There can be little doubt now that Old Media is applying full-court pressure to anoint Barack Obama with the Democratic nomination, and on Hillary Clinton to drop out of the race.

The New York Times's stories for tomorrow's print edition ("Support for Clinton Wanes as Obama Sees Finish Line" and "Pundits Declare the Race Over") clearly point in those directions. The first describes North Carolina as "a decisive loss" for Mrs. Clinton. The second shows how determined the Times appears to be to come up with evidence that Obama has the nomination in the bag, as it actually notes the despised Matt Drudge's headline link earier today to Tim Russert's "The Nominee" video.

Wait a minute.

Jim Geraghty at National Review online appears to be about the only person to have caught the obvious: Barack Obama's overwhelming support from African-Americans means that he performed miserably with the rest of the voters.

Did he ever:

Wednesday’s broadcast network morning shows sounded eager to drum Hillary Clinton out of the Democratic presidential race and turn all critical eyes on John McCain. NBC was most emphatic. Today ran MSNBC midnight footage of Tim Russert declaring Barack Obama the winner: "We now know who the Democratic nominee is gonna be and no one is gonna dispute it." Russert added live: "I cannot find an objective Democrat who does not think this race is over." On ABC, George Stephanopoulos endorsed the New York tabloid newspaper headlines: "Toast. Hil Needs a Miracle. That's exactly right....this nomination fight is over." On CBS, co-host Harry Smith suggested to Bob Schieffer: "Bob, this party needs a nominee and fast. What do you think? Will Hillary Clinton get out, and when?" Schieffer declared "This race is over."

The same message came through in the screen graphics. For example, ABC pictured Mrs. Clinton with the words "End of the Road?" as co-host Robin Roberts began the show: "This morning, is it over?" NBC’s Matt Lauer also asked "Is it over?" and so did the NBC screen. The segments to follow answered the question with an emphatic yes.

My two cents say George Stephanopoulos gave Hillary a harder time than Tim Russert did Obama during their respective appearances on This Week and Meet the Press today. Russert never pinned Obama down on exactly what he knew of Rev. Wright's most controversial assertions and when he knew it.

Over on ABC, Stephanopoulos twice challenged Hillary to name a single economist who supported her proposal for a gas-tax holiday, and threw in her face the fact that even her big admirer in economist ranks, Paul Krugman of the NY Times, has criticized her over it. In exposing her inability to name a single practitioner of the dismal science who supported her plan [McCain, who's also called for a gas-tax holiday would presumably be similarly hard-pressed], Stephanopoulos left Clinton looking like a panderer. Stephanopoulos raised the issue right out of the box.

View video here.

The Time 100 list of the most influential people is out, and MSNBC on Friday afternoon was touting its own designated power broker, NBC Washington Bureau Chief and Meet the Press host Tim Russert. There’s only one problem. The gooey profile is written by former New York Gov. Mario Cuomo. Russert worked for Cuomo as a counselor and media strategist in 1983 and 1984, but Time never mentioned that. Neither did MSNBC anchor Norah O’Donnell as she interviewed Time’s Adi Ignatius on the picks, and turned to ask him giddily which NBCer was honored. Ignatius replied:

It's Tim Russert. You know, I mean, part of the magic of this list is having interesting people write about the honorees. We had Mario Cuomo, former governor of New York, write the piece on Tim Russert. He said, whether you like Tim or not, whether you like his programming, the road to the White House goes through Tim Russert and his program. So he is, you know, practically a kingmaker in U.S. politics.

For a moment, let's step away from the commentary, per se, and focus on the commentators. Liberals love to chide Fox News for its alleged conservative bias. So why don't we see, when it comes to being fair and balanced, how this morning's Fox News Sunday panel stacked up against that of its main competitor, Meet the Press?

Here are the line-ups—you be the judge.

MEET THE PRESS

Host–Tim Russert

Panel

• David Broder–Washington Post columnist
• John Dickerson–Slate
• Gwen Ifill–PBS
• Andrea Mitchell–NBC
• Richard Wolffe–Newsweek

Washington Post media reporter Howard Kurtz takes up the left-wing brouhaha over ABC’s "trivial" questions to Barack Obama on Wednesday night. Here’s the weird part:

It is hardly unusual for debate moderators to draw partisan criticism, as NBC's Tim Russert did in October, when liberal commentators accused him of harassing Clinton over driver's licenses for illegal immigrants and other issues. But it is rare for ostensibly neutral media writers and television columnists to pile on with such fervor.

But Kurtz never quoted anyone "ostensibly neutral" -- they all came from the left. He began with Jason Linkins of the Huffington Post, Will Bunch of the "Attytood" blog, and Post TV critic Tom Shales. Later on he added Greg Mitchell, the socialist editor at Editor & Publisher, Josh Marshall of Talking Points Memo, and Steve Benen of the Carpetbagger Report. He wrapped up with Keith Olbermann. Not an "ostensibly neutral" voice in the bunch.

Would it be fair to guess that inside the "ostensibly neutral" Washington Post there is a lot of wailing and gnashing of teeth?

Kurtz did pass some of the internal reaction and defense from ABC:

Asked by anchor Brian Williams why Hillary Clinton chose Tuesday to assert that Reverend Jeremiah Wright “would not have been my pastor,” Tim Russert declared “the setting in which she did this is particularly striking.” The Washington Bureau Chief for NBC News proceeded to marvel at how she made her comments in an interview with reporters and editors at the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, owned by Richard Mellon Scaife whom Clinton's allies consider “the 'Godfather' of the Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy.” Russert then recounted Scaife's presumed sins of questioning “the suicide of Vince Foster” and funding “investigations of Troopergate and Whitewater.” Russert pointed out:

The setting in which she did this is particularly striking. It's a newspaper in Pittsburgh owned by Richard Mellon Scaife, who is described by her allies as the 'Godfather' of the Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy. The man who raised questions about the suicide of Vince Foster, the death of former party chairman Ron Brown, who funded investigations of Troopergate and Whitewater. It was that setting she decided to offer comments about Reverend Wright.

It's not Ben Bernanke's fault, according to CNBC's Maria Bartiromo.

Bartiromo appeared on NBC's March 23 "Meet the Press" with CNBC's "Street Signs" host Erin Burnett as the program's featured guests.

"Meet the Press" host Tim Russert asked Bartiromo and CNBC's Erin Burnett if Bernanke was "up to the task" to take on problems with the U.S. economy. Bartiromo didn't blame the Fed chief for the current economic environment, but defended Bernanke and said the foundation of the housing problems was in place prior to his tenure.

"I really don't think you can blame Ben Bernanke for this, Tim," Bartiromo said. "You know, I think that he is, as Erin said, throwing the kitchen sink, doing a lot at this point. And remember, he's a new chairman. You know, so what was put in place before he was actually in this role has set us up for this."

On Sunday's "Meet the Press," Newsweek editor Jon Meacham hinted that if the Clintons were to execute a "corrupt bargain" which gave Hillary the nomination, it could lead to a split in the Democrat Party akin to what happened in 1824.

In that election, only one Party, the Democratic-Republicans, ran presidential candidates. Although Andrew Jackson won the most popular and electoral votes, he didn't receive a majority of either resulting in the House of Representatives controversially giving the nod to John Quincy Adams.

This skirmish led to a division in the Democratic-Republican Party such that four years later, Jackson ran and won the presidency as a member of the newly created Democratic Party defeating Adams who represented the newly created National Republican Party.

With this in mind, here's what Meacham said Sunday:

On Thursday's "Today" show when co-host Meredith Vieira asked NBC's Washington bureau chief Tim Russert if there would be any "fallout for the Democrats" from the Spitzer scandal, Russert asserted: "Probably not....that story pretty much leaves the front pages."

However, last year, when Senate Republicans David Vitter and Larry Craig were in the news for sex scandals the "Today" show wasn't so quick to let those stories rest and predicted they would have a lingering impact on the party and even conservatism as a whole. As the MRC's Tim Graham reminded NewsBusters readers earlier this week, the "Today" show, ran headlines trumpeting: "Conservative Crisis," and "Craig's Crisis: The Last Straw for the GOP?" Co-host Ann Curry used the scandals to bury Republicans on the August 29, 2007 edition of "Today":

If Hillary Clinton's latest gambit--floating Obama as her VP--were a play not a ploy, and the Today crew the theater critics, they would have left at intermission to begin penning a blistering pan.

Interviewing Tim Russert, Matt Lauer kicked off the kicking around of Hillary's idea.

MATT LAUER: Let's talk about this idea. Is it being floated seriously? Is this light-hearted, and who's behind it?

TIM RUSSERT: Well the Clintons are behind it, and New York Daily News columnist Michael Goodwin said today that he talked to a Clintonista who said it's an attempt to belittle Barack Obama, that if they can suggest that he can be Vice-President, it's an indication that who should be President?

LAUER: Yeah, but couldn't it backfire? I mean, he's ahead in the delegate count, she needs a miracle. Might it not come off as ignorant, or arrogant, not to be too harsh?

Unless you've been asleep or out of the country for a month, you're well aware of claims by Hillary Clinton and NBC's "Saturday Night Live" that media are totally in the tank for Barack Obama.

On Wednesday, conservative author Ann Coulter was Steve Malzberg's guest on WOR radio, and she couldn't agree more with this assertion about the mainstream media's love affair with the junior senator from Illinois.

After Malzberg mentioned Michelle Obama's recent despicable comments about our country published in The New Yorker magazine and reported by NewsBusters Wednesday, he asked his guest what impact Mrs. Obama might have on the election. Coulter responded (seven-minute audio available here):

NBC's "Saturday Night Live" responded to criticism over two skits from its February 23 program that gave the appearance the show was supporting Hillary Clinton's campaign for president by giving the junior senator from New York her own "Editorial Response" in the most recent installment.

To make it clear the show isn't in the tank for Barack Obama's opponent, the real Hillary Clinton was allowed to address the nation rather than "SNL" actress Amy Poehler.

That should settle once and for all the questions about which candidate "SNL" is endorsing.

Hillary's editorial response immediately followed the opening sketch which, once again, was a lampoon of a recent debate between Clinton and Obama:

During Tuesday night’s presidential debate, NBC’s Tim Russert tried to test the Democratic candidates’ basic knowledge of foreign policy, asking what they knew about the man who will almost certainly be elected president of Russia in Sunday’s elections. After Hillary Clinton gave a general answer that kept referring to “Putin’s handpicked successor,” Russert pounced: “Do you know his name?”

But if the fact that Dmitry Medvedev will assume the Russian presidency is actually important, Russert and his co-moderator, NBC Nightly News anchor Brian Williams, have utterly ignored it as journalists. A Nexis search shows just one reference to Medvedev on NBC, an April 14, 2007 story about Russia’s giant energy company, Gazprom, of which Medvedev was chairman of the board. (The story aired on a weekend, when Lester Holt, not Brian Williams, was in the anchor chair.)

Standard-free journalism on parade all day on NBC's Sunday

Forgotten But Not Gone

It was another do-as-we-say, not-as-we-do day for the National Broadcast Company this past Sabbath.

Over the weekend NBC offered up their latest versions of Tim Russert's Meet the Press and the Chris Matthews Show -- the latter being political television's answer to Jerry Springer. In them we were treated to two more glittering examples of all that is wrong with the Jurassic Press.

That being the woeful lack of journalistic ethics demonstrated by those at the heights of the media mountain, and the utter shamelessness they and their colleagues exhibit upon their being outed as amoral hacks.

The New York Times "scoop" strongly suggesting a romantic relationship between John McCain and a lobbyist drew heavy coverage from all three morning shows Thursday. All three featured interviews with McCain staff members on the defensive. Critical scrutiny of the Times story was mostly left to the McCain aides, as the networks presented the tone of a real crisis for McCain, not for the newspaper.

On NBC’s Today, at least its opening allowed the idea that an outrage had taken place: "Good morning, bombshell or hatchet job? A New York Times report out this morning raises questions about John McCain's relationship with a female lobbyist eight years ago. He is outraged and he is fighting back. Will it turn the presidential campaign upside down?"

MSNBC has cited and discussed the press release issued today by Brent Bozell, President of NB's parent Media Research Center, excoriating the New York Times for its article on John McCain. The discussion came during the network's post-press conference analysis of McCain's appearance this morning.

JOE SCARBOROUGH: Let me interrupt. This is interesting. Mika just handed me a Blackberry quote here. Chris Matthews, earlier this morning Tim Russert asked the question how would conservatives respond to this? Would they rally behind John McCain, against the New York Times, or would they go ahead and finish off John McCain? I've got this press release. Brent Bozell on the New York Times, quote, politically motivated hit job:

It is beyond appalling that the New York Times continues its steady slide into the journalistic toilet with such a spurious, and so patently motivated, hit job.