David Letterman

On the CBS Late Show Thursday, host David Letterman aired a mock video of Republican presidential candidate Newt Gingrich having sex with a vending machine.

This came at the end of his Top Ten segment called, "Top Ten Revelations In The Interview With Newt Gingrich's Ex-Wife" (video follows with transcribed highlights and commentary):

CBS comedian David Letterman teed off on the Republican presidential field on Monday night while barely batting an eye toward President Obama or the Democrats. The Late Show host joked at the expense of Newt Gingrich's first marriage and New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie's weight, while comparing former First Lady Pat Nixon to a reptile from Star Trek.

In addition, the CBS comedian dismissed the entire GOP presidential field as he insinuated that none in the group of rich boring white guys would beat President Obama in the general election. [Video below the break.]

Appearing as a guest on Thursday's Late Show with David Letterman on CBS, Arizona Senator John McCain complained about ABC's George Stephanopoulos because the ABC host asked GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney if states have the constitutional power to ban contraceptives.

Occupy Wall Street attacks income inequality and the richest 1 percent, adopting as its slogan ''we are the 99 percent.'' In October, its protesters staged a ''millionaires march' 'in New York City, parading to the homes of wealthy citizens such as Rupert Murdoch and David Koch. But only some riches bother the Occupiers, who have ignored the massive wealth of celebrities in their own ranks.

The top 25 richest celebrities supporting Occupy Wall Street, according to the website Celebrity Net Worth, possess a combined net worth just over $4 billion.

On Tuesday, Diane Sawyer absurdly claimed the Occupy Wall Street protests have spread to more than a thousand countries.

Following in this arithmetically-challenged tradition, David Letterman told former President Bill Clinton Wednesday Obama's been in office "a year and a half, close to two years" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Updated [12:45 ET]: Full transcript added.

Appearing on Monday's "Late Show with David Letterman" on CBS, NBC "Nightly News" anchor Brian Williams responded to Letterman's assertion that Texas Governor Rick Perry was a "right-wing conservative psych job" by declaring: "In a Republican primary race in this early stage, you run far to the right....You can't say something shocking enough in some of these crowds." [Audio available here]

Williams observed: "You're trying to keep tacking to the right of your opponent." He then warned: "This will all settle down, though comments last forever. They will all be held accountable for what they're saying now. It's tough to run in the general after this."

View video after the jump

Is there anything David Letterman hates more than conservative women?

On Wednesday's "Late Show," the host went after Republican presidential candidate Michele Bachmann saying, "She is now publishing her memoirs, and I thought, well, wait a minute, why can't we pray that away?" (video follows with transcript and commentary)

The hypocrisy of Rachel Maddow knows no bounds.

On Tuesday's "Late Show," the MSNBCer scolded Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) for meeting with Libya's Moammar Gaddafi in August 2009 while completely ignoring the fact that President Obama met him at the G8 summit the month before (video follows with transcript and commentary):

 A truly amazing coincidence happened on Monday night as former President George W. Bush was praised for helping millions in Africa by two separate public figures in two unrelated matters - the fight against AIDS in Africa, and South Sudan’s successful fight for independence - on two different television shows.

As rocker Bono of U-2 appeared as a guest on CBS’s Late Show with David Letterman, he praised President Bush for helping to save so far five million lives in Africa over the past eight years because of his push to supply treatment to AIDS patients.

And on Comedy Central’s Colbert Report, guest and human rights activist John Prendergast of the Enough Project, when prodded by host Stephen Colbert, noted that it was under Bush that America used its influence to help the South Sudanese secure a peace deal with the north.

 On Sunday’s World News, ABC correspondent David Kerley mocked the current field of GOP presidential candidates as making comedians "happy" as he recounted that polls show many Republicans are not satisfied with the choices available so far. After informing viewers of the disappointment for Republicans that Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels had chosen not to run, Kerley continued: "Recent polls show that nearly half of Republican voters are not happy with their potential candidates. But comedians are."

Then came a clip of late night talk show host David Letterman: "The Republicans are really scrambling out there, really backs to the wall looking for a guy to lose to Obama."

Kerley then moved on to revelations about Republican candidate Newt Gingrich spending $500,000 on jewelry and comedian Stephen Colbert’s response:

Are you old enough to remember the polio-era line: "funny as an iron lung"?  After all, what kind of person would find funny the notion of someone fighting to breathe?

Answer: Mika Brzezinski.

Today's Morning Joe played a Letterman clip of a faux-promo for an imaginary TV show called "The Dick Cheney Story."  As the title song from the Mary Tyler Moore Show plays merrily in the background, we're treated to images of Cheney wielding a gun, in a wheelchair and undergoing open-heart surgery.  The clip closes with video of Cheney fighting to get a breath of air.

Cut to Mika, doubled-over, laughing hysterically, literally to the point of tears.

View video after the jump.

The Media Research Center is out with another edition of our bi-weekly Notable Quotables newsletter, a compilation of the latest outrageous, sometimes humorous, quotes in the liberal media. Highlights from this issue include: Network reporters contrasting left-wing union protests in Wisconsin with recent uprisings against brutal Middle Eastern dictators, and journalists suggesting a “coordinated” Republican “assault on unions,” with MSNBC's Mika Brzezinski badgering Governor Scott Walker: “How this is not an attempt to crush the unions.”

In other NQ news, we think we’ve finally fixed the problems that have plagued MRC’s e-mail newsletters over the past few weeks, so if you’d like to subscribe (or unsubscribe) to Notable Quotables or any of the MRC’s other fine newsletters, click here.

Now, here’s a sample of our best quotes from the past two weeks, including six video clips — for the full edition (Web page or full-color, printer-friendly PDF), visit www.MRC.org.

Catching up with a Thursday night appearance by Senator Rand Paul to plug his new book, Paul’s segment on the Late Show exposed David Letterman as an arrogantly ill-informed ally of Wisconsin’s public employee unions: “Why don't we just raise the taxes and let these folks have their collective bargaining, have their union representation and go back to their jobs? Raise the taxes on the wealthy.”

When Paul tried to educate Letterman about how a small percent of the wealthy pay far more than their fair share, Letterman was an oblivious student as he baselessly countered: “I think there's something wrong with those numbers. I don't know what it is exactly, but I'm pretty sure there's something wrong with them.”

Paul had outlined his wish to reduce government spending, prompting Letterman to retort: “What would be so wrong then in terms of leaving the public sector alone and reducing tax benefits for the wealthy and large corporations? Why couldn't you make up your money that way?” (Audio: MP3 clip)

Searching for an upside to the WikiLeaks release of secret documents, Late Show host David Letterman on Wednesday night pointed to how such disclosures could have possibly prevented the 9/11 attacks since former President George Bush had disregarded “for months and months and months” the warning “that bin Laden and al-Qaeda were interested in hijacking planes and flying them into buildings,” but not even Rachel Maddow, his far-left guest from MSNBC, bought his spin. Letterman contended:

There is the viewpoint if WikiLeaks had been in business prior to the attack of 9/11 and we knew that George Bush had looked at a document suggesting that bin Laden and al-Qaeda were interested in hijacking planes and flying them into buildings – which largely went disregarded for months and months and months until long after the attack. If we had known that, via something like WikiLeaks, we perhaps could have acted a little more alertly.

In fact, the Presidential Daily Brief to which Letterman referred, the one titled “Bin Ladin Determined To Strike in US,” was presented to Bush on August 6, barely five weeks before 9/11, not “months and months and months” in advance.

As the long holiday weekend comes to an end, catching up with a humorous, seemingly spontaneous, moment on the last fresh Late Show before Thanksgiving. David Letterman is a big believer in cataclysmic predictions about global warming, but on Wednesday’s program his mom, Dorothy, rejected his proposition that global warming was to blame for some unseasonably warm days in Indianapolis -- prompting her disappointed son to shake his head in disapproval.

Dorothy, better known as “Dave’s mom,” appears annually from her kitchen in suburban Indianapolis to let her son guess the types of pies she’s baked for Thanksgiving. This year, the 89-year-old remarked “it's been unseasonably warm,” leading her son to assert “that's that climate change. It's the global warming. You know that, mom? Do you believe in the climate change, in the global warming?”

To which, Dorothy Letterman innocently responded: “Not really.”  (MP3 audio clip)

Since National Public Radio somehow missed out on an author interview with George W. Bush -- they did portray his presidency as a horror film -- NPR's Chicago-based weekend game show Wait! Wait! Don't Tell Me!   mocked the former president by "interviewing" clips from his audio book, or as they called it, "A Fake Interview with a Real President." Bush's decision to tell about how he gave up drinking after his 40th birthday in 1986 is apparently a lie, if you're a public-radio comedian. Game-show host Peter Sagal mocked Bush as a drunk in the White House (MP3 AUDIO)

SAGAL: Thank you, everybody. With President George W. Bush's memoir, "Decision Points," coming out this week, naturally we reached out to invite the president on for an interview. Now this was the response we got, for real, from his former press secretary Dana Perino, quote, "That's hysterical. You guys are so funny," and then a smiling emoticon. So instead, we'll be interviewing George W. Bush's audio book. So welcome to WAIT WAIT, this is a big honor for us. Now, you tell some great stories in the book. Tell us about your first week as president.

BUSH: I had a few beers with the guys on Monday night. On Tuesday, I’d fix my favorite after dinner drink, Benedictine and brandy. I had a couple of bourbon-and-Sevens after I put Barbara and Jenna to bed on Wednesday.

CBS "Late Show" host David Letterman bashed the Fox News Channel in his Top Ten list Tuesday (partial transcript after the break):

Top Ten Signs There's Trouble at FOX News

Earning applause from the audience inside Manhattan's Ed Sullivan Theater for Wednesday's Late Show, Donald Trump gave David Letterman his take on placing a new mosque near Ground Zero: “I think it's very insensitive to build it there. I think it's not appropriate, a I think it's insensitive and it shouldn't be built there.” Letterman frowned, prompting Trump to point out to the audience: “I don't know if he agrees.”

Letterman eventually asked “what about the notion” of when the “pilgrims came over...looking for religious expression? And as far as I've always known, that's a fundamental building block of what makes this country great.” Trump agreed, but “it's caused such a storm that the people doing it would make so much good will” if they moved it to a different location.

When Trump repeated his point, to more applause, about how “it's very insensitive to build it there and I think they should go someplace else,” a befuddled Letterman wondered: “Describe for me what insensitivity is manifested if it's built there?” And Letterman fretted: “Does this suggest that we are in fact officially at war with Muslims?”

To which, Trump observed: “Well, somebody knocked down the World Trade Center.”

David Letterman for at least the second time in eight days mocked Barack Obama for spending so much time on R&R

During his "Late Show" opening monologue, the host quipped, "The President's been busy, he redecorated the Oval Office and then he took another two week vacation." 

Moments later, Letterman talked about Obama's address to the nation the previous day before presenting a video of the speech. 

As you'll see from this doctored clip, the President wasn't wearing attire at all suitable for the occasion (video follows with commentary):

David Letterman on Tuesday took quite a swipe at Barack Obama.

During the opening monologue of CBS's "Late Show," the host asked the audience, "You know who else is on vacation?"

Letterman answered, "President Barack Obama. And this is his, since he's been in office, this is his sixth vacation."

Then came the marvelous and surprising punch line (video follows with transcript and commentary, file photo): 

Appearing on the Late Show on Monday night to plug his Friday night Dateline on the 5th anniversary of Katrina, NBC Nightly News anchor Brian Williams bizarrely asserted “we're still enjoying the fruits really of the Clinton economy,” claimed Tea Party activists who say “we want our country back” want it back “from the Trilateral Commission” and ridiculed their presumed hypocrisy as he insisted “you see a lot of signs, ‘Federal Government Out of My Social Security,’ ‘Federal Government Out of My Medicare and Medicaid.’ But for the federal government, of course, those programs would not exist.”

Plus, he passed along how “I'm hearing a few people say” that President Barack Obama won’t run for re-election because he “wants to somehow transcend the presidency,” citing a British columnist who contends he was “never supposed to be an ordinary President.” Williams considered the possibility Obama could be as consequential as Jimmy Carter or Bill Clinton: “Jimmy Carter converted the post-presidency, redesigned the idea of an ex-President. Solving diseases and bad elections around the world. Bill Clinton with the Clinton Global Initiative trying to do the same thing.”

Bret Baier on Thursday rebutted Rachel Maddow's claim to David Letterman that Fox News intentionally tries to show images of "scary black people" in order to frighten white folks into voting for conservatives.

As NewsBusters previously reported, the MSNBC host was a guest of the CBS "Late Show" Tuesday, and made some pretty disgusting comments about a competing cable news network. 

Speaking with WOR radio's Steve Malzberg, the host of FNC's "Special Report" countered that because Fox addresses stories that other outlets don't, that "doesn't mean that there's political motivation behind covering actual news."

This, of course, is a huge factor in liberal media bias, and is what folks that analyze news reports refer to as bias by omission (transcript follows with commentary, audio available here with relevant section at 10:00): 

Rachel Maddow on Tuesday told David Letterman that scaring white people is good politics for conservatives.

After the host of CBS's "Late Show" asked his perilously biased guest about the Andrew Breitbart-Shirley Sherrod affair, the MSNBCer predictably pointed her accusatory finger at Fox News and everybody on the right. 

"The idea is you sort of rile up the white base to be afraid of an other, to be afraid of the scary immigrants or scary black people," Maddow said.

"Somebody coming to take what is white people's rightful property," she continued. "And you get them riled up so they feel like they need to vote in self-defense, and they vote for conservative candidates because of that fear" (video follows with partial transcript and commentary, h/t TVNewser):

Appearing as a guest on Friday’s Late Show with David Letterman on CBS, left-wing comedian Robert Klein suggested that it was bad that Rush Limbaugh turned out to be in good health after his hospital visit in Hawaii, inspiring laughter from Letterman. Klein: "You lose some, you win some." After Letterman brought up the birther conspiracy theory that President Obama was not born in America, Klein, who is known for attacking conservatives in his comedy act over sex scandals while being softer on liberals, changed the subject to Limbaugh’s fourth marriage to suggest that Limbaugh is hypocritical for opposing same-sex marriage, and then joked about the possibility of the conservative talker having health problems. Klein:

What's his name, Rush Limbaugh, who believes so much in the sanctity of marriage he's done it four times now, you know, but, you know, not if he, doesn't approve of marriage if both the husband and wife are circumcised, you know, that's out of the questions. I think a lot of that came from him, and, you know, he was in the hospital couple of months ago in Hawaii. Turned out to be nothing. See? You lose some, you win some. But anyway.

Below is a transcript of the relevant portion of the Friday, June 11, Late Show with David Letterman:

Here's a headline I'm sure you never dreamed of seeing: "David Letterman Gives the Tea Party the Best Showcase it's Ever Had."

So wrote Entertainment Weekly's Ken Tucker Wednesday about the previous evening's interview of Sandpoint, Idaho, Tea Party President Pam Stout on CBS's "Late Show."

Tucker went on to call the segment "quietly remarkable" which seems an understatement not only given Letterman's nonconfrontational approach with Stout, but also because at one point, he even said there were "many things about this [Tea Party] movement that I admire" (videos in three parts embedded below the fold with commentary, h/t Hot Air):

With the help of the MRC's talented Bob Parks, the Culture and Media Institute produced a video based on its report, "Sex, Violence and Hate: the Top 10 Most Disgusting Attacks on Conservative Women."

From Playboy magazine's "hate f---" list to comparing Sarah Palin to a case of "herpes," the media took every opportunity to tear down conservative women, not based on what they had to say or the values they promoted, but by commenting on their looks and perceived sexual behavior in incredibly misogynic ways.

Be sure to visit the MRC's video sharing Web site, Eyeblast, for more examples of liberal bias.  

In a clear sign liberal media elites are growing weary of the White House, comedian David Letterman went after President Obama's Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel Tuesday evening.

During the "Top Ten" segment of the "Late Show," Letterman counted down the signs that Emanuel is nuts.

Before beginning the list, Letterman explained with shocking detail that this was precipitated by Rep. Eric Massa's (D-N.Y.) assertion that Emanuel once cornered him in the Congressional shower room wearing nothing but an evil grimace.

Maybe most surprising, Letterman managed to lampoon the COS without once referencing to Sarah Palin (video embedded below the fold with transcribed list, h/t Story Balloon):