GOP “Haters” a Problem for Passing Amnesty Bill in House
“One of the problems of this debate going on — for Boehner and people who want the Republican Party to have a future — is there will be more commentaries like that from the Ann Coulters, from the Limbaughs. They’ll be talking about this endlessly, and they will absolutely be publicly characterizing the Republican Party, in effect, as, Joy [Reid] says, haters of these people [illegal immigrants]. I mean, you didn’t hear anything in what Ann Coulter just said that indicates that she has any positive feelings about the people that we’re talking about here.”
— Host Lawrence O’Donnell on MSNBC’s The Last Word, June 13.
Opposing Pork-Laden Farm Bill = An Ugly, Racist “Jihad”
“Tea Party Republicans, in an effort to kill the farm bill, will stereotype and make racial comments about food stamps, which is a big element to the program.”
— Eleanor Clift’s prediction at the end of the June 16 edition of The McLaughlin Group.
“Republicans have come up with a whole bunch of ugly names for people who need a little help putting food on the table: ‘welfare queens,’ ‘takers,’ the ‘47 percent.’ And now House Republicans are poised to pass a bill that would cut more than $20 billion from food stamp programs and take away benefits from two million Americans. We’ve seen it over and over again....These Republicans are shameless.”
— MSNBC’s Al Sharpton on PoliticsNation, June 13.
“Yes, right wingers, people are going hungry in America. And the GOP’s jihad on those in need gets uglier every single day....There’s a Republican jihad on food stamps, of all things, and it affects millions of people.”
— MSNBC host Chris Hayes teasing an upcoming segment on All In, June 19.
Comparing Iran’s Theocratic Despots to the Tea Party
Anchor Jim Axelrod: “Liz, a man named Hassan Rowhani will be the next president of Iran. Is he in the mold of [Mahmoud] Ahmadinejad?”
Correspondent Elizabeth Palmer: “Well, he was seen as the most reform-minded of all the candidates who ran this time. That being said, they were all very conservative. In U.S. terms, it was as if all the candidates for the presidency came from the Tea Party.”
— CBS Evening News, June 15.
Chris Foams Against “Right-Wing Demagogues”
“This guy [Senator Ted Cruz] goes pretty far. I think he fits in the tradition of Father Coughlin and [Joe] McCarthy and, of course, maybe to a lesser extent, Pat Buchanan and, of course, [Bill] O’Reilly. These guys are hard right-wing guys....Do you think it’s a good career plan to be a demagogue? Is a demagogue a good career plan?”
— Host Chris Matthews on MSNBC’s Hardball, June 12.
Conservative Movement = A Bunch of Clowns
“Everything about the institutional structure and economic benefits of the conservative movement is slanted toward ridiculous clownish antics. It’s what we see on right-wing talk radio, it’s what gets you a contract with Fox News, in some cases a second contract with Fox News....The people who want to be players in this world have to put on the red nose and floppy shoes, and then they have to go to clown auditions.”
— MSNBC’s Chris Hayes on All In, June 14.
More Tales of Woe Caused by Puny Sequester
Correspondent Carter Evans: “Fire season has exploded across the country. So far this year, more than 19,000 wildfires have scorched the equivalent of 700 square miles, forcing thousands out of their homes....But federal firefighters are facing another challenge: a loss of $50 million mandated by the budget sequester. That forced the Forest Service to cut 500 firefighters and 50 engines just when they’re needed most.”
Tom Harbour, U.S. Forest Service: “We’re going to have to work harder. We’re going to face more fire with fewer firefighters.”
— CBS Evening News, June 15.
Anchor Jeff Glor: “It’s been four months since the start of sequestration, mandatory federal budget cuts. Apart from the fight over furloughs for airport traffic controllers, we haven’t heard much about the impact elsewhere. With about one million children enrolled in Head Start programs, some parents say that should change....”
Correspondent Magalie Laguerre-Wilkinson: “Ouida Toutebon runs Head Start here [in Haverstraw, New York]. She’s had to cancel the summer program that serves 300 children entering kindergarten this fall.”
Ouida Toutebon: “This program is so meaningful, to cut it is almost cruel.”
— CBS Evening News, June 16.
“We’ve put a spotlight on the people and the organizations taking the brunt of this arbitrary, across-the-board, spending cuts known as sequester. It’s still going on, by the way. And as you might imagine, it’s the most vulnerable among us taking the hits....Let’s talk turkey, Kim [Gandy]. How do you fight this? Who do you have to talk to?...How do you get the members of Congress to say, ‘Look, some women are going to die this week because these shelters are closing their doors to them’?”
— Host Chris Matthews on MSNBC’s Hardball, June 10, talking about funding programs for abused women.
Don’t Worry — Obama’s IRS Scandal Just a “Big Nothing Burger”
“Coming up, what’s really happening at the IRS office out there in Cincinnati? That old story’s getting new again. To hear some Republicans tell it, President Obama used the office to target his political enemies. But the man in charge of dealing with those non-profit groups for the IRS says now that the White House had nothing to do with it. And by the way, the guy’s a conservative Republican. He’s the guy that was calling the shots. So it could be this whole thing was a big nothing burger.”
— Chris Matthews teasing an upcoming item on MSNBC’s Hardball, June 10.
Pointless to Hold Obama Accountable for Scandals
“You would think they [Republicans] may have learned something from their experience in the Clinton years where — you know what? — going after scandals and, you know, in that case, it was all the way to impeachment, really did nothing to harm President Clinton’s numbers, in fact. They just kept getting higher and higher, and the economy was part of that, but also this witch hunt was another part of it....Republicans have to get onto a position that voters like and stop personalizing it, because otherwise they’re going to face a disaster in 2016, and they’ll lose their third in a row.”
— MSNBC.com executive editor Richard Wolffe on MSNBC’s PoliticsNation, June 6.
Making Excuses for Obama’s Lackluster Berlin Speech
“I think a lot of the problem he had today was the late afternoon sun in Berlin ruined his use of the teleprompter, and so his usual dramatic windup was ruined. I think he was really struggling with the text there.”
— Chris Matthews during live coverage on MSNBC’s The Daily Rundown June 19.
“The way this was all put together, you have this incredible setting, this incredible backdrop, and then you had that very distracting glass and you could just see that the President himself wasn’t feeding off of the crowd. And I think, look, part of it, it was hot. Those folks were out there for two and a half hours. Trust me, I was along there with them. And so, it can sap your energy a little bit, and I just wonder if that added a little bit to this.”
— NBC White House correspondent Chuck Todd on MSNBC’s Andrea Mitchell Reports, June 19.
Insisting Obama Is Really “Conservative”...
“The reason I call the book The Center Holds is, you know, not just ObamaCare, but he has defended the American social contract against an assault by the American Right....So he sees himself as the guardian of that, and in that sense a small-c conservative President who’s protecting those achievements.”
— Ex-Newsweek senior editor and author Jonathan Alter on PBS’s Charlie Rose, June 5.
...& Romney Would Have Made Things “So Much Worse”
“If Mitt Romney were in charge now, the sequester would look like patty cake. There were people in that party who were willing to make cuts that were three or four times as great as what we’re seeing right now in the sequester. Not cutting programs — eliminating them entirely, shredding the American social contract....If Romney and Ryan had been elected, things would be so much worse.”
— Alter on MSNBC’s PoliticsNation, June 7.
More Nannying from Bloomberg = “A Great Idea”
Co-host Matt Lauer: “He [Mayor Michael Bloomberg] wants New Yorkers to start separating food items from their garbage for composting. That’s right, he wants you to take your food scraps, put them in a container about the size of a picnic basket in your home, hold them for a few days and then later put them in some larger dispensal — or disposal items or containers out on the sidewalk....”
Al Roker: “Yeah, I think it’s a great idea.”
Savannah Guthrie: “I was gonna say, I mean, honestly-”
Natalie Morales: “It’s good for the environment and composting is — I’ve done it in the past. It’s really, it’s good.”
Lauer: “And by the way, other cities have tried this with great success.”
— NBC’s Today, June 17.
Backing Bloomberg’s Intrusive Laws: “There Should Be a Nanny State”
“What do you make of Mayor Bloomberg in New York banning the sugary drinks over 16 ounces?...Isn’t he right to be a nanny?...I think there’s often a time when there should be a nanny state. Yes, people need nannying....and they demonstrably improve the quality of life of people.”
— Host Piers Morgan to left-wing filmmaker and new CNN host Morgan Spurlock on Piers Morgan Tonight, June 17.
The Mother of All Suck-Up Interviews
“When we talk about women’s participation and women’s involvement in the world, I must bring up the fact that your mother [Hillary Clinton] — she graced us all. Everyone is thrilled that she is now on Twitter. She has, in my humble opinion, one of the best Twitter bios on the Twittersphere.”
“This is, I think, the fifth anniversary of your mother’s ‘shattering the glass ceiling’ speech. Do you think we need — and I’m not naming names — do you think we need a woman in the White House? Do you think America needs to sort of achieve that milestone, being the leader in the globe that we are today?”
— Two of MSNBC host Alex Wagner’s questions for Chelsea Clinton on the June 14 edition of Now with Alex Wagner.
“The Man Most Responsible for Our Decline” = Ronald Reagan
“This has become a kind of conventional wisdom — that the Republican Party has gone so far right, Reagan himself wouldn’t fit in....Ronald Reagan was an anti-government, union-busting, race-baiting, anti-abortion, anti-gay, anti-intellectual, who cut rich people’s taxes in half, had an incurable case for the military-industrial complex, and said Medicare was socialism that would destroy our freedom. Sounds to me like he would fit in just fine....Both sides really should stop pretending he was something other than the man most responsible for our decline.”
— Bill Maher on HBO’s Real Time, June 7.
PUBLISHER: L. Brent Bozell III
EDITORS: Brent H. Baker, Rich Noyes, Tim Graham
DEPUTY RESEARCH DIRECTOR: Geoffrey Dickens
NEWS ANALYSTS: Scott Whitlock, Brad Wilmouth, Matthew Balan, Kyle Drennen and Matt Hadro
INTERNS: Jeffrey Meyer, Matt Vespa, Paul Bremmer, Andrew Lautz and Nathan Roush