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From The Situation Room Oct. 8, 2009. Tony Blankley tries to rationalize the NRCC's sexist statement about Nancy Pelosi saying 'taxpayers can only hope McChrystal is able to put her in her place'. In Tony Blankley's world, the media doesn't pay any attention to Republicans unless they're behaving badly. Really Tony? You're joking right? Because I sure as hell don't see any shortage of Republicans getting face time in the media no matter how they're behaving. The media has had so many 'exclusive' interviews with John McCain since he lost the presidential election I'd almost swear they didn't realize who won. I can't get the man off of my television screen.

And I think Tony needs to take a look at this from the good folks over at Think Progress with a snapshot of the media coverage of Republicans from back in January-- REPORT: GOP Lawmakers Outnumber Democratic Lawmakers 2 To 1 In Stimulus Debate On Cable News

As Media Matters has documented, during the Bush administration, the media consistently allowed conservatives to dominate their shows, booking them as guests far more often than progressives. The rationale was that Republicans were “in power.”

It appears that old habits die hard. Even though President Obama and his team are in control of the executive branch and Democrats are in the majority in Congress, the cable networks are still turning more often to Republicans and allowing them to set the agenda on major issues, most recently on the debate over the economic recovery package.

On Sunday, conservatives began an all-out assault on President Obama’s economic recovery plan, with House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH) and Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) both announcing that they would vote against the plan as it stood. Despite Obama’s efforts at good faith outreach, congressional conservatives have continued to attack the stimulus plan with a series of false and disingenuous arguments.

The media have been aiding their efforts. In a new analysis, ThinkProgress has found that the five cable news networks — CNN, MSNBC, Fox News, Fox Business and CNBC — have hosted more Republican lawmakers to discuss the plan than Democrats by a 2 to 1 ratio this week.

Boy Tony, how can the Republicans ever manage to get their message out without making sexist remarks about Nancy Pelosi when the media ignores them like that?

And David Gergen tries to rewrite history pretending that St. Ronnie would never have behaved so badly. Two words David. Southern Strategy.

Transcript below the fold.

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From CNN Ensign says he did not breach ethics rules:

Embattled Republican Sen. John Ensign told CNN Tuesday he did not break Senate ethics rules by helping to secure a lobbying job for the husband of the woman he had an affair with.

"I think it's pretty clear. I said in the past, I recommended him for jobs just like I've recommended a lot of people," Ensign told CNN senior congressional correspondent Dana Bash and congressional producer Ted Barrett. "But we absolutely did nothing except for comply exactly with what the ethics laws and the ethics rules of the Senate state. We were very careful in everything that we did. You can see our statements on that."

The comments come four days after The New York Times reported the husband of the woman Ensign had a affair with, Doug Hampton, has since lobbied the Nevada senator on behalf of his clients. The New York Times also reported evidence that suggests Ensign played an active role in getting Hampton the lobbying position. Hampton, a former senior aide to Ensign, is barred by congressional ethics rules from lobbying his old boss for one year after leaving his post in the Senate.

While Republicans continue to distace themselves from the Senator, it appears he still may have one friend in Nevada--Harry Reid-- who continues to call the Ensign scandal a 'personal matter'. Time to end the 'gentlemen's agreement' Senator Reid.

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From CNN's The Situation. As Randi Kaye asks in her report, "Is Texas Governor Rick Perry, a Republican in a tough re- election fight, trying to cover up the execution of an innocent man on his watch?"

From TPM--Texas Governor Stymieing Panel Probing Flawed Death Penalty Case?:

Even by the standards of Texas's enthusiasm for state-sanctioned killing, this is pretty shocking...

A Texas scientific panel has been looking into possible missteps in a criminal investigation of a 1991 arson case which led to the execution of Cameron Todd Willingham. A recent New Yorker story about the case laid out compelling evidence that Willingham may well have been wrongly put to death.

The panel, the Texas Forensic Science Commission, was scheduled to hear today from a nationally recognized arson expert it had hired, Craig Beyler, who had last month released a report which called the original probe slipshod.

But on Wednesday, Texas governor Rick Perry abruptly removed three members of the commission. In their place, he appointed a new chair with a reputation as a hardline conservative prosecutor, who promptly canceled the hearing at which Beyler was to testify.

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As the TPM article points to, there is a lengthy piece on this at The New Yorker--Trial by Fire: Did Texas execute an innocent man?.

Transcript below the fold.

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As Media Matters has documented, the right wing has been after Kevin Jennings for some time now. Conservative media unleash anti-gay rhetoric in attacks on Jennings:

The latest target in the Glenn Beck-driven conservative media witch hunt for Obama administration "czars" is Office of Safe and Drug Free Schools director Kevin Jennings. In their attacks on Jennings, numerous conservative media figures have resorted to thinly veiled homophobic appeals to paint Jennings, who is gay, as a "radical" "gay activist" with an "agenda" of "promoting homosexuality in schools," and have misrepresented or distorted Jennings' previous comments about religion and tolerance.

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CNN's Jessica Yellin debunked some of those attacks on CNN's The Situation Room.

Transcript below the fold.

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Here's another portion of Michael Moore's interview with Wolf Blitzer from Sept. 24, 2009. Michael is exactly right about one thing here. You're not seeing the passion on the left in support of the President because he started from a compromised position instead of starting with single payer and compromising from there if need be. He is also correct that if, not when, the President ever came out for single payer, you would see massive amounts of people coming out and supporting him. You're not going to see that passion on the left for a watered down giveaway to the insurance industry.

BLITZER: That's what President Obama said back in 2003. But now he's backed away from that as president of the United States and he seems to be backing away even from the so-called public option, which would allow the government -- a government-run health insurance company to compete with the private insurance companies. Is this what you wanted?

MOORE: Well, here's the -- here's the problem with President Obama on the health insurance proposal. He's a nice guy. You know, I mean, really, I believe he came into the White House with an olive branch to the people on the other side of the aisle. He believed in bipartisanship. I mean you've got to give the guy credit. He really -- he did not come in wanting to fight. He came in saying, you know, we're all Americans here and we need to fix this and we need to put aside this partisan stuff.

The other side didn't want to put it aside. The other side wanted to fight him tooth and nail. And -- and as part of his nice guy thing, he -- he backs a half measure, a public option.

BLITZER: But that might not even...

MOORE: And we (INAUDIBLE)...

BLITZER: That might not even make the final bill that he signs.

MOORE: And that may not. Well, of course not, because any time you don't fight for the thing you want, any time that you start off compromising, you're never going to get what you want. He started off with a compromise position -- let the private insurance companies still sit at the table, have a public option. He should have started with what he truly believes in, what he believed in, what he said in 2003, a single payer, national health care system, like all other Western countries have. We should have the same thing.

I know he believes in that, but he was trying to reach out and say, you know what, I'm not just going to come in here and ram this, so I'm willing to work with you and listen to your concerns. They don't want to listen to him.

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From The Situation Room Sept. 24, 2009. Lady McCheney Matalin is still out there trying to say that George Bush's foreign policy made the world a safer place to live. What a completely ridiculous thing to say. Walk is what keeps peace in the world. No, "walk" is called starting wars Mary. Why CNN feels the need to continue to give this woman air time as though she has anything credible to say is beyond me.

BLITZER: Mary, let's talk a little bit about the substance, though. Do the folks and the leaders in Iran or North Korea or the Taliban for that matter or al Qaeda, do they fear President Obama?

MATLIN: Well, absolutely not. And what Paul just said is emblematic of how the Democrats think about foreign policy in general. That's demean our strongest friends our greatest allies, like the Australians, like the Polish, like the Czechs, like the central and eastern Europeans who are working so hard at democracy and just demean any kind of opinion.

Look, this is not some sort of partisan or right wing or Murdoch thought. Since the beginning of time the history of the world is that weakness invites provocation. And we have -- and talking is good and relationships are fine. But our allies need to know that they can rely on those relationships and that there will be consequences for the bad guys when the talk runs out and they're not doing the walk.

As for proliferation and chairing a U.N. committee, great. Oh, isn't that wonderful? It's the U.N. that wouldn't enforce 17 of its resolutions against Saddam in the first place, so big deal. He's chairing and talking in another instance.

But the proliferation security initiative of the Bush administration was responsible for quantum leaps in the reduction of proliferation and including the disarmament of Libya, the capture and detention...

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Michael Moore hits back at Wolf Blitzer for his question about "the charge that either has been made or will be made that (he) is being hypocritical". Blitzer seems to have a bit of trouble understanding that someone can be wealthy themselves and still care about the poor and as Moore notes, those two things don't have to be at odds with each other.

BLITZER: But let's talk about -- most people going to see this movie who don't like you are going to say, you know what? Michael Moore has done pretty well in this capitalist or free market system. You've become a fairly rich guy yourself.

MOORE: Well, first of all, Wolf, there's nobody that doesn't like me. I don't know who these people are.

BLITZER: There are a few.

(CROSSTALK)

MOORE: If you have a list of names...

(CROSSTALK)

BLITZER: A tiny number out there.

MOORE: Provide me with those names, and I will go to their homes and cook them dinner. And perhaps they will like me better.

(LAUGHTER)

MOORE: So, yes. Your point was, I have done well. Yes, for a documentary filmmaker, I have done very well.

BLITZER: You've done very well. And the allegations of...

(CROSSTALK)

BLITZER: ... you're being hypocritical.

(CROSSTALK)

BLITZER: Explain, because you're hearing a lot of that.

MOORE: Why am I against capitalism if I have done so well?

BLITZER: Right.

MOORE: Isn't the question better put -- and I'm not trying to do your job for you -- but wouldn't the question better be, gee, Mike, you have done so well. Why don't you just kick back at the lake and enjoy life? Why are you caring about all these people losing their health care and their jobs and all that? You're not losing yours?

I wonder if there was like a Wolf Blitzer like 200 years ago who asked Thomas Jefferson or John Adams or George Washington, hey, you know, you guys are wealthy landowners. You have benefited from the king's system. What are you complaining about? What is this revolt all about?

It's like, sometimes, people, even people who have actually had the good fortune and blessings in life to not have to struggle with worrying about their health care, whether or not it's going to be here tomorrow or the next week, sometimes, those people actually are willing to take great risks and create sacrifices for themselves, in the hopes that others will have it just as well.

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I agree with Jack Cafferty on DeLay's appearance on Dancing With the Stars.

Cafferty: Did you show that Tom DeLay video yet. That's just disturbing...

Blitzer: If you haven't seen it...

Cafferty: It's just disturbing. It's very disturbing.

Blitzer: It takes guts to do that.

Cafferty: It takes something. I'm not sure guts is it.

Blitzer: Wild thing, you make my heart sing.

Cafferty: When he goes to prison they can show that, like the dances and stuff to the general inmate population.

h/t TPM Muckraker

Cenk has the recap. Look at the score in the screenshot.

And here's the full episode if you want to watch it.

Part 1

Part 2

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From AC360 Sept. 10, 2009. While discussing Rep. Wilson's outburst during the President's speech, Tea Party oganizer Mark Williams says this about illegal immigrants receiving health care benefits:

WILLIAMS: Everybody seems to be leaving one very important thing out of this. And that is, the federal courts have spoken with regard to illegal immigrants or illegal aliens getting benefits, especially health benefits. We tried to bar them from doing that in California back in the '90s, and the federal courts slapped us down.

Even language specifically excluding them is not going to stand a court battle. So, whatever Obama believes -- and, for that matter, I don't even know what bill he was talking about. Does he have a proposal? Does he have a plan? What's he even talking about?

He and Roland Martin get into it in the above segment after the commercial break where Williams reiterates what he said about the courts, and Martin insists that there are no provisions for illegal immigrants to receive benefits in any of the proposed health care legislation.

Dave Neiwert gave me his slant on this:

Illegal immigrants entering an emergency room for treatment will be covered under any health-reform plan – because they are already. It’s a basic legal matter that emergency rooms cannot turn away anyone in need of emergency care. The courts have indeed decided this. The question is, does Mark Williams want it otherwise? Does he want emergency rooms deciding who lives and who dies depending on their ability to prove their citizenship? Does he want people to die on emergency-room doorsteps because they are undocumented?

Undocumented immigrants get no insurance benefits under the Obama plan, but the costs of their care will be covered under a more sane system. The taxpayers will wind up covering the costs, as they do now, but the costs should be less because the payment system will be more direct.

Those are the questions Roland Martin or anyone on that panel should have been asking Williams, but I guess that's expecting too much of CNN. I also would have liked for one of them to ask Williams if he thinks going to an emergency room is the equivalent of having health care coverage as I've heard one too many Republican member of Congress assert.

BLITZER: Let's get back to our panel talking strategy on health care reform and Congressman Joe Wilson's outburst, CNN's Candy Crowley joining us, political contributor Roland Martin, and Tea Party Express organizer Mark Williams.

We're going to get what Dana just reported. But, Mark, I want to give you a chance to respond to what Roland said, that John McCain himself agrees with the president that nothing in this legislation would give illegal immigrants in the United States the opportunity to gain from this proposed legislation.

WILLIAMS: Well, Wolf, it doesn't have to, because the courts have already spoken on. And that they will speak again if -- if -- if it happens.

But this bitterness that supposedly is directed toward Obama, if I have learned anything in my work with OurCountryPAC.org, it's that it's not bitterness. It's outrage at the socialist policies being embraced by this administration.

MARTIN: Nonsense. It's bitterness.

WILLIAMS: And that goes -- that goes double for W., by the way.

And, as far as the Republican Party goes, it's no surprise to any of us working stiffs out here that they allow themselves to be a doormat for what is happening in Washington, D.C.

The fact of the matter is, the Republican Party, as a whole, is absent without leave from this debate. And our representatives, our elected representatives, are falling down on the job of upholding and protecting the Constitution. And that's why the American people are rising.

That's why I had almost 10,000 people outside Chicago at our tea party the other day. People are sick and tired of being abused and then being called a mob of Nazis because they object to that.

BLITZER: All right.

WILLIAMS: We're the people who pay the bills.

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From Ted Kennedy's service at Arlington National Cemetary tonight, Cardinal McCarrick reads a letter that President Obama hand delivered to the Pope for him, and reads the Vatican's response as well. As Wolf Blitzer noted just after the service ended, it was known that the letter was sent to the Pope, but not what was in it, or that there was a response from the Pope before tonight.

Digby had this to say about it. All The Way To The End

Ted Kennedy "politicized" his own funeral, in his own words, written in a letter to the Pope and read by Cardinal McCarrick at Arlington National Cemetery:

I want you to know, your Holiness, that in my nearly 50 years of elective office I have done my best to champion the rights of the poor and open doors of economic opportunity. I've worked to welcome the immigrant, to fight discrimination and expand access to health care and education. I've opposed the death penalty and fought to end war. Those are the issues that have motivated me and have been the focus of my work as a United States Senator.

I also want you to know that even though I am ill, I am committed to do everything I can to get access to health care for everyone in my country. This has been the political cause of my life. I believe in a conscience protection for Catholics in the health field and will continue to advocate for it as my colleagues in the Senate and I work to develop an overall national policy that guarantees health care for everyone.

Go ahead. Wellstone that, wingnuts.

Sadly, I'm sure they will regardless of how ridiculous it makes them look. It seems nothing embarrasses them, so I don't know why this would be any different. They'll be calling Pope Benedict XVI a liberal commie before it's over.

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Rachel Maddow on the Republicans attempt at revisionist history that Ted Kennedy would have been all about compromising to the point of making it a lousy bill just to get something passed on health care reform.

Maddow: In other words if only Ted Kennedy were still here. If only he had a health care bill those Republicans say they would have voted for that. You know, ah, Ted Kennedy did have a health care bill. Senator Kennedy was chair of the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee which approved a health care reform package in July. It's called the Kennedy bill. And Senator Kennedy, helped write that bill. Senators Hatch, and McCain and Gregg, all voted against it. But the revisionist history goes even deeper. They aren't just saying they would have voted for a Kennedy health care bill, even though they had the chance and they didn't.

They're saying they would have voted for a Kennedy health care bill because Ted Kennedy would have compromised with them, because Ted Kennedy was all about making concessions to Republicans.

[.....]

Apparently in the history of Ted Kennedy's life and work as imagined by the GOP today Senator Kennedy was the great compromiser. Ready to water down health care reform in order to bring Republicans on board.

As Rachel notes, Kennedy was anything but that. And to add to Rachel's point, here's a little mash up of some of the "news" coverage from today calling for "Kennedy-like" bipartisanship.

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Later in her show Rachel gave some kudos to friend of the site Bob Cesca for his column at the HuffPo titled, Healthcare Reform Named After Ted Kennedy Must Not Suck. If there's one point to get across with all this yapping about what Senator Kennedy would have or would not have done to reform our health care system, I agree with Rachel that Bob's very simple, yet honest statement hits the nail on the head. Bipartisanship be damned if it means passing a lousy piece of legislation, and do not put Senator Kennedy's name on it if that's what we're going to end up with.

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Bobby Jindal continues to refuse to credit the stimulus package for Louisiana's economic recovery even though as Think Progress noted, he was happy to go around the state presenting jumbo sized checks which included money from those funds.

Gov. Bobby Jindal (R-LA) reemerged on the national stage yesterday, penning an op-ed in the Politico to slam efforts to reform health care and declaring the Economic Recovery Act a failure. Jindal declared the Recovery Act “a nearly trillion-dollar stimulus that has not stimulated.” However, less than 24 hours before Jindal published his op-ed, Jindal traveled to Anacoco, Louisiana to present a jumbo-sized check to residents of Vernon Parish. The funds included hundreds of thousands of dollars directly from the Recovery Act — at least $157,848 in Community Block Grant money authorized by the Recovery Act and $138,611 for Byrne/JAG job training programs created by the Recovery Act. Rather than credit the federal government or the Recovery Act he opposed, Jindal printed his own name on the corner of the massive check.

When asked about this on Blitzer's The Situation Room, Jindal refused to acknowledge that the stimulus package has been successful, and instead touted the use of the line item veto and said the stimulus money should have been temporary and targeted, and included more tax cuts. Blitzer didn't ask him about the jumbo sized checks he was using for photo ops.

I thought they weren't going to allow that to happen?

Sen. Charles Schumer (D-NY) has a message for Republican governors hemming and hawing over whether to accept the stimulus money Uncle Sam is mailing to each state: Take it or leave it.

Several GOP governors, including Louisiana's Bobby Jindal and South Carolina's Mark Sanford, have cited ideological differences with the stimulus spending and suggested they may take some parts of it and decline the rest. For Schumer, it's all or nothing.

"No one would dispute that these governors should be given the choice as to whether to accept the funds or not. But it should not be multiple choice," Schumer writes in a letter to Office of Management and Budget Director Peter Orszag.

So why is Jindal being allowed to use the line item veto to block part of the stimulus spending in Louisiana? Full transcript below the fold.

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Rudy needs a little more work on his be afraid, be very afraid shtick when it comes to health care reform. He obviously hasn't had quite enough time to recite Frank Luntz's talking points memo since he stumbled and stuttered through the interview. Blitzer actually tries calling him out for some of the talking points, but of course like a good little Villager, relents in the end and doesn't really challenge him.

BLITZER: Let's talk about health care reform, a critical issue right now for the country.

Republican Senator Jim DeMint from South Carolina, he made news this week when he said this: "If we're able to stop Obama on this it will be his Waterloo. It will break him."

He's not backing away from that either.

Do you agree with Senator DeMint?

GIULIANI: Well, I think it's a critical measure for a different reason. I don't see the politics of it as much as I do a tremendous impact that I think could have a destructive impact on the American system as we know it. I doubt that...

BLITZER: Because right now, 40 million or 45 million Americans don't have any health insurance.

GIULIANI: They don't, but about half of them could afford it if it was just more affordable. And what you don't want to do is ruin the system for the whatever million, 90 million, 100 million, 118 million.

BLITZER: Because President Obama keeps saying if you like what you have with the private insurance, if you like your doctor, you can keep exactly that. Nothing is going to change.

GIULIANI: Well, then what are all these commissioners that he's appointing that are going to determine health care outcomes? And the fact that you add 30 million, 40 million people to a government program that's already very large means the government will be the major player in health care. It already is pretty close...

(CROSSTALK)

BLITZER: He says that he wants one government option to compete with the private insurance companies.

GIULIANI: But that government option will be so big, it will just overwhelm all private insurance companies. If it's 40 million people, that conceivably could be part of it.

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Wolf Blitzer asks Fareed Zakaria if he agrees with former CIA agent Bob Baer's assessment that there has been a military coup by the revolutionary guard in Iran. Zakaria is not as willing to use the word coup, but does feel that there is some conflict between the clerics in Iran.

As Zakaria points out, the dynamics of those conflicts and the ease with which they can be blamed on American interference is exactly why it was wise for the Obama administration to be cautious with their rhetoric.

BLITZER: One Middle East expert says what we're seeing unfold in Iran right now isn't just a government crackdown, but an actual coup by the country's elite revolutionary guard.

ZAKARIA: Do you think it's pretty clear that the government has the ability to really consolidate power and crackdown on this?

BAER: Fareed, I'm quite sure there's been a military coup d'etat by the Islamic revolutionary corp in Tehran. They're taken over. And the fact that the Basij came out so quickly. They could have only done that on orders from the IRGC. The fact that Ahmadinejad's a former IRGC officer, he has the backing of senior officers. I think what we've seen is a military coup against the old clerical establishment.

BLITZER: Let's bring in Fareed Zakaria to join us now. Fareed, what do you think? You are an authority on this subject?

ZAKARIA: I think that Bob Baer is on to something. I'm not sure I would use the word coup, you know, that strongly, but there is no question what we're witnessing in Iran is the displacement of the old clerical establishment and the rise to power of some new clerics, but mostly a group of people who have much closer ties to the military, to the intelligence organizations, to the police, and to the Basij. So what you're seeing is a kind of consolidation of a pure military dictatorship, losing the trappings of the Islam and the ideology as much.

And by the way, this is very much part of Ahmadinejad's strategy when he is now attacking America. It is an attempt to consolidate power and to move beyond the debate about what's going on in Iran.

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