Networks Trumpeted Obama's Pledge to Veto Backtracking on Spending Cut

Over 13 months ago, the NBC, CBS and ABC newscasts touted Barack Obama as a tough talker who wouldn't back down on threatened spending cuts. Now, that he's backed down, the same networks have ignored the President's retreat. On November 21, 2011, Obama thundered, "My message to [Congress] is simple: No. I will veto any effort to get rid of those automatic spending cuts to domestic and defense…
Scott Whitlock
January 3rd, 2013 5:13 PM

MSNBC’s Alex Witt Asks: ‘What’s It Going To Take To Get Abortion

Well, there goes any chance that MSNBC might have resolved to drop the phony "war on women" meme in the new year. On the January 3 NewsNation fill-in host Alex Witt interviewed Kate Pickert to push for greater abortion access across the nation, discussing her cover story for the January 14 print edition of TIME magazine, which is pegged to the forthcoming 40th anniversary of Roe v. Wade. "40…
Jeffrey Meyer
January 3rd, 2013 4:32 PM

NBC's Andrea Mitchell Implores Chuck Schumer: 'Is Something Meaningful

NBC’s Andrea Mitchell, on Thursday’s edition of MSNBC’s Andrea Mitchell Reports, implored liberal New York Democratic Senator Chuck Schumer to push for more gun control. After noting that students from Sandy Hook Elementary School had finally returned to class after the tragic shooting, Mitchell pressed Schumer: “Is something meaningful going to happen on guns this year?” An appreciative…
Geoffrey Dickens
January 3rd, 2013 4:05 PM

Politico's Sloan Writes That Dems Are 'Done Hiking Tax Rates,' But Doe

In a late Wednesday column at the Politico, the online website's Steven Sloan wrote that Democrats might be done hiking tax rates, specifically "that they’ve exhausted their ability to raise taxes on the richest Americans by jacking up their rates." But it's clear in later segments of his write-up that Democrats still want to go after "loopholes" and deductions, meaning that they still want to…
Tom Blumer
January 3rd, 2013 3:31 PM

New York Times Keeps Liberal Priorities Straight, Sorting Chicago Murd

Monica Davey's Thursday front-page New York Times story on rising homicide numbers in Rahm Emanuel's Chicago ("A Soaring Homicide Rate, a Divide in Chicago") was suspiciously silent on the utter failure of the city's strict gun laws, but vocal about sorting the annual homicide numbers into patterns of race and class (as if equality among homicide victims would be preferred). Davey focused on…
Clay Waters
January 3rd, 2013 2:24 PM

David Shuster (Formerly of MSNBC) Wants David Gregory to Apologize for

On New Year's Day, perhaps before he learned that his current employer's enterprise would be sold to Al Jazeera, Current TV's David Shuster took to the bandwidth of the Huffington Post to ask that former NBC/MSNBC colleague David Gregory apologize for his December 23 gun magazine-waving stunt on Meet the Press. Get a load of the sense of self-importance Shuster gives the Sunday news show (…
Tom Blumer
January 3rd, 2013 1:10 PM

Obama DHS Takes New Step to Make It Much Easier for Illegal Immigrants

You wouldn't know it from all the political oxygen in the media taken up with the fiscal cliff and the kerfuffle over the House not voting for a Hurricane Sandy relief package, but the Obama administration yesterday announced a regulatory change that will make it incredibly easier for some illegal immigrants to apply for legal status. The Washington Post gave the development six paragraphs of…
Ken Shepherd
January 3rd, 2013 12:58 PM

Matthews Sneers: Fiscal Conservatism Is Like Being 'the Most Segregati

On New Year's Eve, Chris Matthews got off one last sneering shot against conservatives. In a special 2012 retrospective, the Hardball anchor connected fiscal conservatism to segregation. After guest Howard Fineman insisted that Mitt Romney's aversion to tax increases during the primary doomed him in the general election, Matthews snorted, "It's today's politics! It's like, they used to say, you…
Scott Whitlock
January 3rd, 2013 12:45 PM

Report: Gore Wanted Current TV Sale Completed in 2012 to Avoid Obama T

Al Gore, the man who first introduced the idea of blaming “the wealthiest one percent” for all of America’s ills, is continuing to embarrass himself in the sale of his low-rated Current TV channel to the Al Jazeera. First, we learned that Current’s management believed that the favorite news channel of Islamic fundamentalist terrorists is closer to its own viewpoints than conservative media…
Matthew Sheffield
January 3rd, 2013 12:29 PM

NYT's Weisman Doesn't Get Why House GOP Rejected Fantastic Fiscal Clif

New York Times reporter Jonathan Weisman strangely painted the fiscal cliff deal (which displeased conservatives with its tax increases and lack of spending cuts) as a fiscal dream come true for Republicans in his "news analysis" for Wednesday's front page. Weisman also mocked the GOP's historical support for low taxes. Just a few years ago, the tax deal pushed through Congress on Tuesday…
Clay Waters
January 3rd, 2013 12:28 PM

NBC's Lauer Hypes: GOP 'In Throes of a Civil War' Over Sandy Relief Bi

At the top of Thursday's NBC Today, co-host Matt Lauer teased an upcoming interview with New York Congressman Peter King by seizing on House GOP disagreement over when to schedule a vote on a Hurricane Sandy relief bill: "...fresh off the fiscal cliff fight, the Republican Party appears in the throes of a civil war. This morning, we'll talk to an outspoken GOP congressman who urged voters in…
Kyle Drennen
January 3rd, 2013 12:02 PM

Al’s Jazeera: Gore Rejected Glenn Beck Bid for Current, Deemed Him

Are you tired of having to go to YouTube to watch video of terrorists killing U.S. soldiers? Do you get annoyed when slow download speeds interrupt hearing your favorite Islamist cleric call for infidel blood to restore the Caliphate? Wish you could see suicide bombers lovingly read their last statements in crystal-clear HD? Well, great news, kids! Al “no controlling legal authority”…
Matt Philbin
January 3rd, 2013 11:41 AM

Open Thread Thursday

Discuss the news of the day and anything else you'd like.
NB Staff
January 3rd, 2013 11:40 AM

Cal Thomas Column: We Treat Federal Government Like an ATM, Drawn From

Everything that everyone loathes about Washington was present in the "fiscal cliff" bill just passed by Congress. It is 153 pages long; most members probably hadn't read all of it before voting on it; it was delivered in the middle of the night; it was loaded with pork -- the mother's milk (to mix a metaphor) of politicians -- and while the country is already swamped with massive debt, it…
Cal Thomas
January 3rd, 2013 11:33 AM