MSNBC

Of all people, you'd think a movie director would understand the importance of sticking to the script. But no . . .

There was a delicious moment on this afternoon's "Hardball." Host Chris Matthews had billed a new movie as standing for the proposition that Saudis hate Americans [note the screen graphic]. But when the movie's director came on, he declined to buy into Matthews's sweeping generalization, pitched capitalism as the answer to the region's problems, and even speculated that Iraq war has helped America's relations in the Middle East.

In his opening tease, Matthews proclaimed "Let's talk about why the Saudis hate us . . . in our second story tonight, why do Saudis hate Americans?"

Then, after an interview about Iran with Mario Cuomo [yes, he's still around], Matthews, teasing the next segment:

David Shuster's tasteless game of "gotcha," that we reported here and here, in which the MSNBC "correspondent" exploited the name of a fallen American soldier to put Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) on the spot, is getting considerable media attention. Brit Hume featured it in last night's "Grapevine" segment of "Special Report."

View video here.

Joe Scarborough is still trying to wring mileage out of bashing Bill O'Reilly over his Sylvia's comments. After calling the "Factor" host a "moron" yesterday, the "Morning Joe" host was back at it today.

On this afternoon's "Tucker," the eponymous host was discussing with Dem strategist Peter Fenn and former Dem congressman Tom Andrews [a grown-up among liberals, IMHO] the unwillingness of the leading GOP presidential contenders to participate in the debate moderated by Tavis Smiley, billed as addressing issues of concern to black Americans.

On the one hand, Tucker criticized the Republicans' reticence. On the other, he flashed anger at the way Dems play the race card. Carlson concluded with a particularly tantalizing comment.

View video here.

Keith Olbermann this week has been happier than Ralphie Parker on Christmas morning over a left-wing group-generated controversy over Bill O'Reilly. But like the BB-gun-receiving protagonist of "A Christmas Story," lil' Keithie needs to know the dangers of (metaphorically) putting his eye out. After all, on September 9 on NBC's "Football Night in America," Olbermann made a cryptic crack that could be taken to be racially insensitive, if not racist.

SEE Video (0:54): Real (1.46 MB) and Windows (1.64 MB), plus MP3 audio (417 kB).

This could be a first: Al Sharpton criticized for being insufficiently inflammatory; faulted for not shooting from the hip.

At the opening of today's "Morning Joe," host Joe Scarborough panned the Rev's "O'Reilly Factor" performance last evening, in which the normally obstreperous one was relatively subdued on the subject of his host's comments on Sylvia's restaurant in Harlem. Scarborough later escalated his criticism, calling O'Reilly a "moron," and accusing him of making "racist" comments.

View video here.

Did Chris Matthews, on his September 24th edition of "Hardball," really hear Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad "allow" that there was a Holocaust? This is what he insisted to New York City Councilman David Weprin:

MATTHEWS: OK, let‘s talk about that very point. The hottest issue of the last century, of course, and the worst case of inhumanity to man, of course, is the Holocaust. I listened carefully to him. And I know you did, sir. Didn‘t you hear him allow the fact that there was, in fact, a Holocaust?

WEPRIN: Well, he—his statement today was different than his statement in the past.

MATTHEWS: Right.

WEPRIN: In the past, he‘s clearly said that the Holocaust was a hoax, it never existed. Now he‘s talking about doing more research. There‘s no question...

UPDATE -- SHUSTER APOLOGIZES: At 6:44 PM EDT, MSNBC broke into the Tucker Carlson show to air a terse apology from Shuster. See "My Take" below.

View video of Shuster apology here.

Here follows the text of Shuster apology.

DAVID SHUSTER: On Monday evening while guest-hosting the 6 p.m. evening hour, I conducted an interview with Tennessee Republican Marsha Blackburn. The congresswoman spoke at length about a newspaper ad that criticized General Petraeus. In what I believed was an effort to examine Representative Blackburn's priorities, I then asked her to name the last soldier from her congressional district killed in Iraq.

She responded "the name of the last soldier killed in Iraq from my district, I do not know." After that response, I identified who I believed to be that fallen soldier, a Tennessean killed in Iraq last month. But according to Pentagon documents, that young man came from a town inside a neighboring congressional district, not from Representative Blackburn's, and for that, I apologize for that mistake.

Read past the jump for the rest of the story..

On Wednesday, a MSNBC graphic flat-out accused Bill O’Reilly of being a racist. It read: "Anchor’s Racist Comments" and there was no accompanying question mark to at least add the benefit of the doubt. During the 11am hour of "MSNBC News Live," anchor Contessa Brewer discussed a liberal group’s attack over O’Reilly's comments about eating at a black restaurant. A second graphic, below the host, did offer some slight uncertainty. It asked, "Anchor’s Racist Comments? Bill O’Reilly Comes Under Fire For Description of Black Restaurant."

Brewer discussed the issue with Paul Waldman of Media Matters and Republican strategist Joe Watkins. At one point, Watkins noted that both he and the host had previously been attacked by the liberal organization. Brewer defensively replied, "And, by the way, I'm not a conservative." The host appeared to be sympathetic to the idea O’Reilly’s comments, which originated on the September 19 edition of his radio show, had some sort of negative intention. She opened the segment by asserting the Fox News host is "now at the center of a heated debate about racist language."

Figures. Who else would Mika Brzezinski's ink-stained doppelganger be but Maureen Dowd?

"Morning Joe" has apparently introduced a new feature, "Three Things to Read Today," in which each of the panelists recommends an item from that morning's newspaper crop. Willie Geist went first today, and being the pop-culture maven he is, suggested the New York Post's coverage of the sexual harrassment lawsuit that a former female New York Knicks employee has brought against coach Isiah Thomas.

Then it was Mika's turn.

View video here.

Anybody that has logged on to the Internet in the past couple of days is well aware that the far left in our nation are doing what the far left are best at: calling people racists, and hoping folks will be fired as a result.

The latest conspiracy fabricated by the left - albeit in a long line of conspiracies - deals with comments made by Fox News's Bill O'Reilly on his radio program.

Tuesday evening, O'Reilly invited liberal NPR correspondent Juan Williams on "The Factor" - who, coincidentally, was O'Reilly's radio guest when the supposedly offensive words were uttered - for his views on the subject.

Likely much to the chagrin of liberals throughout the nation, Williams came strongly to O'Reilly's defense, and pointed an accusatory finger at those that have intentionally mischaracterized what transpired for their own benefit (video available here, h/t Johnny Dollar):

Less than a half-hour after Kiran Chetry and Roland Martin speculated whether O’Reilly’s recent comments on race would be the next "Imus Moment," the cast of MSNBC’s "Morning Joe" mocked the Fox News host. Co-host Mika Brzezinski put on her best Meryl Streep imitation after a clip of O’Reilly’s comments were played. "Oh, my God.... Wow... That's attractive," and also made an audible Al Gore-style sigh. Guest host Willie Geist went further. "Also, using the term 'blacks.’ I don't think anybody's said that since like 1973." Come again?

Brzezinski, Geist, and host Joe Scarborough discussed O’Reilly at the top of the 8 am Eastern hour on Tuesday’s "Morning Joe." While the cast played the O’Reilly clip for the first time, a caption spun O’Reilly’s words: "O’Reilly Shocked That Harlem Restaurant is ‘Normal’ (see above picture). The three were so "overwhelmed" by the clip that they played it again.

Does it get much lower than this?

After first extolling the "F--- Bush" headline, MSNBC's David Shuster, substituting for Tucker Carlson today, later engaged in a grotesque game of "gotcha," exploiting an Amercan soldier killed in Iraq to make his partisan point.

Chatting with Newsweek's Richard Wolffe and MSNBC analyst Craig Crawford, talk turned to the controversy surrounding the editorial in the Colorado State student newspaper headlined "Taser This: F--- Bush" [f-word spelled out in headline].

Wolffe went first, and was patently delighted by the incident. With a hearty grin, he observed . . .

On Friday's Countdown, MSNBC host Keith Olbermann questioned why Democrats are not accusing Republicans of racism because of the decision by GOP presidential candidates to reject invitations to debate at black and Hispanic events, as he asked: "When the Republican presidential candidates refuse to debate at black or Hispanic venues, why are they not being asked if they're as racist as that seems?" As he discussed the issue with liberal Washington Post columnist Eugene Robinson, during which the words "White Wingers" were displayed at the bottom of the screen, the Countdown host raised the possibility Republicans are interested in re-segregating schools by overturning Brown versus Topeka Board of Education. Olbermann: "Is it possible they're actually hoping to move backwards in this, that there is some part of the Republican party that says, you know, we got to roll back, those activist judges in Brown versus Board of Education, we got to get rid of them?" (Transcript follows)

MSNBC’s Mika Brzezinski said MSNBC would show the full comments in context of Rep. King, a top advisor of Rudy Giulliani. Instead they begin the video segment directly with the mosque statement. After showing a few seconds of his comment and a statement from Giulliani, the rest of the segment was spent with CAIR representative, Ibrahim Hooper, without anyone offering an opposing challenge or viewpoint.

Watch Video Here

 

MSNBC: We Love Liberals

Sometimes, the truth is obvious to everyone. During a discussion with fellow MSNBC host Chris Matthews, Keith Olbermann wondered why Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards found it necessary to buy commercial time following a speech by President Bush. Marveling at Edwards’s actions, he revealed, "I don't think I'm saying anything unknown to the audience, I don't think he would have gotten a hard time from this particular network."

What Else Can I Blame on Iraq?

Speaking of Chris Matthews, one has to admire the host’s creativity. On Tuesday, while discussing the tasering of a University of Florida student, the cable news anchor blamed it on, you guessed it, Iraq. Matthews also decried the "fascistic notion" of American troops "forcing" democracy on Iraqis. Only a day earlier, the MSNBC host wondered, "Should we put Exxon signs up over Arlington Cemetery and Mobil signs up there, like they have at baseball stadiums?"

Partners in deception, partners in denial . . .

Earlier today I noted that in her HuffPo column, ex-CBS producer Mary Mapes continues to cling to the delusion that the Memogate documents were authentic. In an inteview on "Morning Joe," Dan Rather has now made a comparable reality-defying claim.

Mika Brzezinski, who, as was repeatedly pointed out, used to work at CBS and has friends on both sides of the issue, conducted the interview. Bubbles didn't have the gumption to challenge Rather regarding the forged documents at the heart of the story. Interestingly, Rather chose to raise the issue himself, and in doing so demonstrated his tenuous grip on reality and some twisted journalistic standards.

View video here.

On Thursday's Countdown, MSNBC host Keith Olbermann used his latest "Special Comment" to attack President Bush's "pissy juvenile blast" for the President's criticism of the MoveOn.org "General Betray Us" ad during the day's news conference, accusing him of "hypocrisy" for not criticizing what Olbermann called the Republican "hamstringing of Captain Max Cleland and the lying about Lieutenant John Kerry." Olbermann further accused Bush of "pimping" General David Petraeus and of making the general into a "political hack" at the risk of moving America's government toward a "military junta." Olbermann: "It is a line which history shows is always the first one crossed when a democratic government in some other country has started down the long, slippery, suicidal slope towards a military junta. Get back behind that line, Mr. Bush, before some of your supporters mistake your dangerous and stupid transgression as a call to further politicize our military." (Transcript follows)

Sticking and moving like a prize fighter, talk show host and author Laura Ingraham, outnumbered in a three against one fight, took out not only "Hardball" host Chris Matthews but his colleague David Shuster and NBC News political director Chuck Todd, as well.

View video here. (courtesy NB contributor Mark Finkelstein)

On Thursday night's "Hardball" Ingraham took Matthews to task for his outrageous claims about the Iraq war being about oil as she threw his past bias in his face: "What? What? Chris are, were you the one, the other night, correct me if I'm wrong, who said that we should hang Exxon and Mobil signs at, at Arlington National Cemetery?" Then Ingraham slapped down Matthews about his pessimistic view on the war: "Chris, I'm different from [where] you are on this. I actually have hope that goodness will prevail."

"I'm a Dan Man myself, so I tend to look at this from his viewpoints [sic]." -- WaPo media critic Tom Shales, on today's "Morning Joe."

It's a morning for candor on "Morning Joe." Earlier, Mika "Bubbles" Brzezinski had admitted that "the SATs were not my strong suit." Later in the show, the notoriously tough-on-conservatives [see, e.g., MRC item #3 here] Tom Shales acknowledged that he has a soft spot for Dan Rather, calling himself a "Dan Man."

I'll say. Despite the overwhelming mountain of uncontroverted and incontrovertible evidence, Shales refuses to admit the obvious: that the documents at the heart of Memogate were the most transparent [literally] and amateurish of forgeries.

Substitute anchor Willie Geist interviewed Shales at 8:30 A.M. EDT this morning.

View video here.

Upset that a University of Florida student was tasered by campus police at a John Kerry event, MSNBC's Chris Matthews, on Tuesday's, "Hardball" feared it was a result of the "fascistic notion" of American troops "forcing" democracy on Iraqis at "gunpoint", filtering back home.

Chris Matthews: "You know when we walk into those, every night on television you watch pictures of American soldiers risking their lives to break into homes in Baghdad, at gunpoint, telling people to go along with the government that we've set up over there. Democracy at gunpoint. I wonder if it's filtered back here at home. I wonder if it's drift back home? The idea that democracy is something you do at gunpoint. ‘Either you behave and do it this way and show up by putting your fingers in the ink and doing it this way or you're an insurgent, therefore, we can round you up and if you resist we can kill you.' That notion it's a bit fascist and it's certainly a fascistic notion of democracy we're forcing, forcing on people over there. They didn't invited us into Iraq and I wonder now whether we are picking up some of the bad habits of the war front?"

Video and additional transcript below the fold.

Even as the words were leaving his mouth, Joe Scarborough acknowledged that he was going to get "killed by conservative bloggers." And being the obliging sorts we are here at NewsBusters . . .

Interviewing Hillary Clinton on today's "Morning Joe," Scarborough's performance was one long paean to her perfection, coupled with a mea culpa for the wrongs that he and other Republicans visited on the Clintons during the '90s.

View video here.

Excerpts:

Chris Matthews might as well have chanted "No Blood For Oil" throughout the Monday edition of MSNBC's "Hardball" as he sounded like an anti-war protestor as he charged that U.S. servicemen and women were spilling blood for Big Oil, as he questioned: "Are we fighting for the American oil companies for Mobil and Exxon? And they are making these enormous profits because of access to oil over there...Should we put Exxon signs up over Arlington Cemetery and Mobil signs up there, like they have at baseball stadiums?"

Pivoting off a David Shuster report that claimed Alan Greenspan "provided evidence" that the Iraq war has been "fought for oil," Matthews devoted much of the September 17 edition of "Hardball" to that conspiracy theory. The following is Shuster's report followed by Matthews's various "No Blood for Oil," rants:

The idea that cable network MSNBC is liberally biased is certainly no stunning revelation. However, when one of its foremost liberal hosts, Keith Olbermann, admits it on the air, that is truly something to behold.

Such actually occurred Thursday evening, and was captured for posterity by Real Clear Politics' Blake Dvorak (h/t NBer SMGalbraith, video available here courtesy Olbermann Watch with thanks to NB reader Damien G.).

To set this up, Democrat presidential candidate John Edwards bought some advertising time on MSNBC Thursday evening to respond to President Bush's address to the nation concerning Iraq. After the ad finished, Olbermann disgracefully said the following:

We Get it: You Don’t Like Fox

In an interview with Playboy magazine, MSNBC host Keith Olbermann actually fulminated that "Fox News is worse than Al Qaeda." He then went on to compare his cable rival to the Ku Klux Klan and rail against Rudy Giuliani. And this is the guy who is hosting football coverage on NBC? Live?

Live From the Bathroom

Speaking of Fox News, the network proved this week that it’s not always "fair and balanced." FNC reporter Laurie Dhue anchored a segment entitled "Lavatory Lust" that re-enacted the infamous Larry Craig bathroom incident. Before ending the "Geraldo at Large" piece, Dhue editorialized that it was sad Craig "had to go to a public place, and that’s the shame of homosexuality in this country right, today — at least the shame that the Republican Party puts on it."

Damn the NewsBusters, full speed ahead!

Look for Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid to be pinning a DNC medal for heroism on Mika Brzezinski. The MSNBC newsreader opened today's "Morning Joe" with an intrepid assault on President Bush, undaunted by the rhetorical fire she knew it would draw from NewsBusters.

View video here.

On Thursday night, after President Bush's Address to the Nation regarding Iraq, MSNBC featured a discussion dominated by criticism of the President from the left, which bolstered the views of such liberal guests as talk radio host Rachel Maddow and Democratic Senator Joe Biden, and challenged conservative guest and Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee's take on the speech. Chris Matthews showed repeated fascination with the President's reference to 36 nations fighting in Iraq, calling it "ludicrous." When Maddow compared America's toppling of Saddam Hussein's government to attempts by insurgents to topple the current elected government by remarking that "it's like getting a lecture on the evils of prostitution from David Vitter," Keith Olbermann seemed impressed as he labeled her words "the first zing of the night." (Transcript follows)

On his Thursday night radio show, Mark Levin laid into MSNBC's Joe Scarborough over a Thursday morning interview with Arianna Huffington. (He calls the host "the Morning Schmo.") Scarborough had no answer for Huffington when she stoutly defended the MoveOn.org ad bashing Gen. David Petraeus. She added: "And again and again, despite the administration's best efforts to present him as this figure beyond reproach, we see that he's playing politics. He's playing politics with soldiers' lives in Iraq."

Levin found it disgusting that Huffington can sit in her luxury home and sip Chardonnay while Gen. Petraeus and his troops have their boots on the ground on the front lines every day sacrificing for the country. Here's the exchange from MSNBC:

Nearly everyone with a television can make jokes about TV awards shows, especially the speech-making. How many times have people made the hoariest jokes about thanking the "little people," or mimicking Sally Field’s Oscar speech: "You like me! You really like me!" But Kathy Griffin, the comedienne with the self-satirizing "My Life on the D-List" show on that D-list network Bravo, took the ritual to a new low when she won an Emmy for Outstanding Reality Program.

She mocked Jesus Christ.

"A lot of people come up here and thank Jesus for this award," she declared. "I want you to know that no one had less to do with this award than Jesus. So, all I can say is, 'suck it, Jesus.' This award is my god now." The audience reaction? Reporters noted laughter in the crowd. Griffin certainly knew Hollywood die-hards would be pounding the tables over that one.

It's a flip-flop that would be the envy of John Kerry in good windsurfing weather off Nantucket. For the last two days, Chris Matthews had been excoriating General David Petraeus for his reluctance to opine on the effect of the Iraq war on America's safety at home. Suddenly this morning, Matthews has decided that -- guess what? -- it's not Petraeus's job to make pronouncements of that sort.

View video here.