Tina Brown

Politico’s Dylan Byers reported “The Daily Beast is dropping Howard Kurtz, the veteran media critic who made headlines this week for his erroneous report about NBA star Jason Collins.” Kurtz erred in suggesting Collins hadn’t been forthcoming about his fiancee, even though he discussed her on both ABC and in the Sports Illustrated cover story that made “history.” Kurtz’s story was retracted on Thursday.

On top of Kurtz losing his $300,000-a-year Beast gig (which started in October of 2010), TV Newser reported “A source at CNN tells TVNewser that Kurtz’s current deal with the cable channel will likely be his last.” The New York Times had a source claiming it wasn't just a Collins thing:

On Monday, CBS This Morning launched a week-long set of interviews for Women's History Month, but the majority of the women they picked for their list of "Eye Opening Women" are dedicated liberals, particularly on social issues. The morning newscast first conducted a fawning interview of former Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, who was part of the Supreme Court plurality that upheld the Roe v. Wade decision in 1992's Planned Parenthood v. Casey.

Five out of the eight remaining women featured for the series of interviews are all notables on the left side of the political spectrum. On Tuesday, anchors Charlie Rose and Norah O'Donnell will interview The Daily Beast's Tina Brown and Arianna Huffington, founder of far-left website The Huffington Post. Brown has a history of attacking conservatives. During a 2011 appearance on MSNBC's Morning Joe program, she likened tax hike opponents to terrorists:

Newsweek/Daily Beast editor Tina Brown said something Friday night that should wake up the Left and their media minions.

Appearing on HBO's Real Time, Brown said during the online Overtime segment, "He'd [Obama] be impeached by now for drones if he was W. Bush" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange is scheduled to be one of Bill Maher's guests on HBO's Real Time Friday.

The folks at Monsters and Critics said it best about this matter in their preview of the upcoming program:

On PBS's Charlie Rose show on Monday, as the group discussed the night's presidential debate, New York magazine's John Heilemann described Mitt Romney's past statements on foreign policy as "relatively harsh and relatively bellicose," as he argued that Romney had faced political "dangers" in his foreign policy positions "because he's been surrounded by some number of neo-conservative foreign policy advisors."

Fox News's Bret Baier quoted NewsBusters associate editor Noel Sheppard on Thursday's Special Report.

In a "Grapevine" segment about Newsweek's announcement that it will be printing its last magazine on December 31, Baier read from the note Newsweek publicists sent Scott Whitlock at NewsBusters from editor Tina Brown in July claiming that this wasn't going to happen (video follows with transcribed highlights and commentary):

When you go to your doctor or dentist's office in January, there won't be a copy of the latest Newsweek waiting for you in the reception area.

On Thursday, the long-embattled periodical announced that its December 31 edition will be the last it prints:

[Update: 2012-07-27 19:04: Newsweek's Tina Brown has sent a notice to staff: "Barry Diller would like to make it clear that he did not say on the earnings call as reported that Newsweek is going digital in September. He made the uncontroversial, industry-wide observation that print is moving in the direction of digital."]

According to an announcement on Wednesday, Newsweek magazine will "likely" go digital and switch to an online presence. Despite hemorrhaging money for years, the publication has been a steady voice of liberalism, both in the magazine and when contributors and editors appeared on  television. On June 9, 2009, managing editor Evan Thomas famously told Hardball anchor Chris Matthews: "[Barack] Obama's standing above the country, above — above the world. He's sort of God." [See video below. MP3 audio here.]

As the magazine's circulation plunged, the publication became even more shrill. A January 23, 2012 cover story wondered, "Why Are Obama’s Critics So Dumb?" In 2010, liberal editor Tina Brown took over and Newsweek merged with the Daily Beast. Appearing on the July 6, 2011 edition of Morning Joe, Brown compared conservative Republicans blocking tax increases to "suicide bombers."

Et tu, Tina?  Has Maureen Dowd, by her scalding column this weekend, signaled to fellow liberals that it's OK to rap President Obama?   Dowd portrayed Obama as lazy, nihilistic, removed and self-absorbed.  Now comes Brown on today's Morning Joe, calling Obama "aloof" and not "lovable."

Daily Beast editor Brown made her comments in the context of criticizing Obama's decision to stay out of Wisconsin, not deigning to come to the aid of Tom Barrett, the Dem candidate looking to unseat Republican Governor Scott Walker in today's recall election. View the video after the jump.

During the Today's Professionals panel discussion on Thursday's NBC Today, NBC chief medical editor Nancy Snyderman cheered the latest cover of Newsweek magazine that proclaimed President Obama to be "The First Gay President": "[Newsweek editor-in-chief] Tina Brown has revolutionized how provocative and how much you can push magazine covers. And when magazines frankly aren't selling, she's shown that you can uptick sales by what's on a cover."

Would you say it was heroic to make a blunder on national television that forces the President of the United States to flipflop on an issue six months before Election Day thereby threatening his chances at the polls?

Newsweek editor Tina Brown did exactly that Wednesday when during an interview with the Huffington Post called Vice President Joe Biden "the hero of the hour" for making what could be game-changing comments about same-sex marriage on Meet the Press earlier this month (video follows with transcribed highlights and commentary):

Bill Clinton was the first black president. And now, according to Newsweek, we have the first gay president.

Yes, all the speculation over what cover Tina Brown would choose for Newsweek is over. Despite several suggestions from The New Republic on this crucial subject, Brown refrained from taking their kindly advice and chose a picture of President Obama with a rainbow halo over his head.

The world awaits a momentous decision in a few days. According to the New Republic staff, Newsweek editor Tina Brown must decide what Newsweek cover to use to illustrate President Obama's announced support  for gay marriage. To aid Ms Brown in making her choice, the New Republic staffers provided a gallery of illustrations for the Newsweek cover including the Obama rainbow umbrella man at the top of this story.

You can see several of the New Republic suggested illustrations below the fold. I must give them credit for extreme creativity although I am slightly disappointed that they didn't suggest a Tinker Bell Obama with transparent wings hovering above us all while tinkling stimulus pixie dust over the land.

For the last two years, NPR has offered Newsweek/Daily Beast editor Tina Brown a monthly "Must Reads" feature on Morning Edition. Last week, she posed as the guardian of journalistic ideals as she trashed the late Andrew Breitbart (who "dropped dead," she sneered like a female Christopher Hitchens). So much for the sonorous civility of NPR, putting on this British-accented guttersnipe.

Does anyone at NPR want to suggest what Newsweek has done under Tina Brown is a crusade against the "degradation of journalistic ideals"? This was the last cover story, complete with a naked lady in a blindfold on the cover: "The Fantasy Life of Working Women: Why Surrender Is a Feminist Dream." It was a cover story on career women with sexual fantasies of wanting to be spanked!

Appearing on the April 16 "Morning Edition" to discuss what NPR tagged as "the contributions of journalists to global culture," Newsweek/Daily Beast editor Tina Brown worked in a gratuitously crude and error-laden slam of the late "right-wing radical blogger" Andrew Breitbart, who, Brown reminds us "dropped dead in [his] early 40s."

Apart from her crass description of Breitbart's sudden death, Brown got the underlying facts of her complaint wrong, furthering the meme that Breitbart deliberately took Shirley Sherrod out of context and hence was responsible for destroying her career:

Early frontrunner for the most preposterous political analogy of the year . . .

On today's Morning Joe, Tina Brown said Rick Santorum was "like Judas Iscariot."  And just what was Santorum's sin that merited comparing him to the man who betrayed Jesus Christ for thirty pieces of silver?  That Santorum, 15 years after the fact, now regrets having supported Arlen Specter when his then-fellow Republican senator from Pennsylvania ran for president.  View the video after the jump.

As NewsBusters reported Tuesday, former Alaska governor Sarah Palin was quite displeased to find out that Trig Truther Andrew Sullivan actually had an article published on the cover of Newsweek with the headline "Why Are Obama's Critics So Dumb?"

During an online chat about the piece Tuesday, Sullivan told participants that he had an orgasm when he saw Palin's tweet (vulgarity warning):

The pushback concerning Newsweek's decision to publish a cover story asking "Why Are Obama's Critics So Dumb?" continues.

On Tuesday, former Alaska governor Sarah Palin weighed in on Twitter saying, "@Newsweek: know what's truly 'dumb'? Giving a cover story to the TrigTruther conspiracy kook writer who thinks I didn't give birth to my son":

As NewsBusters reported Sunday, Newsweek's most recent cover astonishingly asked, "Why Are Obama's Critics So Dumb?"

This critic of the President analyzed the contents of so-called conservative Andrew Sullivan's piece and has come to the conclusion that it is he and the unashamedly liberal magazine he writes for that are lacking in intellectual capacity and/or integrity.

All one needs is read the following from Sullivan's third paragraph to understand the absurdity on display:

It seems almost impossible to believe, but the upcoming issue of Newsweek has a cover story entitled "Why Are Obama's Critics So Dumb?"

If you think we're kidding, the following picture was tweeted by @Newsweek three hours ago:

Washington Post book critic Jonathan Yardley took up the new book by Weekly Standard contributor Joseph Epstein on Gossip. Yardley complained that Epstein defined gossip with some "lame" words by John Podhoretz (instead of liberal Nora Ephron), but he deeply enjoyed how Epstein managed to take apart one Tina Brown, who is now the editor of both Newsweek magazine and the Daily Beast website.

Epstein identified how seemingly everywhere Tina goes, the magazine loses gobs of money but she build all kinds of "buzz," largely about herself:

As NewsBusters previously reported, the gang on MSNBC's Morning Joe Wednesday got into a serious discussion about whether or not Barack Obama actually likes his current job.

In the middle of this exchange, when Mika Brzezinski - who appeared uncomfortable with all the criticism of her beloved president - started defending him, co-host Joe Scarborough smacked her down saying, "Stop the apologizing" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Recently on Morning Joe it was Jon Meacham suggesting that Barack Obama doesn't particularly like people and was in the wrong line of work. Today it was Tina Brown's turn, opining that PBO doesn't dig his gig.  

Discussing PBO's ever-paltrier poll numbers, Brown opined that Obama "doesn't like his job."  Video after the jump.

President Barack Obama and MSNBC's Ed Schultz have been named to GQ magazine's annual list of "The 25 Least Influential People Alive."

Although not available online yet, TVNewser published a preview Friday:

Q. How does someone seeking the Republican presidential nomination know he might have stepped in it with the people who will actually vote in the primaries? A. When a position he's taken has the likes of Newsweek/Daily Beast editor Tina Brown suddenly saying she likes him, and calling him a "shining star."

Newt Gingrich might thus be having a "ruh-roh" moment this morning. On today's Morning Joe, Brown repeatedly said "I like Newt" and saddled him with her "shining star".  It was Newt's position on immigration, in which he called for a "humane" solution that would find a path to "legality" for illegal immigrants, that won Tina's heart--and may have turned off GOP voters from Iowa to South Carolina.  Video after the jump.

Ever been watching Morning Joe, and wished you could stop the steady stream of liberal blather?  Simple.  Say the magic word—Solyndra—and watch the gabby guests fall suddenly silent.

Today's show offered a prime example of the phenomenon.  For the first ten minutes, the panel had a great old time cackling and crowing on the theme that the Republican presidential field is a mass of morons.  They laughed at the mere mention of Herman Cain, likened the GOP field to a vaudeville show, dragged out the shopworn "bar in Star Wars" simile, and called the Republican candidates "jokes," "clowns" and "stupid." But then, 13 minutes in, Mika Brzezinski mentioned a story reporting that the Obama admin had suppressed the announcement of layoffs at Solyndra until after the 2010 elections.  Despite Mika looking around the table at her guests as she wondered out loud "why this story hasn't picked up more," there wasn't a peep out of the quickly clammed-up crew and Brezinski breezed on to another topic. Video after the jump.

While their colleagues at MSNBC spend hours of airtime mercilessly bashing Republican presidential candidate Herman Cain, the folks on Morning Joe took a different position Wednesday.

Much to the surprise of this author, Joe Scarborough and Willie Geist claimed that if Cain were a Democrat, the media would be "swooning over" him just like they did Barack Obama (video follows with transcript and commentary):