2012 Presidential

ABC's George Stephanopoulos, who makes $8 million a year, pounced on the release of Mitt Romney's tax returns, sneering on Tuesday, "So, just how rich is Mitt Romney and is he paying his fair share of taxes?" [See video below. MP3 audio here.]

The Good Morning America co-host excitedly told viewers, "Breaking overnight, the long-awaited tax returns from Mitt Romney finally revealed. Our team [is] poring over the numbers."

You have to give McKay Coppins credit. The Buzzfeed writer today managed to work in hints of anti-Mormon skepticism and the complaints of the gay rights lobby into his January 24 story -- "What's With Mitt's Mormon Money?" -- on Romney's tax records.

It's a liberal bias trifecta!

It appears that even Andrea Mitchell doesn’t watch MSNBC.  During Tuesday's edition of her eponymous program, while speaking to Ryan Lizza of The New Yorker, the anchor failed to acknowledge former Sen. Rick Santorum’s (R-Pa.) strong repudiation for comments made by an attendee at one of his campaign events over the weekend.

While the presidential hopeful did not initially correct the woman’s allegations that President Obama was a devout Muslim who was illegally occupying the White House, appearing on Morning Joe today, Santorum strongly condemned such rhetoric as being bizarre and out of touch with reality. [See video below. MP3 audio here.]

What was in Ann Curry's coffee this morning? In an uncharacteristically challenging interview with Obama advisor David Plouffe on Tuesday, the NBC Today co-host actually defended Mitt Romney's wealth and questioned why Democrats would criticize his success: "Now, what's wrong with that?...is that not the American dream?"

Her question became even more pointed as she pressed: "...isn't making a lot of hay over how much money he's earned and how much money he's paid in taxes, you know, really not just fanning the flames of this sort of idea of politics of envy?"

Does CNN favor class warfare? They played the part on Tuesday, hyping the negative image Mitt Romney's overseas wealth and low tax rate would present to the average American voter while ignoring his charitable (and tax-deductible) contributions.

Host Kyra Phillips warned that Romney's just-released tax records would not sit well with voters earning less income but paying a higher tax rate. "It's a bad economy, people are out of work. This doesn't look so good from the average American's standpoint," she argued. [Video below the break. Click here for audio.]

Question: What do you call it when a former Democratic operative recites an e-mail from the Democratic National Committee to an adviser for a Democratic president? Answer: Good Morning America. On Tuesday, George Stephanopoulos interviewed David Plouffe and began, "[I] got this e-mail from [the] Democratic National Committee...saying Mitt Romney's tax returns release raises more questions than it answers." [See video below. MP3 audio here.]

Talking to Barack Obama's top political strategist, Stephanopoulos tossed this softball: "What more do voters need to know about Mitt Romney's taxes and his wealth?" Could one come up with an easier, more Democratic-friendly question? Stephanopoulos continued, "So, you think it's wrong that Mitt Romney only pays about 15 percent of his income in taxes?"

After eagerly awaiting the release of Mitt Romney's tax returns, on Tuesday's NBC Today, co-host Matt Lauer immediately wondered how the new information could hurt the Republican presidential candidate, asking chief White House correspondent Chuck Todd: "Do you see any surprises in here, anything that will give his rivals more ammunition?"

Todd wasted no time in reciting liberal talking points bashing Romney: "I think there is certainly some fodder for some of his Democratic opponents. Things like having a Swiss bank account. You know, that's not something a lot of ordinary Americans have....it certainly paints a picture of something that a lot of Americans cannot connect to."

Now that Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney has released some of his recent tax returns, it is quite clear that the Obama-loving media are going to use the information against the former Massachusetts governor in any way they can.

Take for example the wire service Reuters who was quick out of the gate early Tuesday morning with the following bogus report (emphasis added):

Rick Santorum to John Heilemann [and by extension to MSM at large] on today's Morning Joe: "it's your responsibility to defend the president, not mine." Ouch! If Newt's deft dicing of John King and Juan Williams paid huge electoral dividends, Santorum might anticipate a much-needed bump after running roughshod over the New York mag reporter.

Heilemann had called on Santorum to explain his failure to correct a woman at a town hall meeting in Florida yesterday who said President Obama was an "avowed Muslim" and legally unqualified to be president. After noting that he has repeatedly been on the record saying that he doesn't believe PBO is a Muslim and recognizes that he is legally qualified to be president, Santorum said that he chose not to chastise an elderly and infirm lady.  Then came Santorum's grand slam, as set forth above.  Heilemann only dug himself deeper when he responded by saying that prez candidate McCain had always defended Obama on the campaign trail. Video after the jump.

MSNBC's Martin Bashir spent a good part of his on air time Monday calling Republicans liars as he foolishly confused two extraordinarily simple pieces of economic data thereby making it he that was commiting a falsehood.

After calling Tea Party Express founder Judson Phillips a liar on his 3PM program, Bashir said the same thing about Republican presidential candidate Newt Gingrich on The Ed Show roughly five hours later while in both instances wrongly claiming there were more food stamp recipients when George W. Bush was president than there are now (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Salon's Joan Walsh stooped to an even further low Monday when she said on MSNBC's pre-debate show, "Newt is the face of the politics of resentment and racism and angry white male rage."

Yes, she was talking about Republican presidential candidate and former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich (video follows with transcript and commentary):

UPDATE AT END OF POST: Bashir responds via Twitter.

During a heated exchange with Tea Party Express founder Judson Phillips, MSNBC's Martin Bashir on Monday actually called his guest a liar for correctly saying there are more people on food stamps now than when George W. Bush was president.

This makes two MSNBC anchors in just three days that have made the same completely false claim on the air (video follows with transcribed highlights and commentary):

Appearing on Saturday's NBC Today, Time magazine and MSNBC political analyst Mark Halperin chatted with co-host Amy Robach about how thrilled the Obama White House has been with the Republican presidential race: "I think the White House is loving this. They've said all year the chaos in the Republican race is good."

That proclamation was prompted by Robach wondering if during the ongoing GOP primary season, "the Obama White House sitting back and enjoying the view?" Halperin asserted: "The President's State of the Union is coming up this week, I think that'll be a good moment for him...the contrast between a guy who is working...versus what's going on, on the Republican side..."

The South Carolina primary may be over, but MSNBC anchors are not letting up on their portrayal of Republican primary voters are bigots whose support is being courted by the use of "code words." [See video below. MP3 audio here.]

During a promo for her 2 p.m. Eastern show NewsNation, MSNBC anchor Hall falsely accused Gingrich of using incendiary rhetoric on minorities, and claims such words are part of an overall racially charged “attack strategy” in his bid for the White House. About two hours later, fellow MSNBC host Martin Bashir read from a 17-year old New York Times editorial that similarly blasted Gingrich.

Charles Blow’s Saturday column for the New York Times, “Newt’s Southern Strategy,” tastelessly conflated GOP candidate Newt Gingrich’s (imagined) racism with conservatives who believe the media have a liberal bias, while Blow called the former House Speaker a "vile, reptilian, hatemonger" on his Twitter feed.

In a confounding decision, the Republican candidates agreed to a second debate, to be held tonight in Tampa, moderated by NBC’s Brian Williams who, along with Politico’s John Harris, back on September 7 repeatedly peppered the then-larger Republican presidential field with liberal talking points and Democratic agenda items. Below, an excerpt from my September 8 post, with illustrative video:

Williams hit Texas Governor Rick Perry from the left on his state’s poor economic indicators (“no other state has more working at or below the minimum wage”) , chastised him for cutting education funding and, citing how “your state has executed 234 death row inmates,” demanded to know whether he’s “struggled to sleep at night with the idea that any one of those might have been innocent?” More examples and video below.

When did NBC News suddenly become concerned with the welfare of the Republican Party? On Monday's NBC Today, former Democratic staffer and current chief White House correspondent Chuck Todd hyped Republican fears of Newt Gingrich: "...look what Gingrich did when he was essentially on the ballot, if you will, in '96 and '98, he helped re-elect a Democratic president..."

Todd promoted the idea of the GOP in disarray: "So there is this panic that they could not just lose the presidency, but lose control of the House and actually blow their chances at picking up the Senate. That's why this panic that the establishment will just do whatever it takes to stop him [Gingrich]."

Irony alert: Former Clinton operative George Stephanopoulos on Monday questioned Newt Gingrich's "character and temperament." The Good Morning America co-anchor interviewed the Republican presidential candidate and unselfconsciously scolded, "I know you've faced these kinds of questions before. Is there any way for you to put this issue of temperament to rest?" [See video below. MP3 audio here.]

Stephanopoulos began his attack by highlighting, "Let me get to the question of character and temperament. Rick Santorum on This Week, yesterday, called you a friend but also erratic and a high-risk candidate." Back in the early '90s, Stephanopoulos was in charge of handling Bill Clinton's "bimbo eruptions."

"There was nothing newsworthy" about Marianne Gingrich's latest claims about the dissolution of her marriage to Newt Gingrich, NewsBusters publisher Brent Bozell told Fox News host Sean Hannity on his January 20 program.

"We looked at the September 2010 Esquire story on the marriage" and found "there's nothing, let me underscore, nothing in the story last night that wasn't in that interview," Bozell noted during the "Media Mash" segment [MP3 audio here; videofollows page break]

After the media's disgraceful intrusion into Republican presidential candidate Newt Gingrich's former marriage last week, it would be hard to make the case they've been too easy on him.

But that's exactly what MSNBC's Joe Scarborough did on Monday's Morning Joe (video follows with transcribed highlights and commentary):

You know liberals are desperate if they’re playing the race card so early in the 2012 campaign cycle. The latest edition of MRC’s Notable Quotables is now out, and this week’s collection was heavy with media quotes attacking both Republican voters and their presidential candidates as racist.

Among the lowlights: NBC’s Ann Curry accusing Newt Gingrich of “intentionally playing the race card” when he talked about President Obama’s dismal economic record, and ex-CNN correspondent Bob Franken nastily asserting that conservative voters harbor “a real resentment against blacks,” and “would love to see us return to the good old days of Jim Crow.”

The worst quotes are below the jump; the full issue can be read at www.MRC.org. (PDF version)

Of all the Morning Joe regulars, I find Harold Ford, Jr. the least interesting.  Ever on the lookout for his next opportunity, the fiercely ambitious Ford is firmly of the "my good friend" so-and-so school of politics, constantly hedging his bets and finding a way to praise or agree with virtually everyone.  

So it was an exception this morning when the former Dem congressman from Tennessee actually said something of note, if only for its sheer silliness.  Ford somehow managed to maintain a straight face while claiming the media doesn't strongly favor Barack Obama.  Video after the jump.

After Newt Gingrich recently proclaimed that "more people have been put on food stamps by Barack Obama than any President in American history," presumably referring to the straightforward statistic that a record number of Americans now receive food stamp assistance, FactCheck.org set out to prove him wrong. (Video below)

Last Friday saw two high-profile liberal pundits - one on Bloomberg News's Political Capital and the other on PBS's Inside Washington - repeating the story that Newt Gingrich divorced his first wife while she was being treated for cancer, without either of them noting that one of Gingrich's daughters - Jackie Gingrich Cushman -  last May specifically disputed the account that her mother, who is still alive, ever had cancer, or that her father initiated the divorce during a hospital visit.

On Bloomberg News's Political Capital show, host Al Hunt only vaguely noted that Gingrich's daughter had disputed some of the commonly believed details of her parents' divorce as he dismissed her account as "demonstrably false." After Bloomberg News columnist Margaret Carlson called the former House Speaker a "lout," Hunt asserted:

In their attempt to demonize Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney, the Obama-loving media have been misinforming Americans that venture capitalists are robber barons and corporate raiders preying on failing companies to suck every penny out of them with total disregard for employees.

What these ignorant and/or dishonest members of the press are hiding from the electorate is that venture capital-backed companies were responsible for 21 percent of the Gross Domestic Product in 2010 while creating 11 percent of the nation's private sector jobs.

Republican presidential candidate Newt Gingrich on Sunday told Meet the Press host David Gregory, "Nobody in the elite media wants to cover" Barack Obama's Saul Alinsky roots.

This came in response to Gregory asking the former Speaker of the House if he can "win independent voters in a general election campaign" talking about Obama's ties to Alinsky and other "radical left-wingers" (video follows with transcript and commentary):