During Monday's “Morning Joe,” Time's Mark Halperin and co-host Mika Brzezinski helpfully provided some spin for the White House to borrow as President Obama finishes his prepared remarks for Monday evening's address to the nation on the events in Libya. President Obama has received sharp criticism for his foreign policy concerning Egypt and Libya, but Halperin threw cold water on that, calling Obama's strategy “extremely deft in a very tough situation.” Brzezinski agreed with his premise, adding that his “deft” handling is also in accord with promises he previously made. “He's pro-democracy, right? He's anti-violence. He's anti-unilateral U.S. intervention,” Halperin noted of Obama, trying to connect his current policy with the peacemaker he claimed to be as a presidential candidate. (Video below the jump. Comments begin at the 12:30 mark.)
Continue reading …Major Garrett Says He’s ‘Militantly Non-Partisan’–But Sounds Like Obama Flack
March 25, 2011 No Comment
No wonder he left Fox News . . . On Morning Joe, Major Garrett, formerly of Fox News, now with the National Journal, claimed to be “militantly non-partisan” . . . then proceeded to offer a passionate defense of Pres. Obama's Libya policy. As an hors d'oeuvre during the discussion of the need for the media to acknowledge their leanings, Katrina vanden Heuvel risibly refused to admit that her Nation magazine is left-wing. View video after the jump. Garrett repeatedly put his defense of the Obama policy in the mouths of Hillary Clinton and other administration figures.
Continue reading …Ed Schultz: Three GOP Governors Down in Polls – ‘It’s a Turning Point in American History’
March 24, 2011 No Comment
MSNBC's Ed Schultz on Wednesday claimed that recent polls finding that three newly-elected Republican governors wouldn't win if elections were held today represented a turning point in American history. Not surprisingly, his far-left guests from the Nation magazine quite agreed with him (video follows with transcript and commentary): ED SCHULTZ, HOST: But, this is the story that has me fired up first tonight, folks: American voters are having, I think, buyers’ remorse with radical Republican governors in key parts of the country when you look at 2012. If the elections were held tonight, Republican Governors Scott Walker, John Kasich and Rick Snyder, they would all be out of a job. Last November, Walker in Wisconsin defeated Tom Barrett 52-46 percentage-wise. Walker would now lose to Barrett by seven points. In Ohio, John Kasich — well, he defeated incumbent Ted Strickland 49 to 47. And at this point, Strickland — well, I guess you could say he would just smoke Kasich by 15 points. And in Michigan, Rick Snyder, very radical, very anti-public education, walked to an 18-point victory over Lansing Mayor Virg Bernero last fall. In a hypothetical do-over — I like do-overs — Bernero would now beat Snyder, 49 to 47 percentage-wise. Now, in less than five months, has the light bulb gone on? Voters have quickly pivoted away from these radical Republican governors. This shift is taking place because Walker, Kasich and Snyder’s radical priority list is being played out right in front of our eyes and it’s getting attention. Scott Walker, he didn’t run on ending collective bargaining for public employees, but now that he’s shown his cards, he stands a real chance of being recalled. Now, 57 percent of Wisconsin voters oppose Walker’s radical policy. Only 39 percent support it. In Ohio, Kasich ran on job creation and low taxes — you know, the normal Republican thing. Now, he wants to sell state prisons, the state liquor licenses, and maybe even turn over the Ohio turnpike to the private industry. Well, but his attack on collective bargaining is really tanking him in the polls — 54 percent of Ohio voters are against Kasich’s attack on labor, and only 35 percent support it. Now, former Gateway CEO, Rick Snyder, sold Michigan voters on the fact that he was a job creator. Take a look at this. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) GOV. RICK SNYDER (R), MICHIGAN: Fifty percent of the jobs lost in America in the last 10 years were lost in Michigan. How did that happen? Politicians gave us the worst business tax in the country. And regulations that made creating jobs almost impossible. I’ve created thousands of jobs. We’ll dump that tax. Thin the regulations. And jobs will come back. C.J. LEE: Rick is our one chance for jobs. (END VIDEO CLIP) SCHULTZ: One chance for jobs? How many jobs have they created? We’ll get to that story in future shows. Isn't that great? “How many jobs have they created?” They've been in office less than three months and this so-called journalist is asking how many jobs they've created. But that's just the beginning: SCHULTZ: Michigan has been killed by Republican policy that led to thousands of jobs being shipped overseas. Um, Ed – the previous governor was Jennifer Granholm, a Democrat that raised taxes and drove the state into the ground. But that's not important, because Snyder's been in office for almost three months: SCHULTZ: Ever heard of manufacturing in China? When Snyder was on the board at Gateway, they shut down plants in America and shipped those jobs to China. Snyder’s plan for labor? Well, you know what it’s going to do? It’s going to bring Chinese wages back home to the great state of Michigan. I bet they can’t wait for that. Almost 60 percent of voters in Michigan are against Snyder’s plan to strip public workers of collective bargaining rights. Now, get this number — if 300,000 people sign a petition in the state of Michigan, Snyder could be recalled as early as June. I tell you, it’s in the air, isn’t it? All of these governors got elected by talking about jobs and the economy. Obama wasn’t any good. They had all the answers. Well, now the pushback is very clear. And I think that this is a political turning point. I think that this is a moment that voters aren’t going to forget, because it’s a consolidated, concerted effort by these right-wing Republican governors to butcher — to butcher — labor in this country and in their states. Get your cell phones out. I want to know what you think about this. Tonight’s question: can Democrats capitalize on reaction to the radical GOP governors in the 2012 election? Text “A” for yes, text “B” for no to 622639 — or go to our new blog tonight at Ed.MSNBC.com. And I’ll bring you the results later on in the show. Joining me now is John Nichols, Washington correspondent for “The Nation.” Is this a political turning point in American history? I mean, you can’t tell me that all of a sudden there’s a group of Republican governors that are tanking in the polls, there’s demonstrations abound in all of these states. What do you think, John? Yep – some polls in three states concerning governors in office for less than three months are a turning point in American history. Not surprisingly, his guest from the Nation agreed: JOHN NICHOLS, THE NATION: Well, I think there’s no question, Ed. In fact, we’ve already reached a turning point. It’s just a question of how big a turning point it is. Yep – we've already reached a turning point. These polls on these three governors mean that the entire country has in less than five months shifted back to the left despite rising gas and food prices, exploding debt, a new war, plummeting home values, and continued unpopularity of ObamaCare. Republicans oughtn't even run candidates in the November 2012 elections – conservatism has ended in this nation because these three new governors have seen their poll numbers drop. But there was still more, because Schultz's next guest, Katrina Vanden Heuvel of the Nation – isn't it marvelous how he brought on two folks from the country's most left-leaning magazine rather than anyone that might actually challenge his cockamamie premise?!? – who after agreeing with him broadened the conservative bashing: ” We are witnessing a possibility of these House extremists taking us back to a time when we didn`t have child labor laws, or safety or clean water or clean air .” Yep – that's what Republicans are all about. They want to get rid of child labor laws as well as those involving clean water and clean air. And this is what passes for journalism on MSNBC.
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Former Clinton labor secretary Robert Reich wrote a truly nonsensical piece for the Huffington Post Tuesday ironically called “The Republicans' Big Lies About Jobs.” MSNBC's Chris Matthews must have loved this tripe and its sophomoric title for he invited the Berkeley professor on Wednesday's “Hardball” so that the pair could put on a clinic in liberal economic fantasy (video follows with partial transcript and oodles of commentary): (BEGIN VIDEO) REPRESENTATIVE ERIC CANTOR (R-VIRGINIA): We have adopted a two-track approach called cut and grow. Now, the first part, cut, is obvious. We know that we have to stop spending money that we don't have, and we have to begin managing the money we do have and spend it more wisely. The American people are tightening their belts and Washington should too. The growth part is about those gazelles, growing businesses that add new employees every month, keeping regulators from running amok. (END VIDEO) CHRIS MATTHEWS, HOST: Welcome back to “Hardball.” That was House Majority Leader Eric Cantor Monday out at Stanford University. His speech on the economy prompted a reaction from former labor secretary Robert Reich in the Huffington Post. We all read it. Reich wrote about what he called, “Republicans’ Big Lies About Jobs.” Reich says there are five of them: deficit cuts somehow create jobs; tax cuts for the rich create jobs; corporate tax cuts create jobs; wage and benefit cuts create jobs; regulation killing creates jobs, and; regulations kill jobs. […] Robert, you say what we were taught in school. So, is there somebody teaching something else? I mean, if you want people to spend more money, you give them more money in wages or whatever, you don't fire them and leave them as paupers, because they're not very good consumers then. When you fire people, take away their rights to bargain for higher wages you take away their ability to spend their wages. So, what is this thing, this sort of religion course we’re getting, this primer we’re getting from Cantor? What is it, neo-classical from the 19th century? Where does he believe that stuff from? From here, Reich repeated some of the nonsense in his piece concerning how spending cuts would be the end of the world now, and President Obama needs to push back to prevent this from happening. However, what was stunning about this over eight minute segment was how Matthews and Reich admitted that the economy is in terrible shape right now, but implied it was somehow caused by spending cuts that haven’t happened yet. What they both totally ignored was the fact that spending has increased by 41 percent since 2007 while unemployment has risen from 4.4 percent to 8.9 percent while the country lost seven million jobs. Sound to you like this massive increase in spending over the past four years has done any good? But even better, towards the end of the segment (minute 7:16), Reich let a really inconvenient truth slip: “ This is the most anemic recovery we’ve had from a deep hole since the Great Depression .” Please notice that Matthews agreed, as of course do I. And that's the point, for we’ve increased federal spending by 41 percent without it resulting in much economic improvement. Yet Matthews, Reich, and their ilk believe cutting spending will hurt the economy. In reality, we now have two distinct economic periods in the past 80 years when huge increases in federal spending were made to try to pull the nation out of a “deep hole,” and neither has worked. Consider that from 1929 to 1939, federal outlays tripled from roughly $3 billion to $9 billion. Did it help? Hardly. The unemployment rate was 3.2 percent in 1929. Having peaked at roughly 25 percent in 1933, it was still at 17.2 percent at the end of 1939. Did a tripling in spending end the Depression? Certainly not, which means that massive federal spending has not solved the worst two economic crises of the last 80 years. But let’s take this a step further. The Left and their media minions always like to use the Clinton Era as an example of how raising taxes can actually spark economic growth. Of course, we conservatives know that the early ’90s recession ended in the 2nd quarter of 1991, and that the economy was already booming before the former governor of Arkansas was elected. We also know that the creation of the Pentium chip as well as internet routers sparked a technological and economic boom like nothing most baby boomers had ever seen. Ignoring all that, the 90s were also a period of fiscal restraint in Washington. On budget spending (meaning not including Social Security and Medicare) only grew by 42 percent. In the ’80s, this rose by 115 percent, which was actually down from 184 percent in the ’70s. Spending grew by 107 percent in the ‘60s. More recently, on-budget spending in the ’00s rose 117 percent. This means that if the Left and their media minions want to use the Clinton years as the blueprint for economic success, they should realize that government spending during that period increased at the slowest pace in the last five decades. Putting even a finer point on this, spending in the ’90s grew at less than 1/3 the rate of the average of the other four decades – meaning that the four decade mean growth was three times the ’90s. Add this to the failure of massive spending increases to get us out of the Depression and the most recent recession, and it’s clearly preposterous to claim that growth in government is at all economically stimulative. What was that Matthews and Reich were saying about big lies?
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They won't agree on much, but Fox News host Bill O'Reilly and Medea Benjamin, founder of the far-left anti-war group Code Pink, found some common ground on one fact Tuesday night: MSNBC talkers Rachel Maddow and Ed Shultz are hypocrites. Both Schultz and Maddow defended President Obama's decision to impose a no fly zone over Libya on their respective shows. Maddow trotted out the “reluctant warrior” line, while Schultz insisted that the president “deserves the benefit of the doubt and our support.” O'Reilly asserted – and Benjamin agreed – that neither MSNBC host would have been so generous had Obama's predecessor engaged in such a conflict. “The word 'hypocrisy' comes to mind,” Benjamin quipped (video and partial transcript below the break). O'REILLY: Our Unresolved Problem segment tonight, as we have been reporting there is a split among liberal Americans over Libya and other issues. Some on the far left believe President Obama is not doing a good job. But the mainstream liberal media in general remains supportive of the man they helped elect in 2008. Imagine, if you will, President Bush ordering the Libyan bombing, even with UN approval. Do you think the left would have supported that? But last night here's what went down. SHULTZ: I think the President of the United States, Barack Obama, deserves the benefit of the doubt and our support. MADDOW: He very clearly did not want there to be another military action in the world. He is very open about his reluctance. He wants everybody to know how reluctant he was. O'REILLY: Everybody knows how reluctant [imitates bomb dropping]. Joining us now from Washington, Medea Benjamin, co-founder of the anti-war group Code Pink. When you hear that kind of stuff, Medea – you're honest woman, which is why we have you on the program. We know you are anti-war, we know you're Code Pink. We know all of that. You are honest. Those people at MSNBC cheer-leaded Barack Obama into office. They are hard core left wingers over there. Yet, yet, you know if Bush had ordered the bombing what they would be doing, but they are not doing with President Obama. What say you? BENJAMIN: I think the word hypocrisy comes to mind. I'm sure if this were under President Bush they would be asking a barrage of questions about why didn't you go to Congress? Can we afford this? What's it going to cost? Don't we need jobs and not bombs? Is this really going to help the Libyans? Why not Bahrain, Saudi Arabia? All kinds of things. O'REILLY: Alright, so you don't think they are doing due diligence in analyzing the situation. Now the question becomes: why? Why are they in the tank? BENJAMIN: Well, you know, Bill, this is partisan politics. I think people that support President Obama wanted to see him as a reluctant warrior. But, yet, he was the one that gave us the surge in Afghanistan. We still have troops in Iraq. We are dropping drones in Pakistan that are killing innocent people. And now we see a – what I would say a rush to another war in Libya. So, at some point, have you got to admit that whether he is reluctant or not, he is giving us a lot of wars for a peace president. What portion of this double standard stems from an earnest belief in the goodness of Obama's motives and what portion is simple partisan hypocrisy is a wholly different question. Allahpundit recently explained it this way : So much of politics is driven by suspicions about motives; liberals cut The One slack that they wouldn’t cut a conservative because they assume he has good intentions, that he wants to withdraw from Iraq and Afghanistan ASAP, that he’s not serving any special interest overlords like Halliburton, etc. Rage is what gets people out in the streets, but it’s hard to feel enraged at a guy whom you believe is doing his earnest best to solve a difficult problem… But … yes, of course some of the anti-war movement eight years ago was fueled by partisanship aimed at delegitimizing a Republican president (one whom they never really felt was legitimate in the first place), just as conservative complaints about Afghanistan from the likes of Michael Steele and Ann Coulter became more vocal only after Obama’s surge. Which do you think better describes Schultz and Maddow? Let us know in the comments.
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In this interview with MSNBC’s Chris Matthews, Joe Biden clearly states his position that a President should be impeached for launching an attack on a nation that hasn’t attacked the United States. Broadcasting platform : YouTube Source : I Hate The Media Discovery Date : 23/03/2011 14:41 Number of articles : 6
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In this interview with MSNBC’s Chris Matthews, Joe Biden clearly states his position that a President should be impeached for launching an attack on a nation that hasn’t attacked the United States. Broadcasting platform : YouTube Source : I Hate The Media Discovery Date : 23/03/2011 14:41 Number of articles : 6
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In this interview with MSNBC’s Chris Matthews, Joe Biden clearly states his position that a President should be impeached for launching an attack on a nation that hasn’t attacked the United States. Broadcasting platform : YouTube Source : I Hate The Media Discovery Date : 23/03/2011 14:41 Number of articles : 6
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In this interview with MSNBC’s Chris Matthews, Joe Biden clearly states his position that a President should be impeached for launching an attack on a nation that hasn’t attacked the United States. Broadcasting platform : YouTube Source : I Hate The Media Discovery Date : 23/03/2011 14:41 Number of articles : 6
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