Justin McCarthy's blog

Is ABC "View" co-host Joy Behar so far out of the political mainstream that she has a skewed sense of what entails a "liberal" and a "conservative?" The same woman who called Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama "very moderate" on the February 7 show, John McCain has "been very conservative in all his policies." Apparently anyone who does not march lockstep with NARAL is an arch-conservative, as Behar explained that McCain is "so conservative because he’s against choice."

Very conservative in all of his policies? John McCain’s 2006 rating with the American Conservative Union was 65. While he certainly votes for the conservative position more often than not, he has far from a solid conservative record. The Club for Growth assailed McCain’s vote against the 2001 tax cuts and his class warfare reasoning for opposing it.

Does Chelsea Clinton have the ears of three of "The View" co-hosts? According to Joy Behar’s, Whoopi Goldberg’s, and Sherri Shepherd’s accounts, Bill and Hillary Clinton’s daughter canvassed them for her mother’s vote. Unfortunately for Clinton campaign, it was too late as all three of them voted before the call. However, Whoopi Goldberg did say that she voted for Hillary Clinton and Joy Behar told Chelsea she has been a "big champion" for Hillary Clinton. The exchange from February 6 follows.

None of the Republican presidential candidates have a health care plan, according to “The View’s” Joy Behar, known for putting ideology over facts. On the February 5 edition, where Super Tuesday was the dominant subject, Elisabeth Hasselbeck told her struggles voting as a Republican in New York City. First, Joy Behar charged that Republicans “never mention health care.” After Hasselbeck noted the media just does not promote their plan, Behar responded in a mocking tone.

BEHAR: Your party never mentions health care. The Republicans never bring up the subject. I’ve been watching them. I watched every single debate.

SHEPHERD: Because they’re more on the spending on the war.

BEHAR: Why not even bring it up as a possible solution? Come up with- Republicans have their own ideas. What is their idea on health care? Nothing! Zero!

"View" co-host Joy Behar offered her political expertise to explain the conservative opposition to John McCain: Conservatives support "torture" (a liberal propaganda term for CIA interrogation methods of actual terrorists). On the February 4 edition of "The View," Behar, who considers the term "fringe liberal" "name calling," explains why "very extreme right wing conservatives" oppose McCain.

BEHAR: Ann Coulter, she says, Coulter, who makes a living by being provocative, picked a predictably offensive reason to oppose McCain. Quote, from Ann, "he has led the fight against torture at Guantanamo." That’s why she doesn’t like him because he is against torture. I think that’s fascinating.

GOLDBERG: I think if she meets him, he would torture her.

BEHAR: Well, she tortures us plenty.

To recap the previous night’s Democratic debate, "Today" featured two liberal commentators to analyze it. It might be fair had "Today" interviewed two conservatives the previous day to analyze the Republican debate. They did not. Instead, they went to former Carter speechwriter and Obama supporter Chris Matthews.

The February 1 edition of the NBC morning show turned to known liberals Paul Begala and Rachel Maddow. Host Matt Lauer did identify Begala as a Democratic strategist and called Maddow’s radio network, Air America, "liberal." However, "Today’s" bias is obvious giving air time to two liberals and none to conservatives.Perhaps, in the elite media world, former Democratic staffer Matthews is "conservative" because of recent left wing blog attacks for his anti-Hillary comments.

Does left wing "View" co-host Joy Behar owe her success to the king of talk radio, Rush Limbaugh? At the very least, he gave her "the best advice" she has ever recieved. On the January 31 episode of the women’s chat show, Behar discussed a very friendly encounter she had with Limbaugh and recounted his wisdom when he urged her to "be bold."

"I used to work on the same radio station with him. I always credit him with giving me the best advice. He said to me ‘Joy’- after I got fired- he said ‘whatever you do Joy, be bold.’ He gave me the best advice I ever got."

Video (1:17): Windows (4.64 MB), plus MP3 audio (579 kB).

Behar first began by describing her encounter with Limbaugh where he allegedly "squeezed" her "to death," "snuggles and nuzzles" her neck. Her fellow panelists seemed surprised about the cordial meeting and kind words about one of America’s greatest conservative icons.

The transcript is below.

People who oppose Hillary Clinton's presidential aspirations do so primarily out of sexism. That's at least how "The View" co-host Joy Behar sees it.

Discussing NOW’s attack on Senator Kennedy for supporting Obama over Clinton on today's show, Behar implied anti-Clinton forces are after her because she’s a woman.

"They’re piling up on Hillary from every, every corner, including Maureen Dowd, women are against her in many, many ways. And you have to say to yourself why is she at the mercy of so much more scrutiny than others? And the hatred that’s coming towards her. Think about it ladies. That’s all I’m saying."

In Joy Behar’s fantasy world, an automatic tax increase for nearly all income taxpayers are simply "taking back tax cuts to the rich." And if one calls it a tax increase, one is engaging in "double speak." On the January 29 edition of "The View," the co-hosts chatted about President Bush’s last State of the Union and co-host Joy Behar added this comment on the president’s tax hike veto pledge.

Video (45 secs): Windows (2.64 MB), plus MP3 audio (325 kB).

"There was one point where he says, you know, ‘no- we will not-’ basically he’s saying we’re not going to take back our tax cuts to the rich. Which he interprets as ‘tax increases.’ Just because you’re taking it back, he says it’s an increase. See that double speak I don’t care for."

Joy Behar, a noted Bush hater, took the moral high ground to denounce hatred against Ted Kennedy and Hillary Clinton. On the January 28 edition of "The View," Ted Kennedy’s endorsement of Barack Obama was the discussion topic. Behar then scolded those who exhibit hatred towards the Massachusetts Senator as well as Senator Clinton claiming Kennedy "is hated by a lot of Republicans just like Hillary Clinton is hated. The hatred that goes through on both sides is horrible."

Video (37 seconds): Windows (2.19 MB), plus MP3 audio (266 kB).

Before Behar casts stones, she may want to consider some of the hateful comments she has made on "The View." Maybe she will exhibit another double standard as she previously denounced a personal attack on Senator Clinton but defended her own personal attacks on President Bush because she "doesn’t like him."

A woman has the hots for former President Bill Clinton, "The View’s" Joy Behar. Discussing the former president’s recent confrontation with a CNN reporter, Behar announced she still has "the hots for the guy" and "women respond" to a man notorious for sexual indiscretions.

Video (1:12): Windows (2.25 MB) or MP3 audio (538 kB)

Sherri Shepherd and right of center co-host Elisabeth Hasselbeck added Bill Clinton is "very charming" and "extremely charismatic." Whoopi Goldberg told the story of her mother’s star struck meeting adding Clinton has "got it" "that just grabs somebody."

A long time NBC anchor spent his weekends as a hippy. Appearing on the January 23 edition of "The View" to promote his book "Boom," former "NBC Nightly News" anchor Tom Brokaw described himself as "kind of a weekend hippy" when he lived in California in the 1960's. Brokaw recalled "wearing bell bottom trousers and sandals" and attending the Renaissance Faire. Of course on Mondays he would put on a coat and tie and "be a network correspondent."

Elisabeth Hasselbeck asked the "did you inhale" question to which Brokaw responded "as Senator Obama has said, isn’t that the point?"The veteran journalist then recounted the strong marijuana culture in 1960's California and that he himself "experimented with it."

The entire transcript is below.

Whoopi Goldberg has proven to be no Rosie O’Donnell. While Rosie’s successor on "The View" does lean to the left, she has taken some conservative positions like attacking the death tax. The January 22 edition was another example.

Discussing a recent CNN story on black women torn between Obama and Clinton, Whoopi felt "pissed off" that the media would simplify individuals to voting their gender or race. Elisabeth Hasselbeck agreed questioning if this story "undermines the intelligence of the individual" adding "it’s pretty ridiculous." Sherri Shepherd joined the consensus opining "a lot of black women are very angry" adding she wants "the best person who’s going to lead the country."

Predictably, Joy Behar dissented adding "all things being equal" she would vote for the woman over the man. Hasselbeck continued that she just sees "the individual."

Ten years after the Lewinsky scandal broke, Barbara Walters is still acting as a spokeswoman for Bill Clinton’s former mistress. On the January 21 episode, Walters scolded fellow "View" panelist Joy Behar for incorporating Monica Lewinsky jokes into her comic routine, opining "I don’t think one should joke about it."

The veteran journalist, who landed the first interview with Lewinsky, hyped her recent master’s degree and claimed she is having difficulties finding a job. Elisabeth Hasselbeck felt "that’s what happens when you make decisions like that, that affect your future." Whoopi Goldberg ended the segment adding that women should support Lewinsky because she’s a woman. After the commercial break, Hasselbeck replied that she thinks " about supporting the person, you know, and taking gender out of it."

Class warfare seeped into the January 18 edition of "Today." Upon interviewing Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson on the Bush administration’s proposed economic stimulus package and rebates, Matt Lauer pitched the liberal "tax cuts for the rich" line inquiring "you're not going to give rebates to the rich here, correct?"Secretary Paulson declined to answer the question saying he does not "want to get ahead of the president."

Just as he did yesterday, Matt Lauer asked again if the media’s gloomy economic news is a "self fulfilling prophecy."

"Do you ever worry that the media, we get the ‘r’ word on our lips, recession and we chant it and that eventually it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy, the consumers of TV and the media hear it and they are also consumers of the economy and they spend themselves into a recession or don't spend themselves?"

"The New York Times" uses fuzzy math to smear volunteer soldiers and "Fox and Friends" picked it up. MRC’s Clay Waters reported on the "Sunday Times" January 13 story, "Across America, Deadly Echoes of Foreign Battles," essentially smearing soldiers linking some committed murders to the Iraq and Afghanistan conflict.

However, the numbers show that Iraq and Afghanistan veterans are far less likely to commit murder. On the January 16 edition of "Fox and Friends," co-host Steve Doocy noted that veterans are "five times less likely to commit murder." Gretchen Carlson noted the danger of putting out these dubious stories adding "You don't have time to actually get to the bottom of all of these articles. People just assume that what they read, wrong or right, is truth."

After Joy Behar’s inflammatory comments, claiming saints would be no more than mental patients in modern society, Fox News was the one of the very few major news outlets that picked it up. Other than Joe Scarborough on MSNBC, Fox News was the only news outlet that covered the Joy Behar craziness. In cyberspace, Fox News was the only major news website to report it.

Could it be that her comments were simply not newsworthy enough? Under the mainstream media’s standards with Rush Limbaugh and Bill O’Reilly, they should be. On the January 11 edition of "Fox and Friends First" Steve Doocy noted Fox News’ sole voice.

"Extraordinarily, I was googling this last night. Fox News is pretty much the only outfit that is even talking about this. It’s so extraordinary."

Roughly 24 hours after essentially calling the saints mentally ill, "View" co-host Joy Behar claimed moral authority on inflammatory statements. Discussing Chris Matthews dismissing Hillary Clinton’s successes due to her husbands infidelities, Behar opined that Matthews’ comments were "inappropriate."

Behar previously admitted to having a "do as I say, not as I do" approach. When she railed against McCain for a supporter calling Hillary Clinton a "bitch," Sherri Shepherd called Joy out on the many personal attacks on President Bush asking "what’s the difference?" Joy Behar snidely responded "the difference is I don’t like [Bush]"

According to "View" co-host Joy Behar, those sainted by the Catholic Church are no more than mentally ill individuals who heard voices. On the January 9 edition of "The View" Behar, who considers prayer a "distraction," suggested that there are no longer any saints due to modern medicine.

"I have a theory that you can’t find any saints any more because of psycho-tropic medication. I think that the old days the saints were hearing voices and they didn’t have any thorazine to calm them down. [laughter] Now that we have all of this medication available to us, you can’t find a saint any more."

Are Hillary Clinton’s recent troubles the result of unfair press coverage? According to "The View’s" Joy Behar they are. On the January 8 edition of the ladies chat show, the co-hosts discussed Senator Clinton’s recent emotional breakdown when Behar exclaimed, "I feel like crying for her now. I feel so bad about how the press has been vilifying her."

As is expected for a woman who frequently gets her facts wrong, the facts simply do not back her up. Even the allegedly "conservative" Fox News gave the New York Senator a softball interview. Since the fall, several negative stories about Senator Clinton broke that the network news simply did not pick up. Some of the most prominent examples include news that former President Bill Clinton left his wife in charge of Clinton Library documents that have not been released, and raising an extremely high amount of money from poor Chinese immigrants.

Is Fox News really the hard right news outlet that left wing bloggers and presidential candidates to even a former president accuse? When contrasting interviews between Democrat Hillary Clinton and Republican Mike Huckabee, that charge appears almost laughable.

After asking Senator Clinton all softball questions such as how she keeps herself "going everyday," to what nick name she would like if she wins Iowa, "Fox and Friends" asked Governor Huckabee fair but much tougher questions.

NBC’s Ann Curry interviewed Mitt Romney on Friday morning's Today on the impact of Benazir Bhutto's assassination, and in a tough interview, she dismissed Ronald Reagan’s foreign policy credentials. When Curry questioned Romney’s foreign policy experience, Romney noted that Reagan "was a governor, not a so-called foreign policy expert." Curry dismissively stated "Reagan was not elected at a time of war."

No, Reagan was just elected in an intense point in the Cold War. The Soviets had invaded Afghanistan and U.S. diplomats were still being held hostage in Iran. Romney did say that Reagan was "elected at a time of the Cold War. And the Cold War was the greatest challenge that was faced by this nation in the last half of the last century."

On the news of Republican presidential hopeful Rudy Giuliani’s hospitalization and release, ABC’s Jake Tapper spun it as a case of secrecy. On the December 21 edition of "Good Morning America," Tapper reported that after Giuliani and his wife claimed to be in "good health," his lack of details may harm him. "Experts on political crises say Giuliani is handling this the exact wrong way," Tapper suggested.

Tapper also stated, according to former Clinton aide Lanny Davis, 2000 long shot Democratic hopeful Bill Bradley’s lack of health disclosure was the "turning point"of his campaign.

Tapper finally played a sound bite of Giuliani promising a more open government. The ABC correspondent sniped back "apparently that pledge of transparency not applying to his current health crisis."

The entire transcript is below.

Does "Good Morning America" mean "good morning all you racists"? Co-host Chris Cuomo seemed to suggest that on December 20. (Hat tip: Howard Mortman) Upon interviewing presidential candidate Barack Obama Cuomo inquired about Obama’s biggest obstacles.

"What do you think the bigger obstacle is for you in becoming president, the Clinton campaign machine or America's inherent racists, racism?"

Obama, though conceding he does not think "race has played a significant role in this campaign," went on to add that many people may vote for or against him because of his race.

Video (:56): Windows Media (1.76 MB) and MP3 audio (.4 MB).

"The View"co-hosts discussed the Mike Huckabee Christmas ad when Joy Behar moved to quote Ron Paul, ideologically libertarian, whom Behar calls "a very staunch Republican," who quoted Sinclair Lewis: "When Fascism comes to the country, it will be wrapped in the flag, carrying a cross."When they played the advertisement, Behar moaned "we don’t have to listen to him do we?"

Whoopi Goldberg, who previously defended Georgia Governor Perdue for holding a prayer service, defended Huckabee’s ad claiming "if he wasn’t a Christian, I don’t think people would be as freaked out by it." Whoopi also defended those who wish to proclaim Merry Christmas.

KEYS: Do you think it matters? Well, well, do you think it matters?

Is this the evil conservative Fox News that those on the left portray? From the December 17 "Fox and Friends" interview with Senator Hillary Clinton, one has to wonder where it came from. After a surprisingly tough interview with David Gregory on NBC’s "Today," Senator Clinton sailed through a softball interview with the allegedly right wing Fox News.

After Hillary’s husband accused "Fox News Sunday" host Chris Wallace of engaging in a "right wing hit job," and the left wing blog campaign to boycott the Fox News debates, co-host Gretchen Carlson asked such hard hitting questions like "how do you keep yourself going everyday?"

Co-host Steve Doocy asked the tough question of what her name would be if she pulls off a victory in Iowa.

According to ABC’s Kate Snow, support for the Iraq War automatically makes one a conservative, even if that individual is liberal on most other issues. In reporting on the increasingly tight race between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, Snow briefly mentioned at the end that Joseph Lieberman endorsed John McCain. She dismissively referred to Lieberman as a "conservative Democrat."

"And he won over long-time Democrat, all be it a conservative one, Senator Joe Lieberman, who ran with Al Gore, will endorse McCain later today."

ABC’s Chris Cuomo, who previously tried to push John McCain to give a preference between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, asked Mike Huckabee, after citing Hillary Clinton, "can a woman be president?" Cuomo inquired this after mentioning that Huckabee signed an ad stating "a wife is to submit graciously to...her husband."

Huckabee appeared on the December 13 edition of "Good Morning America" to address his recent questioning of Mormon doctrine that "Jesus and the devil are brothers." Cuomo also asked Huckabee why he is "unwilling to say" that Mormons are Christians. Huckabee responded "it's not my place to start evaluating his faith, your faith, somebody else's."

It is also notable that GMA co-host Diane Sawyer previously attacked Huckabee for playing the "religion card."

The entire transcript is below.

After speaking against the death tax last week, "View" co-host Whoopi Goldberg said "people are very annoyed" with her and reliably left Joy Behar attacked with her pro-tax liberal spin. The December 12 edition of "The View" featured country star and politically conservative guest co-host Sara Evans, who also spoke out against the death tax.

Similar to her previous statement on the issue, Goldberg said "I just feel like...I’ve worked very hard...this is something I want to give to my kid and she should be able to accept it." After Whoopi called it a "double tax" Sara Evans exclaimed "I totally agree with you!"

Joy Behar, in using the typical left wing class warfare propaganda claimed that "the very, very rich, not only don’t have to pay it, but get tax cuts." As she has done before, Behar gets her facts wrong. In 2005, the top one percent (those making $364,657 or more) paid 39.4 percent, but earned only 21.2 percent of the wealth.

Whoopi Goldberg did call out Joy Behar exclaiming that the wealthiest Americans are "pay ing 50 percent of their income. It’s not like they’re not paying."

Video (50 secs): Windows Media (1.55 MB) or MP3 audio (384 kB).

The entire transcript is below.

Joy Behar took up Media Matters talking points on her "View" forum and Whoopi Goldberg and Sherri Shepherd, whom Barbara Walters calls "very conservative," backed Behar up. On discussing Barack Obama and whether his African American race helps or hurts him, Joy Behar brought up the far left Media Matters smear of Bill O’Reilly.

JOY BEHAR: Well, remember the Bill O’Reilly thing when they went up to Sylvia’s and he was so astounded-

WHOOPI GOLDBERG: Yes he was astounded.

BEHAR: -that black people use forks or something when they eat?

GOLDBERG: Yeah, I mean, you know, what kind-

BEHAR: It’s Bill O’Reilly.

In reality, Bill O’Reilly was using his experience to note that African-American culture is not as profane and coarse as stereotyped by many white Americans. Barbara Walters very timidly defended O’Reilly before Sherri Shepherd and Whoopi Goldberg continued.

Joy Behar still complains about Al Gore’s 2000 election loss. In discussing Gore’s Nobel Prize acceptance, Behar implied Gore lost an unfair election. When Whoopi Goldberg reminded Behar that Gore conceded. Behar retorted "that was a mistake" after the Supreme Court, which has final jurisdiction ruled against him.

Behar continued that Gore "should have let them count the votes legitimately...to keep our country the way it’s supposed to be instead of the Supreme Court making the decision." Behar essentially said Gore should have defied the Court to "let them count the votes legitimately."

Behar is forgetting that Gore exhausted the legal system and there were little or no avenues Gore could have pursued after the Supreme Court ruled against him. Also, Florida did have a full state recount, including court ordered hand recounts of Florida’s most liberal counties.