Remember JournoList? That email list consisting of various liberal MSM members who conspired to get a certain message across to readers and/or viewers? That list is now supposedly defunct but you have to wonder, especially when news of Chuck Schumer’s remarks during a conference call are all but ignored by the MSM. He was overheard briefing fellow Democrat lawmakers how to belittle and denigrate conservatives.
Jennifer Steinhauer from the Times was one of the few to write a few syllables on it:
After thanking his colleagues — Barbara Boxer of California, Benjamin L. Cardin of Maryland, Thomas R. Carper of Delaware and Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut — for doing the budget bidding for the Senate Democrats, who are facing off against the House Republicans over how to cut spending for the rest of the fiscal year, Mr. Schumer told them to portray John A. Boehner of Ohio, the speaker of the House, as painted into a box by the Tea Party, and to decry the spending cuts that he wants as extreme. “I always use the word extreme,” Mr. Schumer said. “That is what the caucus instructed me to use this week.”
And use it they did:
“We are urging Mr. Boehner to abandon the extreme right wing,” said Ms. Boxer
…Mr. Carper continued with the theme, referring to some House Republicans’ “right-wing extremist friends.” Mr. Cardin decried Mr. Boehner’s giving into “extremes of his party.” Mr. Blumenthal closed by speaking of the “relatively small extreme group of ideologues” who are “an anchor” dragging down the budget negotiation process.
Somehow, someway, this isn’t news to our unbiased MSM:
Tuesday’s nightly newscasts on NBC, ABC and CBS all skipped the story. On Wednesday, Good Morning America, Today and Early Show did the same.
But they found other more important news to cover:
…ABC program did cover breast-feeding dolls and whether it’s “too much too soon.”
CBS’s Early Show featured a former girlfriend of the late JFK Jr. She informed viewers that kissing him was “magical.”
NBC’s Today covered a conversation between two babbling babies.
Amazing how this happens eh? News of Boehner uttering something like that would be blasted from one end of the media spectrum to another but not so much when its uttered from someone, and some party, they root for.
I mean he is basically TELLING the other members what to say…don’t answer the question, just spin it somehow with “tea party” and “extreme” in the same sentence.
I have a feeling that when Marco Rubio wrote:
…demagoguery is the last refuge of the spineless politician willing to do anything to win the next election.
He was picturing Chuck Schumer.
But why were these marching orders given to Schumer anyways? Andrew Stiles has some thoughts:
[Schumer] has been unrelenting in his badgering of House speaker John Boehner (R., Ohio), urging him to “abandon the Tea Party” and cut a deal with Democrats ever since 54 Republicans rejected a short-term spending resolution over the objections of GOP leadership. The only alternative, Schumer says, is a government shutdown.
Indeed, Schumer has also been the most outspoken rabble-rouser over the prospect of a government shutdown, or rather, in his view, Republicans’ determination to bring one about.
…GOP leaders have repeatedly stated their opposition to a government shutdown, and more importantly, their actions have clearly confirmed this position. But Schumer has continued to insist otherwise until only recently. Now he has taken to accusing “extreme elements” within the caucus, namely the Tea Party, of actively pursuing a shutdown to the detriment of a “good and honest man” (Boehner). One Republican source tells National Review Online that it is the Democrats who would like nothing more than to see the government shut down. “It’s practically their only strategy at this point,” the source says. “They refuse to cut spending and they think a shutdown would benefit them politically by turning the public against Republicans.”
These suspicions, harbored by many on the right, were seemingly confirmed on Tuesday by the extraordinarily candid remarks of Howard Dean, former chairman of the Democratic National Committee, at a conference panel organized by National Journal. Dean said that if he were still head of the DNC, he would be “quietly rooting” for a government shutdown, because of the political damage it would likely inflict on Republicans. “From a partisan point of view, I think it would be the best thing in the world to have a shutdown,” Dean said.
And right on cue comes the news that Democrats and Republicans may have come to a budget deal, replete with a whole 33 billion in cuts, and some kind of nuclear option written in for “next year”
Before you throw up your hands and decide that it’s third-party time, though, here’s a bit of breaking news from The Hill: “Senate Republicans will finally unveil their balanced budget amendment tomorrow, this time with leadership (I.e., McConnell) on board.” That’s the way they’re going to sell this to Republican voters, I guess — by accepting a deal on this year’s budget and then going nuclear on the next, replete with entitlement reform and a BBA.
Americans have built the single greatest nation in all of human history. But America’s exceptionalism was not preordained. Every generation has had to confront and solve serious challenges and, because they did, each has left the next better off. Until now.
Our generation’s greatest challenge is an economy that isn’t growing, alongside a national debt that is. If we fail to confront this, our children will be the first Americans ever to inherit a country worse off than the one their parents were given.
…In a few weeks, we will once again reach our legal limit for borrowing, the so-called debt ceiling. The president and others want to raise this limit. They say it is the mature, responsible thing to do.
In fact, it’s nothing more than putting off the tough decisions until after the next election. We cannot afford to continue waiting. This may be our last chance to force Washington to tackle the central economic issue of our time.
“Raising America’s debt limit is a sign of leadership failure.” So said then-Sen. Obama in 2006, when he voted against raising the debt ceiling by less than $800 billion to a new limit of $8.965 trillion. As America’s debt now approaches its current $14.29 trillion limit, we are witnessing leadership failure of epic proportions.
I will vote to defeat an increase in the debt limit unless it is the last one we ever authorize and is accompanied by a plan for fundamental tax reform, an overhaul of our regulatory structure, a cut to discretionary spending, a balanced-budget amendment, and reforms to save Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.
…Whether they admit it or not, everyone in Washington knows how to solve these problems. What is missing is the political will to do it. I ran for the U.S. Senate because I want my children to inherit what I inherited: the greatest nation in human history. It’s not too late. The 21st century can also be the American Century. Our people are ready. Now it’s time for their leaders to join them.
Conservatives understand the MSM is against us. They will ignore a smoking gun soundbite from a Democrat like Schumer but go apes**t over a similar one from a Republican. But it worries me that they can’t hold tough on a small pittance of a budget cut. How in the world do they expect us to believe they will hold tough to a nuclear option next year? Yes, I understand they are stuck in between a rock and a hard place but the demagoguery from the left will still be there next year. The MSM will still be in the pocket of the Democrats. And Schumer will still be instructing Democrats what to think so how does “wait till next year” make sense?
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