John Heilemann

The double standard by which the media view presidential sex scandals is nothing less than stunning.

On this weekend's syndicated Chris Matthews Show, the entire panel - which included two women, one being the supposedly conservative syndicated columnist Kathleen Parker - said the new revelations regarding former President John F. Kennedy having sex with a 19-year-old White House intern will have absolutely no impact on his legacy (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Something extraordinarily rare happened on MSNBC Thursday.

One of the network's admittedly liberal anchors, Hardball's Chris Matthews, scolded a liberal guest, New York magazine's John Heilemann, for echoing Obama administration talking points (video follows with transcript and commentary):

On the February 7 edition of MSNBC's Now with Alex Wagner, panelist John Heilemann, who writes for New York Magazine, thought it appropriate to equate the gay marriage debate in California to racial bigotry experienced by African-Americans in the 1960s. 

During an interview with openly gay former Lieutenant Dan Choi, Heilemann asked former Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele the following bigoted and offensive question: “Michael I’m curious about whether you think it would be okay in modern America, for there to be some states where black men could not marry white women?  If local standards where that were unacceptable.” [MP3 audio here. See video below.]

The ridiculous media hypocrisy concerning all the fuss over Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney's wealth and income tax rate was perfectly demonstrated on MSNBC's Morning Joe Monday.

After claiming that Romney's "tax issue is not remotely" past him, John Heilemann, the National Affairs editor for New York magazine, admitted that he never reported John Kerry's income tax rate during the 2004 campaign (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Rick Santorum to John Heilemann [and by extension to MSM at large] on today's Morning Joe: "it's your responsibility to defend the president, not mine." Ouch! If Newt's deft dicing of John King and Juan Williams paid huge electoral dividends, Santorum might anticipate a much-needed bump after running roughshod over the New York mag reporter.

Heilemann had called on Santorum to explain his failure to correct a woman at a town hall meeting in Florida yesterday who said President Obama was an "avowed Muslim" and legally unqualified to be president. After noting that he has repeatedly been on the record saying that he doesn't believe PBO is a Muslim and recognizes that he is legally qualified to be president, Santorum said that he chose not to chastise an elderly and infirm lady.  Then came Santorum's grand slam, as set forth above.  Heilemann only dug himself deeper when he responded by saying that prez candidate McCain had always defended Obama on the campaign trail. Video after the jump.

On Thursday's Hardball, Chris Matthews preposterously insisted that Barack Obama added "only 13 people" to the federal workforce in 2009 and that the total number of individuals working for the U.S. government (as of 2010) was 4,443. 

[UPDATE, 8:55 PM EST: Two hours later, in the otherwise identical 7 PM EST re-play, MSNBC inserted a new graphic and a new audio overlay in which Matthews corrected his incompetence without noting any change from his first broadcast: Video below features both versions. In the 5 PM EST hour, Matthews claimed “the federal workforce totaled forty-four hundred and thirty people in 2009 when Obama took office. In 2010, a year later, the number increased to forty-four forty-three people – a difference of only thirteen people.” In the re-do, Matthews realized “the federal workforce totaled four million, four hundred and thirty thousand in 2009...”]

One year ago, America's media were shouting from the rooftops about the need for more civil political discourse following the tragic shooting of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.).

Less than three days after the anniversary of that horrible event, the gang at MSNBC's Morning Joe gleefully discussed how Mitt Romney is going to "kill" any of his Republican presidential opponents that try to attack him (video follows with transcribed highlights and commentary):

Appearing as a guest on Wednesday's The Colbert Report on Comedy Central, New York magazine's John Heilemann - also an MSNBC analyst and formerly of The New Yorker - made a gay joke about GOP presidential candidate Rick Santorum as he described the competitive election in Iowa. (Video below)

After host Stephen Colbert, playing the part of committed conservative wanting to pump up Santorum, asked of the Iowa results, "So, Santorum, this is a victory, right? He may have lost, but it's a victory," Heilemann took a shot at the former Pennsylvania Senator in his response:

It's hard to imagine the media rooting, even "cheering" for a social conservative like Rick Santorum.  But two certified MSMers claim that Santorum does have the potential to attract such unlikely support.

On today's Morning Joe, Mark Halperin and John Heilemann, co-authors of the best-selling Game Change about the 2008 election, both opined that Santorum, given his appealing blue-collar background—and if he can avoid getting prickly with the press—could indeed find the media rooting for him.  Video after the jump.

The next time you get into an argument with a liberal about whether or not the media is biased, show him or her the following video of MSNBC's Chris Matthews admitting on Friday's Hardball that it is (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Brand new MSNBC host and Second Amendment critic Alex Wagner devoted a segment of her November 15 Now with Alex Wagner program to express her exasperation at the fact that she's far left of the American public on the issue of gun control. Wagner prefaced a panel discussion with footage of an ABC News interview with Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, who was critically injured in a January shooting.

"Support for handguns, or rather support for a handgun ban has gone down," Wagner noted as she opened her panel discussion, entitled onscreen "Out of Control?". "In October of 2011, it was at 26 percent. In 1959, it was at 60 percent."

"Gun violence increases and yet people still believe handgun bans are bad. What's the logic there?" the liberal Center for American Progress alumna demanded [MP3 audio here; video follows page break]:

Well, that didn't take long. It took about half an hour into her new noon Eastern program Now with Alex Wagner for the host to attack the Republican presidential field as insane. And true to MSNBC form, her panel of liberal journalists largely agreed with her.

"When I watched that waterboarding segment, all I could think of is these Republican candidates are putting another brick on the house of crazy that they are building for themselves," Wagner complained after airing a montage of  GOP presidential contenders in Saturday's CBS-National Journal foreign policy debate regarding their views on the controversial enhanced interrogation technique. [MP3 audio available here; video follows page break]

You have to wonder if a day has gone by since the September 7 GOP presidential debate without someone on MSNBC referring to audience members cheering when NBC's Brian Williams asked Texas governor Rick Perry about capital punishment in his state.

Likely the most colorful description of this incident to date occurred on Monday's Hardball when host Chris Matthews said Republicans "look hot and horny for executions out in that Reagan library" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

While media outlets such as CBS News celebrate Vice President Joe Biden's claim that rape and murder will increase if the President's jobs bill isn't passed, they've all ignored a crucial point.

According to a report released by the Federal Bureau of Investigation last month, despite the recession with its associated state and city budget cuts, violent crime in America has declined four years in a row:

As NewsBusters reported Monday, Newsweek featured an in-depth look at Fox News and chairman Roger Ailes in its most recent installment.

When this subject came up on MSNBC's "Morning Joe" Tuesday, after the guests predictably carped and whined about FNC's conservative leanings, host Joe Scarborough observed, "People are shocked and stunned at the blurred lines when Roger Ailes and Fox does it, not so shocked and stunned when Democratic establishment figures have been doing it over the past three decades" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

MSNBC's Joe Scarborough chided the "crazy" rhetoric of Republican presidential candidates Tuesday, as he called them out by name and affirmed "crazy never wins." This aired on the same network that employs Al Sharpton and Ed Schultz.

Scarborough insisted that "crazy never wins, one of the reasons we're seeing Rick Perry collapse, the same reason we're seeing Bachmann collapse, the same reason why Newt never took off, the same reason Sarah Palin never took off."

[Video below the break. Click here for audio.]

What a curiously incurious Morning Joe bunch!  Joe Scarborough says Solyndra "is just not a story I have focused on" and John Heilemann similarly admits to not having "drilled down" on the matter.  Meanwhile, Harold Ford, Jr. assures us that when it comes to any potential Solyndra scandal, "there's no there, there" and that no one "has done anything illicit here at all."

A blasé Joe Scarborough grudgingly introduced "this Solyndra thing," citing those pesky "conservatives on Twitter" who keep raising it.  The show deigned to devote under two minutes to the story, with nary a mention of the facts that the main driver behind Solyndra was a major Obama fundraiser, that the Bush admin blew off funding for Solyndra after concluding their products weren't competitive and that Solyndra execs are now taking the Fifth. View the video after the jump.

MSNBC's "Morning Joe" spent a good deal of time Tuesday discussing Teamsters president James Hoffa Jr.'s disgraceful Labor Day comments about the Tea Party and his political rivals.

After playing a clip of Hoffa's remarks as well as President Obama calling for civility months ago, Scarborough pointed out, "There seems to be a rule here which is don’t say really mean things that coarsen the debate, could encourage violence, unless you’re a Democrat...If you support [Obama], you can say, 'We’re going to take people out'" (video follows with partial transcript and commentary):

Forget about 2008's "Hope and Change" mantra.

New York magazine's John Heilemann said on this weekend's "Chris Matthews Show" Barack Obama's message in 2012 will all be about "fear" of the Republican candidate, and the President will spend $500 million on negative attack ads against his opponent to instill it (video follows with transcript and commentary):

The story about Michele Bachmann's migraines was not the product of a "liberal media conspiracy." Instead, it was a "calculated hit piece" by one of Bachmann's rivals for the Republican presidential nomination.

That's the view emphatically propounded by John Heilemann on Morning Joe today.  As evidence, the New York magazine editor and Game Change co-author noted that the story first appeared in the conservative Daily Caller.  According to Heilemann, the story was the result of a "calculated leak of opposition research" by a Republican campaign.

Meanwhile, sisterhood was powerful for Mika Brzezinski.  The MJ co-host sneered at the migraine story, chalking it up to "sexism" and saying Tim Pawlenty and others seeking to exploit it "should be ashamed of themselves."

View video after the jump.

Chris Matthews as usual had four guests on the weekly syndicated program bearing his name.

When he asked them which of the current Republican candidates could end up being a great president, nobody chose to identify a single one (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Joe Scarborough took Morning Joe co-host Mika Brzezinski to task Thursday over the ongoing debt negotiations. "[Republicans] already have given specifics on the Paul Ryan Medicare plan which was political suicide for a lot of Republicans. They took that hard vote. What hard vote have Democrats made on the debt over the past year? Name one. Name one vote" said Scarborough.

[VIDEO BELOW THE FOLD]

MSNBC's Chris Matthews opened his "Hardball" program Monday by once again bashing the possible Republican presidential candidates.

With Indiana governor Mitch Daniels dropping out Saturday, Matthews focused his attention on Mitt Romney, Tim Pawlenty, and Jon Huntsman telling guests John Heilemann and Mark Halperin, "I don’t want an interview with any of these guys" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

In lockstep with Atlantic's Jeffrey Goldberg, who scolded Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to "please don't speak to my president that way," MSNBC anchor Andrea Mitchell cautioned of the "political pitfalls" for Republican presidential candidates who dared to challenge Barack Obama's speech on the Middle East.

On the May 20 edition of "Andrea Mitchell Reports," NBC's chief foreign affairs correspondent warned against criticizing the Democratic commander-in-chief and bewailed the "angry reception" he's received over his desire to see Israel surrender territory it acquired in the six-day Middle East war of 1967.

The liberal media are on a full-court press to make the entire GOP presidential candidate field look hapless and unelectable.

Doing his part Friday was New York magazine's John Heilemann who on "The Chris Matthews Show" said the Obama campaign thinks their guy has "more talent in his little finger than any of these Republicans" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

"Morning Joe" co-host Mika Brzezinski and regular guest John Heilemann both pulled the class warfare card and pressured Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (R) Tuesday on why he did not raise taxes on the wealthy to cover the state's budget shortfall, rather than pushing to require union members pay into their pensions.

"You're receiving a lot of criticism for only asking the other side to give, and they have given – on health care and pensions. Are you asking people in your state across the board, including the wealthiest, to give, to help deal with the crisis....and I mean tax increases for the wealthy, or in any way, has anyone else been asked to give?" Brzezinski pressed Walker.

Following up on Brzezinski's question, New York Magazine columnist John Heilemann asked Walker why he cut the corporate income tax rate and chose to go after unions – but Walker corrected him. "We didn't cut corporate taxes," he answered.
 

New York Magazine's John Heilemann on Friday said the Republican presidential field is the weakest anybody has seen in our lifetime.

This absurd statement was made on the syndicated "Chris Matthews Show" in a segment about which GOPers will be throwing their name into the ring in the coming months before next year's elections (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Talk about bullish consensus, the entire panel on this weekend's "Chris Matthews Show" felt that President Obama was going to be a big winner in the first quarter of this year making him the proverbial comeback kid.

Alex Wagner of Politics Daily went so far as to predict, "Obama’s going to be flying on angels wings two feet off the ground" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

On the syndicated Chris Matthews Show, over the weekend, CNN's Gloria Borger predicted that incoming House Republicans will overreach and make Barack Obama "look good" in comparison and allow the President to become the "grown-up." During a segment in which host Chris Matthews asked his panel to predict how Obama will deal with the GOP, New York magazine's John Heilemann suggested Republicans would "work with him" on issues like deficit reduction and education, which prompted Matthews to ask Borger if this meant Republicans could no longer call him a "socialist."

CHRIS MATTHEWS: So, you're shaking your head. Is one of the advantages of cutting deals with Republicans, they can't call you a socialist anymore?

GLORIA BORGER, CNN: Right! They can't call you a socialist anymore. Although there will be some Republicans, in the new Congress, who are not gonna like the deals that the other Republicans cut. So he's still gonna have those problems. But they will make him look good, by the way. And he will be able to triangulate and to look like the grown-up which is-

MATTHEWS: Oh my favorite word!

BORGER: -what people want.

A little bit later on in the segment the Atlantic's Andrew Sullivan insisted a GOP House will allow Obama to become the "President he wants to be" because, as he insisted, "he's not a big spending liberal, never was!"

New York magazine's John Heilemann said this weekend that President Obama is the only serious adult in the deficit reduction conversation now going on in Washington.

This deliciously came seconds before Heilemann told other guests on the syndicated "Chris Matthews Show," "I have been dispirited by the lack of strategy on the part of the White House since the midterm elections...specifically on this [issue]" (video follows with transcript and commentary):