Martin Bashir tossed softballs at Planned Parenthood head Cecile Richards on his eponymous MSNBC program on Monday, letting his guest spout her talking points in defense of her abortion-providing organization. Bashir even went so far to use a phrase in vogue with the pro-abortion left in one of his questions: "Do you think this is, in effect, a war on women?"
[Audio available here; video below the jump]
Anthony Weiner finally came clean about Weinergate, but not before an interview with ABC's Jonathan Karl that ABC is pushing in light of Weiner's confession yesterday. In the tape, Weiner insists he is the innocent victim of a hoax and lectures Karl for assuming anything else.
The whole thing is a bit off-putting in light of yesterday's events. After Karl asks why Weiner was following a significant number of young women on his Twitter account, the congressman blows up at him for making "outrageous implications."
More double standards for Middle East morality. Monday’s New York Times's off-lead story featured 30 paragraphs from Jerusalem by Isabel Kershner on Palestinians in refugee camps in Syria goaded to cross over into Israel, who were then fired upon by Israeli troops, only after nonlethal means were tried: "Protests Draw Israeli Gunfire At Syria Border – Deadly Confrontation – Trying to Force Way In Emerges as a Strategy by Palestinians." A Syrian news agency reported 22 Palestinian protesters were killed, though Israel suggested that figure was exaggerated.
While Israel’s armed response to the attempted invasion on its border with Syria was at least somewhat justified, Syrian authorities themselves in the last weeks have slaughtered over 1,000 of its rebelling citizens, actual human rights atrocities that have only sporadically made the Times's front page. In this way the Times is playing into the hands of Syria, which is using the all-purpose enemy Israel as a distraction from its own internal oppression.
The Washington Post published a seriously misleading headline Tuesday. At top of the Style section, it read: “Anthony Weiner is everywhere – except CBS: Anchor Scott Pelley takes the high road in his debut, focusing on other news.”
It would be natural for readers to think Pelley skipped Weiner’s confession entirely on Monday night. But TV critic Hank Stuever was merely thrilled and impressed that Pelley showed a “ray of serious sunshine” by delaying Weinergate until midway through his first newscast:
Daily Kos was a complete Weinergate embarrassment in the "Netroots Nation," claiming Weiner was set up by conservative Clarence Thomas supporters. But the vicious leftist bloggers there are doubling down. The blogger with the appropriate byline "Solomon Drek" responded to Weiner's confessions within an hour Monday afternoon with a post simply titled "Clarence Thomas Used Prostitutes." Mr. Drek's standards of evidence can't really be called standards, but well, he's angry and wants to lash out.
He offers no name or place or date, but the "social Talibanistas" must pay for Weiner brought low: "There's no doubt Anita Hill was telling the truth about Thomas, and while I don't expect anyone to believe my story I felt like telling it anyway." Suffice it to say The National Enquirer is a more reliable media outlet on wandering public servants:
MSNBC.com on Monday accused economist Dr. Walter Williams of making racist statements during his interview with Fox News's John Stossel last week.
The charge was associated with an "Ed Show" segment in which the host disgracefully cherry-picked one of Williams' comments about welfare and slavery (video follows with transcript and commentary):
On Friday, Cass Sunstein, the White House's 56 year-old Administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (pictured at right), attempted to disavow a 42-page paper he wrote called "Lives, Life-Years, and Willingness to Pay," which recommended that the government reduce resources directed at benefitting the elderly in favor of increasing what goes to young people, because young people have more years of life ahead of them. His statement, as carried at CNS News:
“I’m a lot older now than the author with my name was, and I’m not sure what I think about what that young man wrote,” he said. “Things written as an academic are not a legitimate part of what we do as a government official. So I am not focusing on sentences that a young Cass Sunstein wrote years ago.
So, dear readers, before you go to the rest of this post, guess how "young" Sunstein was when he engaged in his de facto "death panels" advocacy.
... Ready? Okay, here goes:
As NewsBusters has been reporting for weeks, one of the goals of the Obama-loving media is to depict every possible Republican presidential candidate as racist.
On Monday's "MSNBC Live," substitute host Al Sharpton implied that newly announced candidate Rick Santorum was making a racist comment when he said at Saturday's Faith and Freedom Conference, "America was a great country before 1965" (video follows with transcript and commentary):
Bush Derangement Syndrome never really went away. Nowadays it's directed at Sarah Palin instead.
A good example of Palin's uncanny ability to unhinge liberals could be heard on a recent Randi Rhodes' radio show.
Rhodes, who infamously derided Hillary Clinton as a "big f***ing whore" during the 2008 campaign, was angered by Palin wearing a Star of David pendant during a stopover in New York City on her bus tour. (audio clip after page break).
In his newest CNN.com op-ed titled "Don't Doom GOP's Chance to Win in 2012," David Frum clearly outlines the Republican Party's best chance for victory – if they don't come off as "Medicare-annihilating racist maniacs." He then goes about making the case that Republicans are doing just that.
"It is Tea Party conservatism itself that is Obama's last, best hope for a second term," Frum boldly concludes in a stinging indictment of the Tea Party.
He claims that the Republicans' refusal to raise the debt ceiling unless President Obama agrees to the Ryan budget plan is akin to the "militant wing" of the party mounting a coup and dragging the GOP to defeat in 2012.
Barbara Walters said Monday that if Sarah Palin can be considered as a possible presidential candidate, Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-N.Y.) can stay in Congress despite the current sex scandal he's involved in.
Significantly more shocking, "The View" co-host Joy Behar actually came to Palin's defense (video follows with transcript and commentary):
Chrystia Freeland made a series of bizarre statements on MSNBC today that were overshadowed only by Anthony Weiner's contrite presser during which the Democratic congressman admitted to tweeting the infamous crotch photo and lying to cover it up.
Before the press conference, the Reuters editor-at-large quipped that the Twitter controversy showed that Eliot Spitzer, who resigned as New York governor in 2008 after being caught sleeping with prostitutes, "is a really classy guy."
Bill Keller, the soon-to-be-former executive editor for the New York Times, writes a front-of-the-magazine column for the Times Sunday magazine. This week he had a relatively balanced take on conspiracy theories left and right, including a whopper from leftist feminist Naomi Wolf, in "Let Me Take Off My Tinfoil Hat For a Moment...to discuss why otherwise-smart people fall for crackpot conspiracy theories."
But Keller equating "global warming is a hoax" to genuinely crackpot theories reaffirms the paper's preconceived opinion on the matter: Global warming is real and dangerous, and anyone who believes otherwise is a shill or dupe. And since when does rational, non-conspiratorial thinking require believing everything the Times has to say, as Keller also implied?
In an ongoing press conference, an emotional Rep. Anthony Weiner admitted that he sent lewd photos to six women over the past few years. The New York Democrat refused to resign, however, depsite expressing his "deep regret" for his actions. Weiner also seemed to acknowledge the possibility that Andrew Breitbart, who took questions before Weiner took the stage, has in this presence a photo even more revealing than those that have already come out.
This is all developing. Post updates below as you hear them come in.
"I am fairly certain that when Paul Ryan first decided to publicly share his admiration of Ayn Rand, he could not have imagined it would lead to him speed-walking to his SUV to avoid a young Catholic trying to give him a Bible and telling him to pay more attention to the Gospel of Luke," Time's Amy Sullivan snarked in a June 3 Swampland blog post.