MSNBC

One of the most blatant and disgusting blackouts of the Kermit Gosnell murder trial occurred on MSNBC on April 11.  Appearing on Jansing & Co. on Friday morning, former Governor Ed Rendell (D-Pa.) appeared with Republican strategist Chip Saltsman to discuss changing trends in support for abortion, yet host Chris Jansing did not ask the former governor (and former Philadelphia mayor) about the murder trial for the notorious abortionist in his state. 

Gosnell is currently on trial, charged with murdering seven babies and a female patient at his abortion clinic in Philadelphia.  If convicted, he could face the death penalty.  Despite the horrific nature of the crimes Gosnell is accused of committing, including forcing women to endure labor and then deliver live babies that were killed by staff with scissors, the liberal media all but ignored the story altogether, although that may be changing with CNN's Anderson Cooper pledging to delve into the trial tonight.

"CNN and MSNBC, as we can see with the gun control debate are openly promoting not just gun control but the president's gun control agenda and calling it news," NewsBusters publisher Brent Bozell argued on the April 11 edition of Hannity, where he appeared for the popular weekly Media Mash segment. Reacting to the fact that MSNBC's Morning Joe program gave Vice President Biden an entire three-hour program yesterday to push for more gun control, Bozell added that the bias is so endemic that it must be addressed at the corporate level of media ownership, as the so-called news networks are pushing a political agenda, not relaying information and giving time for both sides of the debate.

For the benefit of his viewers at home, Fox News host Sean Hannity played clips of Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.V.) and Vice President Joe Biden praising CNN and MSNBC respectively for their biased coverage. "We appreciate your support too, this is very, very important," Manchin told the anchors of Thursday's edition of CNN's Starting Point.  Mr. Vice President, thank you so much," faux conservative Joe Scarborough told the vice president as he wrapped up the April 11 Morning Joe, thanking him for a "great discussion." "No, thank you!" Biden shot back. "No, no, no, no, no. You have changed the debate in America.... The two guys that deserve, if anything gets done [on gun control] - an award here are you and Michael Bloomberg." [watch the video below]

Hardball's Chris Matthews on Thursday again smeared pro-Second Amendment Senators, this time comparing them to "Jim Crow" racists. While talking about GOP politicians who threatened to filibuster the current gun control bill, Matthews spewed, "But you remember when they fought in the early '60s about, about Jim Crow and getting rid of all those racial things down south where it says white only at the gas station, men's room and everything?"

Talking to journalist Chuck Todd, Matthews continued, "And that was the old states of the confederacy were against any of those changes. But now is there that large a body of Republicans out there that are truly being represented by the don't-even-vote crowd?" Apparently, Matthews has again forgotten that it was the Democratic Party that represented the segregationist south. [UPDATED with video below. MP3 audio here.]

MSNBC's Joe Scarborough got an endorsement Thursday that he might live to regret.

In an exclusive Morning Joe interview with Joe Biden, the Vice President told Scarborough, "The two guys that deserve - if anything gets done [on gun control] - an award here are you and Michael Bloomberg" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Is it MSNBC or MSDNC?  Andrew Kirell of Mediaite reported today that the left-wing commentary network has hired the Democratic National Committee’s director of video production, Anne Thompson, to produce the network’s newest weekend show Up with Steve Kornacki.  Yet, this is just another episode in the annals of MSNBC’s revolving door of hiring Obamaites.  MSNBC has already hired David Axelrod and Robert Gibbs, two high-level Obama campaign advisors. On top of that, other Obama acolytes Like Ben LaBolt are recurring guests on shows like Now with Alex Wagner.

If MSNBC’s president, Phil Griffin, was really trying to distance himself from the Democratic Party, this was a poor decision.  Griffin has been trying to dispel the fledgling narrative that his network is nothing more than a communications outlet for the DNC.

It appears as though MSNBC’s war on women agenda has found a new target, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.).  The subject of this controversy comes from the liberal Mother Jones magazine, which obtained audio of a McConnell campaign meeting discussing a potential challenge from Ashley Judd for Senate and preparing a dossier on weaknesses she has as a candidate.

The liberal media, particularly MSNBC, have been busy using the leaked audio as an occasion to bludgeon McConnell, but MSNBC Live host Thomas Roberts took things a step further on his April 10 program by posing a question to his audience obviously devised as a call to the liberal actress to get back into the game and run for Senate in 2014 after all:

Was Senator Minority Leader Mitch McConnell’s campaign office bugged or do they have a mole on their team? Lots of finger pointing over those secret strategy tapes making fun of actress Ashley Judd if she were to throw her hat in the ring and run against him. And that leads our question of the day for you. Should Ashley Judd reconsider running now that Mitch McConnell’s opposition playbook has been revealed?

On Tuesday's The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell, MSNBC host O'Donnell fretted that people "suffer deprivations" in the United States because the U.S. is the "world's biggest tax haven" with a relatively low tax burden compared to other countries. After showing his viewers a chart recounting that the U.S. ranks 31st in the percentage of the economy the government collects in taxes, O'Donnell added:

Karen Finney’s days as a Democratic National Committee spokeswoman are over, but you would never know that by listening to her speak in her current role as MSNBC contributor. On Saturday’s Weekends with Alex Witt, Finney essentially reprised her role as DNC press secretary during a discussion with former Rep. Tom Davis (R-Va.) about President Obama’s proposed budget.

Host Alex Witt asked Finney how tough it would be for the president to get his own party on board with his budget proposal, given that many Democrats are upset about the proposed cuts to Medicare and Social Security. Finney ignored the question, instead using it as a chance to attack House Speaker John Boehner and the GOP. “I think [Boehner’s] reaction basically showed that Republicans are not at all sincere about wanting to work with the president. They won't accept the balanced approach," she groused. [Video below. MP3 audio here.]

Maybe MSNBC was trying to deflect some of the controversy surrounding Melissa Harris-Perry's previous "Lean Forward" promo by pushing out a new one. MH-P had provoked outrage in that earlier promo by proclaiming that "kids belong to their communities," not to their parents.

But if anything, the new promo aired during today's Morning Joe just adds fuel to MH-P's socialist fire. While claiming to defend meritocracy, Harris-Perry could only grudgingly admit that the most successful should earn "a little more." She then proceeded to proclaim as a right "health care, education, decent housing and quality food at all times."  From each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs, anyone?  View the video after the jump.

With his penchant for ripping Republicans rather than Democrats, Joe Scarborough likely long ago ruined his chances of winning a Republican primary.  But the Morning Joe host today jokingly acknowledged how particularly tough it would now be, after Harry Reid yesterday approvingly quoted him on the Senate floor.

Ever since Newtown, Scarborough has been waging a daily campaign for gun control, repeatedly scourging Republicans for their opposition to President Obama's proposals. Quoth Reid: "Scarborough tears into GOP filibuster on gun bill, and I quote, 'is anybody awake in my party?'" View the video after the jump.

Chris Matthews and former Republican National Committee chairman Michael Steele got into a heated debate Tuesday over the Hardball host painting the GOP with "one brush."

At the end of the segment, Steele said, "You're not having a broad-based discussion any longer. You're becoming a cartoon of the cartoon" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

On Monday's All In show on MSNBC, host Chris Hayes praised Britain's "beloved" national health care program as possibly "one of the great hallmarks of western social democracy," as he admitted to delivering criticism from a liberal point of view of former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher's administration.

In what is a rare occurrence on MSNBC, one of the panelists actually challenged the conventional liberal view on one of its daytime shows.  The most recent example occurred on Now w/ Alex Wagner on April 9, when Ron Fournier of National Journal rejected the panel’s arguments that the Plan B pill should be available over-the-counter to all girls, regardless of age.

The segment began with host Alex Wagner seemingly perplexed at the Obama Administration’s initial position that girls under 17 should have to obtain a prescription for Plan B.  Wagner commented that:

MSNBC's Melissa Harris-Perry this afternoon took to her blog on the network's website to "double down" on her recent "Lean Forward" spot in which she lamented that we as Americans don't have a view of our "collective" responsibility to the nation's children.

From start to finish, the Tulane professor played the victim of right-wing persecution, even closing with a link to Matthew 5:44, where Jesus commands his followers to "love [their] enemies and pray for those who persecute [them]." Here's how Harris-Perry opened her April 9 blog (emphasis mine):

Al Sharpton on Monday said one of the funniest things uttered on MSNBC this year.

Talking with Chris Matthews immediately after President Obama's speech in Hartford, Connecticut, Sharpton said - with a straight face no less! - "We’re not engaging in Americans hating each other" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

According to BuzzFeed, the gay son of a Republican congressman claims both CNN and MSNBC canceled interviews with him after he refused to criticize his father, who opposes same-sex marriage, on the air. He said CNN producers were "gung ho" about an interview before they changed their mind.

CNN's Piers Morgan Live and MSNBC's The Last Word were the two shows that reportedly canceled on Matt R. Salmon, son of Rep. Matt Salmon (R-Ariz.). Sources from both networks responded to BuzzFeed, denying that they dropped him because of his refusal to criticize his father.

Someone at NBC News really has to take a serious look at the things coming out of Martin Bashir's mouth.

On Monday's MSNBC program bearing his name, the host actually asked a Democratic Congressman if a family member of a Republican Senator is going to have to be killed in order to prevent a filibuster on gun control legislation (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Joe Scarborough’s vitriolic language against conservatives appears to have entered a fever pitch on April 8, as the MSNBC host disgustingly asserted that the GOP cares more about a rapist’s rights than parent’s rights. The faux conservative host of Morning Joe made such a charge in his attack on Republicans planning to filibuster a federal gun control bill.

Scarborough, who along with the rest of MSNBC -- save S.E. Cupp -- has been on a gun-control tirade over the past several months, on their show Monday ranted that:

We’ve got an issue that is a 92-7 issue and I can't believe that Republicans, first of all, aren't going to support it but, secondly won't let background checks against rapists, people who have committed manslaughter in the past, people with mental illness, dangerous mental illness.  [See video after jump.  MP3 audio here.]

MSNBC continued the bashing of Margaret Thatcher on Monday. Richard Wolffe, a British journalist and editor of the network's website, smeared the late prime minister as "the antithesis of freedom" when it came to how she dealt with her domestic enemies. The liberal reporter sneered that the Conservative politician "hurt working families and working people." Now host Alex Wagner even went so far as to quote arch-socialist Ken Livingstone while attacking Thatcher.

Speaking of the woman who was instrumental in bringing about the end of the totalitarian threat of Soviet Communism, Wolffe, a former correspondent for Newsweek, excoriated, "She had an attitude to her domestic enemies that frankly was the antithesis of freedom." [See video below. MP3 audio here.] The journalist summarized Thatcher as "someone who was a pioneer for women, who actually also hurt working families and working people and that includes teachers and women across the board."

Melissa Harris-Perry declaring in an ad that we must “break through” the “private notion” that “your kid is yours” because “kids belong to whole communities” is an outrage. This isn’t what Mediaite called “a collection of tired progressive cliches on steroids.” This is shredding the notion of family, replacing it with the commands of the state.

MSNBC has awarded itself a new acronym: My Son Needs to Belong to the Collective. How do you sell a private network with this dreadful collectivist advertising?

Leave it to MSNBC to bring its perhaps most vile ultra-liberal daytime host to make the first comments following the death of former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. Speaking with host Chuck Todd and the BBC’s Katty Kay, Bashir sharply smeared the legacy of the Iron Lady, calling her tenure very divisive and one that promoted selfishness. 

The segment began with Bashir -- who has no qualms about calling living conservatives Stalinesque -- giving liberal talking points as to why he disliked the career of Thatcher:

On Thursday, NewsBusters exposed Melissa Harris-Perry saying in an MSNBC "Lean Forward" ad, "We have to break through our kind of private idea that kids belong to their parents or kids belong to their families and recognize that kids belong to their communities."

Former Alaska governor Sarah Palin tweeted her displeasure about this remark Saturday:

Something very rare and equally odd happened on MSNBC Friday.

Not only did an anchor criticize President Barack Obama on the air - horrors! - All In host Chris Hayes also accused the current White House resident of engaging in what he called "crazy vagina politics" (video follows with LexisNexis transcript and commentary):

MSNBC’s blatant promotion of gay marriage appears to have taken a bizarre and sad turn.  Krystal Ball, co-host of The Cycle, has taken to using her four-year-old daughter Ella as a prop in a pro-same-sex marriage video.

In the 3-minute video, Ball asks her young daughter a series of questions about who she is allowed to marry, eventually asking her what happens if she loves another girl.  Ball’s daughter, who is clearly taking cues from her mom, says that because she lives in New York she can marry another girl if she loves her.  [See video after jump.]

MSNBC’s newest liberal darling Chris Hayes has just been given a promotion, going from weekend anchor to host of his own primetime show, All In w/ Chris Hayes.  So how does he celebrate? By arguing that Guantanamo detainees should be paid restitution and allowed to live in the United States, with a path, ultimately to citizenship, of course.

In an article posted on MSNBC.com, Hayes criticized Guantanamo Bay’s continued existence in a piece entitled, “Time for radical action on Guantanamo.”  Hayes, who railed against Obama’s failure to keep his promise to close the prison in Cuba, argues that:

The dozens of men who have been cleared by the United States government for release should be released immediately, should be paid restitution, and offered legal residence in the United States.

Clueless Chris Matthews stepped into it this week when he expressed shock that women actually fear domestic violence. After watching the clip on the "Media Mash" segment on Fox News Channel's April 3 edition of Hannity, NewsBusters publisher Brent Bozell observed "It is a head scratcher because he spent all of last year and all of 2011 telling us that there was a war on women." [video embedded below the page break]

"He doesn't understand that there are -- in 2010, there were 765,000 cases documented of attacks on women. So suddenly he's oblivious to that," the Media Research Center founder observed. Host Sean Hannity also addressed the latest incident where Chris Matthews tried to tar conservatives with murderous violence, this time the slayings of prosecutors in Texas that may be connected to the Aryan Brotherhood. Responding to that video, Bozell observed:

On Thursday, MSNBC host Andrea Mitchell celebrated five years of her 1 p.m. ET hour show, Andrea Mitchell Reports, with highlight reels and congratulatory messages from her NBC colleagues. The accolades for Mitchell followed five years of her using the program to routinely praise liberals and bash conservatives.

Here is a sampling of how Mitchell's supposed news show often devolved into left-wing commentary:

On March 23, my colleague Mark Finkelstein noted how MSNBC's Melissa Harris-Perry considers the unborn child a "thing" which takes a "lot of money" to "turn into a human," costing thousands of dollars to care for each year of his/her life. Now it appears that Harris-Perry thinks that, after they're born, children fundamentally belong to the state.

Narrating a new MSNBC "Lean Forward" spot, the Tulane professor laments that we in America  "haven't had a very collective notion that these are our children." "[W]e have to break through our kind of private idea that kids belong to their parents or kids belong to their families, and recognize that kids belong to their communities," Harris-Perry argued.

MSNBC's Chris Matthews had quite a heated debate Thursday with Larry Pratt, the executive director of Gun Owners of America.

At the end of a highly-contentious Hardball segment, Pratt told his host that he's against all background checks "because we don't trust people like you" (video follows with transcript):