2012 Presidential

Well, at least he isn't shy about it.

According to Dylan Byers at Politico, the National Journal's Ron Fournier is going to "step down as editor-in-chief" and moving to "a role as editorial director." Before joining that publication in June 2010, Fournier worked at the Associated Press for a total of over 20 years in two different stints. In an email response to Politico yesterday, Fournier elaborated on the motivation behind his move (bolds are mine throughout this post):

Well, if the President himself can call a sacked consulate and four dead Americans who deserved adequate security and didn't get it "bumps in the road," why not?

Monday morning, the Associated Press, aka the Administration's Press, presented a story in advance of United Nations ambassador Susan Rice's meeting today with certain Republican senators -- a meeting from which Rice, who engaged in serial falsehood peddling during the weekend after the September 11 Benghazi attack, apparently falsehood-peddling Rice emerged today even worse-off than before. In that story, both the headline and first paragraph of Anne Flaherty's coverage characterized Benghazi as a "PR (public relations) disaster."

Others can comment on the entirely of the Sunday New York Times story by Serge F. Kovaleski and Brooks Barnes (used in Monday's print edition) about Nakoula Basseley Nakoula, the maker of the infamous "Innocence of Muslims" YouTube trailer the authors characterize as a "film" a dozen times in their write-up. Nakoula has now been in jail for two months.

I'm only going to comment on the following two sentences from the writeup which follow the jump:

[UPDATE: See bottom of post] Chris Matthews on Monday disgustingly connected conservatives unhappy with the 2012 election to Hitler and the 1936 Olympics. After Huffington Post journalist Howard Fineman mocked the GOP for supposedly considering the African American and Hispanic vote to be "extraterrestrial," Matthews spewed, "The last guy to refer to the black auxiliary was Hitler." [See video below. MP3 audio here.]

Matthews, known for his verbal gaffes, prefaced the Nazi comparison by rambling, "...And these references are always dangerous, but I'll take it anyway." Trying to explain his smear, the Hardball anchor expanded, "During the '36 Olympics, we had Jesse Owens and a couple other guys winning the Olympics and they [the Nazis] were saying, "Well, they had their auxiliary out there." As if this made his comments all go away, Matthews added that his comments have "no bearing on the Republican Party."

It’s commonplace for a news organization to be attacked for failing to cover certain major news events.  On the other hand, it is rare for a news outlet to be attacked for doing its job and reporting the news. 

According to Pulitzer Prize winning reporter Thomas Ricks, Fox News’ extensive reporting on the terrorist attack on our consulate in Benghazi is not only a waste of time but an example of how Fox is, “the wing of the Republican Party.”  Appearing on Monday’s Happening Now, Ricks openly called out Fox News for its coverage of what he dismissed as merely a “small firefight.”  [See video below break.  MP3 audio here.] 

The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree, so it’s hardly shocking that the children of a journalist would prefer President Barack Obama’s re-election, but instead of being embarrassed by such stereotype-confirming views, Al Neuharth embraced them and decided to follow their advice in casting his vote – as if there were any doubt.

In his weekly column back on Friday, November 9, the 88-year-old founder of USA Today recounted how his six adopted kids, ranging in ages from 12 to 21, all supported Obama, including “Rafi, 12,” who “said Romney wants to ‘take from the poor and give to the rich’” and “Ariana, 14,” who “said if Romney wins, she wants to leave the USA and move to her second favorite country -- the Netherlands.”

Jay Leno continued his string of comedic attacks on the current White House resident Wednesday.

During his opening monologue on NBC's Tonight Show, the host said that because Democrats did so well on Election Day, President Obama is running out of Republicans to blame the fiscal cliff on (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Armed with so-called 'facts' disguised as the same liberal talking points we're all too familiar with, MSNBC's staff of bloggers published an article yesterday that detailed the top 10 comebacks that are guaranteed to confound and demoralize any Republican relative who dares to speak ill of Obama at the Thanksgiving dinner table.

The "Lean Forward" network won't let their bias take a rest even for the holidays, nevermind that politics is hardly polite conversation for the dinner table on any given holiday, let alone Thanksgiving. But family harmony is a small price to pay for dutifully defending President Obama to your relatives who aren't buying into the hope-and-change mantra.

Ah, Thanksgiving.  A time for Americans to come together, be grateful for their blessings—and tell people with different politics to stuff it?

That's apparently Ed Schultz's take on the holiday. On his MSNBC show this evening, gloating over his presumption that taxes will be going up on the top 2%, Schultz sent this warm 'n fuzzy message to John Boehner: "think about it over your turkey and stuffing Speaker Boehner. And by the way, you can put some gravy on that--and you know the rest of the sentence."  View the video after the jump.

NBC's David Gregory put forth on national television Tuesday every liberal media member's fantasy.

Appearing on the Tonight Show, the Meet the Press host said, "You could have a kind of permanent Democratic majority" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Even though Republicans kept the House, CNN was trying to bury the Tea Party on Wednesday. Anchor Carol Costello asked if the movement was dead while CNN's headline proclaimed the "end of the Tea Party movement."

"Is the Tea Party dead?" Costello ridiculously asked GOP strategist Ana Navarro. She took a shot at Fox News after Bill O'Reilly blamed some liberal media for "promoting ideology," to which Costello said "You mean like Fox?" Costello apparently believes she is non-partisan. [Video below the break. Audio here.]

A picture of Mitt Romney pumping his own gas in La Jolla was a big hit on the internet Tuesday after getting posted at Reddit.

For some reason NBC Nightly News anchor Brian Williams decided to do a story on it Tuesday evening specifically designed to mock the former presidential candidate (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Peter Nicholas of The Wall Street Journal is playing dumb. He played it straight when When Politico’s Mike Allen asked Obama campaign manager Jim Messina “which Republican would have had the best shot at beating your boss?” and Messina said Jon Huntsman.

“We were honest about our concerns about Huntsman,” Obama campaign manager Jim Messina said at a Politico breakfast event Tuesday. “I think Huntsman would have been a very tough candidate.” This is like praising the last player at the end of the bench.

Radio talk show host Rush Limbaugh responded on Monday to comments from Republican strategists Mike Murphy and Steve Schmidt, who have called on the party to “stray away from a vision” that is right out of the conservative commentator's “dream journal.”

The radio personality deflected the criticism, noting that the moderate GOP consultants got the candidate they wanted -- former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney -- and stated that strategists get rich regardless of who wins the elections.

CNN.com cherry picked a few conservative blog posts to make the sweeping claim that "arch-conservatives" are in denial over President Obama's victory. It's definitely poor journalism when four bloggers at two conservative websites represent all "hard-core conservatives."

The article points to four writers at Tea Party Nation and RedState.com as examples of "many" "die-hard conservatives" who "remain stuck somewhere between denial and anger, very far from acceptance" of Obama's re-election. In short, the implication is that conservatives need to get with the times and change their message.

Two days after the national election on November 6, Brian Williams -- anchor and managing editor of NBC Nightly News -- made a peculiar comment during that Thursday's edition of Rock Center, the network's prime time news program.

“With the election now over, it is once again safe to talk abut the economy and jobs, Now that it is not a campaign issue, it's back to reality,” he stated despite the fact that he had regularly discussed the topic during the campaign in a manner that always favored President Obama.

Appearing on Saturday's NBC Today, CNBC chief Washington correspondent John Harwood completely dismissed the scandal surrounding the Benghazi terrorist attack as merely leftover campaign politics: "...what we're seeing in the Petraeus scandal and the Benghazi issue being prolonged is an extension of some of the conflict and the bitterness that we had during the election campaign." [Listen to the audio or watch the video after the jump]

Harwood predicted the whole controversy would just go away: "I'm not sure what the resolution of that is going to be. I think ultimately that energy is going to get spent and lawmakers are going to turn to the real crisis that is looming over the American economy, which is the fiscal cliff..."

From Joe Scarborough to John Heilemann, Katty Kay to Mark Halperin to Willie Geist, it was unanimous on today's Morning Joe.  Whatever the substance, whatever the policy, Republicans would be making a massive political mistake by opposing the possible nomination of Susan Rice as Secretary of State.

Summed up Scarborough the MJ zeitgeist: "do a bunch of old white guys want to make their first big battle, post-election, a battle going up against a younger woman of color?" View the video after the jump. H/t reader cobokat.

CNN anchors have been turning to advocacy. Don Lemon didn't show a hint of journalistic integrity on Sunday's Newsroom as he ripped into conservative guest Will Cain and lectured him on the offensiveness of Mitt Romney's "gift" remarks, joining liberal journalist LZ Granderson in the leftist ambush.

"This is an astounding interview," Cain remarked, realizing he was outnumbered by two liberals. "I'm a little taken aback by the chorus of surprise. I really am. From both of you guys." Cain lashed out on Twitter after the ambush. [Video below the break. Audio here.]

This is all Americans need to know about just how disgraceful a "news network" MSNBC is.

A new study just released by the Pew Research Center found that in the final week of the just-ended presidential campaign, the "Lean Forward" network did absolutely no negative stories about President Obama or positive ones about Mitt Romney.

In an interview with liberal historian Doris Kearns-Goodwin for NBC's Press Pass, Meet the Press moderator David Gregory invited her to draw parallels between President Obama and Abraham Lincoln: "It seems like it's so hard to put Lincoln in a modern political context...But there is a leadership lesson that you think is important now and is important for President Obama embarking on a second term, as he seeks to be what he's always wanted to be, which is not just a president, but a great president."

Kearns-Goodwin used the newly released film about Lincoln to make the point: "Absolutely. I mean I think the timing of it couldn't be better. And it's just coincidence that it really happened to be....there's this great scene, it's not just a scene, but Lincoln's actual words, 'I am clothed with immense power. You will get this vote.' So a president is clothed in immense power if they use the leadership skills to make it happen."

Schlockumentary filmmaker Michael Moore had some straight talk for Barack Obama Monday.

In a letter to the President published at the perilously liberal Huffington Post, Moore advised Obama to "DRIVE THE RICH RIGHT OFF THEIR FISCAL CLIFF" while putting an end to "the s***ting on the poor."

It should come as no surprise to most people that MSNBC is a liberal network, but it appears as though they are now actively campaigning for the Democratic Party.  For several years, MSNBC has produced their own ads featuring numerous on-air personalities promoting different liberal causes.

 MSNBC’s latest ad, however, goes well beyond promotion of liberalism and has shifted into outright DNC promotion.  Narrated by ultra-liberal primetime host Rachel Maddow, the commercial is a litany of Democratic “achievements” essentially a mirror-image of the DNC platform.   [See video below page break.  MP3 audio here.] 

It took more than a month -- and an intervening presidential election -- but it appears as though MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough has finally joined the chorus of conservatives criticizing Candy Crowley for covering for President Obama’s false statements on Libya during the presidential debates. 

Speaking on Monday’s Morning Joe, Scarborough strongly rebuked the Obama administration’s handling of the post-Benghazi coverage.  [See video below page break.  MP3 audio here.]

It's rare that we take on liberal newspaper columnists. They're entitled to their opinions and no one expects them to adhere to a standard of objectivity. But on those occasions when a columnist transgresses the bounds of decency, we have to take note.

The Miami Herald's Leonard Pitts Jr. is one such opinion writer. In his November 17 column he argued some of the blame for a suicide in Key West, Florida, should be laid at the doorstep of conservative talk show hosts:

Last week it was Republican strategist Steve Schmidt blaming Mitt Romney's loss on conservative "loons and wackos," this week on Sunday's NBC Meet the Press, fellow Republican strategist Mike Murphy joined the media chorus demanding the GOP move left: "...if we don't modernize conservatism, we can go extinct....we've got to get kind of a party view of America that's not right out of Rush Limbaugh's dream journal." [Listen to the audio or watch the video after the jump]

Murphy explained how to "modernize" the party: "We alienate young voters because of gay marriage, we have a policy problem. We alienate Latinos – the fastest growing voter group in the country, because of our fetish on so-called amnesty....It's a fundamental rethink that begins with policy..." Moments later, he asserted: "...the biggest problem Mitt Romney had was the Republican primary. That's what's driving the Republican brand right now to a disaster."

When Barack Obama was campaigning for president in 2008, he and his supporters in the media claimed his election would create a post-racial America.

Far from accomplishing that, the United States appears more racially divided than it has in decades.