CPAC

Conservative publisher Andrew Breitbart issued a strong warning to the disgracefully biased cable "news" network MSNBC Friday.

Appearing at the Conservative Political Action Conference, Breitbart said, "We’re watching you to play the race card" (video follows with transcript and commentary, vulgarity warning):

With an on-screen headline describing the annual Conservative Political Action Conference as a "Battle for the Base," correspondent Kelly O'Donnell remarked: "...the Republican Party stars are, in essence, competing to outdo each other taking apart President Obama. From Florida, Senator Marco Rubio....to those former candidates who gave the primary season a fleeting spark."

Earlier in the report, O'Donnell proclaimed that Rick Santorum had "...pounded away again at the White House for its battle over contraception coverage with the Church" in a campaign speech on the campaign trail.

New York Times reporter Erik Eckholm (pictured), whose previous reporting betrays no conservative sympathies, listened to former presidential candidate Rep. Michele Bachmann speak at the Conservative Political Action Conference on Thursday afternoon and winced at her attacks on President Obama. Thursday’s post for the paper’s “Caucus” blog, “Bachmann Assails Obama Before Conservatives.”

The Times is particularly sensitive to people accusing Obama of “apologizing for America” overseas. Public Editor Arthur Brisbane got huffy and pedantic in defense of the president back in January:

MSNBC's Joe Scarborough thinks the GOP's house is already on fire in his latest Politico column, where he thrashes the party's leadership for a poor showing at CPAC. He ridiculed the gathering as "a conference cursed with dull speechmaking and intraparty battles."

"Like most Egyptians, the conservative movement still has no idea who will lead it through the next election," Scarborough writes. What is the biggest reason candidates have not entered the field, he thinks? They are scared to run against Obama.
 

MSNBC's Lawrence O'Donnell on Monday expressed concern that someone like conservative author Ann Coulter has the "freedom" to make a joke about jailing journalists.

This was amazing expressed moments before "The Last Word" host applauded the free flow of information that enticed and united protesters to rebel in Egypt (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Words of wisdom from a Greek restaurant owner who employed me in my youth after I messed up an order for moussaka or souvlaki -- once OK, twice stupid!

Associated Press reporter Liz Sidoti might want to take this advice to heart.

In a CPAC roundup story written yesterday and picked up by The Huffington Post, Sidoti wrote this, initially referring to post-Tucson calls for civility --

[Video after page break]

During a report on Friday's CBS Early Show, congressional correspondent Nancy Cordes emphasized division in the new Republican Congress: "The prospect of a mutiny had sent Republican leaders scrambling to craft an even leaner budget, and make good on their promises to the Tea Party....Just this week, small groups of conservatives defeated two of their own party's measures on the House floor."

Cordes went on to highlight tensions at the Conservative Political Action Conference in Washington: "Former Vice President Dick Cheney and former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld were booed by one faction of attendees. While Donald Trump, who's toying with a presidential run in 2012, took a swipe at his fellow Republican, Congressman Ron Paul." The headline on screen throughout Cordes's report read: "GOP Power Struggle; Agree to Budget Deal After Early In-Fighting." Later in a 7:32AM ET news brief, news reader Jeff Glor similarly declared: "Republicans are closing out a week of infighting."

MSNBC's Chris Matthews on Wednesday decided to wade into the Rick Santorum-Sarah Palin-CPAC dust-up by cherry-picking what the former Pennsylvania Senator told S.E. Cupp on Glenn Beck's online program the day before.

Not surprisingly, by presenting only his biased and abbreviated side of the story, the "Hardball" host attacked both Palin and Santorum (video follows with transcript and commentary):

CNN contributor John Avlon took yet another shot at mainstream conservatives in a Wednesday column on CNN.com. Avlon blasted the "far right" Family Research Council and other conservative groups for their opposition to GOProud's sponsorship of CPAC, and accused conservatives of being on "the wrong side of history" with homosexuals, just as they supposedly were with the "last great civil right movement."

The Daily Beast columnist, a known Tea Party critic, took delight that the "gay rights movement...has finally reached the Republican Party" in his column, titled "Gay group in conservatives' gathering splits GOP." He continued by noting how "former first daughter Barbara Bush made news by announcing her support of gay marriage, joining the former GOP presidential nominee's daughter Meghan McCain. Last year, former Republican National Committee Chairman Ken Mehlman came out."

A few paragraphs later, Avlon began ripping the conservative groups that decided to boycott CPAC over the GOProud issue:

CNN's Abbie Boudreau omitted the left-wing ideology of discredited organization ACORN in her hour-long documentary on young conservative activists, "Right on the Edge," which aired Saturday evening. Boudreau also labeled Ryan Sorba, one of the subjects of her documentary, "anti-gay," and gave an overgeneralized account of an incident which Sorba took part in.

The correspondent profiled Christian Hartsock, who "directs films with a conservative message;" author Jason Mattera; "anti-abortion activist" Lila Rose; Sorba; and Hannah Giles and James O'Keefe, who "dressed up as a prostitute and a pimp to expose ACORN." Seven minutes into the 8 pm Eastern hour, as Boudreau introduced Giles, she noted that "there's a reason Hannah Giles became an overnight sweetheart of the conservative Movement. In September 2009, she and James O'Keefe used hidden cameras to expose ACORN." The CNN correspondent then gave a very sparse and favorable description of the group: "ACORN helps low-income people register to vote, find housing, and file taxes."

The Pentagon rescinded the invitation of evangelist Franklin Graham to speak at its May 6 National Day of Prayer event because of complaints about his previous comments about Islam.

The Military Religious Freedom Foundation expressed its concern over Graham's involvement with the event in an April 19 letter sent to Secretary of Defense Robert Gates. MRFF's complaint about Graham, the son of Rev. Billy Graham, focused on remarks he made after 9/11 in which he called Islam "wicked" and "evil" and his lack of apology for those words.

Col. Tom Collins, an Army spokesman, told ABC News on April 22, "This Army honors all faiths and tries to inculcate our soldiers and work force with an appreciation of all faiths and his past comments just were not appropriate for this venue."

Comedian Jon Stewart on Monday bashed the just-concluded Conservative Political Action Conference by calling it "this year's Festival of Whites."

The "Daily Show" host devoted two segments to the conservative gathering going after many of the presenters including former Vice President Dick Cheney and former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney.

But the real target of Stewart's disaffection was Fox News's "Glenn Beck and his magical erasable truth board" (videos embedded below the fold with commentary, h/t Story Balloon):

We've seen the likes of Time Magazine, MSNBC, the Washington Post, and Newsweek link the Joe Stack airplane attack to the conservative movement.  But in an interesting twist, a political blogger for The Nation has inexplicably linked Stack to several players at the recent CPAC convention - including Tim Pawlenty, Scott Brown, and most notably Glenn Beck. 

Leslie Savan wastes little time delving into despicable comparisons from the onset with the title to her rant: 

Glenn Beck Dodges Incoming Plane at CPAC

From there, the associations to Stack stretch ever further.  Savan somehow manages to draw parallels between Pawlenty's comment about taking a 9-iron to big government, and the attack (emphasis mine throughout):

"Minnesota governor Tim Pawlenty strained to hit a Southern-sheriff note of populist threat by suggesting, rather oddly, that conservatives were cuckolded wives who, like Tiger Woods's spouse, should "take a 9-iron and smash the window out of big government in this country!"--thereby managing to invoke both the wall of shattered glass windows at the Echelon Building and the marital troubles that may have contributed to Stack's anger."

It would seem the term ‘metaphor' is beyond the writer's grasp. 

Next up is an out of context quote from Scott Brown:

On Monday's Rick's List, CNN's Rick Sanchez painted Ann Coulter and CPAC as "hardline." Sanchez also implied that the CPAC attendees were hypocritically cheering Dick Cheney: "I invited Ann Coulter, who exemplifies the hardline spirit of CPAC...and asked her why anti-spend conservatives meeting there...would give a standing ovation to a former vice president whose administration ran up the deficit" [audio clip available here].

The CNN anchor revisited his Friday interview of Coulter 13 minutes into the 3 pm Eastern hour (Noel Sheppard exposed Sanchez's slanted interview of Coulter): "Do you remember last week when former Vice President Dick Cheney got the loudest ovation at CPAC? So I invited Ann Coulter, who exemplifies the hardline spirit of CPAC, I believe, and I asked her why anti-spend conservatives meeting there at CPAC would give a standing ovation to a former vice president whose administration ran up the deficit to $1.2 trillion, even though they were handed a surplus. I thought it was a fair question."

While the national media dig through CPAC 2010 material for anything potentially embarrassing to fling at conservatives, their actions highlight a stark example of the blatant double standard applied to controversial speakers.

Back in 2009, the Netroots Nation Convention took place in Pittsburgh just before the G20 summit. Even though it hosted a number of far-left agendas, the media stuck to popular, mainstream subjects in their coverage.

The archive section of the official site of Netroots Nation revealed shocking material largely ignored by the national media. Below is a list of some of the ridiculous discussions that took place:

Good Morning America's John Hendren on Saturday fretted that attendees to the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) came "from the right" and "the far right." He allowed that conservative are "on fire" with optimism about the future, but opined that the movement is "fractious."

John Avlon, author of Winguts: How the Lunatic Fringe Is Hijacking America, was featured in a sound bite to deride intolerant conservatives: "Reagan's ideal of the big tent, which invited people in, is now seen as code language for liberal."

On February 19, Avlon appeared on CNN attacked the "saving freedom" agenda of CPAC as "a little extreme" and "a little far out."

Reporter Kate Zernike continues to take heat for her false allegation, in a February 18 post on the New York Times's "Caucus" blog, that Jason Mattera of Young America's Foundation, a speaker at the annual Conservative Political Action Conference in Washington, engaged in racial stereotyping during an anti-Obama tirade.

Her bizarre charge appeared under the headline: "CPAC Speaker Bashes Obama, in Racial Tones."

How can conservatives win the youth vote that overwhelmingly went for Barack Obama in 2008? At the Conservative Political Action Conference, apparently, some are betting on using racial stereotypes.

UPDATE AT END OF POST: Young conservative in question responds to Lemon.

Just how out of touch must you be as a so-called journalist to think someone attending a conservative conference is liberal all because he or she is young?

Such a question should be asked of Don Lemon who on Saturday interviewed a couple of under-aged conservatives at CPAC and actually called one of them progressive.

Although CNN is to be commended for letting right-leaning youth discuss their views with cameras rolling, you would think someone would have clued Lemon in to the fact that the people he was speaking to - ahem, at a CONSERVATIVE gathering - were not liberals (video embedded below the fold with transcript):

This will certainly be mulled over by the talking heads in the mainstream media for days to come.

At her 2010 Conservative Political Action Committee speech on Feb. 20, conservative author and commentator took the usual shots at the former President Bill Clinton and former Democratic vice presidential nominee John Edwards, but she also let it be known that the she's not a fan of the mainstream media. And she showed how the media totally missed it with the future of the GOP.

"What a difference a year makes," Coulter said. "This time last year, the Republican Party, according to the media - it was finished, dead," Coulter said. "It was the beginning of the Democrat's thousand-year reich."

More Video Below Fold

Good Morning America's Claire Shipman on Friday highlighted the upbeat mood of the 2010 Conservative Political Action Conference, but also fretted about the "Republican-edgy" tone. This came after she mentioned unidentified conference promises of a "Nancy Pelosi pinata and a Harry Reid punching bag."

Former Democratic operative turned journalist George Stephanopoulos lectured that for Republicans to retake the White House, "...They're also going to have to reach out to the center. That's the big challenge."

Shipman agreed and derided this as a "big tent problem." She added, "This gathering pulls together so many different kinds of Republicans. A lot of enthusiasm here, George. Can they get their message and agenda together?"

The New York Times suggests racist appeals were afoot at the Conservative Political Action Conference that kicked off Thursday morning in Washington. Reporter Kate Zernike filed on the paper's "Caucus" blog Thursday to chide as offensive "some" CPAC speakers, by which she evidently meant one in particular, young conservative author Jason Mattera: "CPAC Speaker Bashes Obama, in Racial Tones."

The teaser to the link repeated the plural: "At the conservative conference, some speakers are revving up the crowd in ways that could be considered offensive."

Evidently, mimicking comedian Chris Rock, as Zernike claimed Mattera did on a Thursday morning panel, is a scandalous use of "racial stereotypes" when done by a conservative. Interestingly, a quick tour of the blogosphere suggests that other left-wing sites, while trashing Mattera for his jokes about ugly liberal women, haven't gone so far as the Times did to accuse Mattera of racist appeals.

Zernike wrote:

How can conservatives win the youth vote that overwhelmingly went for Barack Obama in 2008? At the Conservative Political Action Conference, apparently, some are betting on using racial stereotypes.

New York Times columnist Gail Collins appeared on MSNBC's Morning Joe, Thursday, to worry about "scary," fringe conservatives who will be appearing at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in Washington D.C. Picking out certain panels at the three day event, she fretted, "But, suddenly, we're back to nullification. All this sort of succession stuff. That part of it is very scary." [Audio available here.]

Collins portrayed those in the conservative establishment as simply trying to keep pace. The columnist dismissed, "The rest of it, you almost sort of a feeling [sic] that the movement has passed these people by, that these are sort of the '90s conservatives, who you know, are not quite- trying to race to catch up."

Scarborough derided the selection of conservative host Glenn Beck to be the keynote speaker for the 2010 CPAC. He allowed that there could be some "good people there," but added, "...They have Glenn Beck, a guy that called the President a racist who hated all white people, as their keynote speaker. And you sit there going, 'Really, is that who you want to project as the most important person of the conservative movement?'"

There were many famous people at CPAC this year and I was lucky enough to run into some of them. And some of those I ran into even let me ask them a few questions about media bias. The resulting videos are embedded below the fold.

The four interviews I was able to get where with Joe the Plumber, John Ziegler, George Phillips, and Roger Simon. Each have unique experiences with liberal media bias and each articulated different but insightful points about the media.

Make sure you check out each of the videos and watch them all the way through.

Liberal New York Times reporter turned liberal nytimes.com blogger Timothy Egan's latest rant against conservative talk radio giant Rush Limbaugh, "Fears of a Clown," was propped up on the front page of nytimes.com on Thursday for the delight of the paper's liberal audience.

Last February, Egan called Limbaugh "talk radio's leading gasbag." Today, after lamenting about the ubiquity of Limbaugh on the radio, Egan piled onto the White House-driven bash-Rush bandwagon, focusing on Limbaugh's speech to the recent Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), which was broadcast live on FOX News and CSPAN.

As someone who spends a lot of time on the road, I used to find Limbaugh to be an obnoxious but entertaining companion, his eruptions more reliable than Old Faithful. But now that Limbaugh has become something else -- the face of the Republican Party, by a White House that has played him brilliantly -- he has been transformed into car-wreck-quality spectacle, at once scary and sad.

Although the New York Times never complained when lefties called George W. Bush and other Republicans "fascist" for eight years running, reporter Mark Leibovich is suddenly concerned with rhetorical precision now that conservatives are using "socialist" as a "demonizing" epithet against President Obama's massive spending plans.

Leibovich used the news hook of the recent 2009 Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in Washington to write a front-page Sunday Week in Review story portraying conservatives as mindless mockers of the concept of socialism: "'Socialism!' Boo, Hiss, Repeat."

Conservatives might be seeking a spiritual leader, organizing principle and fresh identity, but they at least seem to have settled on a favorite rhetorical ogre: socialism.

As in, Democrats are intent on forcing socialism on the "U.S.S.A" (as the bumper sticker says, under the words "Comrade Obama").

It seems that "socialist" has supplanted "liberal" as the go-to slur among much of a conservative world confronting a one-two-three punch of bank bailouts, budget blowouts and stimulus bills. Right-leaning bloggers and talk radio hosts are wearing out the brickbat. Senate and House Republicans have been tripping over their podiums to invoke it. The S-bomb has become as surefire a red-meat line at conservative gatherings as "Clinton" was in the 1990s and "Pelosi" is today.

Conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh spoke at the Conservative Political Action Conference Saturday in what he called his "first ever address to the nation":

Parts two through ten embedded below the fold (previous problem for Internet Explorer users has been remedied):

Conservative author Ann Coulter spoke at the Conservative Political Action Conference Saturday (h/t Hot Air):

Part two is embedded below the fold:

Washington, D.C. -- The Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) for 2009 is underway and NewsBusters is here to cover it at the lovely Omni Shoreham Hotel on Bloggers Row. We're not sure how much we'll blog per se, but you can also follow us on Twitter @TheMRC and @KenShepherd.

You can watch a Web stream of the CPAC proceedings at Ustream here.You can watch the streaming video embedded below the page break on this post.

Be sure to set your stopwatch alarm for 3:40 p.m. That will give you a good 5-minute warning for a CPAC panel discussion entitled Targets of the Fairness Doctrine, moderated by MRC/NewsBusters's own Seton Motley. Radio host Roger Hedgecock and former and current MSNBCers Tucker Carlson and Joe Scarborough will comprise the panel. 

Speaking of which, feel free to sign the MRC's Free Speech Alliance petition here if you haven't done so already.