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After a lull, in which the Times' initial assumption the Tucson shooting had something to do with political conservatism was refuted by reality, the paper again tried to use the tragedy to smear conservatives, in Frank Rich’s Sunday column, “The G.O.P.’s Post-Tucson Traumatic Stress Disorder.”  It’s a truly weak effort that will change no  minds. Still, Rich’s absurd and mean-spirited attempt…

When three-fourths of the Boston police department went on strike in 1919, leading to broken shop windows and looting, then-Massachusetts Governor Calvin Coolidge called out the state militia and broke the strike. Coolidge declared, "There is no right to strike against the public safety by anybody, anywhere, any time." His courage propelled him to the vice presidency and eventually to the…

"The fate of our country won’t be decided on a battlefield. It will be determined in a classroom." Do you believe that? Last week, Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker called on 14 state Senate Democrats, who had fled the state instead of voting on a deficit-cutting anti-teachers-union bill, to return and do their jobs. Senate Republicans hold a 19-14 majority there but can't vote on the bill unless…

UPDATE AT END OF POST: 'Limited Memory' Matthews gets Washington's birthday wrong! A Gallup poll released Friday found Americans are most likely to say Ronald Reagan was the nation's greatest president. On Monday, MSNBC's Chris Matthews was visibly angered about these results and actually insulted those in Reagan's camp as having a "limited memory" (video follows with transcript and…

AP reporter Ryan Foley's update from Madison on Monday night included details about a rock musician causing the crowd to to roar: "At noon, guitarist Tom Morello of Rage Against the Machine took to a stage on the Capitol steps to fire up the crowd. He said he flew in from California to lend his voice to the protest." While reporters like Adam Nagourney "worry" out loud that the Wisconsin…

UPDATE AT END OF POST: Ann Coulter agrees! Lawrence O'Donnell on Monday made a prediction that most who hadn't heard of Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker until a week ago might find astonishing. On MSNBC's "The Last Word," the host told his perilously liberal guest Ezra Klein that if Walker's budget repair plan goes through, "He would instantaneously become the greatest hero in the Republican…

Normally you'd expect a left-winger like MSNBC's Rachel Maddow to do cartwheels if current-day Republicans agree with opinions held by Franklin Roosevelt during the depths of the Great Depression. This is not one of those times, however, as we are learning during the ongoing battle in Wisconsin over public-sector unions.   What's happening in Wisconsin, according to Maddow, is an…

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration somewhat under the radar a few weeks ago rebutted Nobel Laureate Al Gore's claim that January's heavy snowstorms across the country were caused by global warming. As readers might remember, the man that has been made rich advancing the myth that carbon dioxide is destroying the planet weighed in on the inclement weather at his blog on…

MSNBC's Chris Matthews tried Monday to push the liberal media meme that Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker exempted police and firefighters from his budget repair plan because their unions endorsed him in last November's election. "Well one more time you're completely uninformed," replied Republican State Senator Glenn Grothman who then proceeded to tell the facts to the obviously clueless "…

On Monday's Newsroom, CNN's Martin Savidge teamed up with guests Rachel Sklar and Nick Ragone to oppose a proposed bill in Texas that would allow college students with concealed carry permits to carry handguns on campus. Savidge only had conservative talk show host Ben Ferguson on to voice his support for the bill during the segment, who faced off against the three. The anchor brought on…

This is going to be messy. Kathy Griffin, Hollywood's favorite D-list vulgarian, will apparently be playing a Tea Party candidate loosely modeled on Sarah Palin in an upcoming episode of Fox's "Glee", according to The Hollywood Reporter. What could go wrong? Griffin discovered not so long ago that bashing Palin and her family can help prop up her sagging career - without controversy,…

Leave it to "On Faith" to offer a Marxist/left-wing liberation theology twist on the public sector unions protesting Gov. Scott Walker's (R-Wis.) budget plans. On Saturday the Washington Post/Newsweek online feature published a "Guest Voices" by Wendy Cooper in which the divinity student lamented that middle-class government workers in the Badger State have much in common with the masses in…

Is context a four-letter word to MSNBC's Chris Matthews? During the "Sideshow" segment on Friday's "Hardball," Matthews ripped a comment conservative Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.) made during a recent speech to the Federalist Society in order to paint DeMint either as a birther or as one playing cynically to those who believe President Obama was not born in the United States. CHRIS MATTHEWS:…

NBC's Kelly O'Donnell, on Monday's Today show, lumped the Wisconsin and federal budget fights together and depicted the Republicans, in both cases, as being on the defensive. Starting in Wisconsin O'Donnell reported that over the weekend "Protesters backing union workers vented anger" but didn't mention the Tea Party had a counter-protest. Then O'Donnell, moving to the budget struggle on…