Barney Frank

Conservative talk show host Rush Limbaugh used his Tuesday radio program to criticize members of the mainstream media and others on the political left for diverting any potential blame from Muslims as the possible terrorists behind Monday's Boston bombings while suggesting that “right-wing” groups were possibly involved in the attack on the marathon.

“If you are a Muslim, and it turns out that a Muslim did bomb the Boston Marathon,” Limbaugh said, “how do you feel? I daresay that if you are a Muslim, you can be pretty certain … that everybody in the media will circle the wagons and say: ‘This is not because of Islam.’”

Former congressman Barney Frank (D-Mass.) went on MSNBC this morning to react to yesterday’s bombing at the Boston Marathon. In a shameless moment of advocacy, Frank used the tragedy to make a political statement about revenue and the size of government. Considering that this happened on MSNBC, you might expect the host to condone the congressman’s liberal activism, but anchor Thomas Roberts actually called Frank out for his despicable attempt to politicize this tragedy.

Early in the interview, Frank stressed that none of us know much about who and what were behind this event as of yet. So the former congressman turned to what he does know how to do – attacking his ideological opponents: [Video below. MP3 audio here.]

Former Democratic congressman Barney Frank shamelessly used the Boston Marathon atrocity to promote his liberal political agenda on CNN and MSNBC on Tuesday morning, yet only MSNBC called him out for "making political hay" of the bombing.

"I would say this is a terrible day for our society, but a day when I hope people understand the centrality of having a government in place with the resources," Frank argued on CNN's Starting Point. "No tax cut would have helped us deal with this or will help us recover. This is very expensive." Yet co-host John Berman didn't admonish him for railing against tax and budget cutters less than 24 hours after the bombing, but instead offered some diplomatic praise of his words. [Video below the break. Audio here.]

What's with Barney Frank and his odd obsession with a Henny Youngman line that—had virtually any other politician used it—would result in him being accused of the worst kind of misogyny?

Back in 2011, I noted that, appearing on Morning Joe, Frank had quoted the hoary Henny line: "How's your wife? Compared to what?" Yet there was Barney again this evening, this time on Al Sharpton's MSNBC show, breaking out the identical line.  Really: what gives?  And imagine the feminist outrage if, say, Mitt Romney had dared use the line during his presidential campaign.  View the video after the jump.

Ed Schultz's grasp of American history in the BB era -- Before Barack -- is tenuous at best. And when Schultz is wrong about something from that ancient realm of our past, he makes a fool out of himself.

On his radio show Friday, Schultz got on the wrong side of an argument with a better informed caller. Naturally, Schultz couldn't resist hanging up on the man and labeling him an idiot. That's when you know Schultz is 180 degrees off the mark -- he becomes dogmatic about being right. (audio after page break)

As NewsBusters readers know, one of my guilty pleasures is pointing out the staggering ignorance of Bill Maher.

The object of my disaffection certainly didn't let me down Friday evening when on HBO's Real Time he actually told Congressman Barney Frank (D-Mass.) that we spend 42 percent of our total budget on defense (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Oops. While celebrating in Thursday's New York Times the spotlight shown on gay issues during this week's Democratic National Convention, reporter Adam Nagourney (who is openly gay) wrote that gay Rep. Barney Frank spoke to the convention on Wednesday night. Nope: Frank was actually bumped when the program ran long and will deliver his speech tonight instead.

After the news broke of the First Circuit Court declaring the Defense of Marriage Act unconstitutional, CNN hosted openly-gay Congressman Barney Frank (D-Mass.) and asked him softball questions like "are you heartened to see that?"

The entire interview lasted over 12 minutes, a very long time on cable news, but only a part of it focused on DOMA. Anchor Suzanne Malveaux painted a positive picture for supporters of same-sex marriage, touting a "sea-change" on the issue in America. [Video below the break. Audio here.]

Fresh off his humiliating defeat on Jeopardy! Monday night, MSNBC's Chris Matthews actually introduced a pair of guests Tuesday as "two of the most smartest people."

Almost as funny, "two of the most smartest people" in the Hardball host's opinion are Congressman Barney Frank (D-Mass.) and former Clinton labor secretary Robert Reich (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Fox News's Bill O'Reilly on Friday lambasted the Washington Post for its pathetic hit piece on Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney.

"If while Governor of Massachusetts, Romney shaved Barney Frank's head, then you might have a story. But a prep school prank?" incredulously asked O'Reilly. "The Romney story means nothing, period" (video follows with transcript and absolutely no need for additional commentary):

After President Obama publicly supported gay marriage on Wednesday, CNN continued its cheerleading well into Wednesday evening, including a happy interview of openly-gay congressman Barney Frank (D-Mass.) where he proudly showed the audience his engagement ring.

During CNN's 6-9 p.m. coverage, 9 of the guests voiced their support of President Obama's position on-air, while only two objected. Another guest, Mike Signorile, did not give verbal support but writes for the Huffington Post "Gay Voices" blog and has called for President Obama to "kick down the closet door" and publicly support same-sex marriage. [Video below the break. Audio here.]

George Will on Sunday marvelously told liberal economist Robert Reich something that many conservatives have been dying to say for years.

During a fascinating Right vs. Left debate on ABC's This Week, after Reich predictably pined for higher income tax rates to solve all that ails us, Will struck back with the line of the weekend, "You are a pyromaniac in a field of strawmen" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Some members of the liberal media commemorated Rep. Barney Frank's (D-Mass.) retirement announcement by replaying his testy response to a CNSNews.com reporter about homosexuals showering with straight men in the military. Of course, they included their own eulogies about how much the liberal congressman would be missed.

A nostalgic Martin Bashir expressed his sadness at Frank's departure on his Monday MSNBC show, touting "one of the greatest hits from a man who championed the poor and oppressed, Barney Frank. He'll be sorely missed." He then played the CNSNews.com clip. [Video below the break. Click here for audio.]

Amidst all the media coverage of Rep. Barney Frank's (Mass.) retirement from the U.S. House of Representatives, the media largely praised the retiring Democrat while overlooking the scandals of his tenure in office and his crucial support to government policies that helped fuel the housing bubble, NewsBusters publisher Brent Bozell told viewers of the December 1 edition of Fox News Channel's Hannity.

"Why isn't anyone in the media talking about the obvious? This is a man who single-handedly presided over the collapse" of the U.S. housing industry, Bozell reminded host Sean Hannity in the popular recurring "Media Mash" segment. "Barney Frank in  2003 fought George Bush when he tried to do something about it." [video of the full segment follows page break]

Richard Harris wasn't the only NPR staffer wondering about the backwardness of America on Tuesday's All Things Considered. At the end of a completely supine interview with Barney Frank, anchor Guy Raz asked Frank if he was pleased at how far America had come from its backwardness on gay liberation from when he came out of the closet in the Reagan years.

"I want to ask you about a decision you made in 1987," Raz declared. "You went public to tell people you were gay. That was controversial at the time. Are you heartened at the distance America has come?" Frank said "without question," and said "prejudice" was very close to being eliminated in America:

During what he billed as an "official exit interview" for retiring Rep. Barney Frank, Hardball host Chris Matthews asked the Massachusetts Democrat if he believes in good and evil and moreover, does he believe that "there's some people like Newt Gingrich that personify one side of this Manichean struggle in our life."

Frank, no fan of Gingrich, seemed taken aback by how strident Matthews feels about the former Republican Speaker of the House (video follows page break; MP3 audio here):

Barney Frank's retirement announcement could have come as early as 1989 but back then the Democratic congressman from Massachusetts relied on the liberal attitudes of his constituents and his friends in the media to see him through a prostitution scandal, friends like the Boston Globe's Tom Oliphant. On the August 26, 1989 edition of the syndicated Inside Washington, Oliphant had no fear that Frank would survive the scandal of his apartment being used for a male prostitution ring as he proclaimed Frank to be "a man of surpassing integrity."(video after the jump)

Yesterday we noted how the Washington Post devoted both an A-section front-pager and a Style section front-pager to celebrating the career of Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.), who announced his retirement from the House on Monday.

Today the Post's "In the Loop" columnist Al Kamen continued the paper's celebration with a look at  "Frank's Greatest Hits", a collection of the Massachusetts Democrat's notable jokes and put-downs.

NPR's Tovia Smith sang the praises of Congressman Barney Frank on Monday's All Things Considered: "Frank has proven both piercing and pithy, zinging one-liners....bold and unabashed." Smith barely included any dissenting voices in her report, playing four sound bites from the staunch liberal and his supporters, versus only two from opponents.

Host Melissa Block noted how Rep. Frank is a "leading liberal voice and one of the first openly gay congressman" in her introduction for the correspondent's report and added that "because his district has just been redrawn, he'd likely face a grueling reelection campaign." Smith continued by stating that "some of the Democratic strongholds he's represented for decades have been replaced by more conservative towns."

Anyone who made the easy prediction that the Associated Press would fail to bring up Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac in its fawning tribute to Barney Frank after his retirement announcement yesterday was correct. Anyone making the easy prediction that the AP would lionize him as a "gay pioneer" was also spot-on.

Also predictably, the wire service's Bob Salsberg and David Espo failed to mention that Frank advocated abolishing Fan and Fred as a dishonest survival tactic during his final reelection campaign in 2010, and of course did nothing visible to make that happen this year. What's really odious in this regard is that the AP pair gave him credit (pun intended) for how he "worked to expand affordable housing," when the Community Reinvestment Act-driven subprime crisis Fan and Fred engendered has sent the housing market levels not seen since World War II. What follows are excerpts from the AP. After that I have a few contrary and clear-headed paragraphs from an Investor's Business Daily editorial, and a little reminder of a 1999 "Present" vote which should have generated controversy, but didn't:

The Washington Post responded to yesterday's retirement announcement by Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.) today with not one but two well-placed positive stories. "Longtime lawmaker brokered critical deals as skilled negotiator," gushed the subheader to Paul Kane's 20-paragraph page A1 article.

"Fearlessly, Frank made his mark," blared the below-the-fold Style section front page article by Robert Kaiser. "Longtime lawmaker was one of the few to display a personality," the subheader approvingly noted.

New York Times editorial board member, and former Times reporter, David Firestone is filling in for Andrew Rosenthal this week at the paper’s opinion blog The Loyal Opposition. He has apparently been tasked to make Rosenthal seem balanced by comparison, judging by his Monday posting with the laugh-line headline “Barney Frank, Moderate.”

Firestone was paying tribute to liberal Democrat Rep. Barney Frank, who has represented the Fourth District in southern Massachusetts for the past 30 years and is retiring now, unwilling to stomach the challenge of running in a redrawn district. Firestone termed Frank, who has earned a lifetime rating of 4 out of a possible 100 from the American Conservative Union, a “centrist.” But if Barney Frank isn’t a liberal, than who in Congress is?

“The first line in Barney Frank’s political epitaph,” The Weekly Standard’s Stephen Hayes predicted on Monday’s FNC Special Report upon news the longtime liberal Democratic Congressman won’t seek re-election, will “be the housing crisis.” But that isn’t what those who decide the first draft of history considered relevant.

ABC, CBS and NBC didn’t mention Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac as they instead touted him as “one of the most familiar, powerful and colorful characters on Capitol Hill” (ABC), as “the Congressman who co-authored the overhaul of financial regulations after the crash” (CBS) and all noted his sexual orientation. NBC’s Brian Williams: “Among his legacies – besides his legendary sharp tongue – he was the first Member of Congress to publically acknowledge he was gay back in 1987.”

Congressman Barney Frank has been a liberal media darling for decades. But one of the most memorable media pitches for gay marriage came on December 31, 1992, when liberals were still hopeful after the election of Bill Clinton.

ABC's Prime Time Live ended its last program of the year with a song -- celebrities singing "Winter Wonderland." At the part where the song gets to Parson Brown and asking if can marry someone, ABC recruited Barney Frank and his then-partner Herb Moses to chime in. (Moses is the one that Frank recommended for hiring at Fannie Mae.) Video follows:

Reporting on Monday morning that Congressman Barney Frank (D-Mass.) was not seeking re-election, CNN's political team whitewashed his controversial tenure in office with some fond words like "titan," "larger-than-life," and "teacher at heart."

CNN's Joe Johns lauded Frank's skills as a teacher -- especially as the first openly-gay congressman. "He's taught this country so much about the gay community in the United States and what it means to be an openly gay member of Congress. A leader, in fact, on Capitol Hill," Johns gushed.

Political editor Mark Preston praised Frank as a "titan" of financial sector matters in Congress while saying nothing of the failure of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac under his oversight. While noting that Frank was tough to deal with, Preston added that he was "one of the best debaters in Congress" and "always the smartest person in the room." [Video below the break. Click here for audio.]

If you only read Thursday's coverage of Bank of America's decision to impose a $5 monthly debit card fee by Associated Press Personal Finance Writer Candice Choi, you would have no idea that last year's "Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act" triggered BofA's decision. The legislation gave the Federal Reserve the power to limit debit card interchange fees. The Fed's limit -- 21 cents plus 0.5% of each purchase transaction -- basically cut the banks' fees by about half from their pre-Dodd-Frank level. CardHub.com estimates that the cap will reduce banks' fee income by $9.4 billion annually.

Ms. Choi only cited the existence of "a new rule" in her opening paragraph. She then waited until the ninth paragraph to vaguely cite the existence of "a regulation." It hardly seems accidental that most news consumers who didn't follow the fee fight a year ago will probably have the impression that banks are driving the fee increases, as the following excerpt will demonstrate (bolds are mine):