Brad Wilmouth's blog

While morning and evening newscasts from all three broadcast networks in the last few days have focused on anti-Mormon sentiment within the Republican Party that may hinder Mitt Romney's bid for the presidency, FNC's Special Report with Bret Baier on Monday noted that self-identified Republican voters are substantially more willing to accept a Mormon President compared to Democrats.

FNC correspondent Carl Cameron observed that Democrats are "least tolerant" compared to Republicans and independents as he recounted the findings of a Quinnipiac poll:

As FNC's Geraldo Rivera appeared in New York City for his Geraldo at Large show on Sunday night to give attention to the Occupy Wall Street protests, participant and music mogul Russell Simmons sparred with FBN's Charles Payne after Simmons complained that his taxes were too low and claimed that his employees pay more taxes then he does.

On today's Fox News Sunday, host Chris Wallace devoted the last five minutes of a 13-minute interview to sparring with Republican presidential candidate Rick Santorum, as the Fox host challenged the former Pennsylvania Senator for his opposition to gays serving openly in the military.

After playing a clip of Santorum from a recent debate arguing against the repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell, Wallace began the exchange:

On Sunday's Reliable Sources on CNN, host Howard Kurtz and guest Erik Wemple of the Washington Post both took exception with FNC's Bill O'Reilly for recently calling some of the "Occupy Wall Street" protesters "far-left loons" and "anarchists." Kurtz noted the contrast in how MSNBC and FNC have responded to the protests:

Appearing as a guest on Friday's Imus in the Morning on the Fox Business Network, actor and comedian Jay Mohr took some sexual jabs at Sarah Palin, suggesting that she used to be his "booty call," and then later referring to her as "screwing black people since the mid-90s."

He also imitated GOP presidential candidate Herman Cain as he cracked that Cain is "getting blacker" as the campaign progresses.

During the "New Rule" segment ending Friday's Real Time with Bill Maher on HBO, host Maher asserted that the painted over "N****head Ranch" rock on Texas Governor Rick Perry's hunting territory is a "metaphor" for the Republican Party, because it is "overtly racist bulls*** thinly painted over." Maher also displayed the words "The Bigotest Loser" while an image of Perry was shown on screen.

Maher began the "New Rule" segment:

On PBS's Inside Washington on Friday, the Politico's Evan Thomas - formerly of Newsweek - characterized the United States as a "great giant" that would go on to "stomp on" other countries after the 9/11 attacks.

After substitute host Mark Shields introduced a segment on the 10th anniversary of the war in Afghanistan by asking how history would "judge" the military operation, he turned to regular panel member Thomas who responded with a questionable choice of words:

During the "Psycho Talk" segment of The Ed Show on Thursday, MSNBC host Ed Schultz complained that Massachusetts Republican Senator Scott Brown "has degraded women" as he highlighted liberal criticism of Senator Brown for a joke he recently made about Democratic Senate candidate Elizabeth Warren.

[Yes, the same  Ed Schultz who was briefly suspended earlier this year by MSNBC for calling conservative radio host Laura Ingraham a "right-wing slut."]

Schultz noted that Brown is the successor to former Democratic Senator Ted Kennedy, as if to suggest that he were a disgrace to the former Democratic Senator.

Uniquely among the broadcast network evening newscasts, the NBC Nightly News on Thursday took a moment to recount an appearance by Brandeis University Professor Anita Hill commemorating the 20th anniversary of her Senate testimony making unsubstantiated accusations against Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas for sexually harassing her in the 1980s.

Anchor Brian Williams relayed Hill's contention that "her role in the hearings was worthwhile," before playing a clip of her asserting that her testimony "was not in vain." Below is a complete transcript of the segment from the Thursday, October 6, NBC Nightly News:

The ABC and NBC morning and evening newscasts on Sunday gave attention to President Obama's attack on the Republican presidential candidates for not scolding a couple of audience members who booed a gay solder asking a question at a recent debate. Monday's "Special Report with Bret Baier" on FNC noted that Obama has his own history of standing by without condemning inappropriate comments at public events.

On Monday's "The Daily Show" on Comedy Central, host Jon Stewart called both Rick Santorum and Rick Perry idiots as he responded to some of their statements from the most recent GOP presidential debate.

After a clip of Santorum arguing that the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy should be reinstated, suggesting that members of the armed forces should keep their sexual orientation to themselves as they serve, Stewart responded with censored profanity and ended up calling the former Republican Senator an "idiot":

As attention has turned to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict with the Palestinian Authority planning to seek recognition for a Palestinian state by the United Natinos on Friday, the media have almost universally ignored last week's prediction by Maen Areikat, the Palestine Liberation Organization envoy to the United States, that Israelis - presumably referring to Israeli Jews rather than Israeli Arabs - would be removed from such a Palestinian state.

And, although the allegedly moderate Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas has a history of being even more direct in declaring that not a single Jew would be allowed to live in a Palestinian state - not even Jews from other countries serving as part of a hypothetical NATO peacekeeping force - a small number of the media outlets that bothered to pay attention to the issue at all have naively allowed Areikat to dubiously backtrack and claim that Jews would indeed be welcome in such a Palestinian state. But Areikat himself last year in an interview with Tablet magazine had more explicitly than last week argued that Jews should be removed.

As the morning and evening newscasts on CBS have reported on Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas's upcoming plan to seek statehood recognition from the United Nations on Friday, correspondent Mark Phillips has appeared three times filing reports which have portrayed Palestinians as victims of Israeli extremism and "militant" Jewish settlers, while ignoring Palestinian extremism and refusal to meet for talks in recent years despite overtures from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

On Tuesday's CBS Evening News, Phillips recounted clashes between Palestinians and Jewish settlers, and seemed to suggest that the Israeli military had fired tear gas at the wrong group as he noted that Arabs were subjected to the anti-riot measure. Phillips:

Andrea Mitchell on Friday and Martin Fletcher on Sunday filed reports on the NBC Nightly News filling in viewers on the Palestinian Authority's upcoming plan to go to the United Nations and seek recognition of statehood or at least U.N. membership as the U.N. convenes this week. Both reports ignored last week's prediction by the Palestinian Authority's envoy to the U.N. that Jews would be removed from a Palestinian state.

During a prerecorded commentary on CBS Sunday Morning, left-wing CBS commentator Nancy Giles complained about the "bloodlust" of GOP audience members who applauded Texas's use of capital punishment at the recent MSNBC debate and a small number of audience members who applauded at Monday's CNN debate after moderator Wolf Blitzer asked if someone who chose not to purchase insurance should be allowed to die.

CBS played a clip of the exchanges but notably left out Rep. Ron Paul's answer to Blitzer's question as he argued that organizations like churches used to help provide health care before Medicaid existed, leaving Giles to give the impression that Rep. Paul had been unconcerned about the uninsured dying. Giles:

Appearing as a guest on Wednesday's Colbert Report on Comedy Central to plug his memoir, Here Comes Trouble, left-wing film maker Michael Moore used a provocative choice of words to describe his feelings toward Wall Street and conservatives who oppose regulations against businesses as he declared that "I'm a bigot against people like you that support Wall Street and corporations..."

Moore seemed to play along with host Stephen Colbert's regular shtick as an exaggerated conservative commentator, since the liberal activist smiled and laughed during much of the segment as he sparred with the faux-conservative over corporations.

Below is a transcript of the relevant exchange when Moore chose to describe himself as a "bigot":

Appearing on Tuesday's The Ed Show, MSNBC political analyst Jonathan Alter urged both liberals - euphemistically calling them "progressives" - and non-liberals to support President Obama's economic plan and advised Obama to "fight, fight, fight," and argue that Republican opposition would mean they are "standing in the way of you getting a job."

After host Ed Schultz asked Alter about the GOP response to Obama's plan, the MSNBC analyst soon appealed to Americans to support the bill:

Appearing on Monday's NBC Nightly News, CNBC's Michelle Caruso-Cabrera blamed decades of overspending by European governments and borrowing to help provide promised benefits for the continent's current economic problems.

She said "a lot of governments in Europe for many decades now have borrowed a lot of money in order to give very generous benefits to their workers and their retirees. They thought that they would grow enough to generate enough revenue to pay back those debts. That hasn't happened."

On Saturday's CBS Evening News, correspondent Barry Petersen filed a report which highlighted Human Rights Watch's analysis of government records in Libya which document that, during the Bush administration, the CIA sent prisoners to Libya as part of its renditioning program. Anchor Russ Mitchell saw the papers as potentially "troubling" as he introduced the report:

Appearing as a guest on Friday's Last Word to discuss Republican presidential candidate Jon Huntsman's plan to simplify the income tax code, MSNBC political analyst Richard Wolffe saw extremism in the Tea Party movement as he asserted that Huntsman's plan was "moderate when you compare it to where the Tea Party extremists want to take this."

As the discussion turned to the current anemic job growth numbers and Texas Governor Rick Perry's views on economics, Wolffe claimed that President Jimmy Carter had created more jobs that President George W. Bush as he blamed Bush and Republicans for the current economic slowdown:

On Thursday's The Ed Show, MSNBC host Ed Schultz excoriated Senator Marco Rubio and other "damn Republicans" because Rubio recently attacked Schultz and fellow MSNBC host Rachel Maddow for comments they made about the Florida Republican.

Schultz suggested the Rubio's father might be "ashamed" of him for not accepting the MSNBC host's invitation to come on his show and debate him, claimed that he was "not a true American" for his refusal to debate, and charged that "You're a Tea Partier, and you don't give a damn about" Americans.

Schultz ended up calling Rubio a "damn political phony" and labeled him as "the problem" as he declared that he wishes he could get Rubio defeated:

On Wednesday evening, the NBC Nightly News devoted a segment to a recent study involving the World Health Organization asserting that infant mortality in the United States has fallen behind 40 other countries, including Cuba. NBC's Today show and ABC's Good Morning America also mentioned the study briefly earlier the same day.

NBC's Snyderman on Nightly News even seemed to hint that universal health care in Vermont may play a role in that state's ranking that is relatively higher than other states, even though several other states she named as relatively higher do not have universal health care.

On Wednesday's Last Word on MSNBC, substitute host Chris Hayes of the left-wing Nation magazine used conservative talk radio host Glenn Beck's rally in Israel as an occasion to blame conservative Israelis like Prime Minister Netanyahu for the absence of a peace agreement with the Palestinians and asserted that it was "dangerous" for such Israelis to ally with America's Christian Zionist movement.

ABC Highlights Complaints That 'There is Little Heart' in Rick Perry's Texas

On Saturday's World News on ABC, correspondent Jim Avila filed a report in which he focused mostly on aspects of Texas's economy that receive praise, but he ended up warning that things may not really be as good as they seem, as the ABC correspondent highlighted claims that, "deep in the heart of Rick Perry's Texas, there is little heart."

Avila concluded his piece:

As Saturday's The Early Show on CBS hosted John Avlon of the Daily Beast and conservative commentator Margaret Hoover for a discussion of Texas Governor Rick Perry and other GOP presidential candidates, both guests had skeptical views of the current field, with Avlon finding some of Perry's recent statements "sort of irresponsible," and quipping that "George Bush looks like Abraham Lincoln compared to the whole crowd right now."

On both Good Morning America and World News, two different ABC correspondents filed separate reports recounting that some Christians oppose Texas Governor Rick Perry’s prayer rally from the weekend, but, in both reports, clips of left-wing figures like the Reverend Barry Lynn of Americans United for the Separation of Church and State, and Drew Courtney of People for the American Way were shown, instead of showing any more mainstream Christians as examples of dissent.

The ABC and NBC morning and evening newscasts on Sunday gave attention to President Obama's attack on the Republican presidential candidates for not scolding a couple of audience members who booed a gay solder who asked a question about gays in the military at a recent debate. Monday's Special Report with Bret Baier on FNC noted that Obama has his own history of standing by without condemning inappropriate comments at public events.ABC correspondent David Kerley filed full reports devoted to the story on both Good Morning America and World News Sunday, while NBC's Mike Viqueira mentioned Obama's line of attack within reports that dealt with other political issues on Today and the NBC Nightly News.

 Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Alayon recently released a video in which he defends Israel’s presence in the West Bank, and argues not only that Israeli settlements within the territory are legal, but that the West Bank technically should not be labeled as "occupied’, but rather, "disputed," because the West Bank was not recognized previously as being legally part of a sovereign state.

Staff writer Jeffrey Goldberg of The Atlantic (formerly The Atlantic Monthly) was so incensed by the pro-Israel video that he was driven to use profanity on his blog as he mocked the Israeli government as trying to send the message that the world should "f— off." He further charged that the "cheesy and disturbing video" was an attempt by the Israeli government to hold onto the West Bank, even though Ayalon’s video clearly speaks of negotiating the boundaries for a Palestinian state. Goldberg began his blog posting:

 During a commentary aired on CBS Sunday Morning, supposedly right-leaning actor and economist Ben Stein blamed the "folly of supply side economics" - singling out President George W. Bush’s tax cuts in addition to President Obama’s spending - for the current federal budget deficit. The CBS contributor also complained that some Republicans have an "inflexible belief" that "low taxes were an American birthright."

He also complained that the Tea Partiers "insisted on the basically impossible, an immediate cut in federal spending, large enough to balance the budget without tax increases. In this age of Medicare and Medicaid, two wars, massive federal debt, interest payments, staggering Social Security obligations, that was simply impossible."