Tina Fey

Is this Jeff Zucker's new vision for CNN? Instead of reporting hard-hitting news, Thursday's 9 a.m. ET hour of Newsroom featured conservatives getting whacked by a gauntlet of talking heads, celebrities, and centrist and liberal guests. And anchor Carol Costello added a liberal lament of "Will Gitmo ever close?"

Here were some "stories" that CNN devoted whole segments to: Tina Fey mocking Sarah Palin on Bravo, Fox News' Bill O'Reilly admonishing Rep. Michelle Bachmann, and a question about whether conservatives are overlooked in pop culture, answered by a liberal guest and a centrist guest. CNN is looking more and more like MSNBC. [Video below the break. Audio here.]

It certainly was no surprise that HBO's schlockudrama "Game Change" won best TV movie at Sunday's Golden Globe Awards.

But when Julianne Moore accepted her award for best actress for her role in said piece of detritus, it was truly sick-making hearing her say, "I'd like to give a shoutout to two people who I think made a significant difference in 2008 election, Tina Fey and Katie Couric" (video follows with commentary):

When NBC announced Thursday it was doing a "Coming Together" telethon to raise money for Hurricane Sandy victims, many people including myself worried that given the list of scheduled performers, it would turn into a one-hour Obama campaign ad.

Much to my surprise and delight, Matt Lauer and guests did a classy, somber, respectful, and at times tear-jerking presentation totally absent politics or the mention of either presidential candidate's name.

Not content to restrict the ongoing firestorm surrounding Senate candidate Richard Mourdock to the media, CNN's Newsroom turned to liberal comedienne Tina Fey to bash the Indiana Republican some more this morning.

"Todd Akin and Richard Mourdock better watch out," CNN Newsroom anchor Carol Costello warned, teasing the story at the top of the program. "Tina Fey is coming after them. Why the comedian says their rape comments will make her lose her mind." [ video below, MP3 audio here ]

Someone at Fox News has some serious 'splaining to do.

During a Sunday segment about former Alaska governor Sarah Palin's interview with Chris Wallace earlier in the day, a picture of Tina Fey impersonating her nemesis was accidentally placed in the upper-right corner of the screen:

NBC's Tina Fey guest-hosted "Saturday Night Live" last evening, and viewers could hardly be surprised her network took the opportunity to once again use her to bash former Alaska governor Sarah Palin.

In a mock Republican presidential candidates debate, before depicting Palin as an idiot that doesn't fully understand English, Fey did manage to take a humorous swipe at the soon to be exiting CBS "Evening News" host saying, "I want to acknowledge that this week we finally vanquished one of the world's great villains, and I for one am thrilled to say good riddance to Katie Couric" (video follows with partial transcript):

In the midst of Republicans insisting on defunding NPR, the network thumbed its nose at the GOP again on Tuesday night's All Things Considered newscast by having a book review offered by hard-left "comedian" and failed radio host Janeane Garofalo. The book she reviewed was Tina Fey's new memoir, titled Bossypants. Garofalo spent most of the review in a rut of self-pity, but this political passage popped out:

Another area of interest to me was Tina's discussion of what happened when she impersonated Sarah Palin on "SNL" and became a target of ill-founded wrath. Regrettably, it's always been easy to marshal cultural hostility toward women, especially in politics, where double standards and misogyny tend to dominate the conversation. Those are my words, not Tina's.

Was Tina Fey the victim of cultural hostility toward women? Or was she the one dishing it out?

CNN would like to portray itself as the serious, no-gimmicks news network. So why would Anderson Cooper feel the need to copycat Keith Olbermann and come up with a editorializing feature called the "Ridicu-List"? On Tuesday night, he called out PBS for editing out Tina Fey's less-than-classy jokes about conservative women being great for women, unless you need a rape kit, or are lesbian, or believe in evolution. Cooper obviously believes in taxpayer-funded conservative-bashing:

COOPER: So we started a new segment on the program this week, a nightly effort to point out hypocrisy, double talk, stuff that just is downright ridiculous. We call it the RidicuList. So who's on the list tonight? Well, it's the TV network PBS for their claims about why they edited Tina Fey.

CNN's Dana Bash asked a great question on Tuesday: were Tina Fey's disgusting remarks about conservative women at the Mark Twain Awards "the first time that PBS has been accused of editing to favor Republicans?"

Almost as telling, CNN's Gloria Borger appearing with Bash on "John King USA" answered, "They edited out something Paul McCartney said that was offensive at one point to Republicans, so probably not" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Upon receiving the Kennedy Center's Mark Train Prize for American Humor on November 9, comedian Tina Fey trashed Sarah Palin in her acceptance speech.

By the time PBS broadcast the taped ceremony, the taxpayer-subsidized network had edited out some of Fey's harsher jokes that maligned the former Alaska governor.

NewsBusters publisher and Media Research Center founder Brent Bozell appeared in studio on today's "Fox & Friends" to address the controversy, lauding PBS for doing the right thing by making those edits.

[Video follows after page break]

Paul Farhi in The Washington Post reported that comedian Tina Fey received “a little political airbrushing” from PBS on Sunday night when it aired her receiving the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor from the Kennedy Center. These mean anti-conservative jokes were left on the editing floor:

"And, you know, politics aside, the success of Sarah Palin and women like her is good for all women [applause before the joke kicks in] -- except, of course, those who will end up, you know, like, paying for their own rape kit and stuff," Fey said. "But for everybody else, it's a win-win -- Unless you're a gay woman who wants to marry your partner of 20 years - whatever. But for most women, the success of conservative women is good for all of us -- unless you believe in evolution. You know -- actually, I take it back. The whole thing's a disaster."

Comedienne and actress Tina Fey on Tuesday thanked former Alaska governor Sarah Palin as she accepted this year's Mark Twain Prize for American Humor.

According to the Washington Post, she then mocked conservative women "first to nervous laughter and then to not much laughter at all":

Want to see what sort of rationalizations the scary anti-conservative elements of the media use to justify why they hold any opponents of President Barack Obama’s policies in contempt?

Check out the treatise on the state of “white America” from the Village Voice’s Steven Thrasher. In a long-winded Sep. 29 piece full of invective, Thrasher contends that the “white brain, beset with worries, finally goes haywire in spectacular fashion.” Why? He insisted it was because of the election of Obama and a realization “white America” had lost grasp of the control power in the United States. (h/t @DLoesch)

“About 12:01 on the afternoon of January 20, 2009, the white American mind began to unravel,” Thrasher wrote. “It had been a pretty good run up to that point. The brains of white folks had been humming along cogently for near on 400 years on this continent, with little sign that any serious trouble was brewing. White people, after all, had managed to invent a spiffy new form of self-government so that all white men (and, eventually, women) could have a say in how white people were taxed and governed. White minds had also nearly universally occupied just about every branch of that government and, for more than two centuries, had kept sole possession of the leadership of its executive branch (whose parsonage, after all, is called the White House).”

Tina Fey hosted NBC's "Saturday Night Live" last evening, and as expected, reprised her role as former Alaska governor Sarah Palin.

Dressed in black leather, Fey began by going after Tea Party members referring to them as "protesters dressed like Paul Revere who are so overweight they picket from folding chairs."

Next, Fey introduced the "Sarah Palin Network," which will feature hit movies like, "My Daughter Only Sprained Her Ankle, You Can't Seriously Be Considering Euthanizing Her."

"But not all our programming is fear-based," she said before highlighting SPN's lineup of shows like "Tea Party Wheel of Fortune," "Are You Smarter than a Half-Term Governor?" and "Hey Journalist, I Gotcha," in which Palin re-edited interviews to make it look like her interviewers - Katie Couric for example - were "woefully unprepared" (video follows):

Having been regularly lampooned by the folks at "Saturday Night Live," Glenn Beck and Sarah Palin now want to co-host the weekly comedy program.

On Wednesday's installment of "Glenn Beck," the host pitched the idea: "It will be a very highly rated show I'm guessing. We'll make fun of us and give you guys the time off, where you don't have to make fun of us and we'll co-host the show."

Moments later, Beck asked the former Alaska Governor if being mocked by Tina Fey bothered her.

Palin responded, "Well, the only scary thing about all that is that people did start mixing that parody with those things that I actually have said in interviews and some of the reality started kind of atrophying into whatever she was saying. So that was the scary thing that some people weren't intelligent enough to know what the difference was" (video embedded below the fold with partial transcript):

Where is Tina Fey now that we need her?

Martha Coakley is the front-runner for the Dem nomination for Ted Kennedy's old Senate seat.  In a recent debate, asked about her lack of foreign policy experience, the first credential Coakley offered in response was that "I have a sister who lives overseas, and she's been in England and now lives in the Middle East."

Stop the presses! 

A member of the mainstream media actually said something nice about Alaska Governor Sarah Palin.

I kid you not: "Saturday Night Live" senior producer Marci Klein said during an interview last week, "This is the most confident person I've ever met."

Certainly not the impression created by CBS's Katie Couric or ABC's Charlie Gibson, wouldn't you agree?

Appearing on Julie Menin's "Give and Take," Klein had absolutely nothing but nice things to say about the press's current public enemy #1 (video embedded below the fold with partial transcript, relevant section at 2:25):

The Internet is abuzz Monday morning over the excessive vulgarity at Sunday's Golden Globes.

From middle-fingers to testicular and homosexual references, Hollywood's annual lovefest was almost as bad as accidentally entering the comments section at a liberal blog.

Almost.

As the Los Angeles Times' Rachel Abramowitz reported, the lowlight was Mickey Rourke who gave one of the "most profane acceptance speeches in recent history" (video embedded below the fold, obvious vulgarity alert, photo courtesy AP):

Update 11-25 8:20 AM: Morning Joe Makes SNL References -- see discussion at foot.

Call it "The Wild 'n Crazy Guy–Billionaire Style."  Maria Bartiromo's interview of Saudi Prince Alwaleed, the largest shareholder of Citigroup, is literally a Saturday Night Live skit waiting—begging—to happen.

CNBC's Bartiromo conducted the interview by remote this afternoon. When the camera went to the prince in Riyadh, you might have expected to find him in a TV studio, or perhaps in his business office, maybe even in one of his palace rooms.  But no, there he was sitting outdoors, apparently by his stables, with seated camels and sleek horses very visible in the background.   And rather than being attired in business or traditional Saudi dress, the Prince was duded up with an open collar, tinted glasses and a scarf warding off the desert's cool night air.  He could be seen occasionally fingering what appeared to be golden worry beads.

View video here.

McCain returned to offer some new, last-minute campaign strategies on "Weekend Update" (video embedded below the fold):

In a just released study, "A Study in Character Assassination: How the TV Networks Have Portrayed Sarah Palin as Dunce or Demon," CMI analysts found that ABC, CBS and NBC are airing 18 negative stories for every one positive story on Sarah Palin, the Republican vice-presidential candidate.

Is it any wonder that polls revealed a 17 percent increase in Palin's unfavorability ratings in just one month? 

After examining the TV news coverage of Palin from September 29 to October 12, CMI found that ABC, NBC and CBS news shows ran 69 stories about Palin.  2 stories were positive, 37 were negative and 30 were neutral.  The 2 positive stories were a two-part interview with Palin's parents on the CBS Early Show.  Not one of the major network evening news programs - ABC's World News, NBC's Nightly News, and CBS's Evening News - ran a single positive story about Palin.

ABC was hardest on Palin, as 60 percent of its stories on Palin were negative.  NBC came in second, as 54 percent of its stories were negative.  CBS also ran 54 percent negative stories, but also ran the only two positive stories (8 percent). 

CMI found that the networks promoted three major narratives about Palin:

The Obama-loving media might hate Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin, but according to preliminary estimates, the Alaska governor's guest appearance on NBC's "Saturday Night Live" gave the program its highest ratings in over fourteen years.

This seems to go hand in hand with the great reception Palin got Saturday evening from the audience in attendance for the live broadcast who enthusiastically applauded as she walked onto the stage during the program's opening sketch.

Maybe even more surprising, they weren't the only typically liberal New Yorkers enthralled with the Alaska governor, for the New York Times' television critic actually gave Palin a very solid review.

But before we get there, here's what Reuters reported moments ago (emphasis added):

Video of Palin's second appearance -- on the "Weekend Update" segment -- follows below the fold:

UPDATE: YouTube link to deleted video at end of post.

As NewsBusters reported Sunday, NBC's "Saturday Night Live" in its most recent installment did an extraordinary skit which amongst other things accurately blamed Democrats for the current financial crisis.

Early Sunday morning, as is customary for NBC, the video of this sketch was posted at its website. Some time Monday, it was taken down without any explanation.

One possibility is that two of the targets in the skit, the founders of Golden West Financial who were mocked by "SNL" as having made billions selling subprime mortgages to unqualified borrowers, aren't happy with how they were portrayed. As reported by the Associated Press (emphasis added):

Between 6 a.m. and 12 noon on Monday, MSNBC featured six segments which replayed bits from Tina Fey's Saturday Night Live parody of Republican vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin's performance in Thursday's debate. The SNL parody of Democratic vice presidential nominee Joe Biden was only played twice, and both times were during Morning Joe.

This continues a trend that was also seen last Monday morning when MSNBC replayed Tina Fey's parody of Palin's interview with Katie Couric seven times while avoiding Saturday Night Live's parody of Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama.

Along with the free airtime given to Fey's impersonation of Palin came some commentary by the various hosts of both Morning Joe and MSNBC News Live. First, Willie Geist commented that, "Sometimes you watch [Tina Fey] and forget what Sarah Palin actually looks like. She's so dead on."

It was certainly no surprise that NBC's "Saturday Night Live," in its most recent installment, lampooned Thursday's vice presidential debate between Joe Biden and Sarah Palin.

However, despite doing a nice job of mocking Biden and host Gwen Ifill -- masterfully played by guest Queen Latifah -- the butt of most of the jokes was cleary Palin who was once again portrayed by Tina Fey (video embedded below the fold, photo courtesy Huffington Post):