MSNBC

On Saturday's Melissa Harris-Perry show on MSNBC, NBC correspondent Richard Engel conveyed that the reform advocates who led the toppling of Hosni Mubarak's regime in Egypt are distraught at the kinds of candidates that Egyptian voters are choosing to replace Mubarak, with both major presidential candidates likely to curtail freedom if elected. Engel recounted: (Video at bottom)

Effete: affected, overrefined, and ineffectual; see "Chris Hayes."  OK, I appended the name of the MSNBC host to the dictionary definition.  But if ever you wanted to see the human embodiment of the adjective in action, have a look at the video from his MSNBC show this morning of the too-refined-by-half Hayes explaining why he is "uncomfortable" in calling America's fallen military members "heroes."  

Hayes is worried that doing so is "rhetorically proximate" to justifications for more war.  Oh, the rhetorical proximity!  View the video after the jump.

On Saturday's Melissa Harris-Perry show on MSNBC, after recounting some of the human rights abuses perpetrated by the Cuban government against its citizens, host Harris-Perry praised the efforts of Fidel Castro's niece, Mariela Castro, in securing sex change surgery as one of the medical services covered by the government-run health care system of the communist country as a promising development.

Playing off on a guest last week who compared Harris-Perry to Fidel Castro for supporting more regulations, the MSNBC host declared while holding a cigar: (Video at end)

On Friday, NewsBusters reported Salon editor Joan Walsh saying on MSNBC's Hardball, "I didn’t think it was possible to get lower than Andrew Breitbart, but his spawn have."

In a piece marvelously titled "Is It Possible to Get Lower Than Joan Walsh?" Twitchy reported moments ago that this sparked a new hashtag on Twitter:

Salon editor Joan Walsh took a truly disgusting cheap shot at the late Andrew Breitbart Friday.

Appearing on MSNBC's Hardball, Walsh said, "I didn’t think it was possible to get lower than Andrew Breitbart, but his spawn have gotten lower than Andrew Breitbart" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich told MSNBC's Chris Matthews Thursday, "You have a more ruthless approach to politics than I do."

This occurred at the end of a lengthy discussion between the two on Hardball when the host strangely began asking his guest what animals he likes at the zoo (video follows with transcript and commentary):

As NewsBusters reported Thursday, White House press secretary Jay Carney during the previous day's press gaggle cited a bogus MarketWatch report hysterically claiming "Obama Spending Binge Never Happened."

Washington Post fact-checker Glenn Kessler looked at Carney's comments as well as Rex Nutting's article Friday and gave their assertions three Pinocchios:

If between now and Election Day unemployment numbers improve, particularly if they dip below the 8% barrier, you know President Obama, with an MSM assist, will be out there pounding his chest about the number of jobs "he created."

But when the unemployment numbers remain weak?  Well, that's not Obama's fault.  Just ask Mike Allen of Politico.  On today's Morning Joe, trying to explain Obama's early campaign stumbles, Allen declared that certain factors, including the bleak job numbers, were "beyond the control" of Obama.  View the video after the jump.

MSNBC's Chris Matthews doesn't just hate Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney's money.

During an interview with former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich on Hardball Thursday, the host disparaged George Washington as an elite "with a couple of hundred slaves" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

A bogus report published by MarketWatch Tuesday claiming "under Obama, federal spending is rising at the slowest pace since Dwight Eisenhower brought the Korean War to an end in the 1950s" has been all the rage at the White House and MSNBC.

Conservative columnist Ann Coulter correctly observed Wednesday:

Why not just call Romney a racist and be done with it? In the most tortured twist of logic this blogger has seen so far during this campaign, Al Sharpton somehow managed to equate Mitt Romney's refusal to roll over and accept Barack Obama's attacks on Bain Capital with, yes, birtherism.

I know what you're thinking: what the . . . heck?  Don't ask me to explain how or why Sharpton came to his nonsensical suggestion.  Just sit back and watch the Reverend Al at work.  It was too much even for liberal Washington Post columnist Dana Milbank.  View the video after the jump.

Chris Matthews managed to keep a straight face, Wednesday, when he seriously repeated the "fact" that Barack Obama is "not" a "reckless spender." Highlighting a seriously flawed analysis by MarketWatch, Matthews marveled, "Every once and a while I come across a fact that just blows me away."

The Hardball anchor insisted that "federal spending is rising at the slowest rate" in 60 years. Embracing this new talking point, Matthews continued, " For four years, from fiscal year '09 through fiscal year '13, we are heading into, no change." Except, of course, this isn't true. As James Pethokoukis of the American Enterprise Institute points out, the chart only works if you blame George W. Bush.

Imagine that in one 2004 Republican primary, an opponent running to George Bush's left got 40% of the vote, and in another primary, more than 4-in-10 Republicans voted for "uncommitted" rather than support the incumbent president.  Now imagine the doom the MSM would have found that to portend for Bush.

But when a candidate running to the right of Barack Obama garners 40% of the vote in the Arkansas Dem primary, and "uncommitted" amasses an astounding 42% in Kentucky . . . crickets.  On Morning Joe today, Politico's Patrick Gavin proclaimed that PBO's embarrassing performance "doesn't matter."  View the video after the jump.

MSNBC journalist Andrea Mitchell berated Rush Limbaugh in an interview with More magazine, deriding the conservative star as a "bully with a megaphone." Mitchell is often billed as one of the network's serious journalists, but sounded more like Rachel Maddow in the article.

Discussing Sandra Fluke in the June issue, the reporter sympathized that the college student became "part of a national debate where her reputation was being sullied by a bully with a megaphone." "That just really touched me," she added. On the issue of the so-called war on women, Mitchell lectured, "The women who live in the suburbs and work every day inside and outside the home don’t want to be told what to do with their bodies."

Eight days after making a fool of himself on Jeopardy!, MSNBC's Chris Matthews was back to impugning the intellectual capacity of Sarah Palin.

After playing a clip of the former Alaska governor discussing why she wanted John McCain to focus on Barack Obama’s connection to the America-hating Reverend Jeremiah Wright in the 2008 campaign, Matthews mocked Tuesday, “I think her briefing papers have the weight of a comic book” (video follows with transcribed highlights and commentary):

On Monday, President Obama said his attacks on Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney's involvement in Bain Capital are "not a distraction and that "This is what this campaign is going to be about.”

MSNBC clearly got the message for as Politico's Dylan Byers noted Tuesday, this so-called news network's primetime schedule this evening is chock full of Bain:

The University of Notre Dame along with dozens of other Catholic institutions sued the Obama administration Monday to block the mandate requiring employers to provide contraceptives to employees.

In a discussion about this matter on MSNBC's Hardball Monday, host Chris Matthews asked one of his guests, "Do you think they’re all Republican, the bishops?" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

A furious Chris Matthews on Monday railed against Cory Booker for his "betrayal" and "sabotage" of fellow Democrat Barack Obama. A bewildered Matthews couldn't understand why the Newark mayor would "trash" the President.

Howling over Booker's break from party loyalty, Matthews snarled, "... I think [this] was an act of sabotage. Whatever the intention was, [Booker] was trashing the entire Obama campaign of the summer." The Hardball host then played a clip of Obama "trying to defend himself against what looked like something like a betrayal." [See video below. MP3 audio here.]

As much as Obama supporters like the Rev. Al Sharpton take exception to the haters who use the president's full name -- "Barack Hussein Obama," most recently disdained in the Ricketts super PAC memo revealed by the New York Times -- what about liberals who make fun of the name "Willard Mitt Romney"?

No one is fonder of that playground ridicule that Rev. Sharpton, who loves referring to Romney as "Willard" on his MSNBC talk show "Politics Nation." In fact, an MRC analysis of the last 25 Sharpton shows -- from April 16 through May 18 -- found Sharpton tossed the name "Willard" 194 times, or almost eight times a show. Friday's program contained 16 "Willards."

On today's edition of The Daily Rundown, MSNBC's Chuck Todd sat down to chat with Rev. Jesse Jackson to discuss a variety of issues, from Afghanistan to whether the Rev. Jeremiah Wright is fair game for Republicans to attack President Obama. In the middle of the interview, Todd asked the former Democratic presidential candidate about the NAACP Board of Directors's "historic" decision over the weekend to give the organization's stamp of approval to same-sex marriage.

"There has been this conventional wisdom that particularly among older African-Americans that the president's position on gay marriage is going to hurt him," Todd noted, adding, "Does the NAACP sort of backing up the president on this help convince the older African-American [voters], might be a little more religious, might be struggling with this issue, to ignore that part?"

Although it may not surprise NewsBusters readers, it appears MSNBC's Ed Schultz doesn't pay any attention to what he says, what others on his network report, or what is covered by any mainstream media outlet.

What else could be the explanation for Schultz claiming in an interview with Talking Points Memo that the most under-covered story in the country right now is wealthy people not paying their "fair share" of taxes (question in bold):

Yet another Obamaoid has joined the Ann Romney-bashing brigade.  Hilary Rosen, with her "never worked a day in her life" line, was infamously first.  As documented at NewsBusters, the president of NOW subsequently derided Ann Romney as lacking in "life experience" and "imagination".  Then, feminist author Michelle Goldberg attacked Ann as "insufferable," her writing as "creepy," and even compared her to Hitler and Stalin.

Latest to join the all-women lineup of Ann bashers: Betsey Stevenson.  A former top economist in the Obama administration, appearing on Chris Hayes's MSNBC this morning, Stevenson accused Ann, along with Mitt, of "really having no empathy for people."  View the video after the jump.

"Sometimes you do wonder if [Republicans] are moles, Manchurian candidates for I don't know who, if their real job is to bring down America."

So said New York Times columnist Paul Krugman on MSNBC's Martin Bashir show Friday (video follows with transcript and commentary):

I have a serious question for MSNBC's Chris Matthews: How many lies are you willing to tell on national television to get Barack Obama reelected?

On Friday's Hardball, the host gave viewers a plethora of falsehoods and half-truths to giving us an idea of just how far he's prepared to go this election cycle to make sure the objection of his affection remains in the White House (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Hardball's Chris Matthews ranted on Friday that Sean Hannity and Fox News are spreading "crap" about Barack Obama and trying to turn the President into a "black revolutionary" with an "automatic weapon."

Of his competition on the higher rated Fox News, Matthews spewed, "And then he's like a black revolutionary with the automatic weapons, the big sunglasses, the beret. Right?...Is that Sean [Hannity's] image of this president?" The liberal anchor prefaced his comments by threatening, "Let's do a psychoanalysis of this guy, Sean Hannity." [See video below. MP3 audio here.]

In the midst of fill-in host Craig Melvin hyping accusations that black lawmakers were "being unfairly targeted for ethics investigations" by the Republican-led House Ethics Committee during Firday's News Nation on MSNBC, the channel's graphics department mistakenly displayed an image on screen of the Reverend Jesse Jackson senior, instead of his son, Illinois Congressman Jesse Jackson Jr. [Listen to the audio or watch the video after the jump]

Melvin touted Democratic Congressman Emmanuel Cleaver "now calling for members...of the House ethics panel to temporarily step aside." He continued: "The Congressman writing a letter saying in part, quote, 'I write to express my deep and abiding concern with the protracted length, abnormal number, motive, and fairness of pending matters.'"

When the New York Times reported that a pro-Mitt Romney super PAC was toying with a proposal to attack President Obama by highlighting his connections to his former pastor, the controversial far-left Rev. Jeremiah Wright, the liberal media went predictably apoplectic, calling the proposed ad campaign “incendiary and racially-tinged,” ignoring of course the incendiary things Wright thundered from the pulpit for years.

That's why Time magazine's Mark Halperin's defense of Romney and his Super PAC on the May 18 Morning Joe program is striking by contrast. [Audio here. Video below the jump.]

According to Chris Matthews, the radically pro-abortion Kathleen Sebelius has "done more to reduce the number of unwanted pregnancies than anyone in this country." Matthews assailed pro-life demonstrators who approve of "dictatorial laws" to reduce abortion. According to him, these protesters need to give the woman, who has made birth control "free," a "little credit."

The Hardball anchor on Thursday insisted that Sebelius, who as Kansas governor vetoed a partial birth abortion bill and entertained radical doctor George Tiller at the official residence, is a hero. Matthews praised, "It could be argued that this one person has done more to reduce the number of unwanted pregnancies than anyone in our country."  [See video below. MP3 audio here.]

Martin Bashir got a scolding on national television Thursday that everyone on MSNBC as well as within the parent companies Comcast and General Electric should receive.

During a contentious interview with the general counsel for Koch Industries, Inc., Bashir's guest said, "The way that your network has handled issues with us, the way that a lot in the far-left media have handled issues with us, attacking us even when there’s no basis like with the Trayvon Martin issues, that situation, that has led to death threats against our owners" (video follows with transcribed highlights and commentary):