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Keith Olbermann, Ed Schultz and the brain trust at ThinkProgress probably won't like this, but CNBC "Mad Money" host Jim Cramer thinks the Glenn Beck boycott won't have an impact on NewsCorp's (NASDAQ:NWSA), the parent company of Fox News, bottom line.

During the "Stop Trading" segment on "Street Signs" Aug. 24, Cramer explained that Unilever (NYSE:UN) was going all out with its advertising, by not avoiding shows that might offend someone's political sensibilities. Cramer said that strategy was paying off for Unilever, whose stock is up 10 percent since July.

"When I look at it, it's very interesting because there's an article in the same magazine, Ad Age magazine, about how like Unilever is spending like mad, and that they're going to be, Unilever had a spectacular quarter," Cramer said. "My take is that whoever is just trying to parcel and figure out where to be in the Fox News or where to be in the MSNBC, ought to take their cue from Unilever, which had the best quarter of all packaged goods because they flooded all media and it showed that those who pulled back, whether it be from Glenn Beck, or whether it be from Olbermann, didn't do as well as Unilever, which was all in during this period where the rates went down."

CNN went searching for an example of health care reform without a public option on Aug. 20. Correspondent Jim Acosta found such a “model” in Massachusetts, but downplayed the state program’s flaws.

“What do you get when you take the public option out of health care reform? Well, according to some experts you get Romney Care,” Acosta said. “Three years after enacting its own version of reform, Massachusetts now has near universal coverage. Taxpayer watchdogs say it’s affordable … health care experts say it’s popular.”

Acosta included former Gov. Mitt Romney, Michael Widmer of the Massachusetts Taxpayer Foundation and Robert Blendon of the Harvard School of Public Health in his segment -- all supporting Romney Care.

Push Poll: technique in which an individual or organization attempts to influence or alter the view of respondents under the guise of conducting a poll.

By that definition, it sure seems that NBC is push polling on behalf of ObamaCare.  On this morning's Today, NBC News Political Director and Chief White House Correspondent Chuck Todd reported on a new NBC poll that reflected the fact that, according to him, many Americans continue to believe "the myths" about ObamaCare. But Todd reported that the NBC pollsters also gave people "the facts" about ObamaCare.  And after hearing those "facts," a majority supported the plan.  Sounds like classic push polling.

And what were those "myths" that NBC supposedly busted?  That ObamaCare:

If Napoleon was right about not interfering with an [in this case political] enemy in the process of destroying itself, this could be a time for Republicans to lay low. According to Ed Schultz, the left could be on the verge of an anti-Obama crack-up.

On his MSNBC show this evening, Schultz said to the face of a senior admin official that the left is seriously considering dumping support for the president.

Schultz's guest was reporter-turned-Obama-spokesman Linda Douglass.  The point of Schultz's exercise was to hold Obama's feet to the fire for the way the prez is furiously backpedaling away from his pledge that any health care bill "must" contain a public option.

An agitated Schultz conducted this exchange.

You might call it a decided understatement. Still, it was refreshing to hear a member of the White House press corps state an inconvenient truth about Pres. Obama: that he is under-supplied in the sense of humor department.

Julie Mason, White House correspondent of the Washington Examiner, offered the observation this afternoon on MSNBC. She was on to discuss the awkward situation created by the separate meetings with Pres. Obama that Hillary and Bill Clinton are having this afternoon.

When Monica Novotny asked whether PBO might take the occasion to rib her about her sharp response to the student in the Congo who asked about Bill's views, Mason offered her candid comment.

According to the mainstream media, carrying a gun to a protest is just plain crazy, even if perfectly legal. What’s more, it’s indicative of the toxic, hate-filled atmosphere filling conservative protests of President Obama and his plans for health care reform.

“Hardball” host Chris Matthews and his daytime colleagues at MSNBC, for example, have their used air time to marvel at what would possess an average American citizen to go to a rally near where President Obama is speaking with a gun.

But the media reaction was markedly different nine years ago when a group of Black Panthers marched on the Texas Republican Party’s state convention on June 2000 brandishing AK-47s. Indeed, that incident itself was chalked up as then-Gov. Bush’s fault by none other than then-MSNBC "Equal Time" co-host Paul Begala.

Newsflash: The media doesn't understand that the Catholic Church is not a democracy, and that the Vatican is not swayed by public opinion.

The proof of this disconnect came from ABC "World News Sunday" anchor Dan Harris and correspondent David Wright during the Aug. 16 "World News" broadcast. Wright's report on American nuns facing an apostolic visitation, labeled by Harris as "a controversial investigation," portrayed the Vatican as a big, bad bully of American nuns. 

Somewhere, Joe McCarthy is smiling . . .

On today's Meet The Press, Rachel Maddow demanded to know whether Dick Armey was a member of a coalition with the Tea Party Patriots, a group she alleges to promote "violence."  Moderator David Gregory joined in the cross-examination of Armey, head of Freedom Works.

Seton Motley, the Media Research Center's Director of Communications, was on the Fox News Channel's Glenn Beck to discuss the Federal Communications Commission (FCC)'s new "Chief Diversity Officer," Mark Lloyd.

Chief Diversity Officer Lloyd is virulently anti-capitalist, almost myopically racially fixated and exuberantly pro-regulation.  He is a frightening guy to have having any power at the Federal Communications Commission (FCC).  And yet that is exactly where he currently stands, astride the private radio industry he loathes like a Socialist Colossus.

It does not bode well for free speech on the radio airwaves, but as Seton says to Glenn during this appearance, "That's irrelevent to these people."

UPDATE: Sargento says Colors of Change did not influence company's decision (at bottom)

What constitutes "hateful speech?" It depends on the views of the individual, or in this case the advocacy group propagating the claim.

Earlier this week, Plymouth, Wisc.-based Sargento Food, Inc., along with several other companies, pulled their advertising from the Fox News Channel's "Glenn Beck" program, some at the behest of a campaign by Color of Change, an advocacy group.

Barbara Gannon, vice president of Corporate Communications & Government Relations for Sargento Foods Inc., told the Business & Media Institute why her company decided to stop advertising during the Fox News Channel program.

Jonathan Capehart let the mask slip on just how much the MSM is one with Pres. Obama and Democrats at large.  Here's the WaPo editorialist on Morning Joe today, discussing the daunting task of selling ObamaCare to a doubting public:

"We've got two problems here. We: I should say the administration or Democrats have two problems."

Sorry, Jonathan.  Cat out of bag.  Toothpaste out of tube. Bell rung.

On Thursday’s Newsroom, CNN’s Rick Sanchez couldn’t get a straight answer out of Democratic Representative Sheila Jackson-Lee about her cell phone use during a recent health care town hall, and after he repeatedly asked why she did it and if it was disrespectful, the Texas Democrat bizarrely raised the possibility that the YouTube video of her on the phone was “doctored” [the entire interview can be viewed here; audio clips from the segment are available here].

Sanchez brought on the Jackson-Lee to ask her about the viral video of her phone use as a woman tried to ask her a question at the town hall. He first asked, “How do you explain what you were doing there? What were you thinking, Congresswoman?” For about a minute and a half, the Democrat filibustered by talking about her town hall appearances and the health care issue. The CNN anchor repeatedly tried to get her to answer his question. He asked again: “Why were you talking on the phone?” She continued by avoiding the issue, talking about the “congressional hotline” her office had set up on the health care proposal. Sanchez interrupted, “Congresswoman, you’re not being fair. I asked you a very specific question....The question is, why were you on the phone and was it disrespectful?”

Remember when the children of public figures were off-limits in the day-to-day hand-to-hand combat of political warfare?

It's a rule that didn't just applied to the underage children of politicians, but the adult children. Witness the 2008 suspension of MSNBC's David Shuster for suggesting then-presidential contender Hillary Clinton's 28-year-old daughter Chelsea Clinton was being "pimped out" by the campaign.

But maybe that rule only applied to Democrats. When it comes to liberal pundits attempting to score cheap points against conservatives, especially ones they loathe like Rep. Michele Bachmann, R-Minn, all bets are off. In an Aug. 12 column, Minneapolis Star Tribune columnist Jon Tevlin, citing a hateful anti-Bachmann blog, decided it appropriate to beat up the two-term congresswoman using her son Harrison's decision to participate in the government program Teach for America (TFA). TFA is one of the programs under the AmeriCorps umbrella.

The media are currently apoplectic about the Obama-as-Hitler references at town hall meetings across the country. 

As we have reported again and again, they are often incorrectly ascribing these references to talk radio host Rush Limbaugh and conservatives - as it is lunatic fringe Leftist Lyndon LaRouche that is making these Obama-as-Hitler posters and comparisons.

But this collective media conniption at references to the President as Der Fuhrer is a new development.  Back in the George W. Bush days, the Jurrasic Press was far less reviled by the often made Bush-as-Hitler comparisons, and indeed some saw similarites. 

As you can see in the video at right. Anyone remember CNN's Susan Roesgen?  She is the recently ex-CNN reporter who made a name for herself by assaulting on-air April 15 TEA Party protesters this past Tax Day.

But this clip is from January 13, 2006, with Ms. Roesgen reporting from New Orleans on Hurricane Katrina.  During which she says, in reference to a man in a giant Bush head with a Hitler mustache (and devil horns):

Who says the media are monolithic in their thinking?

Yesterday we informed you of the media's serial misuse of an Obama-as-Hitler poster from esoteric left-winger Lyndon LaRouche's website, as outlets like NBC (on their Nightly News and Meet the Press), CNN and MSNBC all ascribed the poster to sentiments roiled up by talk radio host Rush Limbaugh specifically and conservatives generally. 

We were entertained by the fact that all of these highly trained, keen-eyed journalists missed the words "LaRouchePAC.com" - in fairly large type - printed at the bottom of every one of the placards they used for their little reporting projects.

Well apparently CBS hasn't yet learned the lesson we had hoped to impart.  In fact, last night they did the other networks one worse. 

For the words "LaRouchPAC.com" are prominently visible three times (screen captures below the fold) on two different Obama-as-Hitler posters during reporter Ben Tracy's segment, yet that doesn't stop him from blaming it on right-wingers.

As the second Obama-as-Hitler poster is shown, with LaRouchePAC.com clearly visible front and center, Tracy offers up:

Q. How can you tell that Hillary is blowing her African tour?
A. When even supporters like Tina Brown says she needs to get back home ASAP . . . and hit the gym.

The Daily Beast head made her candid comments on today's Morning Joe.  Mika Brzezinski made a spirited defense of Hillary, claiming her latest gaffe—putting Florida 2000 in the same boat as Nigeria's notoriously rigged elections—was no big deal.  But Scarborough, Buchanan and Barnicle all said it was past time for Hillary to return. And Brown put in the unkindest cut of all . . .

Update below the fold.

This is just a small entry, a blog-lette, if you will.  Because I happened to have seen this bit of broadcast flapdoodle live, which you now have before you at right (with the audio available here).

On this morning's MSNBC News Live, co-host Angela Burt-Murray - the Editor-in-Chief of Essence magazine -uncorks this absolutely wild pitch to Congressman Elijah Cummings (D-Md):

Recently you released a report on women and health care, and taking a look at the very real issue that families are facing we have more than 64 million women who have lost health care due to loss of job or a spouse that has lost a job.  How do you see the Administration's plan being more able to effectively address this issue for women and children in this country?

64 million?  Just women?

We have repeatedly documented that the oft-cited 46 million people - men and women - without insurance is completely bogus.  But as you will find at the link's destination, the media's number on this vacillates wildly.

The media have repeatedly stated how "angry," "hostile" and "ugly" town hall meetings across America are becoming. They are of course largely ascribing the nastiness to conservatives voicing their opposition to (among other things) President Barack Obama and Congress' proposed government takeover of the health care system.

The press has been particularly offended by the "extreme" use of references to Adolf Hitler specifically and Nazis generally. One image they have repeatedly used as an example of this alleged right-wing extremism is a poster of President Obama - on whose face a Hitler mustache has been Photo Shopped - bearing the caption "I've Changed."

We have compiled a video montage (at right) of just some of the recent news programs that have ascribed this Obama-with-Mustache poster to conservative town hall attendees. (The Obama-with-Mustache image itself appears just below the fold.)

Lou Dobbs - you can love him or hate, but sometimes he makes a point that will get your attention.

The CNN host of "Lou Dobbs Tonight" gave his evaluation of MSNBC "Countdown" host Keith Olbermann on his Aug. 11 radio show. According to Dobbs, Olbermann was a neophyte until MSNBC gave him a primetime show in 2003.

"First, I want to share with you something that just, I mean shocks me," Dobbs said. "Over at MSNBC, Keith Olbermann is their resident moron over there. He knows nothing about politics, nothing about economics. He has never covered politics until they put him in that chair and said, ‘Hey, you know, go try it out.' I mean, it's crazy. He's just - oh my gosh."

Ben Bernanke's able use of monetary policy to steer the economy during the current financial crisis sometimes makes it easy to forget that Bernanke helped steer the ship into that crisis early in his term as Federal Reserve Chairman and a member of the Fed's Board of Governors. That's a point Strategic Forecasting (Stratfor) founder and CEO George Friedman made when asked the likelihood of President Obama reappointing Bernanke.

"The probability of Bernanke being reappointed to the Fed is near zero," Friedman said during an interview on CNBC's Aug. 11 "Squawk Box."

"Bernanke presided over the events leading up to the greatest financial crisis we've seen in quite a while," Friedman told CNBC's Steve Liesman. "The best that can be said is that he didn't make it any worse than he already made it. The president is not going to be wanting to reappoint the man that most of the country regards as responsible for the problem."

On today's Morning Joe, host Joe Scarborough was shocked to hear from Mark Halperin of Time and co-host Mika Brzezinski that most people in the MSM don't admit that the press is biased, and to the contrary most in the MSM see themselves as "right down the middle."

JOE SCARBOROUGH: So you're saying that most people in the mainstream media don't admit that the press is biased?

MARK HALPERIN: I don't think so.  You take a survey around the news room --

MIKA BRZEZINSKI: No, they don't admit it: I agree that.

MSNBC, the place for left-wing politics strikes again.

If there ever was a textbook example of what not to do in a TV interview for broadcast journalism students, "Hardball" host Chris Matthews put it on display during his Aug. 10 show. In a segment with Americans For Prosperity President Tim Phillips, Matthews did his dead-level best to discredit the opponent of Obama's health care policy proposals, first by trying to link him to those questioning Obama's presidency on the claims of an invalid birth certificate.

"Tim, where are you from politically? What's your story? Who are you politically?" Matthews said, peppering his free-market conservative guest with questions. "Are you one of the people that question's the president's legitimacy as president?" "You're not a birther or anything like that?"

When it comes to insulting people opposed to ObamaCare, you might say Ed Schultz has plumbed new depths . . .

On his MSNBC show this evening, Schultz branded people turning up at town halls as "dumber than Joe the Plumber."  For good measure, he added a variation on the Washington Post's old canard about certain conservatives being "poor, undereducated, and easy to command."

View video here.

Who says a little engineering mixed in with your journalism is a bad thing? At least one MSNBC host and Washington Post reporter said it's a journalist's job to focus on "real issues" in the hotly debated issue of health care reform.

This was the topic of discussion in a panel featuring John Rother, executive vice president of Policy and Strategy for AARP, Ceci Connolly of The Washington Post, Tim Phillips of Americans for Prosperity and host Dr. Nancy Snyderman during MSNBC's "Dr. Nancy" Aug. 10.

Rother argued there has been far too much hyperbole on the issue, which he insisted was meant to mislead the public.

Watch out, Barbra Streisand!  You've got some serious competition in the category of formerly famous woman singers turned loud and illogical liberal lips.

Carole King has proclaimed that people who say that Pres. Obama's cap-and-tax plan is an energy tax are . . . like "birthers."

King made her wacky claim on Willie Geist's "Way Too Early" show this morning. 

View video here.

Are you opposed to ObamaCare?  Willing to attend a town hall to express your disapproval?  Odds are good you're a racist.  Just ask Cynthia Tucker . . .

As Clay Waters has noted, Paul Krugman alleges that racist motives are at the heart of the town hall protests against ObamaCare.  On this evening's Hardball, Cynthia Tucker of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution was willing to get specific, estimating that "45 to 65%" of the protesters are motivated by racism.

View video here.

On Friday’s Your World program, Fox News Channel’s interviewed Kenneth Gladney, the victim of an assault outside a health care town hall meeting in St. Louis on August 6, along with his lawyer David Brown. A video of the immediate aftermath of the attack (posted earlier on NewsBusters by Seton Motley) showed some of the suspects wearing t-shirts bearing the logo of the SEIU union, which is a member organization of Health Care for America Now!, a left-wing coalition pushing for the passage of ObamaCare [video clips from the segment are available here; audio clips are found here].

Mr. Gladney stated that he arrived outside the building where the town hall meeting was taking place, and started distributing and/or selling flags which bear the famous slogan “Don’t Tread on Me.” He continued that “this guy...walked up to me and said...who in the blank is selling this blank here. And I said, sir, this is my merchandise, and....he was like, what kind of ‘N’ are you to be giving out this kind of stuff here? And he snatched the- the button board. And when he snatched the button board, I snatched it back from him, and that’s when he proceeded to hit me in my face.” He added that others joined in the beat-down.

UPDATE: We have some video of the attack.  It appears that it is members of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) doing at least some of the dirty work.

 

But it's conservatives who engage in violence and hate speech, right?

The Saint Louis Post-Dispatch is reporting that one of their own, reporter Jake Wagman, was one of six people arrested in connection with the beating of a conservative activist outside of a town hall forum held by Democrat Congressman Russ Carnahan.  

According to Dawn Majors, a Post-Dispatch photojournalist who witnessed everything unfold, an officer said that Wagman had been "interfering."

From the article:

Kenneth Gladney, a 38-year-old conservative activist from St. Louis, said he was attacked by some of those arrested as he handed out yellow flags with “Don't tread on me” printed on them. He spoke to the Post-Dispatch from the emergency room of the St. John's Mercy Medical Center, where he said he was waiting to be treated for injuries to his knee, back, elbow, shoulder and face that he suffered in the attack. Gladney, who is black, said one of his attackers, also a black man, used a racial slur against him before the attack started.

"It just seems there's no freedom of speech without being attacked," he said.

That is some list of injuries, which means it must have been some beating.  And Gladney says he was attacked by "some of those arrested,"  which means there were probably more in the mob than just that.

And let us not overlook nor forget the racial slur Gladney additionally endured.

More from the article:

"[W]e've got to be journalists. We've got to keep the facts straight."

That's Chris Matthews referring to the professional standards governing his "Hardball" program in an MSNBC promo that aired in a commercial break halfway through the program's August 6 edition.

You can view the video below the page break.

 

Times have been tough financially for media companies across the board and satellite radio has been no exception.

On Aug. 6, Sirius XM Radio (NASDAQ:SIRI) posted a second-quarter loss and the company hasn't lived up to expectations after Sirius and XM completed a merger a little over a year ago. According to "CNBC Reports" host Dennis Kneale, part of the satellite radio's problem is shock jock Howard Stern's compensation and the company's debt.

"I feel so, bad - there's, being run by one of what I think is the best executives in media, Mel Karmazin, a great salesman," Kneale said on CNBC's Aug. 6 "Power Lunch." "But in the end, does it turn out they just overpaid for Howard Stern and they have too much debt? I wonder if John Malone bailed them out temporarily hoping that they kind of go belly-up so they can get a hold of those assets really cheap."