1600 Pennsylvania Avenue

Just how totally out of touch is MSNBC's Chris Matthews?

At the beginning of Wednesday's "Hardball," he said the actor who famously rode the bomb at the end of the classic film "Dr. Strangelove" was "Sam" Pickens (video follows with transcript and commentary):

MSNBC on Tuesday announced that anchor David Shuster has been "suspended indefinitely" after filming a pilot at CNN. If this is the end of the liberal host's tenure on MSNBC, he'll leave behind a long legacy of viciously attacking "conservative fear mongering."

During the Obama era, Shuster, supposedly a straight-news journalist, has been quick to deride the opponents of the President. On September 10, 2009, he smeared, "Look at the image of the Republican Party, all white males with short haircuts. They look sort of angry. No women, no minorities, and it looks like they've sort of become unhinged."

On his now-defunct program, 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, Shuster assailed conservatives and Republicans as totally irrational: "Plus, the nutty rhetoric continues from Rush Limbaugh, Michael Steele and Sarah Palin....How offensive can Rush Limbaugh be?"

A spokesperson for MSNBC told Politico today that the channel's brass has reprimanded David Shuster for derisive tweets he directed at James O'Keefe Tuesday. Within hours, he had retracted portions of his tweeted comments on air during an interview with Andrew Breitbart.

This humble blogger documented the Twitter exchange yesterday, and pointed out that Shuster was much quicker to assume O'Keefe's guilt than he was the guilt of Major Nidal Hasan, the shooter at Fort Hood.

“The comments were inappropriate. We have talked to David about them," said the MSNBC spokesperson, referring to a series of tweets that included this one: "a) you are not a journalist b) the truth is you intended to tap her phones c) it's a felony d) you will go to prison."

Shuster retracted his accusation that O'Keefe had attempted to tap the phones in Sen. Mary Landrieu's office on his show this afternoon after Breitbart blasted Shuster for his false accusations.

MSNBC host David Shuster has made it clear that he's left-of-center politically with his stands on social issues and his eagerness to ridicule conservatives. But yet he still maintains an anchor post for the network's mid-day regular news coverage.

But the former host of the network's now-canceled "1600 Pennsylvania Avenue" interviewed Rep. Mike Pence, R-Ind. on the issue of the day, health care and kicked it off with a loaded question and followed by repeatedly talking over the congressman and interrupting him. Shuster wanted to know why Pence was misleading his constituents that Medicare was government run.

"Congressman, first of all one of the themes you keep hearing from protesters is that they oppose government-run health care," Shuster said on MSNBC Aug. 12. "I understand that at your town hall at a Republican district, you got a standing ovation when you said to your constituents, ‘I oppose government-run health care.' But did you know that Medicare is government run? And why haven't you told that to your constituents?" he asked with a sarcastic tone in his voice.

"MSNBC News Live" host David Shuster railed against conservative "hypocrite" Newt Gingrich on Monday, resurrecting a segment from his cancelled program "1600 Pennsylvania Avenue." The cable anchor slammed the former House Speaker for calling Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor a racist on his Twitter page. Shuster noted that Gingrich supported Bush pick Sam Alito in 2006. He then played a clip of the then-nominee saying that when he has to rule on a discrimination case, Altio would think of people in his own family who have suffered bias.

Shuster derided, "Hey, Newt. When you embrace the empathy of a conservative judge, but call the empathy of a progressive judge racist, that's hypocrisy and it's wrong." Now, of course, the obvious difference is that Sotomayor didn't just acknowledge empathy, she asserted in a 2001 speech at the University of California, "I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experience would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn’t lived that life."

The stated concept of "Hypocrisy Watch" is to call out hypocritical politicians. On MSNBC, however, that usually means Republicans. An April 6, 2009 fax report by the MRC found that before Shuster's "1600 Pennsylvania Avenue" program was cancelled on April 2, the liberal anchor made conservatives/Republicans the target of "Hypocrisy Watch" 71 percent of the time. Liberals/Democrats accounted for only eight percent of those attacked. So, it's not particularly surprising that Shuster has returned to his old habits.

MSNBC anchor David Shuster appeared on Stephanie Miller's left-wing radio show on Thursday to praise the "brilliant," "informed," and "articulate" President Obama and trash the "atrocious" Fox News Channel. Shuster, who is on the same network as the extremely liberal Keith Olbermann, complained, "I mean, look, if Fox wants to consider themselves the GOP house organ, that's fine. They completely backed it up." [audio for download here]

Just getting warmed up, he continued, "When Fox starts describing themselves as journalists or a news organization, that’s where I think it’s appropriate to describe Fox as disgraceful." Shuster attacked the cable network, where he was a correspondent at from 1996 to 2002, for its "insanity." Getting around to the personalities on FNC, he derided, "The stuff that comes out of Sean Hannity's mouth has been infuriating. The stuff that Bill O'Reilly says has been illogical."

UPDATE AT END OF POST: Hilton Thanks Shuster; Shuster Attacks Prejean's Intellect

David Shuster, MSNBC anchor/journalist, now a part-time Biblical scholar?

The former host of the canceled MSNBC show "1600 Pennsylvania Avenue" has gone on an attack campaign against Miss USA runner-up, Miss California Carrie Prejean for her stance on the same-sex marriage issue and her newly formed alliance with the National Organization Marriage (NOM).

Shuster made the following posts on his Twitter site on April 30, including praising gossip blogger Perez Hilton, who hurled several hateful insults at Prejean:

For over two and a half months, MSNBC host David Shuster featured a segment called "Hypocrisy Watch" on his program "1600 Pennsylvania Avenue" that overwhelmingly singled out conservatives and Republicans as hypocrites, while ignoring Democratic offenders. An analysis by the Media Research Center finds that of the 48 "Hypocrisy Watch" segments, 34 went after conservatives or Republicans. Only four (or just under nine percent) attacked liberals or Democrats. (Only two editions could be described as bipartisan. Another wasn't political. The remaining seven segments all hit business and corporate-related targets.)

Amazingly, despite the fact that Republicans are completely out of power in Washington, 20 (or 40 percent) of the "Hypocrisy Watch" designations were given to congressional Republicans, either individually or to the GOP minority in general. The daily feature began on January 14 and Shuster asserted on that day, "...We will focus on an organization or person who clearly seems to be doing something that makes the term appropriate." Liberal hypocrisies, such as President Barack Obama signing a $410 billion spending bill loaded with thousands of earmarks despite decrying them during the campaign, have gone unnoticed. More often, the targets are conservatives such as Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal, Karl Rove or Congresswoman Michele Bachmann.

MSNBC's David Shuster appears to now sadly be taking tips from colleague Keith Olbermann, for on Wednesday the "1600 Pennsylvania Avenue" host did a segment bashing Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky) the text of which appears to be taken directly from a Daily Kos posting.

Even more absurd, both Shuster and the DKer conveniently cherry picked a statement made by McConnell back in 2006 that when put in the context of what was occurring on Capitol Hill at the time makes those pointing fingers look tremendously foolish.

Isn't it marvelous the far left have their own television network to funnel misinformation through?

But don't take my word for it. Let's first look at the video and transcript:

"1600 Pennsylvania Avenue" host David Shuster escalated his attack on Rush Limbaugh and other conservatives on Monday's show. In a tease for a segment on "GOP all stars," Shuster complained, "Plus, the nutty rhetoric continues from Rush Limbaugh, Michael Steele and Sarah Palin." In a later tease, he fretted, "Up next, how offensive can Rush Limbaugh be?"

The attack on Limbaugh was taken straight from a clip posted on the liberal Media Matters website on Friday. Limbaugh was discussing the flooding in North Dakota and made a joke about PC language and also a sly comment on how the Obama administration is dropping phrases such as the "war on terror." However, Shuster raged to guests Matt Lewis and Democratic strategist Chris Kofinis, "Rush Limbaugh referred- used the word dike when talking about flooding in North Dakota. But, that was not the context that he was using it. He was talking about Democratic female politicians. That kind of stuff, where does that- why do people listen to Rush Limbaugh?"

"1600 Pennsylvania Avenue" host David Shuster on Thursday intensified his obsession with former top Bush aide Karl Rove and made, for the fourth time, the political operative the subject of his "Hypocrisy Watch" segment. He also continued his habit of pointing out that Rove is now a paid contributor of Fox News. After noting that the ex-White House aide attacked Barack Obama in an op-ed for the "extremely conservative" Wall Street Journal, the MSNBC host attacked, "Karl, I appreciate that it may be difficult for you to wake up each day, given what you and your Bush administration colleagues did to this country." (Rove earned Shuster's ire for suggesting in the WSJ piece that Obama has been disingenuous in how he's argued for his economic policies. The MSNBC host mostly ignored the context of Rove's article.)

Shuster once was a serious, supposedly straight journalist who, from 2002 through 2008, reported for the "NBC Nightly News" and "Today," among other programs. However, since taking over hosting duties for "1600" in December, his tone has morphed into that of almost every other extremely liberal host on MSNBC. On March 6, he lashed out at Rove for criticizing the Obama administration over the Rush Limbaugh controversy. Placing Rove in the "Hypocrisy Watch," a segment supposedly designed to go after any hypocritical politician or public figure, Shuster derided, "Karl, you've spent your entire career putting politics ahead of everything else. When you now complain about the Obama White House playing politics with the GOP, your whining is hypocrisy and it's wrong."

Both MSNBC’s David Shuster and CNN’s Rick Sanchez pulled their scoop straight from Media Matters’ blog, and focused on Newt Gingrich’s Twitter comments criticizing President Obama’s upcoming commencement address at the University of Notre Dame, instead of the controversy over the speech itself. Shuster targeted the former Speaker of the House during the “Hypocrisy Watch” segment on Tuesday’s 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue program, saying that Gingrich was “already telling Notre Dame what to do,” even though he wasn’t Catholic yet and had gone through two divorces.
                                    
Almost a day later on Wednesday’s Newsroom program on CNN, Sanchez devoted a whole segment to Gingrich’s Tweet, and also brought up the divorce issue: “Newt Gingrich couldn’t resist taking a shot at President Obama. He seems to infer that the president shouldn’t talk to a Catholic university because of quote, ‘values.’ Should Newt Gingrich, thrice married, go there? Really?”

"Countdown With Keith Olbermann" guest host David Shuster slipped an incredible claim into Monday's program when he highlighted "independent reports" showing that presidential candidate Barack Obama received harsher media scrutiny than did John McCain during the 2008 election.

As a way of introducing a discussion on why the President didn't attend the 2009 Gridiron dinner (a longstanding occasion for journalists and politicians) on Saturday, the MSNBC anchor oddly suggested, "Even though independent reports have shown the media was more critical of Barack Obama than John McCain during the presidential contest, there is still a fantasy that the press is gaga over now-President Obama." What independent reports? He didn't say. It's possible that Shuster was referring to a Center for Media and Public Affairs report from August of 2008. They claimed that, through the first six weeks of the general election, McCain received more favorable coverage. [Updated 2009-03-25 15:32:49 to reflect CMPA study.]

"1600 Pennsylvania Avenue" host David Shuster continued to obsess over and taunt Karl Rove on Tuesday's program, even taking the fight to Twitter. Shuster, who has named Rove a hypocrite three times so far in his daily "Hypocrisy Watch" segment, appeared gleeful that "Bush's Brain finally did respond via Twitter." The political operative told Shuster, through the social networking site, simply to "wait until the book. You're in there."

Shuster retorted on his Twitter page by sarcastically instructing Rove, "Next time, try defending yourself 'like a man,' - mano y mano as I've repeatedly invited you to do." It's odd that Shuster would expect Rove to come on the MSNBC program, considering that he has heaped nothing but invective on the former Bush aide.

The anger and outrage over $165 million in bonuses paid out to American International Group (AIG) executives has many upset and outraged, but it also has some scratching their head wondering where that same emotion is over the entire government spending/bailout culture that has encapsulated Washington, D.C.

Earlier on March 17, CNBC reporter Rick Santelli suggested on CNBC's "Squawk Box" some of this outrage could be purely political. However, liberal talk radio host Ed Schultz said on MSNBC's March 17 "1600 Pennsylvania Avenue," host by David Shuster, this "outrage" is welcomed by President Barack Obama.

"David, I think the Obama administration wants this public outrage," Schultz said. "It's an issue of timing right now. They couldn't have stopped the money to AIG."

"1600 Pennsylvania Avenue" host David Shuster on Monday worried that "conservative fear mongering" about President Barack Obama could be "seriously dangerous." A graphic for the segment hyperbolically read, "Stoking Hatred?" Shuster brought on Republican strategist Brad Blakeman and Democratic counterpart Chris Kofinis to discuss the topic. [audio available here]

In a tease for the piece, Shuster played clips of former Vice President Dick Cheney asserting that Obama has made America less safe and of Fox News host Glenn Beck. The MSNBC anchor asked, "The inflammatory rhetoric from the wing nuts, is it merely entertaining or seriously dangerous?" With a complete lack of irony, Shuster spoke of FNC's Beck and wondered, "Shouldn't there be some standards at some of these other networks? I mean, that's a problem, isn't it? There's no standards." Keep in mind, on May 14, 2008, Shuster's colleague Keith Olbermann accused then-President Bush of "murderous deceit" and told him to "shut the hell up!" Would that be an example of the "standards" that Mr. Shuster would like to see?

"1600 Pennsylvania Avenue" host David Shuster on Wednesday stepped up his attacks on Rush Limbaugh and suggested that if congressional Republicans "align themselves with Rush's statements about wanting the President to fail, they appear unpatriotic." For the second day in a row, Shuster berated a conservative guest about the radio talk show host. He repeatedly encouraged former White House press secretary Ari Fleischer to disagree with Limbaugh and complained, "And, Ari, first of all, when Rush says that all Republicans want the President to fail, Limbaugh's wrong, right?" [Audio available here.]

At one point, Shuster wondered why Republicans couldn't just denounce the "childish" comments by the radio host. He then seriously suggested that GOP members should say, "And we need to isolate Rush Limbaugh because we do have important issues to talk about." Later in the segment, the MSNBC anchor reiterated his assertion that Republicans might be unpatriotic. He challenged, "Ari, is it unpatriotic for somebody to say they hope the President fails?" After interrupting a responding Fleischer, he continued, "...Is it unpatriotic- since patriotism was such a crucial theme in the run-up to the Iraq war in the way the Bush White House defended it- is it unpatriotic to say that you hope the President fails?"

"1600 Pennsylvania Avenue" host David Shuster on Tuesday repeatedly pestered Texas Congressman Ron Paul to publicly attack Rush Limbaugh and seemed frustrated when "even" the outspoken representative wouldn't give him what he wanted. After wondering "why it's so difficult" for Republicans to disagree with the talk show host's assertion that he wants Barack Obama's policies to fail, Shuster repeated the same question over and over. He complained, "How can we have that argument [about other issues], when even you, Ron Paul, are not willing to take this opportunity to say when Rush Limbaugh says that every Republican wants President Obama to fail, Rush Limbaugh is wrong?"

He continued, "How can we have the next conversation if you're not willing to have that first one?" Paul, refusing to allow Shuster to guide the debate, snapped back, "Because you want to control the semantics and the definitions." He added, "And, you know, in the media you like to personalize and then have a fight going on and that's the way politics works." The conversation didn't seem to be going the way Shuster had intended. Later, he derided, "It just seems, congressman, like so many Republicans are terrified of Rush Limbaugh. We're just trying to explore that."