CNBC

UPDATE: Audio of crowd booing GE CEO available here.

General Electric held its annual shareholders meeting Wednesday, and attendees apparently were very upset with the increasing leftward tilt of MSNBC.

According to the Hollywood Reporter, during the question and answer phase of the meeting, shareholders repeatedly brought up the company's far-left leaning network, and often had their microphones turned off as a result.

Here are highlights from the THR report (link loading slowly due to appearance at the Drudge Report):

It was either an effort to avoid blaming individuals for ill-advised borrowing or an effort to vilify the banking system, but a segment on the April 20 "CBS Evening News" took a very one-sided view of credit-card lending. 

On a day bank stocks struggled and dragged the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) down nearly 300 points, "Evening News" scrutinized the current state of the banking system's credit-card lending. According to anchor Katie Couric, that sell-off of bank stocks occurred as a result of the realization the institutions would be forced to cover bad loans.

"Wall Street had been on a six-week winning streak, but today it suffered its worst drop in two months as investors rushed to sell bank stocks," Couric said. "[T]he sell-off came after Bank of America reported earnings of more than $2.8 billion last quarter, but that good news was offset by the word that the bank has set aside more than $13 billion to cover its losses from bad loans made in the past."

Despite all the criticisms of the Fox News Channel broadcasted on MSNBC for promoting tea party coverage, one thing hasn't been pointed out - how the NBC networks, including CNBC and MSNBC are given a pass for their shameless promotion of their Green Week and Green is Universal network events.

Jonah Goldberg, editor-at-large for National Review and author of "Liberal Fascism," appeared on Fox News Channel's April 18 "Fox News Watch" and commented on FNC's promotion of the tea parties, but the double standard of MSNBC's criticism of Fox News.

"I think that there's a perfectly legitimate criticism against Fox for not so much the coverage, but the commercials, you know - promoting the coverage, which was in effect advertisements for these things," Goldberg explained. "But, this was all transparent, people knew that's Fox was doing. But let's flashback to what GE, to pick up a point that Jim [Pinkerton] made - that GE basically issued a fatwa to NBC for Green Week, where they did hundreds of hours of environmental messaging in all of their dramas, news coverage, "Today" show - throughout the network and it was all hailed as a wonderful progressive thing. That is a much more pernicious promotion than anything Fox did."

Are "the suits" looking for Rick Santelli's head?

General Electric CEO Jeffery Immelt, thought to be one of Keith Olbermann's biggest supporters, and NBC Universal President Jeff Zucker are reported to have called some of CNBC's on-air talent to a secret meeting at least if the The New York Post's Page Six column for April 16 has it right. The meeting was called to scold the cable yackers for being too harsh on the Obammessiah, with the duo ala Jeffs warning that CNBC is turning into "the Obama bashing network" and that the cable outlet is becoming "too conservative."

OK... now how did that lefty mantra go again? Doesn't it go that the media couldn't possibly be lefitwing because "the suits" that own the media are conservative corporate types? Once again it looks like the truth is a different animal than the leftist trope pretends.

While Fox News has celebrated the Taxpayer Tea Party rallies and MSNBC has denigrated them, the impetus of the movement - CNBC and specifically Rick Santelli, its inspiration - had been conspicuously quiet about it.

But on CNBC's "Squawk Box" April 15, co-host Joe Kernen asked Santelli what he thought of being a "cultural phenomenon." That was the same show Santelli famously called out President Barack Obama on for the unfairness of his housing bailout proposal on Feb. 19.

"A lot of articles about these tea parties," Kernen said. "They all have your name in them, like you caused it. Are you actually attending any or are you just sort of got the idea going initially? What do you think? I mean, you're like a cultural phenomenon at this point."

With the Tax Day tea party rallies just three days away, outside of the Fox News Channel, the coverage has been lacking. And, it was something that even Washington Post media columnist and host of CNN's "Reliable Sources" Howard Kurtz acknowledged on his April 12 program.

"The folks at Fox News have found something to be for in this age of Obama," Kurtz said. "They are firmly in favor of tea parties. On Wednesday, that would be April 15th - there will be tax protests around the country on the theme of the original Boston Tea Party. TaxDayTeaParty.com says it was inspired by that rant against President Obama's mortgage aid plan by CNBC's Rick Santelli."

However, Kurtz didn't condemn his network and other networks for lack of coverage - but instead explored the notion that Fox News was giving it too much coverage.

Even before a single bag of tea has been dumped as a form of protest over government economic policies, the gang at MSNBC is in full-attack mode over the notion these protests merit any recognition.

On MSNBC's April 10 "Countdown," fill-in host David Shuster imitated his MSNBC colleague Rachel Maddow's juvenile and overdone description of the tea party protest to disparage the upcoming nationwide event.

"Now to the so-called ‘teabagging parties' you may have heard about," Shuster said. "They have been fluffed repeatedly by Fox News. Citizen protests over the government's collection of taxpayer money, specifically that the wealthiest taxpayers in our nation will see their rates go up 3 percent two years from now."

Once again, someone has squared off against one of CNBC's star personalities, and this time it's a liberal economist taking aim at the old standby, "Mad Money" host Jim Cramer.

An April 8 Associated Press story reported that, on the heels of "The Daily Show" host Jon Stewart taking Cramer "to task for trying to turn finance reporting into a game," New York University Professor and Huffington Post contributor Nouriel Roubini blasted Cramer in an interview. Predictably, Cramer responded.

"Cramer is a buffoon," Roubini said to the AP. "He was one of those who called six times in a row for this bear market rally to be a bull market rally and he got it wrong. And after all this mess and Jon Stewart he should just shut up because he has no shame."

BMI's Dan Gainor has the following column on Tax Day and Tea Parties up on the Fox Forum:

When you want tea, you bring water to a boil. When you want genuine change, you do the same thing to the American public.

Right now, that public is boiling mad and, with April 15 around the corner, the most important thing brewing is tax protest. For every state in the nation, this tea’s for you.

Lucky for us, our cups runneth over. The nationwide Tax Day Tea Party movement is building incredible steam with an event on the day most Americans dread – April 15.  It’s an H&R Block Party to take back our government from people who couldn’t manage the budget of a Kwik-E-Mart.

Although CNBC "Mad Money" host Jim Cramer has backed off his hyperbolic attacks on President Barack Obama ever since his "Daily Show" appearance, he's shown that he's not afraid to take on the Democratic-controlled Congress.

So, to give credit where credit is due, the "Mad Money" host dedicated an entire segment to the Employee Free Choice Act, aka card check and how its passage by Congress could be detrimental to Wal-Mart's (NYSE:WMT) stock price on his April 3 program. And during the segment, Cramer used three references to Soviet/Russian communism to describe the Democrat effort pushing card check.

"Right now, in Congress - they're getting ready for what is essentially a referendum on Wal-Mart," Cramer said. "And the referendum's name is the Employee Free Choice Act, also known by slang as card check - a bill that will make it much easier for workers to form unions and much harder for employers to get in their way."

For the second time in a week, CNBC's Rick Santelli faced down one of the standard-bearers of liberalism.

First, he explained to Huffington Post editor and founder Arianna Huffington on the March 31 "Squawk Box" that markets are more efficient in correcting economic hardship, in the banking and housing sectors. On CNBC's April 3 "The Call," Santelli took on University of California at Berkeley economics professor and former Secretary of Labor for President Bill Clinton, Robert Reich.

According to Reich, the agreement brokered between President Barack Obama and other G20 leaders - to give the International Monetary Fund (IMF) $1.1 trillion - was positive and should be celebrated.

It came and went - and some might not have even noticed it - despite the seriousness of its use. On April 2, CNBC's Jim Cramer proclaimed the Depression over.

Throughout that day, the "Mad Money" host told viewers of MSNBC's "Morning Joe," CNBC's "Street Signs" and finally on his own program that the Depression was over and that we were on the verge of a bull run for the financial markets.

"We have reached the land of a thousand bull dances - phoney maroney, why? Because the market swallowed its Prozac," Cramer said on CNBC's "Mad Money" April 2. "And right now, right here on this show - I am announcing the Depression over!"

Since former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean stepped down as the chairman of the Democratic National Committee, he has ventured into other opportunities.

One of those opportunities was to be a business pundit for the financial news channel CNBC, even though Dean's background prior to politics was in medicine. But just over a week later, in an e-mail dated April 2 to MoveOn.org mailing list subscribers, Dean wrote he was leaving Washington to hit the campaign trail "to help President Obama win health care for all."

Both have loyal following, but their fans are on opposite sides of the political spectrum.

CNBC's Rick Santelli rose to prominence earlier this year when he railed against President Barack Obama's policies on live TV from the floor of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange. He's a hit with conservatives staging tea parties to protest the bailout culture in Washington throughout the country. 

Arianna Huffington, who appeared as a guest host on CNBC's March 31 "Squawk Box" has following of left-wing readers and bloggers, as the editor of the very popular Huffington Post blog. The two faced off on "Squawk Box" about how the housing crisis should be handled. Huffington asked Santelli what his thoughts were on more government assistance for underwater homeowners to prevent another round of foreclosures.

"Well, the whole country is underwater I guess," Santelli replied. "It's just a matter of where you want to point the bailout gun. I would certainly like to see some of those mortgage contracts gone through to find out where the erroneous and inaccurate and illegal contracts and separate those from the rest because I think that a lot of the information on the original mortgage contracts is not accurate and I don't think it would be very fair to put those in the same camp as other foreclosures."

One of the subplots in the soap opera known as CNBC took another turn on Monday as some of the pieces fell in place of who's doing what and why.

Last Friday, CNBC and former "Fast Money" host Dylan Ratigan parted ways officially. However, on CNBC's March 30 "Fast Money," show panelist Guy Adami, the managing director of Drakon Capital, announced Melissa Lee, a fill-in host over the past year for the popular network show, as the new caretaker of the show's "center seat," that plays the moderator role for the show.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa, and nothing," Adami said. "Listen, clearly you've noticed some changes on the set, but as a show and as a network, we'd just like to wish Melissa Lee, the Emissary, all the best as she now takes the center seat on ‘Fast Money.'"

After General Motors (NYSE:GM) Chairman and CEO Rick Wagoner was forced out by President Barack Obama, Wall Street is betting bank CEO firings will be the next shoe to drop. 

CNBC's New York Stock Exchange floor reporter Bob Pisani told viewers of CNBC's March 30 "Street Signs" the market's actions, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) dropping as much as 300 points, are reflect, in part,that the government is going to force bank CEOs out as they did with Wagoner.

"Look, the main concern here today is Geithner's comments that some banks are going to need a lot more capital," Pisani said. "And for everybody who says why haven't they fired anymore bank CEOs yet - why hasn't the government done it, wait - they're going to."

More and more people are starting to take notice of CNBC's dramatic shift to the left and the liberal groups promoting it.

On Fox News Channel's March 27 "The O'Reilly Factor," host Bill O'Reilly and Bernard Goldberg, author of "A Slobbering Love Affair: The True (And Pathetic) Story of the Torrid Romance Between Barack Obama and the Mainstream Media" took a look at trends pointing to this shift that started after the feud between "Mad Money" host Jim Cramer and "The Daily Show" host Jon Stewart.

O'Reilly cited a column written by NewsBusters Associate Editor Noel Sheppard on March 26 for The Washington Examiner that noted some of the things indicating CNBC's leftward swing.

A prominent CNBC personality that had been outspoken about the media's role in the current financial crisis, himself included, has reportedly left CNBC.

A spokesman for CNBC told NewsBusters Dylan Ratigan, the co-creator of one of the network's most popular shows, "Fast Money," is leaving the network effective March 27.

"Dylan told us that he is leaving CNBC effective today," CNBC spokesman Brian Steel said in an e-mail. "We thank him for his quality work and wish him well."

CNBC has been a hotbed for commentary - both left and right, from Rick Santelli's call for a tea party on the floor of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange to the hiring of former Democratic Committee Chairman Howard Dean as a CNBC contributor.      

This time, one of the hosts on CNBC's March 26 "Power Lunch" dropped an expletive during President Barack Obama's online town hall meeting as the network broke away from their coverage (h/t Breitbart.tv):

PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA: One last point I want to make and I know I'm not suppose to talk this long ...

UNIDENTIFIED CNBC HOST: Bull****.

Want a little populist outrage?  There's nothing like hearing it from a multi-millionaire advertising mogul with a spot on CNBC.

Donny Deutsch, the host of "The Big Idea," a show the network has shelved, explained to viewers on the March 25 broadcast of "CNBC Reports" he wants measures put in place to keep prevent people he regards as "idiots" from making $10 million a year.

"The issue is even now, with the new asset program, basically if it works, the taxpayer's taking up all the risk," Deutsch said. "God forbid it doesn't work, taxpayers are really going to take it on the chin. And let's say we get it right and the banks are lending again and everything is fine again - what is now put in place on Wall Street to make sure idiots are not getting paid $10 million a year?"

Perhaps this post could be headlined "CNBC Continues to Atone for Its Outspoken Obama Criticism."

As if announcing Democratic National Committee chairman and former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean as a "CNBC contributor" weren't enough, CNBC has invited the editor in chief of one of the its biggest critics to guest co-host one of CNBC's most popular shows.

Originally reported in a status update from Arianna Huffington's Facebook page on March 24, and later confirmed by Huffington herself in an e-mail with the Media Research Center, the co-founder and editor-in-chief of The Huffington Post will co-host CNBC's "Squawk Box" on March 31.

It had been one of the many points of contention against CNBC by the left-wing attack machine - that "The Kudlow Report" host Larry Kudlow was using his show as a platform to make a run at the U.S. Senate in 2010 against Democratic Sen. Chris Dodd.

Well, they're going to have to find another way to try to marginalize Kudlow, as they have with other CNBC personalities. Kudlow announced on his March 24 broadcast that he would not seek a seat in the U.S. Senate in 2010.

The CNBC host explained he was approached by the Republican Party to be a candidate, but said he never considered it "a serious proposition."

"Alright folks, tonight - I want to talk to you for a quick moment about me," Kudlow said. "Several weeks ago, I was approached by the Republican Party to consider a run for the U.S. Senate in the great state of Connecticut. It was a flattering conversation and one that I thought about, but to me it was never really a serious proposition."

Could this be another case of a chastened CNBC succumbing to criticism from the left to improve its image?

Just a day after CNBC named former Democratic National Committee chairman Howard Dean a CNBC contributor, an uncharacteristically soft-spoken CNBC "Mad Money" host Jim Cramer, appeared on NBC's March 24 "Today" along with CNBC "Squawk on the Street" co-host and "Street Signs" host Erin Burnett. In a tone similar to the apologetic one he had earlier this month on Comedy Central's "The Daily Show," he complimented President Barack Obama's rhetoric toward high executive compensation.

"We have to put the shareholders somewhere in the equation," Cramer said. "When these CEOs make so much money, it hurts the shareholders. We have to be pro-shareholder. The president has become pro-shareholder."

It's the latest ailment of the left - CNBC derangement syndrome.

Since CNBC's Rick Santelli and Jim Cramer took an outspoken stance on the shortcomings of the Obama administration, left-wing storefronts have been popping up all over the place wanting to capitalize on the network after it took a vicious attack from Comedy Central "The Daily Show" host Jon Stewart.

After CNBC "Squawk on the Street" co-host Mark Haines took on a couple of sanctimonious Democratic congressmen, Reps. Brad Sherman, Calif., and Charles Rangel, N.Y., for being advocates of a 90-percent retroactive tax on bonuses, he has found himself as the subject of a main headline on the Huffington Post on March 23, for being concerned about some of the populist rhetoric promoting compensation limits after wrapping up an interview with Nick Debenedictus, the CEO of Aqua America (NYSE:WTR).

Is CNBC caving to its critics on the left?

It might appear so now that former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean, also the former chair of the Democratic National Committee, was officially named a CNBC contributor on the March 23 "Squawk Box" by co-host Joe Kernen.

"Joining us for the next two hours, former DNC chair and Vermont Gov. Howard Dean, who is as of today a CNBC contributor," Kernen said.

CNBC had also named Tony Fratto, a former Bush administration Deputy Press Secretary as a contributor to the chagrin of some on the left. Kernen remarked Dean's status as a contributor was an effort to show the network was "balanced."

When Jon Stewart eviscerated Jim Cramer for not doing a better job of warning Americans about the looming financial crisis, the "Mad Money" host should have brought videos and transcripts of some of his highly-publicized rants in order to thoroughly disprove the comedian's premise.

In fact, as former investigative reporter turned actor and producer Dan Gifford revealed at Big Hollywood Sunday, Cramer should have wiped the floor with Stewart and put an end to all the CNBC bashing.

For instance, the "Mad Money" host could have shared with Stewart's audience this tirade from August 2007 (video embedded right):

For the second day in a row, CNBC "Squawk on the Street" co-host Mark Haines took on a Democratic congressman over the issue that American International Group (AIG) paid out too much in bonuses for a company that received federal bailout money.

On March 19, Haines took on alleged tax cheat Charles Rangel, questioning whether or not he should be dictating tax policy while the House Ethics Committee investigates him for his tax problems.  On CNBC's March 20 "Squawk on the Street," Haines took on Rep. Brad Sherman, D-Calif. on the issue.

Sherman contended the 90-percent tax on bonuses exceeding $250,000 that the House passed 328-93 didn't go far enough. He said a government receivership would have been the proper way to handle AIG, and not the bailout method the federal government employed. 

In the wake of the American International Group (AIG) bonus controversy, some have called the plans of congressional leaders to tax those bonuses at a rate of 90-100 percent "legislating with a vengeance."

However, Chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee Rep. Charles Rangel, D-N.Y., insists that doing this is a necessity, despite the premise that retroactively taxing anything is a dangerous precedent. In an interview with CNBC "Squawk on the Street" co-hosts Mark Haines and Erin Burnett on March 19, he explained different rules apply in these extraordinary circumstances.

"When you violate the public trust, different rules apply - the same thing we have in charitable organizations, 501(c)3 when they have excessive payment in certain areas that we're able to penalize them for," Rangel said.

But Haines, referring to a Sept. 9, 2008 New York Times article that alleges Rangel hasn't paid taxes on some of properties, questioned the New York congressman's moral authority.

The ongoing battle between Jon Stewart and Jim Cramer took an interesting turn Tuesday when NBC Universal CEO Jeff Zucker said that it was absurd for anyone to blame the financial crisis on CNBC.

Speaking at the McGraw-Hill Media Summit, Zucker defended the financial news network saying, "I’m incredibly proud of what we’ve done."

Zucker also stood up for Cramer:

Is President Barack Obama's administration showing hints it is losing confidence in Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner? CNBC's Larry Kudlow said the signs are suggesting as much.

The host of "The Kudlow Report" said in an appearance with CNBC On-Air Editor Charlie Gasparino on his March 17 broadcast that a statement put out earlier today by the administration, and placed at the top of the Drudge Report, hinted this was the beginning of the end for Geithner.

"You know, statements out of the blue - statements like this are what I call a real bad leading indicator that Geithner's time, days may be numbered," Kudlow said. "It may not happen in the next week, but it may happen."

The statement was made in relation to the Treasury Department's handling of the brouhaha surrounding the $165 million in bonuses paid out to American International Group (AIG) executives, even though they were recipients of bailout money from the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP).