On Friday afternoon, CNN's liberal contributor Roland Martin suggested that most people who are pro-life seem "hateful" as he was describing Mike Huckabee's need to reach out to non-evangelical voters. During an appearance on CNN Newsroom at about 1:47 p.m. with anchor Kyra Phillips, Martin contended that Huckabee needs to pursue a strategy similar to that of President Bush in 2000: "Sure, [Huckabee is] a staunch pro-life person, but he isn't perceived as being hateful as other people who are pro-life." (Transcript follows)

Below is a transcript of the relevant portion of Martin's comments from the Friday January 4 CNN Newsroom:

CNN’s senior political correspondent Candy Crowley, in a report on Thursday’s "Newsroom" program about college student participation in the Iowa caucuses, featured two supporters of Democratic presidential candidates, one for Barack Obama, and the other a supporter of Hillary Clinton. While host Kyra Philips, in her introduction to the report, highlighted how "all presidential supporters want all the support they can get, and that includes the under-30 crowd," the report did not feature any young supporters of Republican candidates.

Crowley’s report, which aired 16 mintues into the 1 pm Eastern hour, focused on the Obama campaign’s outreach to the "under-30 crowd," and described him in glowing terms. "Barack Obama is a hit on college campuses. He's young. He's new. He campaigns against status quo politics."

CNN, in their day-long reporting on Tuesday about the opening day for a controversial publicly-funded Arabic-language school in New York City, sympathized with the school and its supporters, and helped denigrate its opponents. On "American Morning" and throughout the day on Tuesday on their "Newsroom" program, CNN aired a report from correspondent Richard Roth on the Khalil Gibran International Academy, whose curriculum will focus on teaching "Arabic language and culture" (as detailed in a CNSNews.com report last week). The report focused on Carmen Colon, a mother and "community activist" in Brooklyn (a detail not mentioned in Roth’s report) who pulled her son from the school before its opening. The report closed with a clip from Colon, who said, "The people who are so against this school who, for me, seem more like the terrorists by terrorizing the community and making us feel that it's unsafe for our children to be there. They're the ones who are terrorizing us, not the school, not the principal, and not the administration."

Video (4:13): Real (3.10 MB) or Windows (2.56 MB), plus MP3 audio (1.92 kB).

Update with YouTube video below.

When is it unimportant to the MSM to inform viewers of a congressman's party affiliation?

At 3:51 P.M. EDT today, CNN aired a "Just In" report on filing of assault and battery charges against California Congressman Bob Filner. Anchor Kyra Phillips said the CNN report was in turn based on a report from its Arlington, VA affiliate, WJLA-TV.

According to the WJLA report:

The day after Barry Bonds set a dubious record, CNN's Kyra Phillips [file photo] might have set one of her own. Rather than "Career Home Runs," file this one under "Tasteless and Inappropriate Questions Posed to a Soldier in a War Zone."

At about 3:40 P.M. EDT on this afternoon's CNN Newsroom, co-anchor Phillips was interviewing Lt. General Raymond Odierno, the MNF second-in-command in Iraq.

CNN Anchor Kyra Phillips: You know there's been a lot of shifting around in positions, a lot of positions lost, key positions. Do you think that this job that you've taken on could be career suicide?

A little anti-gun bias on CNN. This week, CNN interviewed 11-year-old Jamison Stone who claimed he killed a “Monster Pig,” which was often compared to the other giant pig Hogzilla, but not everyone in the media was very receptive to the story of an 11-year-old boy using a handgun to kill a giant boar. CNN Newsroom correspondent T.J. Holmes was uncomfortable with the boy’s use of a handgun, asking, “Is it just me, or an 11-year-old with a pistol, is that OK?” (emphasis mine throughout):

On the February 19th edition of Paula Zahn Now, guest host Kyra Phillips, well known for her restroom comments, confused Senator Barack Obama with the world’s most wanted terrorist. When interviewing African American film maker John Ridley on Obama’s standing in the black community, Phillips posed this question.

Kyra Phillips: "What do you think is Osama bin - is, is Obama - boy that was a terrible slip of the tongue, right? Barack Obama, is he that new leader?"

CNN confused the two before. As newsbuster Scott Whitlock noted, a graphic on The Situation Room asked "where’s Obama?" next to a picture of Osama bin Laden.

CNN’s Bill Schneider suddenly feels the resentment of foreign leaders preaching policy to Americans. Of course, it’s a conservative blasting a liberal U.S. politician. Australian Prime Minister John Howard explained why terrorists are rooting for Barack Obama.

Howard: "He’s a long way from being president of the United States. I think he’s wrong. I think that would just encourage those who want to completely destabilize and destroy Iraq and create chaos and a victory for the terrorists to hang on and hope for an Obama victory."

Senator Obama shot back

Obama: "I would suggest that he calls up another 20,000 Australians and sends them to Iraq. Otherwise, it’s just a bunch of empty rhetoric.

CNN’s Kyra Phillips invited comedian Paul Mooney and radio talk show host Roland Martin on to “Newsroom” Tuesday to discuss the Michael Richards (“Kramer”) issue (hat tip to NB member MyKindaSpam). During the conversation, both guests made what many would perceive as being rather anti-Semitic remarks.

This was Martin’s:

Another piece is when you really examine what he said, he not only said 50 years ago we'd have you hanging upside down from a tree. Well, guess what, 50 years ago, Michael Richards would have been in some oven in Germany being baked because he's also Jewish.

Yikes. Mooney must have felt he needed to top that, for later in the discussion, he said:

This week, the MRC’s Megan McCormack brought us a second-by-second account of Kyra Phillip’s now infamous "bathroom chat." She also did a follow-up on FNC’s "Fox and Friends" parody of the event. Soon, the story became a full blown media sensation.

Of course, the media heavily focused on the anniversary of Hurricane Katrina. Harry Smith discussed how the residents of New Orleans feel "abandoned" and "forgotten."

CNN’s Bill Schneider said that the disaster mad the President look "clueless." The BBC stated that the hurricane showed how in the United States, too many blacks are "at the bottom of the pile."

Some have speculated that the "a--holes" CNN anchor Kyra Phillips referred to in her ladies'-room chat might have been President Bush and other Republicans. The folks at the liberal group Media Matters for America, however, don't view Phillips as a GOP-basher. In fact, Media Matters has posted on its web site several items taking Phillips to task for supposed conservative bias. For example:

July 12, 2005: "...Philips [sic] responded to a call by Democratic senators for President Bush to fire White House senior adviser Karl Rove for his alleged role in the outing of covert CIA operative Valerie Plame by saying [that there is] 'definitely a major smear campaign going on [against Rove].'"

I think it's safe to say that Kyra Phillips's bathroom break embarrassment was not entirely her fault. But you do have to wonder why it took so long for someone to cut off her mic. On his radio show yesterday, Rush Limbaugh wondered if perhaps the whole affair was due to someone not liking the CNN anchor:

What was the techie at the CNN control booth doing for 90 seconds? It's obvious they weren't listening to the Bush speech. It's obvious that nobody at CNN was listening to this. Somebody caught her. Oh, the anchor that was on, Daryn was on, and she finally, when this conversation finally started getting into sisters and brothers and control freaks and so forth, while Bush was speaking, "And you're listening to President Bush, who is talking from New Orleans today," and then apparently Kyra came back, she's going to take over at one o'clock, Daryn is still sitting there and she comes back and her mic is still live when she approaches the set, because she says, "Well, I'm here. I'm ready," and that went out.

It got me to thinking. Does somebody there not like Kyra Phillips? I mean how does this just happen? How in the world can audio and video go out when nobody intends for it to? But then when it does, you can imagine... I mean, look, I know broadcasting and broadcasting is me, and these accidents can happen. Somebody can bump into a switch. But for 90 seconds nobody knew it in the control booth at CNN, which means they we were the listening to what was on their own, quote, unquote, air, which was a Bush speech. I mean Kyra Phillips is innocent in this. I mean, she just had her whole personal conversation in a bathroom broadcast all over cable news yesterday afternoon for a minute and a half.

For those who were not watching Fox News Channel at 6:30am EDT today, 'Fox and Friends First' had a little bit of fun with CNN anchor Kyra Phillips’ restroom conversation, inadvertently broadcast live Tuesday during President Bush’s speech in New Orleans.

Making light of Phillips’ gaffe, anchor Kiran Chetry, having returned from a commercial break, was interrupted by an off-air "personal" conversation taking place between fellow F&F anchors Steve Doocy and Mike Jerrick.

The transcript of the F&F skit is behind the cut:

Reports the New York Daily News:

CNN anchor Kyra Phillips was caught with her skirt down yesterday when she left her microphone on during a trip to the ladies room.

The mortifying episode came when Phillips stepped away from her desk during coverage of President Bush's Hurricane Katrina anniversary speech. Viewers saw Dubya's lips moving, but they heard Phillips pulling down a zipper and making girl talk with another woman in the rest room.

"I have the most handsome man," Phillips gushed. "Just a really passionate, great, great human being. And they exist! They are hard to find, but they are out there."

Phillips' sister-in-law didn't get such positive treatment.

Looking for a "passionate, compassionate, great, great" man? Well, according to CNN’s Kyra Phillips, they do indeed exist.

During CNN’s live coverage of President Bush’s remarks from New Orleans, Phillips was unaware that her microphone was on and picked up portions of a conversation she was having with another woman, apparently in a CNN restroom. At 12:49pm EDT, those listening carefully could hear Phillips praise her husband:

Phillips: "Yeah, I’m very lucky in that regard with my husband. My husband is handsome and he is genuinely a loving, you know, no ego–you know what I’m saying. Just a really passionate, compassionate great, great human being. And they exist. They do exist. They’re hard to find. Yup. But they are out there."

Phillips also inadvertently revealed how she feels about her sister-in-law:

Phillips: "..Brothers have to be, you know, protective. Except for mine. I’ve got to be protective of him...Yeah. He’s married, three kids, but his wife is just a control freak."

Video clip (1minute 38seconds): Real (2.6MB) or Windows Media (3.06MB), plus MP3 audio (478KB)

The full transcript is behind the cut [including one vulgarity]: