Ken Cuccinelli

Sorry, Chris Matthews, maybe next year. 

You'd think the MSNBC "Hardball" host would be a shoo-in for the Media Research Center's annual "Obamagasm Award," but the 2011 prize went to Evan Thomas of Newsweek for declaring the president "stand[s] above the country, above — above the world. He’s sort of God." 

The "Obamagasm award" was just one of a handful of DisHonors mockingly awarded journalists and Hollywood lefties Saturday night at the 2011 Media Research Center Gala and DisHonors Awards. 

Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli, columnist and author Ann Coulter, radio host Neal Boortz, Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa) and Red State blogger Erick Erickson were among the conservative heavyweights participating in the festivities.

[For a lengthy excerpt of the Gala that includes Neal Boortz announcing the Obamagasm Award nominees, click play on the first embedded video below the page break]

The editorially-liberal Washington Post is hardly an enemy of government regulation. Except, of course, when it comes to moves to restrict abortion.

In Wednesday's paper, the editorial board lamented "Va.'s abortion end run."

"Mischief, not public health, drives the push for new regulation," griped the subheader. The online edition headline snarked that "Mischief drives change in Virginia abortion rules."

The Post dismissed as unprincipled and slippery the manner with which pro-life state legislators had pushed through a law that would require the Old Dominion's abortion clinics to be regulated like hospitals:

In late October, Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli (R) visited Media Research Center headquarters for a studio interview with CNSNews.com editor-in-chief Terry Jeffrey to discuss his state's lawsuit challenging the so-called individual mandate within ObamaCare that would require Americans, under penalty of federal law, to purchase health insurance.

Yesterday a federal District Court judge in the 4th Circuit ruled that provision unconstitutional.

[Click here for the full ruling by Judge Henry Hudson]

Given this development, we thought we'd post the full 33-minute Jeffrey-Cuccinelli interview below the page break.

Enjoy:

The Republican Attorney General of Virginia, Ken Cuccinelli, accomplished what many others have failed to do and that is stay calm and collected in the midst of Chris Matthews' increasingly absurd charges, that even bordered on accusations of racism. Invited on Thursday's Hardball, to discuss a possible repeal amendment to the Constitution, Cuccinelli faced down a series of Matthews distortions as the Hardball host, at varying times, accused him of wanting to start another Whiskey Rebellion, questioned if he wanted to overturn the Civil Rights Act and charged that he was playing to "The old Johnny Rebs" and "Civil War buffs" in his state.

After Cuccinelli simply explained to the MSNBC host that the amendment was just an "attempt to bring back the balance of authority between the federal government and what goes on in the states" Matthews went on a tear as he insinuated the attorney general wanted to take America back to Antebellum days, as seen in the following exchange:

(video after the jump)

The Washington Post's undisguised loathing for conservative Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli is on display again Tuesday. Post reporter Anita Kumar put him on the "far right" and questioned the propriety (and even the constitutionality) of his working relationship with other Republicans in Richmond. 

Kumar began by noting a list of Cuccinell's "controversial" legal opinions, that "police could check the immigration status of those stopped by law-enforcement officers, that the state could impose stricter oversight of clinics that perform abortions and that local governments could allow religious holiday displays on public property.  In each instance, the request for the opinion came from the same person: Del. Robert G. Marshall (Prince William), a like-minded Republican who shares Cuccinelli's far-right views."

Kumar obviously asked it this "symbiotic relationship" was unconstitutional legal activism that goes around the legislature:

Ken Cuccinelli, the conservative Attorney General of Virginia, came under attack on Friday night's All Things Considered on National Public Radio. This is one angle of Climategate the national media have noticed. But they pitch the battle as Cuccinelli vs. Science or Cuccinelli vs. Academic Freedom.

What's most infuriating is the notion that it's Cuccinelli who's "politicizing" science, and not Michael Mann's openly politicized e-mails explaining his data manipulations and plotting to censor his political opponents. Somehow, the Union of Concerned Scientists is painted as non-political. 

Host Michele Norris began: "The University of Virginia says it will fight a demand from the state's attorney general. He wants the school to turn over private e-mails and documents related to a former professor's climate research. The case has sparked a national debate over academic freedom."

On Tuesday’s Countdown show, MSNBC host Keith Olbermann used his regular "Worst Person" segment to attack Virginia’s Republican Attorney General, Ken Cuccinelli, for planning to take part in a lawsuit against the Environmental Protection Agency on the issue of climate change. Responding to a joke Cuccinelli made about holding one’s breath to make environmentalists happy, Olbermann mocked the Republican attorney general in what could arguably be a suggestion that he should die, as the MSNBC host recommended that Cuccinelli should stop breathing until 2014. Olbermann: "Good idea, Mr. Cuccinelli. we`ll let you know when you should stop holding your breath. I would think sometime in 2014."

Below is a transcript of the relevant portion of the Tuesday, April 13, Countdown show on MSNBC:

Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli (R) has caused students across the Old Dominion to "rise up for gay rights,"* reporters Daniel de Vise and Rosalind Helderman insisted on the March 9 Metro section front page of the Washington Post.

Helderman and de Vise failed to consider the liberal leanings of the protesters, tagging the demonstrators in the lead paragraph as mere "campus activists" who are steamed over the state AG's "letter advising public universities to retreat from their policies against discrimination on the basis of sexual orienation." A few paragraphs later, Helderman and de Vise suggested that an "erosion in gay rights at state universities" would have detrimental effects on attracting and retaining students and faculty.

The problem is, Cuccinelli's legal opinion does not mandate a "retreat" from discrimination, he just noted that under Virginia law, any change in non-discrimination policy wording must be authorized by legislation.

Counseled Cuccinelli:

The Daily Kos is letting its metaphors run wild against conservatives. Ken Cuccinelli, a solidly conservative state senator running for Attorney General, is described as a monster:

And whether or not dragons exist, monsters do. Sometimes they run for political office. I believe if one looks at the public record of Steve's opponent, State Senator Ken Cuccinelli, one will see someone whose record in public office and his declared intentions have monstrous implications.

Then the blogger called "teacherken" says these conservative monsters and dragons should be killed. He might mean defeating them at the ballot box. Maybe. If the writer were conservative, no one would assume anything but the real words on the page: kill.

At the edges of some medieval maps one might see the legend "here there be dragons" with illustrations of sea serpents. These marked the end of the known world, with the fears inherent in the unknown.

And yet, as children know, the monsters and dragons are part of everyday existence. They are under the bed, they are in our imagination, some seek to use them to manipulate use - pace the Glenn Becks and Rush Limbaughs and others of their ilk.

Pity the staff at the Washington Post. Their compatriots at the New York or Los Angeles Times luxuriate in a sea of enlightenment, with blue state voters as far as the eye can see. But the Posties must live and work in uncomfortable proximity to Red State Virginia, with only the thin buffer of the Northern Virginia suburbs between them and the gun-toting snake handlers.

Every now and then the Post publishes the journalistic equivalent of an involuntary shudder at its plight. The latest was an Oct. 30 editorial excoriating Ken Cuccinelli, the GOP candidate for Virginia attorney general. What gave the Post the vapors are statements Cuccinelli made about homosexuality in an interview with the Norfolk-based Virginian-Pilot.

The Washington Post on Thursday continued its quest to defeat Virginia’s Republican gubernatorial candidate, bizarrely citing a "non-partisan" group that, in reality, has endorsed Bob McDonnell’s Democratic opponent. The article by Anita Kumar contained this loaded headline: "McDonnell critics question ideology: Some saw agenda in legal opinions."

Kumar quoted Claire Guthrie Gastanaga, a lobbyist for "Equality Virginia, a nonpartisan gay rights group." Yet, the front page of Equality Virginia’s website features a press release entitled, "Equality Virginia PAC Endorses Deeds for Governor." The organization’s website makes a distinction between its political action committee (EVPAC) and its "non-partisan" activities. However, Kumar made no such clarification. How can a group be non-partisan and endorse the Democratic nominee?

As Scott Whitlock noted last week, the Washington Post editorial page thumped away at conservative Republican Ken Cuccinelli, who’s currently ahead in the race for Virginia’s Attorney General: "Given his sometimes bizarre and incendiary ideas, we worry that Mr. Cuccinelli would drive qualified and nonpartisan lawyers away, transform the attorney general's office into a staging ground for his pet peeves and causes, and make it an object of ridicule in a state where it has enjoyed a long run of respect."

But what about when Cuccinelli’s Democrat opponent, Steve Shannon, becomes an object of ridicule? The Post ignores it.

The liberal Washington Post, which for months has been running a seemingly endless series of attack pieces on Virginia’s Republican gubernatorial candidate, appears to have moved on to a new target, the GOP’s choice for Attorney General. On Thursday, the Post featured a column by Robert McCartney on nominee Ken Cuccinelli and included this ominous headline: "Cuccinelli: In your heart, you know he's to the right of right."

For the benefit of readers outside of Virginia, Cuccinelli is a pretty standard conservative. He’s pro-life, pro-Second Amendment. He’s taken positions in support of lower taxes and restraining spending. Certainly, he’s no moderate. Referring to him as "very conservative" would also be fair. But, according to McCartney, he’s a "militant conservative" and someone "who's so ardently conservative he makes [Republican] gubernatorial candidate Robert F. McDonnell sound like a mealy-mouthed moderate."

In an editorial on Wednesday endorsing Cuccinelli’s Democratic AG opponent, the Post used the same hyperbolic, scary language. The unsigned editorial derided Cuccinelli, who is currently a state senator, as a "provocative hard-liner," someone who supports "far-fetched initiatives" and holds "bizarre and incendiary ideas." The paper generally found his campaign "worrying."