I stopped watching MSNBC in the mornings because Dylan Ratigan is incredibly annoying. He has some good points at times, but he’s only interested in repeating his own opinion . . . over and over again.
Here’s a clip of Ratigan at his worst with Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz. Even Chris Matthews rarely gets this annoying.
If he wanted a real discussion, he could have gotten an answer. Insurance stock went up after the public option was dropped for very obvious reasons – yes, the public option would have resulted in real competition. Fine. End of story. That does not mean, however, that the bill is a “giveway” to the insurance companies as he implied, because as the Congresswoman tried to explain, the bill does include robust regulation of the insurance companies.
Is this perfect? Of course not. Would a public option be better? Of course. But Ratigan just wanted to yell and scream about his simple point that the insurance companies are now better off than if the public option had stayed in the bill.
Of course, a child could probably figure that out as well, but Ratigan thought he was making a big point, so he acted like an ass.
MSNBC is touting their new high-def studios and graphics, but they can’t seem to get the market quotes right. Futures are up big this morning, as reported by CNBC, but MSNBC has red down arrows everywhere showing a down opening.
I’m watching the Sotomayor hearings on MSNBC, and of course they need to break from the actual hearing so Chris Matthews and the other talking heads can pontificate about the hearings. It’s annoying as hell, since we’re missing the continuation of the hearings, but Matthews doesn’t have a lawyer as part of his panel. As a result, Matthews can say idiotic things about her testimony without having a lawyer correct him on the air. What a joke.
I recently got into a somewhat heated argument with a conservative friend of mine about Fox News and whether it was more or less misleading than the other mainstream media outlets. I pointed to the two or three Pew polls that show that Fox News viewers on average were the least likely of all the major news outlets to have a clear understanding of the facts. I argued that MSNBC may on the whole be liberal, but at least they “deal in facts” (i.e. they cite their sources and don’t just make stuff up as they go along, like Bill O’Reilly or Sean Hannity do). The following video is a great example. Bill O’Reilly attempts to debunk Obama’s assertion that Winston Churchill was anti-torture, even when he was under the most dire of circumstances. Notice how O’Reilly makes statements as if they were fact, with no supporting documentation, and how he distracts his audience by going on tangents that have nothing to do with the torture question. Then watch as Olbermann counters Bill O’s argument with facts and actually cites his sources.
It’s amazing to me that anyone still believes that Fox News is “fair and balanced.” What’s even more amazing is that the same conservative friend watched the documentary “Outfoxed” on my suggestion and agreed with much of what it had to say. Three or four years later, now that Obama is in the White House, that objectivity has vanished.
MSNBC is having a field day with this one. See how many double entendres you can find in the following clip. Hint – Dick Armey is one of the easy ones!
This is pretty pathetic, and it highlights how bad Jim Cramer’s appearance was on The Daily Show.
A TVNewser tipster tells us MSNBC producers were asked not to incorporate the Jim Cramer/Jon Stewart interview into their shows today. In fact, the only time it came up on MSNBC was during the White House briefing, when a member of the press corps asked Press Secretary Robert Gibbs if Pres. Obama watched. Gibbs wasn’t sure if the president had, but Gibbs did. “I enjoyed it thoroughly,” the Press Secretary said.
On Cramer’s network, CNBC, the subject has only come up twice today, including when master marketer/CNBC personality Donny Deutsch brought it up briefly around 1pm on “Power Lunch.” “I’m a huge Jon Stewart fan,” said Deutsch, “He does what he does he does his job. But I’m also a huge Jim Cramer fan. He sticks up for the little guy, he cares, he puts his neck out, and I respect that. I respect both those guys.”
How embarrassing. In effect, Stewart destroyed Cramer’s credibility and painted CNBC as a bunch of fools, but MSNBC honchos decided not to respond. This suggests that there might be serious consequences.
Rachel’s new show on MSNBC is doing quite well in the ratings. She’s obviously tapping into the enthusiam on the left, which will likely continue if Obama closes on the deal on November 4th.
Their convention coverage is just pathetic, as they like hearing their own pundits talk endlessly about the Clinton drama instead of actually airing the speeches.
Montana governor Brian Schweitzer is giving a pretty good speech ripping McCain on his energy proposals. CNN is showing it. MSNBC has Andrea Mitchell conducting an interview and saying that none of the speakers are going after McCain.
Keith Olbermann announced the news on Daily Kos, and it will be officially announced tomorrow. Rachel gets the 9 pm slot, and it will be interesting to see what happens to the Dan Abrams show.
Rachel is an excellent commentator. Conservatives will howl that MSNBC is becoming even more liberal, but she is extremely talented so they can’t attack her ability.
The media hit a new low last week when Dana Milbank of the Washington Post reported a Barack Obama quote from a second-hand source which portrayed Obama as a self-absorbed fool who has become completely full of himself. Unfortunately, the quote was taken completely out of context, as Obama was answering a question about the big crowds and explaining it wasn’t about him at all. It was actually a humble statement.
Naturally, before the entire quote was finally reported, the media went crazy. The “arrogance” theme became the talking point of the day on every cable channel. Anyone who thinks MSNBC is in the tank for Obama needs to watch this video from Talking Points Memo.
It’s hard to find a better example of what’s wrong with cable news. They need to fill 24 hours each day, and they need to keep this race interesting to keep the lofty ratings they generated during the Obama/Clinton battles. They’s jump on anything to create a storyline for the day. It’s pathetic.
I’ve had MSNBC on all day and I’ve heard virtually nothing about the situation in Iraq, despite the developing story regarding the increase in violence and the battles in Basra.
Of course, they’ve given plenty of air time to Barack Obama’s bowling score and the Monica Lewinsky questions lobbed at Chelsea Clinton.
I’m amazed that McCain worked for this endorsement, and I have no idea why he is sticking with Hagee. This man is a nut, and his anti-Catholic statements are disgusting. This will be a story in the general election.
Last night on MSNBC, Pat Buchanon argued that the voters were rejecting the GOP but were supporting socially conservative ballot initiatives. It turns out he spoke to soon. Conservatives suffered significant defeats in South Dakota, Missouri and Arizona.
In conservative South Dakota, the voters overwelmingly rejected a ban on all abortions by a 55-45 margin. This is a huge loss for cultural conservatives and a significant win for liberals and for libertarians. This, coupled with the outrage over the Terry Schiavo fiasco, makes it clear that most voters do not want government officials intruding into their personal lives. The social conservatives have reached too far. Hopefully Republicans will pay attention and start moving back towards the middle on social issues. As for Democrats, hopefully they will develope a backbone on these social issues. Their unwillingness to stand up to the Republicans during the Terry Schiavo controversy was shamefull.
Missouri provided the next big win for liberals by passing the stem-cell research initiative. This has become a huge wedge issue for Democrats. Hopefully this vote, along with the gains by Democrats in the House and the Senate, will lead to passage of federal funding for embryonic stem-cell research with margins sufficient to override a veto by President Bush.
Finally, Arizona is the first state to reject a constitutional ban on gay marriage. The proposed amendment would have also banned civil unions. Again, many voters apparantly believed that the social conservatives went to far. A wide majority of Americans oppose gay marriage, but more and more Americans are open to the concept of protecting legal rights for civil unions.
