John Christoffersen's article for the Associated Press on Tuesday night highlighted the life woes of Faisal Shahzad, the suspect in the failed Times Square bombing plot, citing how "his life seemed to unravel." Christoffersen also noted Shazad's "outspokenness about [former] President George W. Bush and the Iraq war." The AP writer's article, titled " Times Square bombing suspect's life had unraveled ," first detailed the suspect's past "enviable life:" how he had become a U.S. citizen, his wealthy Pakistani family, his MBA, his "well-educated wife and two kids" and the house he owned "in a middle-class Connecticut suburb." Christoffersen then... continue reading
News today that the Washington Post Company has put the money-losing Newsweek up for sale reminded me of how during the last presidential campaign the "news" weekly repeatedly showcased their favorite candidate, Barack Obama, on the cover. Might such obvious blatant liberal advocacy, which anyone could see in the grocery store checkout line, help explain its decline in fortunes - in credibility followed by finances? By July of 2008, the Weekly Standard had dubbed the magazine "ObamaWeek" in creating this graphic of six covers which had already featured Obama's image. - Brent Baker is Vice President for Research and Publications... continue reading
Near the end of Wednesday's 10AM ET hour of live coverage on MSNBC, correspondent Luke Russert highlighted a report in Tuesday's New York Times about the number of African-Americans running for Congress as Republicans and observed: "these candidates are actually soliciting support from the tea party, a group that a lot of folks have claimed to be racist against African-Americans." In the Times article, Jennifer Steinhauer noted how the Republican hopefuls were "insisting that the racial dynamics of that movement have been overblown." She then cited evidence of the supposed racism of tea partiers: "Videos taken at some Tea Party... continue reading
Before "a disturbing change" of character in early 2009, arrested terrorist Faisal Shahzad, ABC's Chris Cuomo asserted Tuesday night, "seemed to be living the American dream" with a wife whose Facebook page "says she loves Everybody Loves Raymond and Friends" while "his signature seems to suggest optimism - it appears a heart is dotting the 'i' in Faisal" in a job application found outside his foreclosed house. ( larger jpg image ) How heartwarming. The "big question" for a befuddled Cuomo: "Why did someone, with apparently so much to live for, simply decide to throw it all away?" From the... continue reading
Chris Matthews, on Tuesday's Hardball, brought on two former CIA officials to discuss the latest terror attack, and the MSNBC host agreed with Tyler Drumheller that the most recent attacker was motivated by his house being foreclosed on and also agreed with Robert Baer who feared another attack could lead to "the Tea Party being strengthened," which could lead to "people blaming the White House for a situation it didn't create." Baer also hit Matthews' sweet spot of talking points when he went on to warn that the last successful terror attack "got us into a war in Iraq we... continue reading
The latest New York Times/CBS News poll focused on Arizona's tough new anti-illegal immigration law, summarized in a story by Randal Archibold and Megan Thee-Brenan that only made the top of the National section, not the usual front-page placement for a poll story. At least the print headline was strong: " Poll Finds Serious Concern Among Americans About Immigration ." Here's the lead, slanted toward the protesters point of view: The overwhelming majority of Americans think the country's immigration policies need to be seriously overhauled. And despite protests against Arizona's stringent new immigration enforcement law, a majority of Americans support... continue reading
Near the top of Tuesday's Dylan Ratigan Show on MSNBC, host Dylan Ratigan fretted over American Muslims being harassed in the wake of the failed Times Square bombing: "how do you deal with these types of crimes without resulting in racism, effectively, towards people of Pakistani or Middle Eastern descent?...is there not a natural backlash to this?" [Audio available here ] Ratigan asked that of Sofian Zakkout, the director of the American Muslim Association of North America, who replied: "We should calm down, it's - thank God nobody got hurt. We all know - and also I spoke today, this... continue reading
Tuesday marks the 40th anniversary of the Kent State shootings, and over the weekend Chris Matthews and his liberal cronies, on his syndicated The Chris Matthews Show, previewed the event as they reminisced about where they were at the time. Their memories reflect how anti-war they were back then and how that moment shaped them into the libs they are today as Matthews revealed the likes of his guests, like Newsweek's Howard Fineman and CNN's Gloria Borger, as students, were "editorializing against the war." In his teasers for the segment Matthews set the table by claiming Kent State marked the... continue reading
MSNBC host Contessa Brewer appeared on the liberal Stephanie Miller radio show on Tuesday and lamented the fact that the person arrested for the attempted Times Square bombing is a Pakistani American. She complained, "I get frustrated... There was part of me that was hoping this was not going to be anybody with ties to any kind of Islamic country ." [Audio available here .] Brewer continued, "...There are a lot of people who want to use terrorist intent to justify writing off people who believe in a certain way or come from certain countries or whose skin color is... continue reading
Filling in for host Bob Schieffer on Sunday's Face the Nation on CBS, Early Show co-host Harry Smith grilled former Republican Congressman J.D. Hayworth on Arizona's new immigration law: "Some people would contend that this law in Arizona is racist in nature. Some have equated it even with Jews having to carry identification during Nazi Germany. How do you respond to that?" [Audio available here ] Hayworth shot down the absurd comparison: "That is overblown rhetoric. And it's a tool that's been used before....what's going on is a deliberate distortion to move this from a question of enforcement to one... continue reading