Brad Wilmouth's blog

As he appeared as a guest on Friday's Piers Morgan Tonight on CNN, moments after decrying Rush Limbaugh's recent "slut" comment, liberal talk radio host Montel Williams defended his infamous suggestion that Michele Bachmann should kill herself by decapitation as being unrelated to the recent Limbaugh matter.

While he was discussing his encounter with a wounded American soldier, he bizarrely brought up Limbaugh as if to suggest that the conservative host's strong words were a dishonor to the people who fight to defend the country. Williams:

When FNC's Bill O'Reilly brought up "ABC News's coverage of this Rush Limbaugh/Fluke situation" on Wednesday's The O'Reilly Factor, guest George Stephanopoulos not only misled FNC viewers about ABC coverage by focusing only on how much time his weekday edition of Good Morning America devoted to the story while ignoring other ABC shows like World News and the weekend edition of GMA, but he even substantially understated the amount of time his own weekday GMA show spent on the controversy.

He also failed to mention that he repeatedly brought up the story as he hosted Sunday's This Week on ABC.

During live coverage of the Super Tuesday primaries, MSNBC's Lawrence O'Donnell declared that he hopes that Rick Santorum wins the GOP presidential nomination because he wants to see "hard core conservatism crushed" in November. Moments later, Chris Matthews declared his belief that Santorum would result in a "moderate to liberal Democratic party running the country" which he believed "would be good for the country."

O'Donnell began the back and forth with Matthews as he pronounced:

During live coverage of the Super Tuesday primaries, after Rachel Maddow declared that Newt Gingrich has a way of giving speeches that move people in the audience unlike fellow conservative Rick Santorum, Chris Matthews launched into his latest round of personal attacks on the former House Speaker, asserting that he "looks like the devil," and that he appears "diabolical."

The MSNBC host described Gingrich as a "menacing force" and accused him of doing "evil things" when he ran Congress. Below are both video and a transcript of the relevant portion of MSNBC's Super Tuesday coverage from Tuesday, March 6:

During live coverage of Super Tuesday, MSNBC's Chris Matthews harkened back to a famous historical phone call from then-Senator John F. Kennedy to Coretta King, after her husband, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., was arrested, as he suggested that President Barack Obama's recent phone call to Georgetown Law School student Sandra Fluke would be similarly remembered as important to this year's presidential campaign.

Matthews asserted:

On Monday's The Ed Show on MSNBC, host Ed Schultz and guests Terry O'Neil of the National Organization for Women and former Democratic congressional candidate Kristal Ball were unaccepting of Rush Limbaugh's apology for disparaging Georgetown Law School student Sandra Fluke, with Schultz suggesting that now is the best time to push Limbaugh off the air.

O'Neill claimed that there were "overtones of violence" to the conservative talk radio host's comments about Fluke. O'Neill:

Appearing as a guest on MSNBC's The Ed Show, MSNBC political analyst Richard Wolffe - formerly of Newsweek - complained that the economic policies of GOP presidential candidates Mitt Romney and Rick Santorum "are a repeat of the Bush years," and asserted that President Bush had the "worst jobs record of any President in modern times."

After host Ed Schultz asked "how does Romney and Santorum win over" middle class voters in Ohio, an amused Wolffe recommended that the GOP candidates "change their policies." Wolffe:

Appearing as a subsitute panel member on the Friday, March 2, Inside Washington on PBS, Politico columnist Roger Simon recited the liberal line of attack on Republicans as he theorized that female voters were being turned off from the GOP.

After quoting the Democratic charge of there being a GOP "war on women," moments later he wondered why Republicans were trying to get government 'into our wombs."

During Tuesday's live coverage the Republican presidential primaries in Arizona and Michigan, MSNBC's Chris Matthews again talked about President Obama delivering a "thrill" as he asserted that, unlike GOP candidates Mitt Romney and Rick Santorum, Obama has both a "brain" and a "heart" when he makes speeches. Matthews: (Video below)

On the debut of the Melissa Harris-Perry show on MSNBC on Saturday, after starting the show with a discussion of why she believes it is a good thing for the Republican Party to be a strong party - for the sake of having a competitive, multi-party system to give voters choices - the show soon predictably moved toward talk of alleged racism in the Republican Party. (Video clips below)

At one point, she showed video footage of liberal Republican presidential candidate Nelson Rockefeller from the 1964 Republican National Convention condemning "extremists" in the party. After a clip of a black audience member applauding the speech, Harris-Perry cracked:

On Friday's Real Time with Bill Maher, as he analyzed GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney's predicament of fending off Rick Santorum on his right, host Maher made his latest racially tinged hit on conservatives as he cracked that only "Kirk Cameron and the Neonazi party" are further to the right than Santorum. (Video below)

He began:

On Friday's Real Time with Bill Maher show on HBO, during a discussion of the recently passed Virginia law that requires an ultrasound be performed on every candidate for abortion in the hopes that the mother might decide not to go through with the procedure, economist Stephen Moore was booed by a number of audience members when he expressed the view that generally it would be a "good thing" to convince women not to have abortions, noting the feelings of regret women often feel afterwards. (Video below)

Inspiring boos, Moore innocuously declared:

Appearing as a guest on Wednesday's Tonight Show on NBC, HBO's Real Time host Bill Maher mocked GOP presidential candidate Rick Santorum's pro-life views, inspiring laughter from host Jay Leno.

After Leno brought up presidential politics, Maher cracked that the former Pennsylvania Senator "thinks life begins at erection":

Tuesday's NBC Nightly News informed viewers of the statistic that 1.8 million of the deceased are still registered to vote, as anchor Brian Williams read an item recounting the results of a study by the Pew Research Center.

But the NBC anchor also downplayed the danger of voter fraud as he asserted that "the problems here are not due to fraud," but instead emanate from the lack of the use of technology.

Williams recounted:

As if there were not liberal billionaires able to spend money trashing Republicans and promoting  President Obama's reelection, MSNBC analyst Jonathan Alter -- formerly of Newsweek -- fretted on Tuesday that billionaires would run what he referred to as "hate ads" against President obama right before the election.

After The Ed Show host Ed Schultz complained that the GOP emphasis on "voter ID [laws] is all about voter suppression," Alter made his prediction about billionaires running ads against Obama. Alter:

On Monday, uniquely among the broadcast network evening newscasts, ABC's World News skipped the news that Israeli diplomats were the targets of simultaneous assassination attempts in two different countries, most likely from  Iranian sources.

On Saturday's Fox News Watch, during a discussion of the media double standard between hitting Komen for planning to defund Planned Parenthood, while delaying attention to Catholic leaders criticizing the Obama contraception mandate, liberal FNC analyst Kirsten Powers debated fellow panel member and FNC analyst Judy Miller from the right as Powers noted the media's bias toward Planned Parenthood, while Miller defended President Obama. (Video below)

In a statement that would have been worthy of a right-leaning analyst, Powers exposed the media:

Saturday's CBS Evening News ran a piece highlighting the complaints of a Catholic Democrat - Michael Sean Winters of the National Catholic Reporter, recounting his opposition to President Obama's attempt to force Catholic employers to provide contraception coverage to their employees. Winters asserted that he is "very angry about this," and substitute anchor Elaine Quijano noted that, although he voted for President Obama in 2008, he plans not to vote this year. (Video below)

Quijano used a soundbite of Winters giving a warning to Obama during the show's opening teaser:

On Saturday's Fox News Watch, FNC contributor and conservative talk radio host Monica Crowley cited a letter released last Monday by NewsBusters publisher and  Media Research Center president Brent Bozell which called on the media to give more attention to President Obama's attempt to force religious institutions to provide contraceptive coverage to their employees, even if these institutions object on religious grounds. (Video below)

Crowley cited numbers on how little attention had been given by the broadcast networks and CNN as of Monday, and credited the MRC with affecting a greater focus on the issue from the media:

During the opening monologue on Friday's Real Time with Bill Maher, host Maher derided Rick Santorum as "the little creep that could" because of the GOP presidential candidate's recent electoral victories. He also mocked the concern conservatives have about abortion by cracking that Mitt Romney had come to CPAC with a "fetus in a jar" to try to outdo Santorum with the audience. (Video below)

Referring to Santorum's victories in Colorado, Minnesota, and Missouri from the past week, Maher hit the GOP candidate:

Appearing as a guest on Thursday's Piers Morgan Tonight on CNN, former CBS News anchor expressed agreement with GOP presidential candidate  Ron Paul in opposing U.S. involvement in the civil war in Syria to protect the civilian population from the terror regime of authoritarian ruler, President Bashar Assad. After describing what he believes should be done to put pressure on Assad, he brought up Congressman Paul's left-leaning views on the Middle East:

On Thursday's The Last Word, MSNBC host Lawrence O'Donnell disproved claims by liberals that eight states already have regulations that require Catholic employers to provide health insurance coverage of contraceptives for their employees, as the liberal host informed viewers that his staff had looked into the laws of these states and found the assertions to be untrue. (Video below)

O'Donnell declared to his viewers:

During a syrupy interview with Planned Parenthood president Cecile Richards on Monday's The Last Word, MSNBC host Lawrence O'Donnell was so impressed with her that he concluded the segment by declaring that she is worthy to be ambassador to the United Nations. O'Donnell:

On Sunday's Chris Matthews Show, after panel member Richard Stengel of Time magazine argued that President Franklin Delano Roosevelt is an example of a wealthy President who connected with average Americans more effectively than GOP presidential candidate Mitt Rommney does, NBC Andrea Mitchell praised New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg for donating $250,000 to Planned Parenthood, arguing that it helped him "connect to people" in his "constituency." After an anecdote from Stengel about Roosevelt, Mitchell injected:

It's astonishing that someone whose profession is to talk politics still has not heard that the alleged gaffe of President George H.W. Bush being unaware of the existence of checkout scanners as he visited a grocery store during the 1988 campaign has been disputed, as the veteran MSNBC host repeated the alleged Bush gaffe while opening his syndicated Chris Matthews Show which aired on Sunday.

After guest Andrea Mitchell of NBC tried to correct him, he was still unconvinced and declared, "I'm still not letting him off on that."

On Saturday's Fox News Watch, regular panel member Jim Pinkerton of The American Conservative magazine cited an article by MRC analyst and NewsBuster Matthew Balan, who recounted the media obsession with the Komen foundation's decision to eliminate funding for Planned Parenthood, while the same media have completely ignored the brewing conflict between President Obama and the Catholic Church as the Obama administration tries to force Catholic employers to go against their religious beliefs and provide coverage for contraception in its health insurance plans. Pinkerton:

On Friday's Inside Washington on PBS, as the panel discussed the new Obama administration rule that requires even Catholic employers to provide health insurance coverage for contraception to their employees, both liberal columnist Mark Shields and conservative columnist Charles Krauthammer hit Obama for the decision, while NPR's Nina Totenberg claimed that there were valid arguments in both directions as she made a flawed analogy between contraception and immunization as a defense of the Obama position.

But the blunt criticism directed at Obama by the liberal Shields, who is also a longtime regular on the PBS NewsHour, was the most surprising part of the show. After host Gordon Peterson noted that some Catholic leaders had supported Obamacare, and asked if they are "being hung out to dry," Shields responded: