Katty Kay

On Sunday’s syndicated Chris Matthews Show, after host Matthews asked if electing a President whose middle name was "Hussein" had "opened a door to better relations with the Arab and Islamic world. Or has it opened a door to more xenophobic American negativity?" the panel mostly agreed that Obama’s election was more of a "net plus" for America’s relations with the world's Muslim population. The Washington Post’s David Ignatius had a dissenting view that "President Obama raised expectations that there would be a different kind of America. That in itself could be dangerous."

After former CBS News anchor Dan Rather argued that "I think it's opened the door to both, but, on balance, and in the main, it's still a net plus in terms of the country's reputation," the BBC’s Katty Kay agreed and implicated President Bush in damaging America’s relations with the Muslim world. Kay: "I agree that it's a net plus, particularly when you compare it with what came before and the invasion of Iraq and how much of a problem that was for America's relations with the Middle East."

NBC’s Andrea Mitchell concurred: "I agree because after the invasion of Iraq and with this President and his multicultural background, it is a net plus."

Washington Post columnist David Ignatius then weighed in with a more pessimistic take:

Chris Matthews this weekend actually invited a real conservative on to the syndicated program bearing his name, and what transpired was a thing of beauty.

National Review's Reihan Salam did such a fabulous job of educating Matthews and his guests - especially Time's Joe Klein - that I imagine him quickly becoming a NewsBusters favorite.

The initial topic of discussion was Glenn Beck's "Restoring Honor" rally scheduled to occur after this was taped.

Between Matthews' disrespectful introduction, and Klein calling the conservative talk show host "a paranoid lunatic," one had the feeling this would have devolved into a full on hate-fest if not for Salam's presence.

Fortunately, the National Reviewer was there to set the record straight (videos follow with transcripts and commentary): 

On Sunday’s syndicated Chris Matthews show, during a discussion of a poll reporting that a majority of self-described Republicans expressed a negative view of Islam, as Time magazine’s Joe Klein recounted incidents of recent violence in America by Muslim extremists, host Matthews asked if "this [anti-Muslim] attitude against them" was to blame for "stirring them up," leading Klein to agree that anti-Muslim attitudes played a role:

JOE KLEIN, TIME MAGAZINE: You’ve had over the last year, two or three major incidents of deranged Muslims, the Army doctor down at Fort Hood, the Times Square bomber, who were Americans, American citizens.

CHRIS MATTHEWS: And what’s stirring them up? This attitude against them?

KLEIN: Yeah. But I also think that there’s a small minority of Muslims in the world who believe this extremist philosophy.

After Matthews questioned whether opposition to the Ground Zero mosque and "apocalyptic talk by people like Glenn Beck" exist because the President is black, Klein painted small-town white Americans as resentful that modern America no longer has the "ethnic purity" of the past, with Matthews responding, "Well said.":

On the syndicated Chris Matthews show over the weekend, Chris Matthews praised Barack Obama for earning another "big feather" in his cap for getting his Wall Street reform bill passed and then went on to ask his panel if all of the other overbearing, big government laws signed in his term would lead to victory for the Democratic Party in the fall. Just before closing his show Matthews posed the following big question to HDNet's Dan Rather, the BBC's Katty Kay, CNN's Gloria Borger and the Politico's John Harris: "Will the President's legislative success with the stimulus, with health care, with Wall Street reform and maybe even an energy bill be a net positive or negative for his party this fall?"

The following are their individual responses as aired on the June 27 Chris Matthews Show:

A truly extraordinary thing happened on this weekend's "The Chris Matthews Show": the host asked his panel if former Alaska governor Sarah is the most important Republican in the country right now.

What made this even more surprising was how his guests -- CNN's Gloria Borger, Politico's John Harris, the BBC's Katty Kay, and former "CBS Evening News" host Dan Rather -- seemed to feel she was.

Most bullish on Palin was Rather who said, "I wouldn't underestimate her...If she decides to run, it would be hard to bet against her for the nomination."

For his part, Matthews played a little bit of a misdirection with his viewers by predictably bashing Palin during the program's introduction (multiple videos follow with highlights and commentary): 

Give that lady a Peabody!  

The Peabody folks claim they give their awards for "outstanding" journalism and "excellence."  So just how clueless do you have to be to qualify? Take Katty Kay, the BBC's chief US correspondent, in New York today to pick up her prize.  On Morning Joe, Kay got off a double-barreled dose of classic MSM-think:

1. She defended Elena Kagan's opposition to military recruiting on campus on the theory that the nominee is in the mainstream . . . of college deans.

2. Chatting with the man who made Third World micro-loans famous and who preaches business without profits, Kay fretted that the crash  "has not been long enough" to turn people off capitalism.

The Atlantic's Andrew Sullivan said this weekend he agrees with Time's Joe Klein about Glenn Beck and Sarah Palin being almost seditious in their opinions of the Obama administration while also claiming that the Republican Party IS Fox News. 

"I'm more with Joe than I am with the Fox News Republican National Committee coalition machine, sort of this great machine spewing out an alternative reality to reality every, every minute of the day," said Sullivan on the most recent installment of the syndicated "Chris Matthews Show."

"[T]his essentially is accusing the President -- duly-elected president -- of being illegitimate and even treasonous to what the United States is."

When NBC's Kelly O'Donnell pointed out that most people "think there is a different standard between the politics of entertainment and the politics of policy," Sullivan replied, "I'm tired, I have to say, of this notion that someone like Beck and [Rush] Limbaugh can be excused because they are entertainers, as if that is an excuse for saying substantively what they're saying and for controlling the Republican Party" (video follows with transcript and commentary):  

Remember Danny Williams, the premier of a Canadian province who ditched Canada-care in favor of having heart surgery done in Miami? Lucky for him he didn't speak first with the BBC's Katty Kay. She might have convinced him he'd be better off in Costa Rica . . .

On today's Meet the Press, Kay cited some kind of study to claim that the US has the 37th highest quality of care, "just above Cuba, just below Costa Rica."

On the Sunday, December 20, syndicated Chris Matthews Show – during which the panel weighed in on who should be granted various dishonors for the year – Matthews seemed to lump conservatives like Sarah Palin and Rush Limbaugh in with what Matthews saw as "white tribalism" as he also fretted over the "birthers" who promote the fringe conspiracy theory that President Obama was not born in America. Matthews had notably expressed frustration about "white tribalism" being stirred up by "idiots" in America at the end of last week’s show.

Matthews seemed to compare Glenn Beck and  Limbaugh to swine flu as he introduced the award titled "A Plague on Both Our Houses." Matthews played a clip of Beck going over the top in calling President Obama a "racist" on FNC’s Fox and Friends, but he did not specify any particular quote from Limbaugh. A bit later, after the BBC’s Katty Kay tied Palin to the "birthers," prompting Matthews to interject that "I think it’s white tribalism," Matthews brought up the new book of panel member John Heilemann of New York magazine, and set up Heilemann to blame Palin for "activating" racism against Obama during the 2008 campaign.

Matthews: "Was this something that was simmering, this sort of tribalistic resentment of Barack Obama being what he is?"

Heilemann responded:

Chris Matthews, on his syndicated "The Chris Matthews Show," over the weekend, wondered if the Mark Sanford scandal will make the GOP a more tolerant party as he asked his panel: "Have Republicans finally embarrassed themselves out of calling themselves the family values party?"

His guest panel, for the most part, agreed with the premise as Dan Rather opined: "The Republican Party was already in the process of trying to make a bigger tent with more tolerance. This will, in some ways, help that movement." The New York Times' Helen Cooper admonished: "I think the one thing the Republican Party probably learned this week is that, you know, people in glass houses shouldn't throw stones."

Sticking up for European socialism, Friday night on HBO's Real Time, BBC America's Katty Kay contended the “idea of demonizing” a “public option” for U.S. health care “as some sort of step toward socialism -- it just seems to me so out of touch with reality.” That's because “in Britain we have a purely public plan and even the Conservative Party calls it one of our great national treasures,” while other European nations “that have some sort of a public plan actually, you know what, they seem to like it” since “it seems to actually work pretty well and no one wants to get rid of it.”

The fact Britain's Conservative Party doesn't oppose that nation's nationalized health system says more about how far the party is to the left than anything about the benefits of the system.

On Sunday’s Chris Matthews Show, host Matthews led the panel in a discussion over whether conservatives would choose to cooperate with the Obama administration in making "historic changes" to repair the economy, rather than stand in opposition to his programs. The premise of the discussion seemed to be that times are too serious for conservatives to dare dissent from Obama’s plans. At one point, David Ignatius of the Washington Post suggested that "thoughtful" Republicans will work with Obama as he referred to John McCain’s concession speech. Ignatius: "I thought that John McCain set the tone for thoughtful Republicans in his concession speech election night, where he reached out to Obama. He was remarkably generous. One of the best speeches he's ever made, in my book."

As he teased the show, Matthews seemed to wonder if Republicans would try to stand in the way of Obama accomplishing "great things," or if they would see the light and cooperate. Matthews: "Will the mountain of crises our country faces make Barack Obama do great things? And with all the crises, will even Republicans see historic steps are required?"

The number two man at NBC News believes Barack Obama's skin color gives him more legitimacy around the world than possibly any American leader in history.

For those unfamiliar, Mark Whitaker is the Senior Vice President that succeeded the late Tim Russert as NBC's Washington Bureau Chief, and currently oversees national and international reporting for all the network's news programs including the "Nightly News," the "Today" show, MSNBC, and "Meet the Press." 

As part of the panel on Sunday's "The Chris Matthews Show," Whitaker said the following about Barack Obama (h/t American Thinker's Marc Sheppard, file photo):

Thanks to Sarah Palin, the culture war has become a civil war—on the left. Mika Brzezinski bravely opened a new front in the conflict during today's "Morning Joe," repeatedly going after two female MSMers for suggesting Palin is taking the working-mom thing too far. 

And, mirabile dictu, Mika even admitted to sensing MSM unfairness to Republicans.

"This is an argument Joe and I have about fairness and whether or not there are some sort of underlying unfairness when it comes to Republicans. And I just, you know, I feel it here,"  Brzezinski said referring to a Wall Street Journal op-ed by Katty Kay and Claire Shipman. Full text and commentary after the jump. View video here.

NewsBusters and affiliate The Business & Media Institute have been reporting for many months the continuous, bearish assessments of economic gloom and doom by America's press.

Of course, this all comes despite 24 straight quarters of Gross Domestic Product growth, 50 consecutive months of job gains, higher wages for virtually all Americans, and last month's consumer spending explosion.

Ignoring all this Sunday morning were panelists on "The Chris Matthews Show" who demonstrated such a deplorable lack of economic acumen that maybe they shouldn't be allowed to comment on such matters when cameras and microphones are on.

Host Matthews set this segment up: