Open Thread: Judge Upholds Obamacare, Rules Congress Can Regulate 'Men

On Wednesday, the fifth federal judge to examine constitutional challenges to Obamacare on their merits upheld the law, reiterating that the Congress's Commerce Clause power gives it the authority to mandate the puchasing of health insurance (the judge rejected the argument that the mandate is a tax and therefore permissable under Congress's power of the purse). The most interesting passage…
NB Staff
February 24th, 2011 9:40 AM

Nets Tout Dem Congresswoman’s Defense of Partial Birth Abortion, Ski

  Catching up on an item from last weekend, Friday’s World News on ABC, Saturday’s Good Morning America on ABC, Saturday’s CBS Evening News, and Saturday’s NBC Nightly News all highlighted California Democratic Congresswoman Jackie Speier’s defense of partial birth abortion as a procedure she had herself gone through as she berated New Jersey Republican Congressman Chris Smith for describing…
Brad Wilmouth
February 24th, 2011 9:13 AM

Indignant Norah O'Donnell Defends Obama's Lack Of Leadership On Libya

If Time-magaziner-turned-WH-press-sec Jay Carney ever tires of defending Pres. Obama, Norah O'Donnell clearly seems ready to step in... When on today's Morning Joe Donny Deutsch described PBO as having a passive leadership style as evidenced by his approach to Libya, health care and other issues, an indignant O'Donnell piped up, defending the president's passivity. View video after the…
Mark Finkelstein
February 24th, 2011 8:35 AM

A Price on Our Heads

NOTICE of REVISION: This column has been revised to correctly attribute The New York Times for data and reportage cited in its Feb. 16 story on the statistical value of human life. Back in the American Wild West, federal and state governments often put a price on the heads of infamous outlaws like Billy the Kid, Jesse James, Sam Bass, Belle Star and Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.…
Cal Thomas
February 24th, 2011 5:00 AM

Prime Time CBS Drama ‘The Good Wife’ Impugns Tea Party as ‘Racis

Tuesday night’s episode of The Good Wife on CBS gave prime time legitimacy to the presumption the Tea Party is racist as a lawyer in a courtroom tried to discredit an expert witness (Gary Cole as Sarah Palin supporter “Kurt McVeigh”) who testified against a since-exonerated black defendant, by demanding he admit he’s “a member of the Tea Party.” The lawyer asserts “it is our contention that my…
Brent Baker
February 24th, 2011 2:20 AM

ABC’s Sawyer Publicizes Left-Wing Effort to Tar U.S. and Advocate fo

Human Rights Watch released a hardly comprehensive report, one “based on interviews with 64 parents across the country,” which complained: “Just three countries definitively offer no legal guarantee of paid maternity leave: Papua New Guinea, Swaziland—and the United States.” Picking up on that, Diane Sawyer announced on Wednesday’s World News:  And now, family leave. A new report from…
Brent Baker
February 23rd, 2011 11:28 PM

Rachel Maddow Lies to Leno About Republican Campaign Contributions

As NewsBusters previously reported, MSNBC's Rachel Maddow on Tuesday told a staggering amount of nonsense to "Tonight Show" host Jay Leno concerning what's going on in Wisconsin with the unions and Tea Partiers. After some additional investigation, it turns out the juiciest whopper of all came a few minutes earlier when she totally misrepresented Republican and Democrat political…
Noel Sheppard
February 23rd, 2011 11:10 PM

NOW Yowls at 'Violently Anti-Woman' Catholic Bishops

The National Organization for Women issued a statement from president Terry O'Neill Wednesday with a clearly anti-religion message. The headline: "U.S. Catholic Bishops Major Force Behind War on Women." It began: The collusion of House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) and the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops has led to an open declaration of war on the women of this country. The bishops have…
Tim Graham
February 23rd, 2011 10:41 PM

Elderly 'Teabaggers' Not Dying 'Fast Enough' Laments Libtalker Mike Pa

Looks like yet another left-winger missed the meme on the New Civility. Attorney and "Ring of Fire" radio show co-host Mike Papantonio, guest-hosting on Ed Schultz's radio program yesterday, revealed two things -- he hates old people and wants tea party retirees to hurry up and die. Don't take my word for it, listen to Papantonio's remarks after a caller said he saw "one of these baggers…
Jack Coleman
February 23rd, 2011 9:41 PM

Slippery Cenk Suggests Public Employees Need Unions To Negotiate With

James Taranto could be the best columnist around.  Every day at his Best of the Web at the Wall Street Journal online, Taranto turns out an original, often unconventional, conservative take on the news, regularly managing to leaven the message with humor. Rush today rightly extolled Taranto's column of yesterday, in which he made the point that there is a vast, inherent difference between…
Mark Finkelstein
February 23rd, 2011 9:34 PM

The Sanctity of Contracts? Seriously

Rather than parroting union outrage over broken contracts, media should remind public of GM bail-out.
Dan Kennedy
February 23rd, 2011 7:24 PM

Matthews Accuses Huckabee of Wanting to Commit Genocide, Says Limbaugh

Chris Matthews went off the deep end on Wednesday's Hardball as he accused conservative talk show hosts Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck of demonstrating "ethnic disdain" for the First Family and even charged former Arkansas Governor and current Fox News host Mike Huckabee of wanting to ethnically cleanse Arabs from the West Bank. Right after a discussion about Republican contenders like John…
Geoffrey Dickens
February 23rd, 2011 6:44 PM

Joe Scarborough Hits Vatican Consultant for Call to Deny Communion to

MSNBC's Joe Scarborough, who was raised a Baptist, criticized Dr. Edward Peters, a Vatican canon law adviser, Wednesday on "Morning Joe," for his call to deny Holy Communion to a public figure who is living "in violation of a fundamental moral expectation of the Church." "Deny Communion? I'm sorry, and not to get religious here, but Jesus said, you know, 'I didn't come here to heal the…
Matt Hadro
February 23rd, 2011 6:13 PM

NYT: 'Pugnacious and Boastful' Gov. Christie Left NJ Education System

New York Times reporter David Halbfinger filed from Trenton, N.J., Wednesday on Gov. Chris Christie’s recently unveiled budget proposal (“Christie Declares ‘New Normal’ in Proposing Tight Budget”) and again displayed a pro-Democrat double standard. Only last week Halbfinger penned a favorable profile of Connecticut’s Democrat Gov. Dannel Malloy, who devoted half the interview to running down…
Clay Waters
February 23rd, 2011 5:39 PM