Campaign Watch

Bob Shrum has made an addition to the growing list of things you can't say about Obama, because it's racist: don't you dare suggest Obama's never done anything hard.

Dem Shrum issued his diktat while debating Ed Rogers, a veteran of the Reagan and Bush 41 White Houses, on today's Hardball. Shrum seized on and distorted Rogers' statement, manifestly made in the political sense, that Obama had "never done one hard thing," to play the race card.

View video here.

Having held their peace long enough, or perhaps being longsuffering in abuse, Christianity Today (CT) released an editorial today addressing the media's penchant for misunderstanding Gov. Sarah Palin's evangelical Christian faith.

NewsBusters has been tracking the media's cluelessness and biases on that front since at least early September.

In an October 28 posting to their Web site, Christianity Today's editors tackled how the media misconstrue evangelical views on two matters: teenage daughter Bristol Palin's unwed pregnancy and how the media insist evangelicals view the role of women in secular society, the family, and the church (emphases mine):

Jeanne Cummings, a former political reporter for the Wall Street Journal who now works at the Politico, displayed an obvious double standard in her appearance on Friday night’s Washington Week show on PBS. Joe Biden’s prediction that a President Obama would be tested quickly with an international crisis was worth dismissing, since it came so late in the campaign, after Obama had already convinced many voters he was a capable leader. But the RNC buying "pricey togs" for Sarah Palin was a political disaster that completely undermined her just-folks appeal. It showed "a huge disconnect. And it has the risk of robbing her of the real strength that she had brought to the campaign."

There’s a professional reason Cummings was so invested in the damage that story did: it was her story. But at what point does another journalist like Ifill ask: so, are you happy that you damaged her strength? Here’s how the exchange happened:

CUMMINGS: It does seem like that Biden at some point was going to do this. He was going to go off message.

CNN anchor Campbell Brown criticized the sexism of the "diva" comment about Sarah Palin from a supposed anonymous McCain campaign adviser on Monday’s Election Center program, despite how it was her own network that highlighted this remark. After describing how "it was big news when this story broke over the weekend -- a shocking quote from an adviser to John McCain calling Sarah Palin a ‘diva.’ (correspondents Dana Bash, Peter Hamby, and John King first reported on the anonymous "diva" remark in an October 25 report on CNN.com), Brown decried how it is "a sexist slight, a term that is only applied to women, almost always in a derogatory way."

At the end of her commentary, which led the Election Center program, the CNN anchor attacked the supposed hypocrisy of the McCain campaign and criticized the unnamed McCain campaign official for using the "diva" term: "So, now, for the McCain campaign to be attacking its own candidate in the most overtly sexist way, calling her a ‘diva,’ -- it is beyond ridiculous. Whoever this anonymous adviser is should be ashamed, or, at the very least, have the courage to say it on the record." Since Brown didn’t say anything critical about how her network ran with the comment during her commentary, despite its anonymous nature, one would guess that she isn’t ashamed of CNN’s action in this matter. Isn’t that a bit hypocritical?

Unlike the network morning news shows, the Sarah Palin hanging in effigy was covered by, surprisingly, "The View." On the October 28 edition, the panel, as they should be, was unanimous in condemning inflammatory Halloween decoration. The best remark came from, yet another surprise, Joy Behar. Hinting at media double standards Behar cried "if they had done it to Obama, it would cause a tremendous hoopla."

Behar, who normally attempts to play the equivocation game, offered no such attempt on this subject adding "as much as I disagree with her politics, it’s outrageous. It’s stupid." The others chimed in as well as Whoopi Goldberg asserted "you just don’t do that." Sherri Shepherd raised concerns about Sarah Palin’s children. Elisabeth Hasselbeck declared "it’s not even worth hearing what [the house owner] has to say."

Although the audio that recently emerged of Sen. Barack Obama discussing "redistributive change" came from an interview he did with Chicago Public Radio, National Public Radio's "Morning Edition" and "All Things Considered" on Monday as well as "Morning Edition" on Tuesday completely ignored the audiotape of Obama's 2001 interview.

During his campaign stop in Dayton, Ohio, on Monday, Sen. John McCain specifically addressed the recently surfaced audio and even quoted Obama as saying, "One of the tragedies of the Civil Rights movement was because the Civil Rights movement became so court-focused I think that there was a tendency to lose track of the political and community organizing and activities on the ground that are able to put together the actual coalitions of power through which you bring about redistributive change."

Nevertheless, during Monday's "All Things Considered" report on McCain's campaigning in Ohio, there was no mention of the audiotape or of McCain using Obama's own words against him. Instead, the broadcast focused on McCain's argument that one party ruling the country would be disastrous.

New York Times reporter Patrick Healy profiled Michelle Obama in Akron, Ohio, speaking and making calls to undecided voters, in Tuesday's "New to Campaigning, but No Longer a Novice." The sycophantic Healy is quick to put Michelle Obama's "proud of America" gaffe in context and suggest it's a discredited charge.

And the photo caption over a picture of three adoring fans in Akron listening to her speak reads like a "dinner theatre" review from a local free paper:

In a raucous rally at a school gym in Akron, the would-be first lady had the audience laughing and cheering throughout.

Healy, whose reporting seems to be getting more slanted as the campaign wears on, showed Michelle Obama far more respect than his colleague Jodi Kantor showed John McCain's wife Cindy.

At the top of Tuesday’s CBS Early Show, correspondent Jeff Glor reported on the presidential campaign and continued to portray Barack Obama as the victim of John McCain’s attacks: "Meanwhile, the campaigns were making their closing arguments, with special emphasis on the arguing part...John McCain backers have launched an array of new attacks on Barack Obama, including more robocalls." Glor then skipped over any of Obama’s robocalls and instead delcared: "The Obama campaign's relentless responses come quickly." Glor then played a clip of the "response": "John McCain wants to tear Barack Obama down, with scare tactics and smears."

Following Glor’s report, co-host Maggie Rodriguez discussed the candidates’ chances in Pennsylvania with former Republican Governor Tom Ridge and current Democratic Governor Ed Rendell. Rodriguez began by asking Ridge: "Last week you said that you thought that McCain would be faring much better in your state had he chosen you as a running mate. Sarah Palin certainly is trying really hard, she's been there 11 times, four more times today. Do you think she's been a drag on the ticket in your state?" Ridge responded by correcting Rodriguez’s mis-characterization of his comments: "Well, first of all, I said that Senator McCain chose a vice presidential candidate not to win one state, but someone who had appeal across the board in all fifty states. It would be like saying would Senator Obama be doing even better in Pennsylvania if he had Ed Rendell as a running mate, I suspect he would."

Well the media has officially gotten cocky when they start predicting that the reddest of red states could be in play for Barack Obama, and that's precisely what NBC's Ron Mott did on Tuesday's "Today" show, when he cheered that Texas, "May be surprisingly competitive." [audio excerpt available here]

In a report on early voting, Mott noted the long lines for those willing to participate in early voting and celebrated: 

So far Democratic voters appear to be the ones most willing to wait, and that could spell good news for Senator Barack Obama who's encouraged supporters, including his legion of newly registered young voters, to take advantage of early voting in 32 states and they've answered the call.

Then a little later, before throwing it back to "Today" anchor Meredith Vieira, Mott concluded the story with this overly confident observation:

Polls here in Texas give Senator McCain a relatively comfortable advantage but Democrats are nonetheless optimistic. They point to record turnout that we've seen so far, and a record number of registered voters, 13.5 million, as two signs perhaps that Texas may be surprisingly competitive this time next week. Meredith?

The following is the full story as it was aired on the October 28, "Today" show:

ABC's "Good Morning America" and CBS's "Early Show" on Tuesday avoided any mention of the newly found 2001 audiotape in which then-state Senator Barack Obama lamented to a radio interviewer that "the Supreme Court never ventured into the issues of redistribution of wealth." Only NBC's "Today" show played any of the tape.

GMA and "Early Show" hinted around the subject, but simply in terms of describing it as an attack on Obama. ABC co-host Robin Roberts vaguely asserted, "John McCain claiming Barack Obama is a socialist. Obama countering that McCain is a Bush Republican." On CBS, reporter Jeff Glor continued the equivalence. He derided, "Meanwhile, the campaigns were making their closing arguments, with special emphasis on the arguing part."

Both morning shows replayed McCain's critique in a Pennsylvania speech: "Senator Obama is running to be redistributionist [sic] in chief. I'm running to be commander in chief." But without the context of the audiotape, GMA and "Early Show" portrayed it as just more negative campaigning.

If the leader of one of America's major NATO allies had serious concerns with John McCain's stated position on Iran, would the Obama-loving press report it?

Probably every hour on the hour until the day after Election Day, right?

Well, according to Israel's Ha'aretz, France's Nicolas Sarkozy views Barack Obama's political stance toward Iran "utterly immature" and made up of "formulations empty of all content."

UPDATE AT END OF POST: French Embassy refutes Ha'aretz article.

Don't be surprised if you hadn't heard anything about this, for a Google News search identified not one major American press outlet covering what Ha'aretz reported over eight hours ago (emphasis added, photo courtesy NY Daily News):

Can you imagine a famous, former-President Clinton supporting, liberal Hollywood producer calling MSNBC "completely out of control" and saying she'd "prefer a lunch date with right-leaning Fox News star Sean Hannity over left-leaning MSNBC star Keith Olbermann?"

Well, as amazing as it might seem, that's what happened at a luncheon in Beverly Hills on Monday where one of America's most well-known liberal television producers, Linda Bloodworth-Thomason of "Designing Women" fame, tore into the journalistic embarrassment known as MSNBC.

As Reuters reported, Thomason asked attendees to "stop the demonizing" as she surprisingly claimed "Democrats have been worse than Republicans as far as personal attacks on candidates are concerned" (emphasis added, h/t NBer zachlind):

Both in January and in May, "NBC Nightly News" anchor Brian Williams conducted softball interviews with Barack Obama, holding up a favorable news magazine and asking how his loved ones, like his late mother, would feel about the slobbery covers. In January, he asked: "How does this feel, of all the honors that have come your way, all the publicity?" In May, it was: "Last time we were together, I handed you a copy of Newsweek, it was the first time you'd held it in your hands with you on the cover. Have you yet held this in your hands?"

When Williams aired an interview with John McCain and Sarah Palin for three nights last week, there was no talk of gooey photographs or publicity "honors." The Republican candidates were grilled on how they dared to criticize Obama.

An emerging preview of the post-election media spin that McCain lost because he moved too far to “the right,” with his pick of Sarah Palin as the smoking gun? On Monday night's Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson, veteran journalist Carl Bernstein, now a political analyst for CNN, contended McCain is “in the difficulty he's in” because “he's really become a captive of the right wing of his party and its agenda and it shows, particularly through the pick of Sarah Palin.” Bernstein's supposition came three days after Bob Schieffer of CBS News blamed McCain's situation on how, after the primaries, “instead of moving to the center, he moved to the right. He put Sarah Palin on the ticket which pleased the right but...”

Bernstein, formerly with the Washington Post and Time magazine, lamented on the Monday night/Tuesday morning CBS show: “I think he's abandoned the principles of his campaign in 2000 and that's probably why he's in the difficulty he's in.” He elaborated:

The campaign of 2000 was built about being a really independent-spirited American politician and now he's really become a captive of the right wing of his party and its agenda and it shows, particularly through the pick of Sarah Palin.

YouTube postings over the weekend divulged a 2001 radio interview in which Barack Obama regretted that “the Supreme Court never ventured into the issues of redistribution of wealth, and sort of more basic issues of political and economic justice in this society,” but though John McCain on Monday cited this new evidence of Obama's long-standing advocacy of redistributing wealth, the CBS Evening News offered nothing more than a McCain soundbite surrounded by reporter Chip Reid discrediting the criticism as he relayed the Obama campaign's charge McCain had made a “false, desperate attack” and Reid bemoaned: “If the events of today are any guide, this is a campaign that is taking an increasingly negative tone in the last week.”

In contrast, the NBC Nightly News at least ran a short audio clip of Obama from 2001: “The Supreme Court never ventured into the issues of redistribution of wealth.” ABC's World News, in a piece by Ron Claiborne, aired a much longer audio soundbite from Obama:

One of the, I think, tragedies of the civil rights movement was because the civil rights movement became so court-focused, I think that there was a tendency to lose track of the political and community organizing and activities on the ground that are able to put together the actual coalitions of power through which you bring about redistributive change.

Discussing the Obama campaign’s recent feud with a local Orlando station, best selling author and former CBS correspondent Bernard Goldberg appeared on the October 27 edition of "Fox and Friends" to offer his analysis. Goldberg appeared puzzled as to the campaign’s response to what he found respectful questions.

The former CBS insider, agreed with co-host Gretchen Carlson’s point that the campaign was simply stunned that someone asked either Obama or Biden some tough questions. Bernie Goldberg noted that the mainstream media was largely asking soft questions such as "what is your favorite color?" Goldberg hypothesized Senator Biden’s harsh response is a product of his elitist attitude as a U.S. senator that no local station should ask such an "impertinent" question.

Bernie Goldberg also observed, despite the bad wrap Sarah Palin is receiving, Barack Obama’s and Joe Biden’s recent lack of access to the press.

On Monday's "Good Morning America," former Democratic aide-turned journalist George Stephanopoulos downplayed the idea that both Sarah Palin and Joe Biden might be a drag on their respective presidential tickets. Responding to a question by co-host Robin Roberts about the two taking attention away from Senators Obama and McCain, Stephanopoulos opined, "But I think the bottom line here is that across all voters, across the last couple of months, Senator Biden has made voters more comfortable with Barack Obama." He added, "Governor Palin has made voters, overall, less comfortable with John McCain."

While it's true that Governor Palin's numbers have fallen in the last few weeks, it's also apparent that the ABC network has contributed to that situation by aggressively criticizing Governor Palin, while downplaying gaffes by Democratic running mate Biden. Last Monday, ABC's "Political Radar" blog broke the story of the Delaware senator suggesting that Obama would be tested by an international crisis within the first six months of his (potential) presidency. The ABC network ignored the scoop for almost 24 hours.

Bill Ayers made a visit to the Chelsea neighborhood of NYC to talk about radical education reform, and New York Times Metro reporter Colin Moynihan portrayed the domestic terrorist as a mild-mannered liberal in the misleadingly headlined Monday story "Ex-Radical Talks of Education and Justice, Not Obama."

When did Ayers become an "ex-radical"? He hasn't repudiated any of his views or acts of violence from the period in which he led the Weather Underground in bombing the Pentagon and other government buildings.

Over the last several months, as pundits and partisans have debated the significance of his relationship with Senator Barack Obama, William Ayers has avoided the limelight, steering clear of political commentary and public pronouncements.

But on Sunday afternoon, Mr. Ayers, 63, a founder of the 1960s-era radical group the Weather Underground, a former fugitive, former Chicago Citizen of the Year and current professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago, appeared without fanfare at the Stella Adler Studio of Acting, in Chelsea, to participate in a symposium on educational justice.

In 1995, Mr. Ayers held a fund-raiser for Mr. Obama, who was running for a seat in the Illinois State Senate. The two men later served together on the boards of two Chicago philanthropic groups as well as on the board of an education reform organization. The two men have been described as friendly, but not close.

With nine days left before Election Day, "60 Minutes" aired a segment Sunday evening addressing a complex investment tool at the heart of the current financial crisis without fully explaining the presidential campaign ramifications behind the laws that made the market meltdown almost inevitable.

Despite accurately calling credit default swaps "The Bet That Blew Up Wall Street," CBS didn't properly inform viewers that George W. Bush had absolutely nothing to do with the Clinton-signed legislation that deregulated them, and that frequent campaign statements by Barack Obama and Joe Biden blaming the current financial crisis on Bush economic policies are therefore completely false. 

The producers also chose not to expose the key Democrats -- most notably House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Cali.) and House Financial Services Committee Chairman Barney Frank (D-Mass.) -- that voted in favor of this legislation back in 2000 but have in recent weeks dishonestly blamed President Bush for the current crisis.

Instead, CBS's Steve Kroft offered viewers a very general and nonpartisan political background to the passage of the Commodity Futures Modernization Act of 2000 (video embedded right):

Spreading the Word

Media Research Center Founder and President L. Brent Bozell, III today demanded the press report on damning new evidence of Illinois Democratic Senator and Presidential nominee Barack Obama's radical views on how we need to "break free from the essential constraints that were placed by the founding fathers in the Constitution" because it "doesn't say what the federal government or state government must do on your behalf."  In tearing away from the Constitution, Sen. Obama says he seeks to achieve "social justice" through "redistributive change."

In the 2001 Chicago Public Radio interview, the audio of which has just surfaced, Sen. Obama laments that "the Supreme Court never ventured into the issues of redistribution of wealth, and of more basic issues such as political and economic justice in society."

The media have refused to report on or obfuscated what has now become a series of comments from Sen. Obama that indicate a radical outlook on America, wealth redistribution and the courts.  He famously told "Joe the Plumber" (Samuel Joseph Wurzelbacher) that we need to "spread the wealth around."  On his nominees for the courts, he said "We need somebody who's got the heart, the empathy, to recognize what it's like to be a young teenage mom.  The empathy to understand what it's like to be poor, or African-American, or gay, or disabled, or old. And that's the criteria by which I'm going to be selecting my judges."

Brent Bozell:

Update: ABCNews.com has since changed out the McCain photo to show a grinning McCain.

Lee Boggs found that ABCNews.com augmented a generic horse-race campaign story by Mark Mooney on Monday morning with this slanted "photo illustration" -- or is it some sort of movie poster, with obvious Good Guy vs. Snidely Whiplash overtones? Or just JFK vs. Nixon? Mooney's article suggested Ohio was up for grabs between Good and Evil:

McCain started the week with good news in the Buckeye State, which was critical in President Bush's win over Sen. John Kerry in 2004 and Vice President Al Gore in 2000.

An Ohio Newspaper/University of Cincinnati poll indicates the Ohio race is a statistical dead heat, giving a 49-46 edge to Obama.

Could this agitprop art be more over the top -- on a "news" site?

Monday’s CBS ‘Early Show’ made Sarah Palin’s clothes shopping habits headline news as co-host Harry Smith declared: "Sarah Palin defends her shopping spree...We'll take you to the consignment store where she says she really shops." Only minutes later, Smith seemed to lament the distraction of the issue: "So much time and attention has been spent talking about John McCain's running mate in this -- in this case and, now it's -- they're defending themselves about clothes and all of these other things. Ones wonders if there's a presidential campaign going on here." Apparently Smith forgot that he shares responsibility for making it an issue in the first place.

At the top of the show, correspondent Jeff Glor reported that McCain: "...defended the woman he's running with. Following reports of rising tensions inside Sarah Palin's inner circle and the flap over those high-end designer clothes she wore at the convention." Glor added: "Palin, campaigning with the View's Elizabeth Hasselbeck, also addressed the $150,000 shopping spree." He played a clip of Hasselbeck: "Let me tell you, this is deliberately sexist." However, Glor never explained that Hasselbeck was talking about media coverage of Palin, instead he concluded: "The Alaskan governor said her wedding ring only cost $35 and that she usually buys her clothes from a consignment shop in Alaska."

In the 7:30AM half hour, co-host Julie Chen investigated that Alaska consignment shop: "On the campaign trail yesterday, Governor Sarah Palin again addressed the criticism she has received over the $150,000 that the Republican National Committee spent to dress her and her family. She said she likes to shop in a consignment store called Out of the Closet. The owner is Ellen Arv -- Arvold and she joins us now."

Continuing the theme that John McCain has lost the election, Monday’s CBS ‘Early Show’ already began the post mortem as co-host Harry Smith declared: "This is the final full week of the 2008 campaign. Barack Obama is pressing in on states that were once GOP strongholds and John McCain is on the defensive about himself and his running mate." Later in the show, Smith interviewed McCain supporter Mitt Romney and asked: "So much time and attention has been spent talking about John McCain's running mate in this -- in this case and, now it's -- they're defending themselves about clothes and all of these other things. One wonders if there's a presidential campaign going on here. Is Sarah Palin, has she turned out to be a drag on this ticket?" In the 7:30AM half hour, co-host Julie Chen did an entire segment on Palin’s fashion purchasing habits.

Following Smith’s interview with Romney, fellow co-host Maggie Rodriguez interviewed the Democratic Governor of Virginia, Tim Kaine, and asked about Palin: "One of the concerns that people have in your state, about Senator McCain, is his choice of running mate. Do you think that if he had chosen someone like, let's say, Mitt Romney, this would be a much tougher battle for Barack Obama?" That gave Kaine the opportunity to bash the Alaska Governor: "When you pick somebody who's in the midst of an ethics investigation in their own state legislature, called by the Republican legislature, you know, there's just going to be surprises, and I think the stories, as they come out about it have raised questions about Senator McCain and kind of his decision-making process." Rodriguez never asked about Obama picking Joe Biden, despite the Delaware Senator's numerous gaffes.

Update at bottom of post.

In a story on "Potential Problems at the Polls," Time's Michael Scherer passed along to readers a misleading anecdote about some nuns from South Bend who were "turned away" from the polls in Indiana's May presidential primary. The scary tale of sweet elderly nuns being robbed of their right to vote was how he introduced Time readers to potential problem #6, "New Burdens of Proof."

The sisters of the holy cross [sic] in notre [sic] Dame, Ind., don't have much use for driver's licenses. Or at least that's what a dozen of the nuns thought on May 6, when they went to vote in the presidential primary. They were each turned away as a result of a recently established ID-check requirement at Indiana polls.

In truth what actually happened was the nuns refused to avail themselves the opportunity of voting via provisional ballot and Scherer is hardly the first to mislead readers as to the facts of the incident in question.As I noted in a May 6 NewsBusters post:

Imagine that a week before a presidential election, a radio interview surfaced in which the Republican candidate had called for, say, the abolition of Social Security. Now imagine the broadcast networks' reaction to that nugget: "We interrupt regularly-scheduled programming for this Breaking News," followed by 24/7 coverage with talking heads pondering the devastating impact on America's seniors, the overall economy, the future of Western civilization, etc. Nobel laureate Paul Krugman would be booked from now till election day, offering his pained pronouncements.

But how do those same networks react when a radio interview [YouTube after the jump] surfaces of Barack Obama in a call for the redistribution of wealth, in which he laments the Supreme Court's insufficient radicalism in pursuing redistribution and refers to the civil rights movement's failure to develop a better strategy to bring about wealth redistribution as a "tragedy?

Insert cricket-chirp soundtrack here.

America’s either racist, or it will elect Obama. So writes Newsweek columnist Jonathan Alter, who focuses in his weekly column on imagining the "horror" scenario, titled "Why McCain Won: Snatching defeat from the jaws of victory: how that scenario could (but likely won't) play out." Alter’s theory in a nutshell: If McCain wins, racism is the answer. "Millions of people in the rest of the world assume that Barack Obama cannot be elected because he is black," but Alter hopes "the common sense and decency of the American people will prove the skeptics wrong."

It sounds a little like Bryant Gumbel, who declared in 1989 that his NBC News special on racial attitudes "is not going to tell you whether or not you are a racist or a liberal." Alter thinks less educated (and more racist) voters will be the difference if Obama loses:

In an otherwise pretty friendly 60 Minutes profile of T. Boone Pickens and his “Pickens Plan” to reduce dependence on foreign oil, Charlie Rose, on loan from PBS, couldn't resist repeating the usual derogatory media descriptions and canards about the 2004 “Swift Boat Veterans for Truth” ads against John Kerry, which Pickens helped fund, as “infamous,” “widely criticized” and “representative of dirty politics, smear politics, character assassination.” After video of Pickens taking his case to Democrats at their convention in Denver, Rose highlighted:

It didn't take long for the new non-partisan Boone Pickens to have a visibly uncomfortable encounter with his partisan past: Senator John Kerry, whose presidential campaign Pickens helped destroy four years ago when he gave money for the infamous and widely criticized “Swift Boat” ads that attacked the Senator's service in Vietnam and his later testimony before Congress.

Rose pressed Pickens about any regrets: “You spent $3 million funding an advertising campaign that, in some people’s mind, was representative of dirty politics, smear politics, character assassination, all of that. At this stage, do you have any reservations, do you have any-?” Pickens jumped in with an emphatic “none” and told Rose he'd do it over again.

One of the finest examples of media bias this campaign season occurred last Sunday when Democrat vice presidential candidate Joe Biden guaranteed an international crisis would befall our nation in six months if Obama is in the White House, and the American press almost completely ignored his warning.

To give you an idea of just how absurd the lack of coverage concerning this event was, the entire panel on Saturday's "Fox News Watch" agreed that this shows just how in the tank the press are for the junior senator from Illinois.

Even the left-leaning Kirsten Powers said "if there's any doubt there was a double standard in this race, it is completely laid to rest by this because there is no way that this can be ignored."

I couldn't agree more (h/t Johnny Dollar):

In a Fox News Sunday panel segment on the media's pro-Obama and anti-McCain bias, Juan Williams revealed journalists were in such a swoon for Barack Obama that during the primaries “what you saw was that the executive editors and the top people at the networks were all rushing to Obama events, bringing their children, celebrating it, saying they were, there's this part of history.” Though Williams, a former Washington Post reporter who is now a NPR news analyst and regular analyst for Fox News, maintained “there's no question in my mind the media has been more supportive of Senator Obama,” he contended it does not explain why McCain is losing.

Williams on the Sunday, October 26 Fox News Sunday:

If you needed any more evidence that the media meme regarding Sarah Palin not being qualified for vice president is nothing but liberal propaganda from America's Obama-loving press you got it on Sunday's "The Chris Matthews Show."

After the panel of New York magazine's John Heilemann, the Washington Post's Anne Kornblut, NBC's Andrea Mitchell, and the Chicago Tribune's Clarence Page unanimously concluded that Palin was a horrible choice as John McCain's runningmate due to her lack of qualifications, they all agreed that she will be a serious candidate for president in 2012 if Obama wins this November.

Interesting hypocrisy, wouldn't you agree?

Readers are strongly encouraged to strap themselves in before proceeding to the following partial transcript of this astonishingly revealing segment (video embedded upper-right):