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From Morning Joe, Nov. 24, 2008.
You guys [Team Obama] own the economy at 12 o'clock eastern time today, correct? When Senator Obama announces his Treasury Secretary, announces the Larry Summers position. It is now Barack Obama's responsibility on the economy, is that not correct?
h/t Bob Cesca, who has more here.
On Friday's Hardball, Chris Matthews interviewed his daughter, Caroline, as one of the student members of the group Concerned Youth of America, and just didn't bother mentioning the familial relationship. Apparently his daughter had asked not to be identified as such and, rather than interview another member of the group and thus preserve his journalistic integrity (heh), Matthews went right ahead anyways.
It's such a small-beer breach of what passes for journalistic ethics nowadays as to go almost un-noticed, although in the halcyon days of journalism it would probably have gotten him fired or at least earned the censure of his peers. It simply doesn't compare, though, with the likes of Andrea Mitchell reporting on the bank bailout plan - and blaming Obama for its failure - while married to Alan Greenspan and not making full disclosure of that fact before every report.
Larry Kudlow proves once again that he's nothing more than a right wing, free market, Milton Friedman hack that just lies at will. Doesn't he have a conscience? Nope...It's never the big money freepers that horde the wealth of this country and have no restrictions on what they can do thanks in part to Mr Deregulation himself, John McCain. Jon Perr has more...
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Kudlow: It's time for the Congress, Republicans and Democrats to stop encouraging---exhorting and forcing banks to make low income loans with no documentation. Stop that---literally pushed these lenders to make low income loans
Scarborough: Hold on a second. You cannot blame this on low income people that are getting a house.
Kudlow: I'm not blaming them. Kudlow: Sub prime, sub standard loans were a creature of the US Congress in the 90's and the 2000's.
Scarborough: Are you saying that poor people have caused this crisis?
Kudlow: Not poor people. Members of Congress who were rich people. But their Liberal guilt consciences forced banks and lenders to make lousy sub-standard loans and that has to be repealed...not everybody can afford a home, Joe. Some people have to rent."
What a crock. Kudlow blames it all on the liberals. What a joke this man is. This is another case that proves conservatism is dead. Of course not everybody can afford a home. Sorry, the irresponsible lending practices went on because it kept Bush's economy chugging along for years before it crashed and burned. The ownership society Bush and conservatives called it. Morning Joe actually takes him apart for even suggesting that low income families are the root cause of our economic problems in the housing market. It's up to the lenders to qualify people for loans. PERIOD.
I watched this crisis unfold and saw people walking into fairly expensive homes in Venice, CA with no down payments and either low or no interest loans. Yes, I'm a renter now. I couldn't believe my eyes when the property values skyrocketed (went up to 1 million) because of these lending practices. People can apply for a loan all they want, but that does not automatically mean they should be approved. That's up to the lenders. Liberal guilt is never an issue and a lie, Mr Kudlow. They aren't supposed to hand over thousands of dollars without knowing that they will be paid back. The predatory lenders made boat loads of cash at will with a conservative philosophy in hand. Just ask your best friend for a hundred bucks and see what happens...Naomi Klein writes: Disowned by the Ownership Society
Washington think-tanker Grover Norquist predicted that the ownership society would be Bush's greatest legacy, remembered "long after people can no longer pronounce or spell Fallujah." Bush has turned out to be the ownership society's undertaker.
I hope these work....Contact Larry Kudlow here: Larry.Kudlow@cnbc.com Larry.Kudlow@nbcuni.com Call 877-251-5685 up until 7 pm EST and let him know how you feel in a respectful way.
Logan Murphy says:
On the same day Barack Obama met with the conservative water carrier Bill O'Reilly on Fox News, the McCain campaign made it clear that Sarah Palin won't be talking to any of the media any time soon.
In a jaw-dropping appearance on MSNBC Thursday, McCain aide Nicole Wallace told Time's Jay Carney that the press wouldn't get a chance to take shots at the hockey mom turned McCain running mate.
According to Nicole Wallace of the McCain campaign, the American people don't care whether Sarah Palin can answer specific questions about foreign and domestic policy. According to Wallace -- in an appearance I did with her this morning on Joe Scarborough's show -- the American people will learn all they need to know (and all they deserve to know) from Palin's scripted speeches and choreographed appearances on the campaign trail and in campaign ads.
Given the highly combustible mixture that is Palin's reed-thin resume, radical right-wing agenda and mushrooming portfolio of scandals, Team McCain's effort to field the first stealth vice presidential candidate in history comes as no surprise.
But for conservatives so found of countdowns and ticking clocks, the question now is: when will "Disappearing Palin" meet the press? Apparently, "Sarahcoulda," but won't talk to the media.
The clock is ticking.
Joe Scarborough goes after bloggers (I mean, who else is watching your show, Joe?) on a regular basis, denigrating us as Cheetos-eating Star Wars fans living in our mothers' basements. Joe's court jester Willie Geist interviews bloggers in the DNC Big Tent, and finds very few bloggers who fit Joe's slurs.
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As with most issues, what Joe says as opinion, is simply contrary to fact. Surveys of top political bloggers (here and here) in 2006 found that most are male, white, well-educated, around 45 years old, and earning above-average income. Kinda exactly like you, Joe. We also have extensive activist experience (I shook Ted Kennedy's hand at 18 and haven't really washed under the nails since), and we have an addictive level of news consumption (which is the only explanation I have as to why we get up to watch Morning Joe).
As an Ivy-educated middle-aged mother-of-three homeowner who does not own any Star Wars memorabilia, I can see why you might be jealous of bloggers, Joe. Few of us have to deal with little niggling details like dead staff in our office or having to carry the water of the Worst. President. Ever.
Also, as a blogger, I can tell you in the presence of my considerable, well-educated audience, to kiss my liberal elite blogger ass.
GOP hack Joe Scarborough hasn't been on the air for nearly two weeks thanks to the Olympics and a lot has happened in that time. He and the Morning Joe crew will have a lot of ground to cover when they return to the airwaves, but unfortunately for Joe, one of his favorite wingnut memes has been blown to smithereens while he was away -- the stereotypical, elitist, latte sipping liberals.
Now that we've learned from the LA Times that John McCain ditched reporters and dragged a 9 car motorcade to Starbucks to snag a large cappuccino on Friday, I think it's time for Joe to let it go. Hell, McCain was probably wearing his $500 Italian loafers at the time (I bet he has more than one pair) and probably had a hard time deciding which home to return to.
It's time to give it up, Joe. I think we all know who the real latte-sipping elitist is now.
Let the transcript speak for itself:
SCARBOROUGH: Is the media turning against him? Is the media going to start seizing on things like this to prove that they're not in the tank for Barack Obama?
HALPERIN: There's been a little bit of the paradigm shift. I think that McCain web video might have had the same effect as the Saturday Night Live parody that...on the Clinton/Obama race. I think some reporters recognize going forward if we replicate the way the coverage has been, the imbalance, the unfair pro-Obama coverage going forward, it would do a disservice in the general election. This...whenever I go on TV and say, ‘this election is about a referendum on Obama, that's the whole thing,' those guys with the Cheetos on the end of their fingers...
BRZEZINSKI: [laughs] Exactly...
HALPERIN: ...attack me and say, ‘that's just some dodge, it's about McCain too'. McCain deserves scrutiny and he'll get some. But I think Barack Obama has to find the right balance between this seeming presidential, getting people comfortable with him, and this kind of stuff, the presidential seal, the faux seal, the kind of quote that The Washington Post has. I think that's stuff is dangerous. I think that's the one way he can lose the election.
SCARBOROUGH: People don't understand the dynamics of this race, the landscape, the battlefield, the political battlefield. And it is this: Republicans have had power for 8 years. We've gotten in trouble in Iraq. We've gotten in trouble in Afghanistan. We're going to have a $500 billion deficit. The President's approval rating below 30. He's in Jimmy Carter territory. Right Track/Wrong Track-81% of Americans think we're on the wrong track. There is...so when we say it's not about John McCain, we're saying you could put a Pet Rock, you know, in the position John McCain is, if it were a Republican Pet Rock, it would have all of these problems. It is about Obama, because like Jimmy Carter in '76, a Democrat should win.
First of all, Halperin, bite me with the dismissive Cheetos snark. I'll match not only my diet but my bona fides against yours any day and we'll see just who has the Cheetos stains. You get attacked because you literally can not recognize your posterior from your elbow. You really want us to believe this ridiculous "librul media" bias meme you've been pushing for years? Um, hello...reality to Halperin. Maybe if you weren't so busy eating the doughnuts and BBQ with which McCain is only too happy to keep you supplicated, you'd see that.
As much as I'd hate to agree with the Scar -- and believe me, it's killing me -- the Democrats winning this election should be a foregone conclusion considering just how badly the GOP has screwed up in their 25 years of either Legislative or Executive control. The fact that Obama doesn't have a 25-30 point margin has more to do with hacks like Halperin who will never report honestly on McCain's dizzying number of flip flops, his bad temper, his constant factual errors but will focus endlessly on hard hitting items like unproven, unchallenged and fact-free slurs.
This election is not a referendum on Barack Obama, you hack. It's to the detriment of the entire country that we can't have an referendum on the damage done to democracy by the likes of Mark Halperin. Put that on a Cheetos and eat it.
UPDATE: MoveOn has sent out a political action to its members asking them to contact Halperin and ask him to stop repeating right wing talking points. You may email him at mark_halperin@timemagazine.com and then let MoveOn know your response.
On "Morning Joe," seemingly in response to this C&L post, Joe Scarborough denies he was talking about his colleague Keith Olbermann when he referred to a pundit who "ignorantly" reported on McCain's Anbar gaffe, and then goes on a hysterical little rant about the "Cheetos Brigade" without mentioning who he was talking about.
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"I was talking about someone on another network. [...] But again, you know the problem is when you're in the basement and you're blogging and you're eating Cheetos, sometimes the Cheetos dust goes up, ya know, and you get two choices: You can either keep typing, or you can stop for a second and wipe the Cheetos off your chest, clear out your ears and take a closer listen. But they don't do that. And therein lies the problem with the 'Cheetos Brigade.'"
What other cable news host reported on the story Tuesday night that Joe could have been talking about? Was it Andersen Cooper? We'll probably never know because although Joe may not be a keyboard-carrying member of the "Cheeto Brigade," he sure doesn't have the courage to name names.
Maybe Joe can lament about the evil bloggers with Brian Williams at the next DC cocktail party. I can just picture them yukking it up about guys named Vinny with "Cheetos-stained" shirts in their pathetic "efficiency apartments." Maybe our pads would be a little nicer, Joe, if we were handsomely rewarded for being wrong about everything like you are. Then again, I'll take my snack food, modest housing and clean conscience over your mansion and war-cheerleading record any day of the week.
Be back in a minute....my fingers are orange and the bag is empty. [Blue Gal has a Cheetos message for Joe, too]
Wow. There is so much hackery in this short clip that it's hard to know where to begin. While reporting on McCain's Anbar gaffe, the "Morning Joe" squad not only fails to acknowledge how serious and unprofessional it was for CBS to selectively edit the gaffe out of the interview, they completely buy into the McCain campaign's damage control spin. And as if it that weren't bad enough, Joe Scarborough makes it a point to go out of his way and call the arm-waving host that ran with the story (an obvious allusion to his colleague Keith Olbermann) "ignorant" and "too stupid to be on TV."
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"Look let me tell you....and I know a couple of hosts ran this last night and made a huge deal because some liberal blogger picked it up. I will guarantee you the host that ran it, were waving their arms, had no idea whether the Sunni Awakening, or, or or, the surge began at the same time. They also, anybody that would argue that the Sunni Awakening would have survived in Al Anbar Province, without the surge, anybody that would make that argument is so ignorant of the facts on the ground in Western Iraq, in Al Anbar Province, and what the Sunni sheiks were doing throughout 2007, that they are too stupid to be on TV. And I hope they don't carry that argument much longer because it is laughable."
Let me try and break this down for the slow among us. This is what McCain said:
"Colonel MacFarland was contacted by one of the major Sunni sheiks. Because of the surge we were able to go out and protect that sheik and others. And it began the Anbar awakening. I mean, that’s just a matter of history."
Actually, no, it's not a "matter of history." Whether or not the surge helped strengthen the al-qaeda-routing awakening is not the issue; the issue is McCain crediting the surge with creating the awakening in the first place. That is, as a matter of fact, UNTRUE. Now, if McCain had said the surge "strengthened the awakening," it would be different. But by saying it "began the awakening," he is deliberately distorting the time line in order to give the surge more credit than it's due, and thus give himself more credit than he's due. It's that simple.
When confronted by Senator Obama with the prospect that the surge isn't entirely responsible for the security improvements, McCain is forced to play the only card he has left in his deck and attribute everything to the surge, even though the greatest gains began before it. It's not hard to understand.
I wonder if the McCain campaign realizes how foolish they look right now. While Barack Obama is overseas looking presidential and having his foreign policy ratified by the Iraqi government, John McCain is home undermining his own foreign policy "expertise," undercutting his main argument for the surge, and looking childish as he stomps his feet and blames the press. All I can say is...keep it up!
For a "darling of the left," Joe Scarborough sure doesn't seem to like us all that much. Today on "Morning Joe," he and Joe Lieberman (I-CT) practically made out as they bashed the "angry left" for having the audacity to target the turncoat Democrat over "one issue."
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Scarborough: "Me and Mike Barnicle talk a good bit about these bloggers and people on the far, far, far left. The angry left. Here we have Joe Lieberman, progressive on civil rights. progressive on the environment, progressive on economic issues, progressive on union isues, yet they throw him overboard over one issue. Aren't we talking about extremism on the left and the right?"
While it's true that Lieberman has a pretty strong record of supporting traditionally Democratic positions -- something he should be properly recognized for -- the fact remains that he is a Bush loyalist and absolutist on the most transcendental issues of the day. As I wrote about back in May, Lieberman's betrayal extends far beyond the "one issue" of the war; he supports Bush and the Republicans on every single controversial topic, from torture and habeas corpus, to FISA and judicial nominations. Oh, and did I mention the fact that he is he most outspoken advocate for John McCain, and that he helps spread the most vile of smears about his supposed party's nominee for President? By whatever math you choose to employ, all of those add up to more than "one issue."
Lieberman has every right to support whatever position he wants to, but (a) let us dispense already with this "one issue" nonsense, and (b) he shouldn't be surprised when he is attacked by the Democratic base for embracing every single Republican position.
Then again, what do I know....I'm just a card-carrying member of the DFH "angry left."
John Amato: What a shock. Harold Ford was having a grand old time with the crew.
Like most Republicans these days, MSNBC's Joe Scarborough doesn't mind taking pot shots at George Bush. Hell, it's easy to do with the worst president in modern history, but jumping into the anti-Bush column certainly isn't an act of bravery or a sign that he's moved to the left. It means he knows which way the political winds are blowing and he needs good ratings. I truly believe Joe is unhappy with the direction the GOP has gone in recent years and angry with W for leading his party to its demise, but at the end of the day, he is Republican to his marrow.
According to New York Magazine, Joe's brave leap onto the 75% bandwagon makes him the darling of the left:
Where else could a red-meat, right-wing congressman like Joe Scarborough reinvent himself as the liberal's favorite talk-show host?
Scarborough admits that he is courting a new constituency. “Once we started Morning Joe, Phil Griffin said to me, ‘You can cut out this regular-Joe crap. Our audience is from Boston to Washington, D.C.’” In fact, he seems to be right at home on the Upper West Side. “The thing I hear all the time,” he says, “when people come up to me on the street, is ‘I love your show,’ and then there’s a hesitancy, and I’ll finish their sentence: ‘And I’m a liberal?’” Scarborough beams, pleased with his own apostasy, before adding, “Republicans aren’t as gracious.”
Wait...wait, here's the money shot:
“I was totally skeptical, and now I’m totally won over,” says Time editor-at-large Mark Halperin, a political analyst at ABC News. “I was a huge fan of Imus, but Joe has taken that real estate and turned it into something—and I say this without hyperbole—revolutionary. There’s no other show that does what they do. They’ve really found a new form.” Read on...
Because we all know that Mark Halperin, who said John Edwards thought Barack Obama was a p**sy and recommended John McCain use racist attacks against Obama, represents the views of Democrats and liberals everywhere. Either this fluff piece was bought and paid for, or the people at NY Magazine have never heard of people like Keith Olbermann, Rachel Maddow or Amy Goodman. Ok, libs, let's give them suggestions. Which talk show hosts do you really like?
(h/t Heather)
Barack Obama's Senior Foreign Policy Advisor Susan Rice appeared on Friday's Morning Joe to discuss foreign policy, and more specifically North Korea's destruction of a long-defunct nuclear cooling tower yesterday. The Scar thought this was a huge diplomatic victory for George Bush, but Rice sets him straight, reminding him that North Korea's nuclear program expanded by leaps and bounds under Bush's watch and that if he would have opened negotiations years earlier, much of this could have been avoided in the first place.
Joe pretends to be a middle of the road kind of guy, but when he gets punked, especially by a Democrat, it drives him crazy and his true, far-right colors always come through. As Rice goes down the laundry list of Bush failures, Joe gets snippy with her, and even stoops so low as to hurl an insult at Jimmy Carter in the process. NBC's David Gregory chimes in at the end of the segment and drops a question on Rice that was pulled directly from Karl Rove's playbook:
Gregory: "Hello, Susan. While we are talking about the prospect of nuclear terrorism, which is what is behind the concerns of North Korea and Iran. I have a broader question for you and really for Senator Obama. Why is it, does he believe that America has not been attacked in this country by terrorists since 9/11? And does George W. Bush, President Bush deserve credit for that?"
Rice: "I think what we have to acknowledge, David, that we haven't been attacked but we are nonetheless less safe as a sequence of the policies of this administration has pursued. Our standing in the world is at an all-time low. Al Qaeda is more dangerous now in Afghanistan and Pakistan than it has been. Our intelligence community is warning they are reconstituting and more deadly to U.S. forces than Iraq."
Of course, Gregory is incorrect, there HAS been a deadly terrorist attack in the U.S. since 9/11 -- the anthrax attacks that killed 5 Americans ring a bell to you? It's interesting that so many seem to forget this factoid. Speaking of anthrax and Bush failures, you'll be happy to learn that $5.8 million of your tax dollars were just awarded to Steven Hatfill in his lawsuit against the Bush Justice Department. Hatfill is an Army scientist who was deemed a "Person of Interest" in the anthrax attacks, but was eventually ruled out as a suspect in the Bush administration's botched investigation. Hatfill's lawyer placed partial blame on the media for not questioning the Bush administration's motives in targeting him and for reporting leaked disinformation they could not substantiate.
The disparity in media coverage between Rev. Jeremiah Wright and John McCain's multiple pastor scandals has been widely documented. McCain's Media has done a splendid job of running cover for their candidate while hammering away at Obama -- but according to Morning Joe's Mika Brzezinski, that's all hogwash and how DARE anyone suggest otherwise?
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During this morning's show, while talking about Senator Obama's decision to resign from his church, they read a viewer's e-mail complaining of MSNBC's obsession with his church while barely giving lip service to McCain's pastor problems. Mika was none too happy with the viewer's astute observations and shot back with one of the biggest, bald faced lies I've heard in quite some time:
"Okay, umm...first of all, I think we covered the Hagee story as much, umm...the Reverend Wright situation injected itself into the news cycle for sure, but having said that, don't you think that there is a difference or is there not, especially given the fact that he resigned from his church."
To say that MSNBC and Morning Joe covered the Pastor Hagee story as much as the Rev Wright story is laughable and an outright lie. Joe Scarborough ran wall to wall with with the Wright story for weeks on end, constantly chastising Senator Obama and obsessed over the church and the issue of race -- usually only stopping for headlines and weather in between. Mika was right in the middle of all this coverage, she should know better than to say something so ignorant and easily debunked. Contact MSNBC and demand a retraction.
Update: I thought it only fair to MSNBC that I acknowledge Keith Olbermann's extensive coverage of not only John Hagee, but McCain's other controversial religious endorsements as well as his pandering to the likes of Rev Jerry Falwell.
Sweet Jesus, I hate Tucker Carlson. And Joe Scarborough isn't exactly far down that list either. However, this exchange between the two of them was so far outside anything that that we in the reality-based community could recognize that I actually have to ponder out loud what color the sky is in their world. In discussing the gas tax proposal made by John McCain, Carlson and Scarborough conflate liberals with the media once again (because we all know the media is liberal, right? <snark>) and claim that the media is so in love with Barack Obama that they can't criticize his stance against the gas tax.
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The reality that the media has acknowledged giving McCain a pass and the huge scrutiny of Obama and everyone he might have been in contact with aside--since I've already acknowledged that Carlson and Scarborough do not live in reality--how much more patronizing and ridiculous could their characterizing could be?
TC: It’s gonna be…It’s gonna be such a great election.
JS: It’s gonna be awesome. Especially when you have the media loving one candidate as much as they love Barack Obama.
TC: It’s more than love. It’s the kind of love that…anybody who’s been a ninth grade boy understands, this species of love. Do you know what I mean?
MB: Wow.
JS: No, it’s true. It’s all-consuming.
TC: It’s red-in-the-face, think-about-you-when-I-go-to-bed, too-embarassed-to-stand-up, sealed-with-a-kiss love. It’s puppy love.
MB: Wow.
JS: It really is.
MB: What are you guys talking about?
JS: No, seriously. The media’s love affair with Barack Obama is all-consuming. It is..it is…no, it really is. It is a ninth grade love affair, where if you say anything about their love interest, they get very red-faced, angry, and emotional. They can’t really think logically about it.
Now I'll give Carlson the acknowledgment that there are some Obama supporters who are pretty out there with their support of their candidate (and before someone starts attacking me for saying so, Clinton has some equally rabid supporters as well), but he's talking about the media, not passionate members of the electorate. To conflate the two just shows once again how shallow and un-informed Carlson and Scarborough are and how little truth they add to the public discourse.
Today on "Race to the White House" Rachel Maddow and Joe Scarborough got into a little argument after Rachel called him out for being rude and interrupting her when she criticized John McCain. At the end of the show, when guests are supposed to make a final prediction about the presidential race, Scarborough instead opted to take a shot at Rachel. After Rachel gives her response, Scarborough is nowhere to be found.
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Scarborough: I think I may blow all my time to respond to Rachel. I don't get engage in "Crossfire"-type debates. [...] Again, I don't do Crossfire, so if we want to yell back and forth, then Rachel will have to find somebody else to do that.
Rachel: Joe, I wasn't trying to yell back and forth with you. I was starting to make my point and you cut me off before I started my first sentence.
(a few moments later, sans Scarborough)
Rachel: Me and Joe are gonna get a beer and hash this all out.
UPDATE: Jeremy Gaines tells the Huffington Post:
"Joe didn't walk off. He chose not to participate in the final couple of minutes of the discussion because he felt the conversation didn't fit his role as a political analyst."
What a weak excuse. Joe's job as a "political analyst" is to analyze the political race. That's what the entire show is about. Rachel got under his skin, plain and simple. It was probably when she made that face after he said he didn't want to be condescending, which he was clearly being.
