NBC's "Saturday Night Live" offered viewers a parody movie trailer of the disaster film "2012" Saturday evening.

The premise: former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin and Fox News host Glenn Beck have been elected President and Vice President, and the world is coming to an end as a result.

In an apparent attempt at fairness and balance -- or maybe the real point! -- the "credits" jokingly showed the film was created by the DNC (Democratic National Committee) and authored by MSNBC's Keith Olbermann - "A Political Disaster of Epic Proportions."

"On Election Day 2012, Planet Earth is Going Rogue" (video embedded below the fold, h/t our old friend Ms Underestimated):

NBC's "Saturday Night Live" really went after President Obama in its opening sketch Saturday evening.

Not only that, his policies involving economic stimulus, healthcare reform, and Cash for Clunkers were also exposed as having absolutely no positive or future impact on unemployment.

The setup was Obama, played by Fred Armisen, doing a press conference with Chinese President Hu Jintao, played by Bill Hader.

As Jintao, through interpreter played by Nasim Pedrad, realized how much money the United States owes China, he questioned how we were going to pay them back if Obama's policies "to save money involve spending even more money."

Realizing he's being lied to, Jintao asked Obama to kiss him - "I like to be kissed when someone is doing sex to me!" (video embedded below the fold courtesy Story Balloon):

Some vindication for Sarah Palin in the midst of non-stop media hostility. On Monday night's Late Show with David Letterman, guest Seth Myers, the head writer for Saturday Night Live who also anchors the comedy show's 'Weekend Update' fake newscast, noted how in her new book she asserts that during her guest appearance on the NBC show, just before the election, “that we had taken her mantra, 'drill baby drill,' and tried to make a rude double-entendre about it.”

Myers offered his verdict on the allegation, quipping: “I just want to come here tonight on the record and say that's one hundred percent true.” He recited the original proposed line for a rap: “When we're in Wassila it's chill baby chilla; In the bedroom with Todd it's drill baby drilla.”

Audio: MP3 clip

Fox News' Glenn Beck isn't catching a break anywhere - from "Saturday Night Live," The New Yorker, Al Gore's Current TV and Comedy Central's "South Park." They have all taken shots at the popular TV host.

On his Nov. 16 program, Beck responded to the "South Park" interpretation of him - that he wasn't making accusations, but phrasing them in the form of a question. The show's character Eric Cartman played a spoof of Beck in which he railed against his school's president, Wendy Testaburger. Beck maintained he wasn't making the "accusations" in the form of a question - but playing the words of the "accused" themselves.

"Have we gotten to a place you can't ask questions?" Beck asked. "What were my crazy accusations or questions? Well, the accusation was that Van Jones was a communist revolutionary," Beck said. "I didn't describe him that way. In his own words he described himself that way. He was a 9/11 Truther. He was forced to step down. Was it that the administration was using NEA as a propaganda arm for the administration? That was a question. We played tapes of the call with Yosi Sargent and Yosi Sargent had to step down."

In its opening sketch last night, NBC's "Saturday Night Live" mocked Vice President Joe Biden and healthcare reform.

With the President out of the country for a week, Biden, played by Jason Sudeikis, has picked the lock on the Oval Office in order to get something big done while Obama is gone.

He opted not to solve what's going on in Afghanistan because it's "a mess - it can't be fixed...It's worse than Scranton."

As for fixing the economy, "We already did it...The stimulus is working."

With that in mind, Biden opted to reform healthcare by "[caving] in like crazy!...The President wants to pass a healthcare bill so bad that he will literally sign anything" (video embedded below the fold, h/t Story Balloon): 

"Saturday Night Live" in its recent installment took shots at the Fox News Channel for what it saw as an amazingly one-sided, anti-Obama take on Tuesday's election results.

The skit began with an off-screen announcer declaring, "You're watching Fox News, continuous coverage of the 2009 election -- end of an era."

On screen at that moment was a picture of President Obama above a graphic which read, "End Of An Era."

Actress Kristin Wiig, doing a marvelous impersonation of Greta Van Susteren, then hosted a discussion on the election results which included one-sided opinions from actors impersonating Glenn Beck, Brit Hume, Karl Rove, Shepard Smith, Joe Trippi, and Juan Williams.

The group was ecstatic over what happened in New Jersey and Virginia, but chose not to discuss Democrat Bill Owens victory in New York's 23rd Congressional district (video embedded below the fold h/t Story Balloon):

Where is Tina Fey now that we need her?

Martha Coakley is the front-runner for the Dem nomination for Ted Kennedy's old Senate seat.  In a recent debate, asked about her lack of foreign policy experience, the first credential Coakley offered in response was that "I have a sister who lives overseas, and she's been in England and now lives in the Middle East."

This ought to get the folks at the left-wing noise machine all wound up.

Fox News host Glenn Beck on his Oct. 14 show, after being a regular recipient of MSNBC host Keith Olbermann's "Worst Persons in the World" on his "Countdown" program, decided to have a little fun by mocking Olbermann and his MSNBC colleague Chris Matthews.

Beck mocked Olbermann's "Shakespearean" performance he puts on nightly on his "Countdown" program and also mocked Chris Matthews for his February 2008 "Obama gave me a thrill up my leg" comments.

"Now, the President has an entire network devoted to singing his praises," Beck said. "There is a guy at night I love, he's like Shakespearean, he is waxing poetic about his oratory skills, writing soliloquies - got another one I must say about the greatness of Obama's speaking ability. And then another guy is like, ‘I got a thrill is going up my leg' when they just hear him speak. It is incredible."

On September 25, NewsBusters asked, "Will SNL take off the gloves and set its sights on the suddenly stumbling, bumbling President?"

On October 3, we got our answer, for on the most recent installment of NBC's "Saturday Night Live," the opening sketch absolutely skewered Barack Obama for having accomplished absolutely nothing since Inauguration Day.

In fact, according to actor Fred Armisen portraying Obama, his two biggest achievements thus far are "JACK and SQUAT!" (video embedded below the fold with partial transcript, h/t Story Balloon):

On Thursday, NBC's "Saturday Night Live" spin-off "Weekend Update Thursday" mocked President Obama as being willing to discuss healthcare reform on virtually any cable channel that will have him -- except, of course, Fox News.

Although the opening skit did poke fun at FNC's Glenn Beck, the real joke was that the President, having just done Sunday interviews on ABC, CBS, CNN, NBC, and Univision, wanted to "get the healthcare message out to as wide an audience as possible. I don't want to shut anyone out of this debate."

After that statement, Fred Armisen playing Obama sat down with representatives from ESPN, Bravo, MTV, The Food Network, and even a teenage vampire from The CW, but continually said "No" to meeting with anyone from Fox News (video embedded below the fold):

Stop the presses! 

A member of the mainstream media actually said something nice about Alaska Governor Sarah Palin.

I kid you not: "Saturday Night Live" senior producer Marci Klein said during an interview last week, "This is the most confident person I've ever met."

Certainly not the impression created by CBS's Katie Couric or ABC's Charlie Gibson, wouldn't you agree?

Appearing on Julie Menin's "Give and Take," Klein had absolutely nothing but nice things to say about the press's current public enemy #1 (video embedded below the fold with partial transcript, relevant section at 2:25):

Chris Matthews, on Monday's "Hardball," showcased "Saturday Night Live" skewering Joe Biden but he conspicuously ignored the "Weekend Update" clip, from the same show, making fun of his fondness for Obama in which he was depicted as daydreaming about Obama in a "loin cloth." The MRC's Brent Baker caught the clip from this past Saturday's show making fun of Matthews. However Matthews -- who in the past has enjoyed SNL's Darrell Hammond's impersonations of him so much that he invited the impressionist on his MSNBC show -- ignored the most recent quip made at his expense.

The following moment was aired during the "Sideshow" segment on the April 13 edition of "Hardball":

MSNBC's Chris Matthews, infamous for getting a “thrill” up his leg while drinking in a speech by Barack Obama and his ongoing adoration for the President (“He is the new us!”), became the punch line of a joke on NBC's own Saturday Night Live.

During the Weekend Update segment on the April 11 show, SNL's news anchor, Seth Myers, delivered this “news” item, illustrated by a creative matching graphic:

A new comic is being published this summer called 'Barack the Barbarian' which features the President in a loin cloth. Also featuring the President in a loin cloth: Chris Matthews' daydreams.

Not that much of a stretch. Or maybe no stretch at all.

"Saturday Night Live" has always made politicians’ policies and missteps the butt of jokes, but the popular NBC show stooped too far on Dec.13, when it made fun of a governor’s disability.

On Saturday, Seth Meyers’ “Weekend Update” bit featured a sketch with Fred Armisen playing New York’s Democratic Governor David Paterson. Armisen played the role of the mostly blind Paterson with one eye half closed, and was shown needing help finding the desk right in front of him.

Update 11-25 8:20 AM: Morning Joe Makes SNL References -- see discussion at foot.

Call it "The Wild 'n Crazy Guy–Billionaire Style."  Maria Bartiromo's interview of Saudi Prince Alwaleed, the largest shareholder of Citigroup, is literally a Saturday Night Live skit waiting—begging—to happen.

CNBC's Bartiromo conducted the interview by remote this afternoon. When the camera went to the prince in Riyadh, you might have expected to find him in a TV studio, or perhaps in his business office, maybe even in one of his palace rooms.  But no, there he was sitting outdoors, apparently by his stables, with seated camels and sleek horses very visible in the background.   And rather than being attired in business or traditional Saudi dress, the Prince was duded up with an open collar, tinted glasses and a scarf warding off the desert's cool night air.  He could be seen occasionally fingering what appeared to be golden worry beads.

View video here.

"Saturday Night Live" absolutely skewered MSNBC's Keith Olbermann last night accurately depicting the "Countdown" host as a pompous, dishonest buffoon who regularly takes things completely out of context, or just plain makes things up, in order to lambast Republicans.

Frankly, it was shocking to see an NBC program so aggressively attack a fellow employee, and to watch the excessively liberal actor Ben Affleck, playing the part of Olbermann, participate in the skit.

This must-see video is embedded below the fold with a rough transcript:

McCain returned to offer some new, last-minute campaign strategies on "Weekend Update" (video embedded below the fold):

Busybody Keith Olbermann couldn't wait to see how Saturday Night Live was going to portray him. So, says Politico.com's Michael Calderone, he apparently breached the show's (I thought) tight security to find out.

And of course, when contacted, the MSNBC host took yet another cheap shot at his personal obsession, Sarah Palin. It was just a few weeks ago on NBC's Sunday Night Football that Olbermann made a Palin Derangement Syndrome-betraying allusion when describing the mental condition of a just-injured NFL quarterback.

Here is most of Calderone's brief item:

In a just released study, "A Study in Character Assassination: How the TV Networks Have Portrayed Sarah Palin as Dunce or Demon," CMI analysts found that ABC, CBS and NBC are airing 18 negative stories for every one positive story on Sarah Palin, the Republican vice-presidential candidate.

Is it any wonder that polls revealed a 17 percent increase in Palin's unfavorability ratings in just one month? 

After examining the TV news coverage of Palin from September 29 to October 12, CMI found that ABC, NBC and CBS news shows ran 69 stories about Palin.  2 stories were positive, 37 were negative and 30 were neutral.  The 2 positive stories were a two-part interview with Palin's parents on the CBS Early Show.  Not one of the major network evening news programs - ABC's World News, NBC's Nightly News, and CBS's Evening News - ran a single positive story about Palin.

ABC was hardest on Palin, as 60 percent of its stories on Palin were negative.  NBC came in second, as 54 percent of its stories were negative.  CBS also ran 54 percent negative stories, but also ran the only two positive stories (8 percent). 

CMI found that the networks promoted three major narratives about Palin:

Chevy Chase, who has had a distinctly unfunny disposition for years, is so aggravated by Sarah Palin that he claims it was a big mistake to let her on Saturday Night Live. Chase, who also claims the biggest mistake of his life was leaving SNL after only a little over a year there, let his feelings be known in Access Hollywood:

NEW YORK, New York --

As a former cast member and “Weekend Update” anchor, Chevy Chase knows something about “Saturday Night Live” – and he wasn’t impressed by what he saw this Saturday night, when Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin made a much-hyped appearance.

“Quite frankly, it’s a big mistake to let her go on,” Chevy told Access Hollywood at the Give Food a Chance benefit in New York. “What was brilliant about [‘SNL’ chief] Lorne [Michaels] was that he had nothing written for Sarah and that apparently she cannot improvise herself out of a paper bag!”