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Hack List No. 2: The Washington Post

Thu, 20 Dec 2012 20:25:00 +0000

This year, my annual list of the worst of political media highlights not just individuals, but the institutions that enable those individuals. The 2012 Hack List will be counting down the 10 media outlets that are hurting America over the next two days -- stay tuned! (Previous Hack List entries here, here and here.)

The Washington Post is the hometown paper of the city that everyone in America hates, usually for good reason. And the things Americans hate about that city and the people who work there are reflected in its pages.

The newspaper itself is an ever smaller and more starved-looking thing. The people running it used to actually compete with the New York Times, for readers and writers and national influence. Now they can't really decide if they even want to try.

George Will and Mary Matalin attack Paul Krugman on “This Week”

Mon, 10 Dec 2012 01:12:00 +0000

The clubby tone of the Sunday show roundtable was upended on "This Week" this morning when conservatives George Will and Mary Matalin made unusually personal attacks on New York Times columnist Paul Krugman.

Matalin suggested Krugman was more of a polemicist than an economist. And Will charged him with being unwilling to accept competing arguments.

Krugman asserted that Republicans have put nothing on the table to back up their talk about revenue, tax reform and entitlement cuts, calling their negotiating posture nothing but "big talk."

"So how is the president supposed to negotiate with people who say, "Here's my demands. By the way, I can't give you any specifics. Just make me happy," Krugman asked.

Matalin called Krugman "completely mendacious" and insisted that "Republicans have offered in theory and in specificity, for instance, to raise revenues, capping various deductions, not eliminating, but capping them, which the CBO says would raise $1.7 trillion over 10 years. They've been very specific."

The biggest losers (pundit edition)

Wed, 07 Nov 2012 15:00:00 +0000

Barack Obama and Mitt Romney weren’t the only ones with something on the line last night -- America’s greatest treasures, its political pundits and talking heads, had their reputations at stake as they waited to find out if their predictions and prognostications turned out to come true. Unfortunately for a lot of them, especially for many on the right side of the political spectrum, things didn’t go so well. But fortunately for them, being good at predicting things seems to not be a requirement of being a paid political predictor, so their jobs are probably safe. Here’s your guide to fine men and women of the Sunday shows and the opinion section who will likely see zero negative impact for their false prophecies.

Mitt Romney is going to win!

This was, of course, the biggest class of pundit losers, and includes almost every conservative Tweeter, blogger, columnist, and TV analyst. Almost all, en masse and despite the polls, predicted a Romney win. And what do these pundits know that the polls don't? Wall Street Journal columnist Peggy Noonan explained, “All the vibrations are right.” How so? Romney is “stealing” the thing while “we’re not really noticing because we’re too busy looking at data." Her evidence: “yard signs” (there were apparently more for Romney than Obama), big Romney rallies, and “a person who is helping [Romney]” told her.

This clip of Ann Coulter will make you cringe

Wed, 03 Oct 2012 16:01:00 +0000

She-devil and animatronic brillo pad Ann Coulter debated civil rights activist Kevin Powell over her new book on liberal racism at last night's "Joy Behar: Say Anything!" It got real pretty quickly:

h/t Mediaite