Barbara Walters

"You know what, you've been a great journalist for 44 years," The View host Barbara Walters gushed to Dan Rather at the close of a softball interview on May 23 about his new memoir, "Rather Outspoken."

"No matter what CBS says!" an excited co-host Joy Behar interjected. Yes, "no matter what CBS says," Walters agreed of the former anchor/managing editor of the CBS Evening News, who was fired from the Tiffany network for running stories on a discredited phony memo that alleged President George W. Bush was often AWOL when he should have showed up for training exercises when serving in the Air National Guard.

On the May 15 The View, President Barack Obama visited the ladies of the ABC daytime talk show to chat about his support for gay marriage, Wall Street reform, the 2012 election, and pop culture. Rather than receive a hard-hitting news interview from members of the panel, he was given fluff questions, such as “Are you going to win?” [Audio here. Video below the jump.]

This is a really scary thought.

On this weekend's syndicated Chris Matthews Show, the Huffington Post's Howard Fineman actually said the most powerful and "unifying" media figures in the country today are "the daytime women talk show hosts. It's Oprah, Ellen and The View" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

On Thursday’s episode of The View Joy Behar did what she does best: defend the indefensible.  The ladies of the show were responding to comments made by Democratic donor and PR guru Hilary Rosen, who on CNN Wednesday said regarding Ann Romney, “His wife has actually never worked a day in her life. She's never really dealt with the kind of economic issues that a majority of women in this country are facing.”

The ultra-liberal Behar couldn’t resist the opportunity to attack Mrs. Romney by saying that, “whenever the wife of a politician, very few of them actually work for a living. And she’s talking about economic issues -- she's not the one who's putting bread on the table as millions of women are doing.”  [See video below.  MP3 audio here.]

Oh the delicious irony.

On ABC's The View Tuesday, as co-host Whoopi Goldberg supported Saturday's call by CNN's Don Lemon for reporters to say the N-word when quoting folks that have, the censors actually bleeped her when she said the word herself (video follows with transcribed highlights and commentary):

Barbara Walters gave Joy Behar a well-deserved dressing down on ABC's The View Monday.

After the liberal comedian said Sarah Palin "was completely unprepared for the [vice presidential] job as are a lot of the candidates right now that we’re watching in some of those debates,” Walters responded by providing her co-host the legislative and executive experience of the remaining Republicans in the race (video follows with transcribed highlights and commentary):

As NewsBusters reported Monday, the ladies of ABC's The View were tremendously sympathetic to Georgetown University law student Sandra Fluke's tale of woe and misery having been called a "slut" by conservative talk radio host Rush Limbaugh.

Yet as Laura Ingraham pointed out on Tuesday's Fox & Friends, her being called a "slut" by MSNBC's Ed Schultz last year was a source of great amusement on The View with Barbara Walters acknowledging to great laughter, "Joy Behar on this program has called me a slut" (videos follow with transcribed highlights and commentary):

The shrill, extremist comments coming from the co-hosts on The View continued, Thursday. Liberal comedienne Joy Behar trashed Virginia for passing abortion restrictions, saying the new law makes the state like "the Taliban." 

Behar highlighted legislation requiring women, in some cases, to have an ultrasound before getting an abortion, decrying the move as "invasive." She then hyperbolically shrieked, "It's like, what are we? What is this, the Taliban now? What are we, in Afghanistan? Where are we exactly in this country?"  [See video below. MP3 audio here.]

In case you hadn't noticed, Hell froze over Monday.

ABC's Barbara Walters, appearing on The View, actually said on national television that she agreed with Republican presidential candidate Rick Santorum's point about radical feminism making it more "socially affirming" for women "to work than to give up their careers to take care of their children" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

The liberal women on The View, Wednesday, shrieked at the "totalitarian" decision by a Texas judge to uphold a law requiring women to look at an ultrasound before having an abortion. Co-host and journalist Barbara Walters found the legal ruling– and not the act of abortion itself-- to be "heartbreaking." [See video below. See MP3 audio here.]

Regarding the ruling, left-wing comedienne Joy Behar spewed, "It's very totalitarian in my opinion. I mean, it smacks of forcing somebody to confront something that they have already decided they don't want to deal with." Rather than focus on the actual abortion, Walters lectured, "Then to have to go and be forced to hear, to see the fetus, to hear the heartbeat, to put more guilt on you, I think is heartbreaking."

During her interview with President and Mrs. Obama which aired on Friday's 20/20, ABC's Barbara Walters made a point of contrasting GOP presidential candidate Newt Gingrich's history of marital problems with the successful marriage of the First Family. 

(Video below)

Walters introduced the topic as she observed:

Barbara Walters, who famously asked Katherine Hepburn what type of tree she was, may have outdone herself in a slobbering interview with Michelle and Barack Obama. In previews of Friday's "20/20" segment, Walters asked the President, "If you were a superhero and you could have one super power, what would it be?" [See video below. MP3 audio here.]

To the First Lady, the journalist posed a question about reincarnation: "If you were to die and come back as a person or a thing, what would you want it to be?" This appeared to be too much for Mrs. Obama, she interrupted, "Oh, God, Barbara." The fawning piece was teased on Friday's "Good Morning America" and Monday's "The View." It included queries on the romantic life of the couple.

It's always interesting to see how the several thousand readers who voted in the MRC's "public ballot" differed from the 48 media experts who selected our Best Notable Quotables of 2011 (a panel which included talk radio hosts Mark Levin and Neal Boortz, Human Events editor-in-chief Tom Winter and Boston Globe columnist Jeff Jacoby). This year, there were six categories where our readers and the judges disagreed -- although sometimes the margins were extremely close.

Let's start with the biggest disagreement, in the "Media Millionaires for Higher Taxes Award." By a healthy margin (68 to 53), our judges chose an April 17 quote from CBS's Bob Schieffer, as he was questioning Rep. Paul Ryan on Face the Nation: "Why do these rich people need another tax cut? I mean, they’re already rich....Why cut their taxes some more?"

On Tuesday's The View on ABC, as the group discussed GOP presidential candidate Michele Bachmann's appearance on Monday's Night's Late Night with Jimmy Fallon on NBC, after playing a clip of the Minnesota Congresswoman and Fallon playing a comical game of word association, ABC co-host Whoopi Goldberg declared that "bonehead" is the word she would associate with Bachmann, while co-host Barbara Walters declined to say what word first comes to her mind.

As you've probably heard by now, Bill Maher got quite an unfriendly welcome from Elisabeth Hasselbeck on Tuesday's The View.

The best part that largely went overlooked was when the host of HBO's Real Time predictably disparaged the intelligence of Republicans only to be quickly mocked by the female foe to his left who countered, "You’re so brilliant. Wow, I actually feel smarter sitting next to you" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

An exasperated Barbara Walters on Wednesday aggressively objected to token conservative Elisabeth Hasselbeck highlighting the high unemployment under Barack Obama. In a condescending tone, Walters insisted, "Well, darling, he inherited a very bad situation."

Walters' annoyed comments came after this remark by Hasselbeck: "11.7 percent of veterans out of work, no jobs. Right now, we have the black American unemployment rate, 16.7 percent. That's almost double the national rate. That's insane!" [See video below. MP3 audio here.]

The Media Research Center has just released the latest edition of Notable Quotables, our bi-weekly compilation of the latest outrageous, sometimes humorous, quotes in the liberal media. [here's the link to the formatted PDF version]

Highlights from this issue include: journalists suggesting it’s somehow radical to think the Constitution “was intended to limit the federal government” or to expect the government to do nothing outside the “powers granted to them in the Constitution;” ABC News veteran Barbara Walters hoping disgraced Congressman Anthony stays in Congress and winds up like the “beloved” Bill Clinton; and top editors admitting that “not any single reporter” thinks Sarah Palin “should be President,” and how “most journalists would recoil in horror from the idea.”

A sample of the best quotes from the June 27 edition are after the jump; you can read the entire issue online at www.mrc.org.

If anyone needs one more item for the already massive Missing the Point file, the ladies of The View were happy to provide their insights into the Anthony Weiner resignation. "In a way it's a tragedy." said Barbara Walters. "He's never had another job. What does he do after this?"

That's right Barbara: the real tragedy is not that Weiner has damaged his reputation and humiliated his family, but that the poor little congressman might have trouble finding a new job. "He's got a whole life ahead and he has to worry also because we don't know what Huma, who is three months pregnant, is going to do." added Walters.

Barbara Walters said Monday that if Sarah Palin can be considered as a possible presidential candidate, Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-N.Y.) can stay in Congress despite the current sex scandal he's involved in.

Significantly more shocking, "The View" co-host Joy Behar actually came to Palin's defense (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Rounding out the news of the past couple of weeks, the media elite struck two contradictory themes — with journalists saluting the “courage,”“guts” and “cool hand” of Barack Obama in ordering the mission that killed Osama bin Laden, even as the liberal media were “repelled” and “appalled” by the “vulgar” and “idiotic” celebrations of everyday Americans to the news of the terrorist leader’s demise.

The latest edition (PDF) of MRC’s bi-weekly Notable Quotables newsletter captures the flavor of liberal media coverage since bin Laden’s death, including the bitterness of some on the far left, including the left-wing journalist who griped that it “was not justice” but rather “one killer [the United States] killing another.”

Here are some of the best quotes from the issue; for the entire edition, visit www.MRC.org:

On Wednesday's The View, ABC's Barbara Walters slobbered over the "courage, and the guts, and the coolness" of President Obama in ordering the assassination of terrorist Osama bin Laden. "It was enormously, enormously courageous," she said of the president's decision to commence the mission to kill or capture the al Qaeda leader.

"President Bush tried, President Clinton tried, but Barack Obama was the one who had the courage and the guts and the coolness," Walters said of the mission before being drowned out in applause from the audience.

View co-hosts Joy Behar and Barbara Walters on Monday immediately politicized the killing of terrorist mastermind Osama bin Laden. After giving credit to Barack Obama for the successful strike, supposedly straight journalist Walters giddily announced, "I would hate now to be a Republican candidate thinking of running."

Liberal comedienne Joy Behar played off a months-old comment by token conservative Elisabeth Hasselbeck. Behar crowed, "As Elisabeth always says, they should just skip the next election."
           
As the crew sat next to guest Brian Ross, Hasselbeck refused to join in: "Wait a minute. I think it is insane to politicize this event right now and I refuse to partake in that."

[See video below. MP3 audio here. ]

Joy Behar on Monday's "The View" crowed about Barack Obama being "a very intelligent guy" because he went to Harvard Law School and Columbia University.

Without skipping a beat, Elisabeth Hasselbeck marvelously asked, "Then doesn't that make President Bush very smart as well then? Yeah?" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Alex Jones, a 9/11 truther and promoter of other conspiracy theories, appeared on ABC's The View Monday to defend his friend Charlie Sheen, but diverted the interview into slamming George W. Bush for turning American into "a police state." Veteran journalist Barbara Walters did not denounce the radio host when he referenced the theory that the government was behind the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

Co-hosts Joy Behar and Whoopi Goldberg, who walked out when they objected to a comment Bill O'Reilly made about Muslims, did not leave when Jones attacked, "[Charlie Sheen] didn't kill a million people in Iraq. He wasn't involved with the takedown of Building Seven here in New York."

(Building Seven, across the street from the World Trade Center, is a key component to those who believe that the Twin Towers were taken down by a controlled demolition, not as a result of international terrorism.) Later, Jones shifted the subject to politics again and ranted, "Let's compare George Bush, a million dead in Iraq!"

[See video below. MP3 here.]

ABC's The View on Thursday neglected one side of the abortion debate by bringing on two staunch supporters of Planned Parenthood in Congress without any other guests arguing the pro-life side. As the two championed giving tax money to the abortion provider, Barbara Walters herself defended the organization, while Whoopi Goldberg assisted in spreading a falsehood about "federal dollars" for abortion (audio clips available here).

The show's co-hosts brought on Representatives Gwen Moore and Jackie Speier, two of the current "pro-choice" heroes in Congress supporting Planned Parenthood funding, near the end of their 11 am Eastern hour program to discuss the controversial issue. After playing clips from two of their recent floor speeches in the House of Representatives (they omitted Moore's infamous "ramen noodles" remark), co-host Elizabeth Hasselbeck echoed her colleague Joy Behar's compliment from earlier in the week: "We're glad you're both here. Courageous, indeed, what you did to bring your own personal stories....I think it touched many women, including us."

[Video embedded below the page break]

Sarah Palin found a very strange ally on Monday.

With media outlet after media outlet disgracefully accusing the former Alaska governor of inciting Jared Lee Loughner to go on a shooting rampage in Tucson Saturday, Barbara Walters said on "The View," "To blame Sarah Palin as some are doing I think is very unfair to her" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Ever the classy bunch, the ladies of "The View" spent a few minutes Monday mocking incoming Speaker of the House John Boehner for tearing up during an interview with CBS's Lesley Stahl.

The usual suspects, apparently no longer bothered by dramatic showings of disrespect towards national leaders, hit Boehner with characteristically immature and uninformed attacks.

The bigger surprise, though, was self-proclaimed "objective" reporter Barbara Walters, who claimed that Boehner "has an emotional problem," since "every time he talks about something that's not 'raise taxes,' he cries."

On Thursday, NewsBusters made it clear that no matter how Sarah Palin answered Katie Couric's pathetic reading list question back in 2008, the liberal media were going to ridicule her.

On Friday, this point was made even clearer when Mark Levin told his radio audience that Palin's answer to Barbara Walters' same question on ABC's "10 Most Fascinating People of 2010" was edited to remove his best-selling book "Liberty and Tyranny" (audio follows courtesy Right Scoop):