Bill Moyers

Moyers Trashes Hillary, Defends His Softball Wright Interview

By Tim Graham | May 7, 2008 - 16:37 ET

PBS omnipresence Bill Moyers was interviewed on the radical taxpayer-subsidized Pacifica Radio network's Democracy Now program on Wednesday, and declared that Hillary Clinton wishes the worst on Barack Obama -- "she keeps hoping for every day, is that lightning will strike him" and insisted "She can only win in a way that would leave the Democratic Party in shambles." Even so, Moyers complained that all three candidates are failing to correct a "dysfunctional" capitalist system.

Moyers also made excuses for Jeremiah Wright's wild sermons about 9/11 and AIDS, and brushed off suggestions that his interview could have been tougher. "I’m not a very adversarial fellow. I’m not a gotcha kind of journalist," he claimed. "I knew that they were going to be asking all of these questions. I leave that to those people whose job it is for the commercial media." He decried the ABC debate questions to Obama as "a great exercise in irrelevance."

Moyers Defends Obama and Wright with Democrat Talking Points

By Noel Sheppard | May 3, 2008 - 12:32 ET

Do my tax dollars really have to support the anti-American vitriol that comes out of the mouth of PBS's Bill Moyers every week?

Before you answer, consider that the host of "Bill Moyers Journal" followed up last week's much publicized sycophantic lovefest with Democrat presidential candidate Barack Obama's America-hating pastor by going on a six minute defense of the junior senator from Illinois and the reverend this Friday which was filled with Democrat talking points.

Readers are warned to proceed with caution before either reviewing the highly-offensive transcript that follows, or clicking on the embedded video in the upper-right (h/t TVNewser):

Bozell Column: Moyers Loves Reverend Wright

By Brent Bozell | April 29, 2008 - 13:44 ET

The Bill Moyers PBS interview of Barack Obama’s long-time minister, Reverend Jeremiah Wright, underlined once again that our tax dollars don’t fund programs championing racial harmony. They fund programs that celebrate black radicals, militants, and kooks. Moyers came to Rev. Wright’s side not to condemn him or even challenge him, but to praise him and defend him. As he implored Wright to explain his "God damn America" sermon, Wright at least said he was free in America to denounce America. To which Moyers replied: "Well, you can be almost crucified for saying what you've said here in this country."

Bill Moyers wants us to see Jeremiah Wright as the Jesus Christ of our time?

William Safire Savages Moyers' 'Loving Conversation' with Rev. Wright

By Noel Sheppard | April 28, 2008 - 10:31 ET

As NewsBusters' Brent Baker reported last Friday, Democrat presidential candidate Barack Obama's pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, was "interviewed" last week by PBS's Bill Moyers, and the broadcast networks fell for the snowjob hook, line, and sinker.

Quite surprisingly, Howard Kurtz's panel on Sunday's "Reliable Sources" were far less impressed, in particular, former New York Times columnist William Safire who deliciously framed the interview as a "a loving conversation. And Bill Moyers is a liberal, was from the word go, and he was doing his best to make the most for Jeremiah Wright."

Wonderfully, Kurtz and his panel members, unlike seemingly all the rest of the currently fawning over Jeremiah media, agreed:

Weekend Captionfest

By NB Staff | April 25, 2008 - 15:02 ET

http://newsbusters.org/static/2008/04/2008-04-25PBSMoyersWright.jpg

Interviewed by Bill Moyers for a PBS show to be aired on the night of April 25, 2008, the Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright Jr. accused people of trying to paint  him as "un-American" or "some sort of fanatic" for purposes of harming the candidacy of Barack Obama. (AP Photo/PBS, Robin Holland, HO)

Mitchell Recycles 'Out of Context' Rev. Wright Defense

By Mark Finkelstein | April 25, 2008 - 06:56 ET

It is NBC Green Week, after all, so who can blame Andrea Mitchell for recycling two dilapidated defenses of the Rev. Jeremiah Wright?

Mitchell's heart didn't seem wholly in it, but like a burned-out public defender going through the motions, Andrea apparently felt constrained to mount some kind of defense of Rev. Jeremiah Wright's controversial remarks. And so she trotted out two hoary chestnuts:

  • that's the way it's done in African-American churches, and
  • media critics say he was "taken out of context."

View video here.

Tom Shales Hails Moyers, Wails for Sally Field

By Tim Graham | December 31, 2007 - 00:35 ET

In his review of television for the year 2007, Washington Post TV critic Tom Shales bitterly recounted Fox's allegedly political censorship of actress Sally Field at the Emmy Awards, when she said if mothers ran the world, there would be no "goddamned wars." Shales complained that the lack of profanity "befouled" the airwaves:

The Emmy Awards were marred by a dark and perhaps portentous moment that also involved an unexpected -- and in this case, totally unwarranted -- silence. Sally Field was accepting a prize and talking about mothers and war when suddenly the Fox censor chose to delete some of her words before they could go out to America on the time-delayed telecast. Fox used the absurd FCC crackdown on "obscenity" as its excuse, but the action smacked of political censorship and seriously befouled the American airwaves.

PBS Star Bill Moyers Uses She-God To Raise Funds for Leftists

By Tim Graham | December 23, 2007 - 00:16 ET

The next time someone claims PBS is an oasis of fairness and balance, suggest they notice that Bill Moyers writes fundraising letters for hard-left political efforts. Arriving in the mail at liberal households over the holidays is a direct-mail fundraiser from Jim Hightower, the former agriculture commissioner of Texas and washed-up talk show host. He has a new, cheap newsletter ($10 annual subscription), and included is a testimonial with the Moyers mug on it. Moyers wrote that Hightower's work is better than Heaven, and the she-God learned immensely from it:

Dear fellow citizen,

I am told the first thing the late people's pundit Molly Ivins did upon reaching that Great Valhalla of Scribes in the Sky was to whip out the latest edition of The Hightower Lowdown and read it aloud to the multitude of saints, angels, and cherubs gathered to greet her.

The NYT's Dogs Aren't As Cute As You Thought

By Stuart James | December 21, 2007 - 15:11 ET

You may have heard of "Hentish," the dog in The New York Times that was shot and killed by a Blackwater security guard earlier this week. However in the media's over zealous attempt to crucify Blackwater USA they left out a surprisingly telling piece about some of the dogs that were harbored at the Times compound in Baghdad.

The New York Post reported yesterday that these dogs had already attacked people before, including Eason Jordan who runs the blog IraqSlogger.com, and is a former CNN chief news executive.

"Eason's encounter, revealed on his blog yesterday, involved a dog named Scratch and left him with ‘three deep gashes in my right hand, sending blood spewing in all directions,'" the Post story said.

Eason's blog post also revealed other canine nightmares:

Moyers Asked Olbermann: 'Should Journalists Take Sides?'

By Tim Graham | December 18, 2007 - 00:26 ET

Call it a meeting of the Bush-bashing minds. Longtime PBS host Bill Moyers invited on MSNBC host Keith Olbermann for Friday’s edition of Bill Moyers Journal. The strangest moment came as Moyers suggested that in a polarized country, it might be distasteful for journalists to favor one side. Moyers must be playing devil’s advocate, because he’s been every bit as vituperative against Bush as Olbermann.

The worries about polarization and contributing to "a nation of screechers" came up twice.

BILL MOYERS: It seems to me that this country has become two choirs, each side listening to, only to its own preachers. If -- should journalists take sides when everybody else is polarized?

Keith Olbermann: What I Do ‘Is Really Journalism'

By Noel Sheppard | December 16, 2007 - 00:30 ET

It certainly won't come as a surprise to NewsBusters readers that MSNBC's Keith Olbermann is more separated from reality than virtually any member of the media.

Still, the idea this former sportscaster and current liberal commentator actually considers what he does as "really journalism" should shock and disgust any member of said profession, even Bill Moyers who had Olbermann as a guest on Friday's "Journal."

Wonderfully, referring to himself as a journalist wasn't the only hysterical utterance from Olbermann during this interview, as he also had the unmitigated audacity to criticize conservative radio host Michael Savage for "basically just spattering invective on people he didn't like."

Hey, Keith, have you ever actually watched your program or read a transcript?

As the answer to this question appears to definitely be "No," here are some of the lowlights from this interview (video available here, full transcript here):

Leftist Heaven! Moyers Hosts Keith Olbermann on PBS Friday Night

By Tim Graham | December 13, 2007 - 13:42 ET

It's the holiday season for the hard lefties at Democratic Underground:

What's on Keith Olbermann's mind about the media? This week, as Rupert Murdoch takes over the Wall Street Journal and as the FCC is about to allow more newspapers to expand into the broadcast business, BILL MOYERS JOURNAL continues its reporting on media consolidation and gets insight from MSNBC's popular and provocative Keith Olbermann.

As one delighted commenter replied,

Look up "National Treasure" in the dictionary and there's a picture of Bill Moyers.

Tom Brokaw Trashes Rush Limbaugh, Talk Radio on Ingraham Show

By Tim Graham | November 26, 2007 - 14:25 ET

Former NBC anchor Tom Brokaw took his publicity tour for his Sixties book "Boom!" into (at least somewhat) hostile territory on Monday’s Laura Ingraham show. Ingraham played an old clip in which Brokaw slapped talk radio as "instantly jingoistic and savagely critical" of people questioning war.

Like many other journalists who instantly let conservatives know they haven’t listened to Rush Limbaugh, Brokaw insisted Limbaugh "doesn’t want to hear another point of view, except his." Ingraham disagreed. Brokaw added: "The problem with talk radio is they only want to hear one note...The problem with talk radio is they mock anyone else’s point of view, and they do it often in a mindless fashion." This is rich talk coming from a man whose network hired Bill Moyers as his newscast’s only commentator in 1995, and a man who wrote a syrupy tribute to hot liberal mock-jock Jon Stewart for his "Athenian" ideals in Time magazine. Audio clip (5:05): MP3 audio

Moyers: Liberalism About Friendship and Faith, Not Ideology

By Tim Graham | November 21, 2007 - 22:08 ET

PBS omnipresence Bill Moyers is once again making speeches with tears in his eyes about the wonders of liberalism, which is apparently not an ideology as much as it's about Kumbaya kinship. Moyers touted the socialist vision of Franklin Delano Roosevelt as he won a Freedom of Speech award from the Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt Institute, and his remarks were excerpted by The Nation. He began by mentioning the blue-collar liberalism of his father:

Henry Moyers was an ordinary man who dropped out of the fourth grade because his family needed him to pick cotton to help make ends meet. The Depression knocked him off the farm and flat on his back. When I was born he was making two dollars a day working on the highway to Oklahoma City. He never made over $100 a week in the whole of his working life, and he made that only when he joined the union on the last job he held. He voted for Franklin Roosevelt in four straight elections, and he would have gone on voting for him until kingdom come if both had lived that long. I once asked him why, and he said, "Because the President's my friend."

20 Years of Bias: Evil America

By Rich Noyes | October 25, 2007 - 09:49 ET

To commemorate the Media Research Center’s 20th anniversary this month, we’ve just published a special expanded edition of our ‘Notable Quotables’ newsletter with more than 100 of the most outrageous, sometimes humorous, quotes we’ve uncovered over the past 20 years. Earlier this week, I presented quotes showing the media’s hostility towards Ronald Reagan and other conservatives, and sycophantic coverage of Bill and Hillary Clinton.

Today’s installment: America the Awful. On Monday, I recounted how many journalists offered sympathetic coverage of totalitarian communist regimes. After the 9/11 terrorist attacks, too many journalists opted to take a harsher approach with their own country. In a commencement address at the State University of New York at New Paltz back on May 21, 2006, New York Times Publisher Arthur Sulzberger, Jr., exposed his extreme left-wing agenda as he railed against everything he saw as wrong with America:

Video (0:52): Windows (1.64 MB), plus MP3 audio (261 kB).

CNN's Dobbs Blasts Couric and Moyers Over Patriotism

By Matthew Balan | October 9, 2007 - 18:09 ET

On Monday’s "Lou Dobbs Tonight," host Lou Dobbs took aim at Katie Couric and Bill Moyers for "silly public statements" they’ve made regarding the practice of wearing an American flag lapel pin. "CBS's Katie Couric, of all people, taking exception to an American journalist saying 'we,' when referring to the United States.... I'm sorry, Katie Couric, but who could possibly be offended by acknowledging those troops who have sacrificed so much for us and ours?... PBS's Bill Moyers says the flag's been hijacked and turned into a logo, the trademark of a monopoly on patriotism. Oh, please, Bill Moyers, you're too smart for this kind of babble."

Joe Klein Smartly Salutes Obama Eschewing U.S. Flag Lapel Pin

By Ken Shepherd | October 5, 2007 - 10:52 ET

So Sen. Barack Obama has pulled a Bill Moyers -- shunning U.S. flag lapel pins over political disagreements with the Bush administration -- and Time's Joe Klein applauds the move. After all, the Bush White House, according to Klein is an "administration that endorsed the troglyditic religious views of Christian fundamentalist mullahs," among other nasty un-liberal things.

Klein huffs to his conclusion about the "Phony Issue of the Day":

I adore this country and abhor those, especially those lucky enough to live here, who don't. But to the extent that wearing an American flag lapel pin could be misconstrued as support for the most disgraceful administration in my lifetime, perhaps in American history, I can certainly understand why Barack Obama had reservations about it.

Bill Moyers Claims White House Misleading Americans About Surge

By Noel Sheppard | August 26, 2007 - 15:37 ET

Has Bill Moyers become PBS's Jack Cafferty, Bill Maher, Rosie O'Donnell, and Keith Olbermann all rolled into one crusading, Bush-hating, anti-war propagandist funded by American tax dollars?

After all, on Friday, he followed up last week's disgraceful rant about Karl Rove with an eight-minute segment on how "The Bush White House has launched a massive new P.R. campaign with the message: the surge in Iraq is working. Let's stay the course!"

In it, Moyers offered not one shred of balance to this completely anti-war report by totally ignoring recent statements from liberal think tank members, leading Democrats, and military officials indicating that conditions in Iraq are indeed improving.

Instead, Moyers: disgracefully suggested that the White House is misleading Americans about the surge in much the same way it did weapons of mass destruction; mocked military recruiting ads and techniques, and; cited a British newspaper claiming our army is crippled by fatigue. A full transcript of this abomination follows with video available here for those that can stomach it:

Chris Wallace Slams Bill Moyers: Reporting's Easier When You Don’t Worry About Facts

By Noel Sheppard | August 26, 2007 - 13:29 ET

As NewsBusters reported last Saturday, PBS's Bill Moyers went on an absolutely disgraceful rant about Karl Rove, George W. Bush, and religion during the August 17 installment of "Bill Moyers Journal."

Two days later, Rove was Chris Wallace's guest on "Fox News Sunday," and took issue with Moyers's comments: "Mr. Moyers ought to do a little bit better research before he does another drive-by slander."

Moyers followed this up with a letter to Wallace posted at his blog Wednesday suggesting that Wallace didn't do his homework concerning Rove, and that Wallace shouldn't "take his every word as gospel."

This Sunday, Wallace fired back (video available here):

Moyers Spanked Again by PBS Ombud

By Mithridate Ombud | August 24, 2007 - 16:51 ET

You know it's bad when your own ombudsman compares you to Richard Nixon, or suggests that you need an ombudsman devoted only to you. But that's exactly what PBS Ombud Michael Getler has been pushed to with the latest Bill Moyers "editorial", which was covered by our own Noel Sheppard.

Set aside for the moment that in a tirade Moyers referred to the Commander in Chief as "an intellectually incurious draft-averse naughty playboy in a flig