Free Republic

The narrative. Two words we hear often in cable news. What’s the narrative (insert network) is pushing today? This week? This month? So as breaking news, big news—Boston bombings, Cleveland kidnapping, Oklahoma tornado—subsided as May turned to June, the narrative (outside of the scandal of the week) is now about an event that actually appears on a schedule ahead of time…as all the cable networks are now counting the hours down to tip-off of the Trayvon Martin trial. Headline News (HLN) showed producers and execs alike that owning coverage of one trial can be the difference between 2nd (behind Fox)...

Our favorite new GOP bomb-thrower, E.W. Jackson, is anti-yoga and anti-evolution, but he believes in trickle-up—yes, up—economics. National Review’s Betsy Woodruff reports that The Man Who Would Be VA Lt. Gov. says yoga puts you at risk of Satanic possession. … Jackson also doesn’t belive in evolution. Why? Because monkeys can’t talk. Defeat that with your so-called “logic.” …

Like a zombie that just won't stay dead, pretentious left-wing talking head Keith Olbermann has somehow managed to find a way to befoul Americans' living rooms once more. Thankfully, unless you are a baseball junkie, you won't have to witness his bloviations since Olbermann is scheduled to serve as a host for the Turner Broadcasting System's coverage of post-season Major League Baseball playoff games. The move is a logical one for Olbermann, who began his television career as a sportscaster for almost 20 years before venting his venom on politics for the liberal MSNBC and Current TV channels. According to...

Reporting the breaking news on Wednesday's NBC Today that President Obama had named U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice to be national security advisor, chief White House correspondent Chuck Todd portrayed Rice as a victim of Republican attacks: "Rice, who had become a Republican punching bag during the whole Benghazi controversy....this is a bit of a defiant move by the President to his Republican critics." [Listen to the audio or watch the video after the jump] Later on his 9 a.m. ET MSNBC show, The Daily Rundown, while discussing GOP opposition to Rice's promotion – and her nominated replacement as U.N. ambassador,...

Just when you thought the folks at MSNBC couldn't go any lower in defending the current White House resident, someone there stoops to new depths. On the Martin Bashir show Wednesday, the host actually said that investigating the scandal at the Internal Revenue Service is a racist Republican attack on "the black man in the White House" (video follows with fuller transcribed highlights and commentary):MSNBC's Bashir: Investigating the IRS is a Racist Republican Attack on 'Black Man in White House' After playing a clip of Mitt Romney making a joke about his birth certificate, Bashir said, “That was the moment...

MSNBC continues to disparage the scandals that have plagued the Obama administration the last few weeks. On Sunday’s Weekends with Alex Witt, the host brought on former Democratic staffer Jimmy Williams and former RNC chairman Michael Steele to reluctantly discuss the scandals once again. Of course, rather than focus on the substance of the controversies, Witt fell back on the concern that she and many others in the liberal media have often expressed: “[D]oes this have the potential to derail the president's second-term agenda?” The president’s agenda is always the victim of these scandal investigations in the minds of the...

For a second night on Thursday, MSNBC's Lawrence O'Donnell on his The Last Word show tried to blame NRA Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre for inspiring the ricin-tainted letters recently sent to New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg and President Barack Obama. The MSNBC host teased the show: Well, turns out that when the NRA says that President Obama and Mayor Bloomberg are enemies of the Constitution, some very crazy people actually believe that. O'Donnell began the show by playing clips of LaPierre from the NRA convention in Houston criticizing Bloomberg and Obama. After updating viewers of the letters sent...

There are moments in politics when an argument is advanced that is so surpassingly stupid or dishonest that it momentarily freezes your brain. Welcome to former DNC Communications Director Karen Finney's IRS twilight zoneMSNBC Host Finney: "Everybody Knew About This [IRS] Investigation Long Before The Election"According to Finney, the fact that Mitt Romney didn't make a huge deal out of the IRS targeting scandal last year is somehow proof that the whole thing is essentially a non-story and wasn't buried until after the election.  Where to begin?  As a fellow panelist incredulously points out, the revelation of IRS abuse wasn't...

Apparently the folks at MSNBC have decided that the Benghazi investigation is merely a political ploy by the GOP to hinder Hillary ClintonÂ’s presidential ambitions in 2016. Instead of addressing the substantive issues that potentially resulted in a cover-up surrounding the attack, MSNBC anchors and pundits have been going out of there way to protect the Obama administration and smear Republicans. Doing her duty to defend team Obama on Martin Bashir May 10 program, soon-to-be MSNBC host and former DNC Communications Director Karen Finney laid the blame for the dead in Benghazi on, who else, congressional Republicans: But I believe...

It really is amazing how liberal media members regularly make false statements on national television with total impunity. Consider MSNBC's Lawrence O'Donnell who twice on HBO's Real Time Friday arrogantly claimed that the Obamas' federal income tax rate was "in the high twenties" (video follows with transcribed lowlights and commentary): Lawrence O’Donnell: Obama’s Tax Rate ‘In the High Twenties’; Nope! Try 18.4% In a discussion about the federal budget, Pete Hegseth, the CEO of Concerned Veterans for America, said, “We missed some opportunities by not arguing for the simplification of the codes that Mitt Romney and President Obama and everyone...

On Tuesday's All In show, MSNBC host Chris Hayes asserted that, since Republicans have taken control of the North Carolina state government, the state is moving toward becoming an "insane right-wing dystopia," and claimed that the GOP wants to engage in "voter suppression" in the state. Hayes: It's a state that, to everyone's surprise, went blue in 2008 and was narrowly carried by Mitt Romney in 2012, a state viewed by many as an emerging Democratic foothold in the South, as evidenced by the party holding their convention in Charlotte in 2012. But a state that, since the election of...

On Wednesday's The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell, MSNBC analyst Richard Wolffe -- formerly of Newsweek -- claimed that President Bush "ignored all the warnings about al-Qaeda wanting to attack the homeland" before 9/11 as he mocked Republicans for praising Bush's record of preventing terrorist attacks on U.S. soil after the 9/11 attacks. As he alluded to Republicans criticizing President Clinton for not handling al-Qaeda more aggressively during his presidency, Wolffe asserted: You couldn't just say that 9/11 came out of nothing. It wasn't a total surprise because, in their narrative, Bill Clinton and, by extension, all Democrats somehow lost...

You can call Chris Matthews anything you want — “dimwitted political hack” would be entirely appropriate — but please don’t insult an entire profession by calling Chris Matthews a “journalist.” On March 30, Kaufman County, Texas, district attorney Mike McLelland and his wife were shot to death at their home. Five days later, Chris Matthews invited Mark Potok of the Southern Poverty Law Center onto MSNBC to promote speculation that McLelland’s murder was committed by the Aryan Brotherhood prison gang. In other words, the important thing about this crime — the thing that made it worth eight minutes of national...

One of the UK Telegraph's in-house Labourites, Dan Hodges, urged his comrades on the Left to maintain their dignity in the wake of Margaret Thatcher's death earlier today:   Everyone on the Left is being scrutinised today. Does the compassion we claim to be our driving force extend to the passing of a frail 87-year-old woman? Does the Labour movement’s dignity and discipline enable us to mark with appropriate solemnity the death of a former Prime Minister who successfully secured three independent mandates from the people? Do we have the basic good grace and wisdom to set aside – for...

MSNBC’s newest liberal darling Chris Hayes has just been given a promotion, going from weekend anchor to host of his own primetime show, All In w/ Chris Hayes. So how does he celebrate? By arguing that Guantanamo detainees should be paid restitution and allowed to live in the United States, with a path, ultimately to citizenship, of course.

BEGIN TRANSCRIPT RUSH: I saw something. I don't have the audio on it because I have instituted a ban on anything that happens on MSNBC, and I'm not lifting the ban even for this. But when I saw this last night, I have to tell you I just got viscerally sad. I became depressed and I didn't try to disguise it. I just... It was a feeling of utter frustration at what is happening in our country, particularly culturally. There is a personality on MSNBC whose name is Toure. He's black, and he is a young fool. He is a...

MSNBC’s Toure Neblett last weekend mocked Dr. Benjamin Carson as a token “black friend” to Republicans admired only to “assuage their guilt” for past racial indiscretions. On Fox News’s America Live Tuesday, Carson struck back at his liberal media critics saying that he’s no “Uncle Tom” (video follows with transcript and absolutely no need for additional commentary): Dr. Ben Carson Strikes Back at MSNBC's Toure Neblett: I'm No Uncle Tom MEGYN KELLY, HOST: Boy, have you been attacked. A token you've been called, an Oreo, please pardon me for repeating these to you. Most recently a commentator on a rival...

You've surely heard by now that Michelle Obama presented the Academy Award for Best Picture last evening. On Monday, MSNBC host Alex Wagner, appearing on Hardball, said, "Could Laura Bush have done it? No. If she'd appeared at the Oscars, I don't think she would have been greeted with the same amount of warmth" (video follows with transcript and commentary): MSNBC's Alex Wagner: Oscars Wouldn't Have Greeted Laura Bush As Warmly As Michelle Obama CHRIS MATTHEWS, HOST: Let me ask you about the Obamas. This is the second time politicians have gotten into these awards. Bill Clinton was involved with...

MSNBC, for the second time on Thursday, smeared the National Rifle Association as racist, trashing the gun group's president as appealing to bigotry. Now host Alex Wagner read from an op-ed by Wayne LaPierre in which he argues that owning a gun is the only real protection from crime, looting and riots. Specifically, LaPierre mentioned the aftermath to Hurricane Sandy and looting in Brooklyn. Wagner quoted LaPierre: "Hurricanes, tornadoes, riots, terrorists, gangs, lone criminals, these are the perils we are sure to face. Not just maybe. It's not paranoia to buy a gun. It's survival." She then sneered, "There's also a...

For the third time in the past year, NBC News has been caught selectively editing video for political gain, with the most recent instance coming on the Monday, January 28 Martin Bashir program.  Bashir ran heavily edited video showing Neil Helsin, whose 6-year-old son was killed in the Newtown shooting, appearing to be heckled by audience members during a legislative hearing on gun control. The chorus of criticism from media critics on the right and left forced MSNBC to backtrack, but not apologize. On the Wednesday, January 30 Bashir program, liberal fill-in host Ari Melber of The Nation magazine offered...