interior decorating. The problem is, media reports imply that people won’t have to make enormous sacrifices to do what is right for the environment. That downplays the reality of environmentalism, which is anti-business and anti-economic growth; even, at times, anti-human rights.

But the truth is, like the recent Dilbert comic pointed out, environmentalism is extreme, inconvenient, and costly. In one recent case, environmentalists have even limited people’s right to travel in their own country.

As we all know, Andrea Mitchell having told us so, Chris Matthews is no liberal. However the Hardball host did emphatically state on this afternoon's show that, at least when it comes to health care, he agrees with Michael Moore.

Matthews had just aired an impromptu interview that MSNBC's David Shuster had snared with Moore when the filmmaker appeared on Capitol Hill today on the occasion of this week's release of his latest work, "Sicko," regarding health care in the United States. In both Shuster's depiction of Moore's views, and in Moore's own statements in the course of the interview, Moore made clear that he wants to eliminate private-sector participation in health care insurance.

As Shuster put it: "in this movie, Moore calls for the end, the end, of for-profit healthcare."

In the aired interview, Moore described private-sector insurers as a "racket" and said "I want private insurance companies out of the equation."

So how did Matthews react to Moore's call for the killing of private-sector health care?

HARDBALL HOST CHRIS MATTHEWS: You know, I gotta agree with him on this stuff. I gotta agree with him. He's got a case. Healthcare in this country is not working.

As Newsbusters previously documented, NBC is giving 75 hours of air time to Al Gore and his global warming alarmism with his "Live Earth" concert. On June 20 MSNBC, NBC’s cable channel, ran featured Janet Larson from the Earth Policy Institute, a global warming alarmist, to paint a scary picture for the future.

Host Contessa Brewer started with her editorial comment "it was downright scary," and as Larson continued her frightening predictions, Brewer asked softball questions like "are [government officials] likely to listen to this study?" and "is there anything we can do to help change this?" Brewer never mentioned the cost of combating a scenario that may not materialize. The entire transcript is below.

An article by Ryan Lenz of the Associated Press reported on the shooting of two sheriff’s deputies in Georgetown, Indiana by a teenager, who subsequently killed himself. The article, entitled "Officials: Teen used WWII-era rifle," identified the weapon used in the shooting as a "sniper rifle" in its lead sentence. Two paragraphs later, the weapon was specifically-identified as M-1 Garand. [pictured at right, photo via MemorablePlaces.com]

Anyone who has seen "Saving Private Ryan" or the HBO miniseries "Band of Brothers" has seen the M-1 Garand, the standard service weapon in World War II for the American military. It was the first semi-automatic rifle to be issued in mass quantities to infantry forces. It was used with great effect during the war, and General George Patton called it "the greatest implement of battle ever devised." Since it was a standard weapon, it was generally not used in the sniper role for most of the war. Two versions of the rifle for snipers, the M-1C and M-1D were issued in small quantities in the last year of the war, which had the telescopic sight needed for snipers.

"An Eco-System Runs Through It" trumpets the June 19 front page headline in the San Antonio Express-News. The Anastasia Ustinova story manages to combine two liberal positions together in the guise of protecting the environment, as the sub-head tells readers that "Fencing threatens critters - and eco system."

The story goes on to note that the fence "would cut large swaths through sensitive habitat and harm rare or threatened species." The story reads like liberal environmental literature and even has time to push a non-green liberal cause: preventing border fencing.

Yet once again the left gets confused about the difference of opinion and actual balanced news.

New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg announcing he’s leaving the Republican Party is a little like Madonna announcing she’s leaving the Catholic Church. Was he ever really a paragon of the GOP? Speculation abounds that he’s running for president on the Ross Perot egotistical-billionaire plan, with press reports citing his intention to spend a cool $1 billion of his personal fortune. That will surely create a headwind, but a big part of the wind beneath his wings will be the support he hopes to generate from the national media.

And it’s happening already. Bloomberg’s third-party spoiler ambitions were heavily promoted by two news magazines – a big promotional cover story in Time with fellow RINO Arnold Schwarzenegger titled "The New Action Heroes," and a two-page editorial by U.S. News & World Report owner Mort Zuckerman titled "What to Like About Mike."

This is not to say these magazines believe what America really needs is a successful media magnate in the White House. If they did, they would have done the same publicity favors for Steve Forbes.

Apocalyptic rants about what global warming will do to civilization have become so frequent it's hard to keep up, but CBS “Evening News” had a monumental one on June 19.

Mark Phillips reported an international study that said climate change could threaten the $662 billion international tourism industry – because rising sea levels and humidity will supposedly destroy monuments and sites like the Tower of London, the Eiffel Tower, the Parthenon and so on.

“[G]lobal warming may hasten the destruction of some of the world’s most treasured buildings and heritage sites,” warned Phillips.

Of course, Phillip neglected to tell viewers that some of the sites have already survived at least two changes in climate and a couple world wars.

Since joining the New York Times' Baghdad bureau (after having covering Iraq for the L.A. Times), reporter Alissa Rubin has consistently provided coverage even more pessimistic than even the early "civil war" declarer, reporter Edward Wong. In April, Rubin lamented how "Iraqis feel about the violence and disruption of daily life that have brought so much misery to the country since the American invasion in 2003."

Today's New York Times lead story by Rubin, on the deadly explosion that destroyed part of the Khalani Mosque in Baghdad, included two occasions where Rubin let Iraqis suggest the U.S. was helping the terrorists.

Dilbert, everyone's favorite office life cartoon, has started a series of strips making fun of environmental alarmism.  (H/t: Small Dead Animals)

Here are the most recent cartoons. Follow the series as it happens at Dilbert.com.

The University of Iowa Press will give voice to the poetic ramblings of 17 terrorist detainees in Guantanamo, entitled "Poems from Guantanamo: The Detainees Speak." The Wall Street Journal reports:

The collection, translated from Arabic, was compiled by Marc Falkoff, a defense lawyer with a literary bent. Mr. Falkoff, who got a Ph.D. in English before he went to law school, represents 17 Yemeni prisoners at Guantanamo Bay, and he dedicated the book to his clients, describing them in the inscription as "my friends inside the wire."