Newt Gingrich

MSNBC's Chris Matthews is clearly not going to tolerate anyone on his program saying Republican presidential candidate Newt Gingrich isn't racist.

Politico's Jeanne Cummings had the nerve to do exactly that on Thursday's "Hardball," and for her sins Matthews relentlessly browbeat her until she finally gave up (video follows with transcript and commentary):

A frothing Chris Matthews on Thursday excoriated the "nasty," "shameless" Newt Gingrich for robbing "the political arena of joy and humanity."

The Hardball host even compared the 2012 Republican presidential candidate to a famous horror movie villain: "I cannot believe there are young Republicans idealists out there, young people with hope who want our country to be good and have good politics to want to resurrect this element of Freddy Krueger, Nightmare on Elm Street politics."

[See video below. MP3 audio here.]

The day after Newt Gingrich announced his candidacy for president, MSNBC's Martin Bashir took the opportunity to rail against the Republican contender for criticizing former President Bill Clinton's adulterous behavior while he was engaging in sexual transgressions of his own.

On his eponymous program today, Bashir admonished the former House speaker's "hypocrisy" but failed to mention even once that the Democratic president didn't just cheat on his wife, but committed perjury to cover up the affair.

Teasing a story on former House Speaker Newt Gingrich entering the presidential race at the top of Thursday's NBC Today, co-host Meredith Vieira proclaimed: "Political hurdle. Newt Gingrich launches his run for the White House, but will his two divorces and an admitted affair during his time as House speaker hurt his chances of becoming president?"

Later, fellow co-host Matt Lauer introduced a report on Gingrich by declaring: "He is perhaps the best known Republican in the field to date. But Gingrich also has a messy personal life that includes two divorces, three marriages, and a lengthy affair." Correspondent Michael Isikoff described how, "Everywhere he goes, Newt Gingrich hears the questions [about his personal life]....Gingrich, who once campaigned as a family values candidate, has been dogged for years by criticism of marital infidelity..."

Mike Barnicle has greeted Newt Gingrich's announcement of his presidential candidacy with a sneer, calling the former Speaker of the House "a delusional loser."  The former Kennedy-clan retainer and Boston Globe columnist seasoned his sneer with snobbery, launching an ignorant attack on Gingrich's educational background.

Barnicle spewed his bile on today's Morning Joe.

View video after the jump.

Newt Gingrich: He’s no Mario Cuomo.

New York Times political writer Matt Bai’s "Political Memo" Wednesday was pretty hostile to the battle-scared Republican leader considering a 2012 run for president: "Gingrich’s Run Reflects His Sense of History." Bai led off by asking "Whatever can Newt Gingrich be thinking?" given that he "has never been elected to anything outside his old Congressional district in Georgia." (And, by the way, rose to Speaker of the House.)

But back on April 10 Bai confessed to being awestruck with his proximity to a liberal lion, former New York Gov. Cuomo: "...there is something awesome - in the literal sense - about sitting across a desk from Mario Cuomo."

Judging from his opening lines Wednesday, Bai was not nearly as impressed with the conservative Newt.

Whatever can Newt Gingrich be thinking?

Brace yourself for a shock ... Oprah Winfrey, of all people .... she's one of them ...

At least if judged by the same jaundiced standard that Rachel Maddow applies to Newt Gingrich.

On her MSNBC show last night, Maddow criticized Gingrich for asking why Obama waited as long he did before releasing his birth certificate (video after page break) --

For weeks MSNBC's Chris Matthews has been complaining about the lack of declared GOP presidential candidates.

On Tuesday's "Hardball," former Republican National Committee chairman Michael Steele exposed Matthews' hypocrisy concerning this matter marvelously demonstrating that once any of the possible candidates formally enters the race, the avowed liberal commentator is just going to trash him or her (video follows with transcript and commentary):

As NewsBusters reported, MSNBC's Chris Matthews went on quite a Republican-hating rant Monday linking murder and violence in Afghanistan to GOP "zealots at home."

Such conservative bashing continued till the end of "Hardball" when the host finished with a two minute segment excoriating the Republican Party as one where "you can't say you believe in science, you can't say you believe in evolution or in climate change or in gay rights, or even in separation of church and state" concluding "Maybe this is God's will, that Obama not have a reasonable opponent out there" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

The liberal media are on a full-court press to make the entire GOP presidential candidate field look hapless and unelectable.

Doing his part Friday was New York magazine's John Heilemann who on "The Chris Matthews Show" said the Obama campaign thinks their guy has "more talent in his little finger than any of these Republicans" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

When Democrats opposed war in Iraq, they were often presented by the networks as principled statesmen. But on Meet the Press Sunday, NBC host David Gregory asked Ted Koppel to suggest Republican opponents of Obama's Libya actions are just a feckless mess:

GREGORY: Ted Koppel, what about the Republican opposition? I mean, is there, is it principled here? Or is it much more feckless and inconsistent? Because the--many of them wanted a no-fly zone, then said it was too little, too late. Then said, as Newt Gingrich said, "Well, no, you shouldn't have intervened at all." They either sound inconsistent or a lot more like President Bush, who became quite unpopular within Republican circles and the country at large on the war.

After getting laughed at by Monica Crowley for making a foolish comment about the disparate ways Barack Obama and Ronald Reagan handled Libya during their respective presidencies, Newsweek's Eleanor Clift doubled down on this weekend's "McLaughlin Group" by saying a Tea Party candidate can't win a national election.

Crowley was once again up to the challenge and correctly pointed out, "If the government keeps spending like this, that Tea Party movement is only going to accelerate" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

On Thursday's The View on ABC, during a discussion of potential Republican presidential candidate Newt Gingrich's challenge in having to talk about his history of failed marriages during a campaign, right-leaning co-host Elisabeth Hasselbeck chimed in with a blatantly pessimstic view of Republican chances for winning the 2012 election. Hasselbeck, who has a history of endorsing GOP presidential candidates, quipped that "it could be over for the entire Republican Party" in the next election, and suggested they "consider saving their cash" for next time instead. Hasselbeck:

New York Times columnist David Brooks Thursday took quite a swing at former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich.

During a videotaped interview with Time magazine, Brooks said, "I wouldn't let that guy run a 7-Eleven let alone a country" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

For the seventh day in a row, MSNBC's Chris Matthews attacked possible Republican presidential candidates Newt Gingrich and Mike Huckabee.

In a lengthy, twelve minute opening segment lambasting the pair for largely past indiscretions, the "Hardball" host concluded with a literary reference likening the both to con men (video follows with transcript and commentary):

As NewsBusters reported Saturday, George Will this weekend lambasted Newt Gingrich and Mike Huckabee about separate comments the two have made regarding Barack Obama's background and upbringing.

On Monday, during his fifth day in a row on this subject, MSNBC's Chris Matthews actually compared Will's column to William F. Buckley Jr. banning anti-Semitic writers from the National Review in the '50s (video follows with transcript and commentary):

MSNBC's Joe Scarborough appeared on Monday's Today show to deliver a forecast of doom for Republicans on the budget fight and their 2012 presidential prospects. On their skirmish with Democrats in Congress the host of Morning Joe told NBC's Matt Lauer he thinks Republicans "have the most to lose" and in explaining the late start for GOP entrants into the 2012 race proclaimed, "they are afraid of Barack Obama," as seen in the following exchange:

(video, audio and transcript after the jump)

Even though there's still a year and eight months to go until the 2012 presidential election, Good Morning America's John Berman on Monday derided the GOP field for not joining the race yet. As a mocking trombone sound played, Berman joked that Newt Gingrich "had us on the edge of our seats" last week by establishing only an exploratory website.

Highlighting Mitt Romney's failure to officially enter the race, Berman offered this insulting aside: "But will it be him? What other possible explanation could there be for the  fact that Romney, who was trying to shake the reputation that he was born in a business suit, has apparently has lost all of his neck ties?"

Highlighting a conservative for dismissing other conservatives, the ABC reporter quoted, "Some Republicans feel timing isn't the problem, but the field. Columnist George Will writes, 'If pessimism is not creeping into Republicans' thinking about their 2012 prospects, that is another reason for pessimism.'"

[See video below. MP3 audio here.]

President Obama apparently has 18.5 million Facebook friends which not surprisingly is far more than former House Speaker Newt Gingrich and former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney.

When the Huffington Post's Howard Fineman told his liberal colleagues on the syndicated "Chris Matthews Show" what a potential advantage this gives the current White House resident, there was much rejoicing (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Howard Kurtz on Sunday spent a whopping 45 seconds scolding Chris Matthews for saying former House Speaker Newt Gingrich looks like a car bomber.

This was after the "Reliable Sources" host did an entire ten minute segment lambasting Glenn Beck (video follows with transcript and commentary):

As NewsBusters reported Tuesday, former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee was lambasted by numerous liberal media outlets for comments he made to conservative radio host Steve Malzberg regarding President Obama's past.

Surprisingly joining in the harsh criticism was George Will whose column to be published in Sunday's Washington Post also excoriated former House Speaker Newt Gingrich as well as Malzberg:

MSNBC's Chris Matthews had multiple Obamagasms on his program again.

The thrills up his leg embarrassingly came at the beginning and the end of "Hardball" in what at times seemed like an hour-long commercial for the President's reelection (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Discussing the possibility of Newt Gingrich running for president in 2012, on Thursday's CBS Early Show, co-host Chris Wragge touted "big negatives" for the former House speaker: "...baggage that he brings with him...the government shutdowns back in the '90s, to being forced out as speaker, to the fact that he's on his third marriage, which is probably going to alienate some social conservatives."

Political analyst John Dickerson agreed with Wragge's assessment: "Well, some of that baggage, they're trophies. He can say, 'I fought for these principles harder than anyone else.' But as you say, the personal baggage is considerable. He's not only had multiple marriages but he is an admitted adulterer. That matters in Republican primaries, where religious voters care about that kind of thing."

Chris Matthews, once again, abandoned any notion he was serious about establishing a new tone of political civility in the wake of the Tucson shooting, as on Wednesday's Hardball he compared former Speaker of the House and possible GOP presidential candidate Newt Gingrich to a terrorist as he screeched "He looks like a car bomber" and even described him in demonic terms, adding: "He's got that crazy Mephistophelian grin of his. He looks like he loves torturing."

The following Matthews rants came during a discussion about possible GOP presidential contenders with the Chicago Tribune's Clarence Page and The Huffington Post's Sam Stein on the March 2 Hardball:

(video, audio and transcript after the jump)

Chris Matthews got another thrill up his leg for Barack Obama Tuesday.

As you read and/or watch the most-recent presidential gushing and fawning from the "Hardball" host, keep telling yourself that this man believes his program is "absolutely nonpartisan" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

 On Tuesday’s NBC Nightly News, after anchor Brian Williams asked correspondent Richard Engel to respond to concerns about the radical nature of the Muslim Brotherhood that have been expressed by former Republican House Speaker Newt Gingrich, Engel asserted that the movement is "not al-Qaeda, it’s not the Taliban," but, as he went on to compare the group instead to Hamas, partly because they "wear business suits," he neglected to point out that Hamas is itself a terrorist organization.

He related that the organization is "anti-American, it’s anti-Israel, but it wouldn’t kick all the Christians out of this country."

When Williams brought up the Muslim Brotherhood, he posed the question: "And the Speaker (Gingrich) said that they were enemies of civilization. He said it’s in their own creed. I know for many years you lived and worked alongside members of the Muslim Brotherhood there in Cairo. Tell us your knowledge of this group."

Engel responded:

MSNBC political analyst Richard Wolffe on Tuesday said, "The experiment of democracy, of untrammeled democracy inside the Middle East is most clearly demonstrated by the Palestinian authority with Hamas taking power in the Gaza strip."

Such transpired in the same lengthy "Hardball" segment wherein Chris Matthews called Sarah Palin "a cuckoo clock" and Newt Gingrich "a mortal enemy to our civilization" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Former House Majority Leader Dick Armey said Monday that MSNBC's Chris Matthews "seems to be slipping out of touch with reality."

On Tuesday, the "Hardball" host proved Armey's point by calling Sarah Palin "a cuckoo clock" and Newt Gingrich "a mortal enemy to our civilization" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Good Morning America's George Stephanopoulos on Tuesday used ominous Democratic talking points and pressed Newt Gingrich as to whether Republicans are willing to put uninsured Americans at "risk" by repealing Obamacare.

The former Democratic operative turned journalist also offered this complaint about GOP efforts to overturn the 2010 health care law: "This repeal is likely to pass the House tomorrow. But it's not going anywhere in the Senate. So, what's gained?"

Citing a new study by the Department of Health and Human Services, Stephanopoulos warned, "If President Obama's reform is repealed, they say that's going to put these people at risk. Are you willing to take that risk for the 129 million Americans?" The ex-Speaker of the House dismissed this document as "far-out left-wing propaganda" and added, "I don't particularly trust Health and Human Services on anything at the present time because it's a very politicized agency."