Newsbusters

No one would call Kasie Hunt a conservative. But as the host of CNN This Morning, Hunt did regularly include actual Republicans, most often Brad Todd or Matt Gorman, on her panels. 

If not MAGA per se, Todd and Gorman are solidly mainstream GOP, and regularly, and ably, defended Republican and Trump administration positions. 

But one week ago today, Audie Cornish replaced Hunt as host of CNN This Morning. And–poof!–Trump-friendly Republicans have virtually disappeared from the show.

Today marked the fifth episode of CNN This Morning with Cornish at the helm. Let’s review the panels Audie has assembled, identifying any Republicans or conservatives.

Cornish set the new tone with her debut show on March 3rd. No Republican on the panel. Jonah Goldberg was present. And while Jonah has been an authentic conservative intellectual, he has been strongly critical of Trump, as is reflected in The Dispatch, of which he is co-founder. He’s brought on CNN to attack Trump.

On March 4th, not even a nominal Republican or a conservative.

On March 5th, Cornish did grant a spot to her first Republican, Kristen Soltis Anderson. Anderson is a pollster, not typically an opinioniator. And while she is not a Never-Trumper, neither is she expected to be a defender of the president.

On March 6th, Cornish created an all-female panel with no Republican or conservative in sight.

March 7th was once again Republican-free. Michael Warren, a former CNN reporter and current editor of the aforementioned Trump-unfriendly Dispatch was on the panel. Warren also worked at Bill Kristol’s Weekly Standard, but he’s followed Kristol into CNN-pleasing territory.

Which brings us to today. Doug Heye was on the panel. And while a Republican, Doug is anything but a Trump fan. In 2016, he announced that he would not vote for Trump if he won the nomination, denouncing him as “a charlatan posing as a conservative — and a dangerous demagogue.” During the 2024 campaign, Doug appeared on an Anderson Cooper segment in support of the notion that Trump lied when he dared to criticize the Biden administration’s response to Hurricane Helene in western North Carolina.

In contrast with the absence of Trump-friendly panelists, Cornish has peopled her panels with a number of former Biden administration officials, all too happy to tear into Trump.

Cornish is a former co-host of All Things Considered. Like they say, you can take the journalist out of NPR. But you can’t take the NPR out of the journalist!

C’mon Audie. Seventy-seven million Americans voted for Trump. How about inviting onto CNN This Morning panelists who firmly reflect their voices? Your show would be all the more interesting and entertaining for it!

CBS Sunday Morning glowingly promoted a Broadway play about a controversial Cuban band, without once mentioning the word communism, and barely mentioning the Cuban Revolution. Its report promoting “Buena Vista Social Club” should be viewed as no less than softcore communist propaganda.

Watch this eye-popping segment towards the end of the report:

MARTHA TEICHNER: Brought to life on a Broadway stage: the old songs, as they were played in the 1940s and ’50s at the actual Buena Vista Social Club, a members-only Havana nightclub for working-class black Cubans. It was shut down after Castro came to power in 1959. The events of the Cuban Revolution lurk at the edges of the show.

ACTOR: It’s not your fault the world made us take sides. Until one day, there were only two types of Cubans. Those who stayed and those who left. 

TEICHNER: Playing yesterday’s Cuban music on Broadway, some of today’s finest Cuban musicians. Most of whom now live outside Cuba. Because making a living there is tough.

Correspondent Martha Teichner never explains WHY making a living in Cuba might be tough. Such explanations, perhaps, might soil the premise of the report, which is to glamorize the regime-comfortable band as the semi-biographical play hits Broadway proper. Or perhaps such an omission is intended in order to grant viewers permission not to dwell on such unpleasantries as the murderous regime that has held Cuba in its iron grip for 66 years and whose cancer has metastasized throughout this hemisphere. Either way, it is disgusting.

Although it is sanitized out of CBS’s report, the Castro regime does indeed loom over Buena Vista Social Club. From Samuel Leiter’s review on theaterlife dot com:

One central conflict is between Young Omara (Kenya Browne) and her sister Haydee (Danaya Esperanza), with whom, in 1956, she shares an increasingly successful act performing for tourists at the Tropicana Hotel. When Cuba’s troubles heat up, Haydee decides to flee for the USA, but Omara, who wants only to “sing for our people,” can’t bring herself to do so. 

Partly that’s because of her relationship to a talented Black performer, Ibrahim (1956: Olly Sholotan; 1996: Mel Semé), with whom she chooses to perform at a déclassé, non-discriminatory joint called the Buena Vista Social Club. Racial issues in the music business, however, prevent them from continuing their budding partnership.

Talented individuals who stay “for the people” rather than flee communist revolution for personal freedom (see Cruz, Celia) are often lionized and elevated by the regimes.

Consider that the 2001 Latin Grammys were moved from Miami to Los Angeles due to the Cuban exile community protesting the nominations and potential attendance of Buena Vista Social Club singers. This change in venue was trumpeted by the Castro regime as a victory, on the heels of Elián González getting sent back to Cuba.

In 2015, Buena Vista Social Club were invited to perform at the Obama White House for Hispanic Heritage Month, despite their appearing to have recorded a version of what could be most charitably described as an elegy to murderous homophobe Ernesto “Che” Guevara. When you click on the Babalu Blog item, note the picture of the heroine of the play, getting her hand kissed by Raul Castro as she performs for him and Venezuelan tyrant Hugo Chavez. For what it’s worth, none of this made it to Jim Acosta’s writeup on the BVSC-White House booking.   

CBS’s whitewashing of history and syrupy treatment of communist-adjacent elites might play well for liberal theater kids, but reeks of communist propaganda to the rest of us, especially those of us who understand that our hemisphere will not be truly free until the Castroite cancer is cut from Cuba.

Click “expand” to view the full transcript of the aforementioned report, as aired on CBS Sunday Morning on March 9th, 2025:

MO ROCCA: Martha Teichner this morning is taking us on a colorful journey to Old Havana for a preview of the new Broadway musical Buena Vista Social Club.

MARTHA TEICHNER: Remember Buena Vista Social Club the album? Even if you don’t, now there’s Buena Vista Social Club, the musical. An exuberant blast from the past. Old Cuban music for a new audience. The Broadway version is a stand-in for the city’s corroded grandeur and for the studio where in 1996, a group of old, mostly forgotten Cuban musicians recorded the album.

ACTOR: What follows is the story of a band, not ours, though we will do our best. Some of what follows is true. Some of it only feels true.

TEICHNER: The true part: the real person this actor is playing: Juan de Marcos González. Look. There he is during rehearsals. Juan de Marcos had already located and brought together the old musicians before music producers Ry Cooder and Nick Gold showed up in Havana. When their plan to make an album pairing Cuban and west African performers fell through, they went with plan B and recorded with the group Juan de Marcos had assembled.

JUAN DE MARCOS GONZALEZ: I was so happy. Because they were my idols. You know, I grew up listening to their music. And then, suddenly, I was the band leader.

TEICHNER: Did any of the people involved, including you, have any idea that what became “Buena Vista Social Club” would be something big?

GONZALEZ: No. They became pop stars. It was like unbelievable fame.

TEICHNER: The unexpected and irresistible phenomenon that resulted is the subject of the Oscar-nominated Wim Wenders 1999 documentary.

JUDY CANTOR-NAVAS: Well, it was just ubiquitous. I mean, you would hear this music everywhere.

TEICHNER: Music journalist Judy Cantor-Navas is a Substack contributor, and the author of Cuba on Record.

CANTOR-NAVAS: To say that, yes, we’re listening to this old Cuban music that is suddenly selling millions of albums seemed like something that was unlikely.

TEICHNER: Why do you think people love the music so much?

CANTOR-NAVAS: I think not only this, but Cuban music has really appealed to so many different kinds of people. They say it has the perfect combination of the Afro-Cuban rhythms and the Spanish melodies that came together in Cuba. And it’s just this very infectious music that, like, gets in your soul.

TEICHNER: It wasn’t just the music they loved. It was who the musicians were. The improbable last act of their careers. The album won a Grammy, and has sold more than 8 million copies worldwide.

GONZALEZ: And they were so happy, you know, because they came back to the stage. Because if you are a musician and you are an artist, you are always an artist. And even when you are retired, you have this small candle in your heart. 

TEICHNER: Omara Portuondo was 67. Ibrahim Ferrer was 70. Other band members were as old as 90. They began touring the world, even singing to me for a Sunday Morning story 25 years ago. “I still have to pinch myself to make sure I’m not asleep and dreaming,” Ferrer says. I never thought I’d have so much success.

The play tells the imagined origin story of the musicians, of their careers, their personal struggles.

ACTOR: But I know how the story goes.

TEICHNER: With hints of romance. Decades before their fame late in life.

ACTRESS: What’s this place called?

ACTOR: The Buena Vista Social Club.

MARCO RAMIREZ: I’m Cuban American. I was born and raised in Miami. But my parents and my family is Cuban. And so for me, what brought me to this was the music. It was music I was raised around my entire life.

TEICHNER: Marco Ramirez wrote the Broadway show. He was 14 when the album came out.

MARCO RAMIREZ: There was a moment of intense pride- of us realizing that the world cared about our music and that these songs that I was used to hearing on my grandfather’s little yellow Sony boombox over the washing machine, these were songs that suddenly the world cared about. That meant everything to me.

ACTOR: I guess I just dreamed one day that with the right record, we might remind the world that Mozart has got nothing on us.

SAHIM ALI: And I just was obsessed with this album. I kept listening to it on repeat. Something about the lyrics spoke to me. I learned the lyrics without knowing what I was talking about. Because Swahili is my first language.

TEICHNER: This was in Kenya where Sahim Ali, the director of the show, grew up. His father, an airline pilot, brought the album home.

AKI: I knew nothing about their stories. The first time I knew about the stories was reading Marcos’ script. That’s what excited me about this musical. People are going to know about them now in a way that young people like me never had a chance to.

TEICHNER: Brought to life on a Broadway stage: the old songs, as they were played in the 1940s and ’50s at the actual Buena Vista Social Club, a members-only Havana nightclub for working-class black Cubans. It was shut down after Castro came to power in 1959. The events of the Cuban Revolution lurk at the edges of the show.

ACTOR: It’s not your fault the world made us take sides. Until one day, there were only two types of Cubans. Those who stayed and those who left. 

TEICHNER: Playing yesterday’s Cuban music on Broadway, some of today’s finest Cuban musicians. Most of whom now live outside Cuba. Because making a living there is tough.

GONZALEZ: The people are going to see the real Cuba. They are going to get a piece of our country when they attend the musical. We have nothing in our country. We don’t have oil, we don’t have gold but we have the music, beautiful ladies, good coffee, the best cigars and best rum. And the best music. Which is the most important thing like food for us.

TEICHNER: Served up on Broadway, a feast.

 

California Senator Adam Schiff was a darling of the Sunday show circuit when he had a Russia Hoax to peddle. When asked about an actual issue that is really happening, though, Schiff demurred and instead pivoted to talking points.

Watch the exchange, which ended Schiff’s interview with ABC’s Jon Karl: 

SHIFTY: Sen. Adam Schiff (D-CA) punts on men playing in women’s sports when asked by ABC’s Jon Karl, pivots to lament that the issue distracts from Dem messaging on the economy
JON KARL: I mean, I guess, first, what would you think about Newsom sitting down with Charlie Kirk?… pic.twitter.com/txvoU6uNjC
— Jorge Bonilla (@BonillaJL) March 9, 2025

JON KARL: I mean, I guess, first, what would you think about Newsom sitting down with Charlie Kirk? But more importantly, do you think — do you agree with those in your party who say it is time for Democrats to have a different approach to transgender issues?

ADAM SCHIFF: Well, first of all, I agree that we should be broadening our reach and talking to people we haven’t been talking to. I’m not sure that I would start with Charlie Kirk. But I also think, as I was mentioning earlier, that we need to keep the focus on what matters most to the American people, and that is the economy. We need to be talking to people about how we’re going to improve their quality of life, and we can make sure that if they’re working hard, they’re earning a good living, to the degree that we get after — we get away from focusing on those things I think it’s a mistake.

In terms of the particular issue that the governor was talking about — look, I played in sports. Our kids played in sports. I want all young people to have the experience of playing in sports, every young person. And I want those sports to be fair. I want those sports to be safe, and I have confidence that local schools and local communities can make those decisions without the federal government making them for them.

(CROSSTALK)

KARL: But is he right on that? Is — is he right on that?

SCHIFF: I think to the degree — to — well, to the degree though, I think as a as a political matter, that we remove the focus from where most Americans are concerned and that is they’re concerned about their ability to provide for their family. I think to degree that we get away from that, that’s a mistake.

KARL: OK. All right. Senator Schiff, thank you very much for joining us on “This Week.”

The exchange, in itself, shows how much the discourse has evolved on the trans issue- to the point that Jon Karl addresses it in a non-ironic manner…with a DEMOCRAT. It wasn’t that long ago that Karl was annihilated by then-Senator JD Vance over his glib dismissal of legitimate concerns over Minnesota’s “trans refuge” law (click “expand” to view transcript):

ABC THIS WEEK

8/11/24

9:16 AM

JON KARL: And finally before you go, we commit to this race to kind of sticking to the facts? I mean, I heard Donald Trump give this speech in Montana he just gave, and he said that Tim Walz has signed a letter letting the state kidnap children to change their gender, that- allowing pedophiles to claim, you know, I mean, to be exempt from crimes. This is not true. It’s not remotely true.

VANCE: What President Trump said, and I haven’t watched the whole rally, but…

KARL: What he said was not true.

VANCE: What President Trump said, Jon, is that Tim Walz has supported taking children from their parents if the parents don’t consent to gender reassignment. That is crazy. And, by the way, Tim Walz gets on his high horse about “mind your own damn business.” One way of minding your own damn business, Jon, is to not try to take my children away from me if I have different moral views than you.

KARL: He has not signed a law into the state to kidnap children…

VANCE: They have…

KARL: …to change their identity

VANCE: What I just described to you, I would describe as kidnapping, Jon.

KARL: That’s crazy.

VANCE: He has absolutely done this stuff… It’s not crazy, Jon. C’mon.

KARL: It’s not what he signed.

VANCE: You should not- you should not be able to take people’s children away from them…

KARL: And that’s not what he’s proposed.

VANCE: If you disagree with decisions about gender reassignment- yes he has, proposed that, Jon. He absolutely has. Now, here’s the more important thing, Jon. Why aren’t we talking about inflation? Why aren’t we talking about the fact that groceries are unaffordable thanks to Kamala Harris’ policies and so is housing? We’ve talked a little bit about the border. Why aren’t we talking about the fact that the entire world is on fire because of Kamala Harris’ foreign policy? She’s just asleep at the wheel. We have a set of plans. You talk about sticking to the facts. Donald Trump and I have a set of plans…

KARL: (unint)

VANCE: …to lower the costs of housing and food. To bring peace back to the world with American leadership. That is all that we want to do, and I think it’s telling that the Harris Administration is focused so much on these side issues instead of on the real substance…

KARL: I mean, we’re…

VANCE: …why Americans are unhappy with Kamala Harris’ leadership.

KARL: To be clear, I just asked you about Donald Trump brought up, not something the Harris campaign brought up. I was asking you about Donald Trump’s words, but thank you…thank you…

VANCE: No, I’m saying, that… we’re talking about the Harris campaign. What are their policy views? They don’t have a policy position on their website. Should she sit down and answer tough questions with you?

KARL: Yes. Absolutely. 

VANCE: I think she should. Where is she? But we respect the American People enough…

KARL: We- we hope she’ll be on the show soon.

VANCE:  I hope so too, Jon, because the person who wants to be our president ought to sit down for some tough interviews. I’m willing to do it and I wish she would too.

KARL: All right. JD Vance. Thanks for your time. We really appreciate it.

VANCE: Thanks, Jon, Appreciate it, man.

One election later, Karl poses the question to a Democrat, within the context of eliciting reaction to Charlie Kirk’s appearance on the Gavin Newsom podcast, and proceeds to make him squirm. Schiff can’t bring himself to answer the question, deflecting to a “local communities” answer and ultimately lamenting the issue’s interference with Democrat talking points on the economy.

The interview was not tough by any means- Karl didn’t aggressively follow up with Schiff the way he did with Vance, despite Vance answering the controversial question. Nor was he condescending in his questioning of Schiff. Nonetheless, it was interesting to watch the left eat their own on an issue where the American people are way ahead of them.

Click “expand” to view the full transcript of the aforementioned interview as aired on ABC This Week on Sunday, March 9th, 2025:

JIMMY KIMMEL: The big question going into this, at least on cable news, was whether the Democrats were going to do anything to disrupt the proceedings. They did. Some of them wore pink clothes which was pretty wild.

STEPHEN COLBERT: The Democrats came ready to fight back with their little paddles, OK? That is how you save democracy, by quietly dissenting, or bidding on an antique tea set. It was hard to tell what was going on.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

JON KARL: Late night’s take on the Democratic opposition at Trump’s State of the Union address this week.

I’m joined now by Democratic Senator Adam Schiff of California.

Senator, thank you for joining us this morning. There’s obviously been a lot of hand-wringing over how Democrats treated the State of the Union address. Let me read you what your colleague in the Senate, John Fetterman, had to say. He called the Democrat response a sad cavalcade of self-owns and unhinged petulance. It only makes Trump look more presidential and restrained. We’re becoming the metaphorical car alarms that nobody pays attention to, and it may not be the winning message.

Does Senator Fetterman have a point?

ADAM SCHIFF: Well, I think the lack of a coordinated response in the State of the Union was a mistake, and frankly it took the focus off of where it should have been which is on the fact that the president spoke for an hour and 40 minutes and had nothing to say about what he would do to bring down costs for American families that were watching that lengthy address, sitting at the kitchen table, hoping that he would offer something to help them afford a new home or pay their rent, afford health care or child care.

There was nothing for the American people, and that’s where we need to keep our focus. I was just listening to your guest precede me trying to explain that these tariffs, these on-again, off-again tariffs, are not about trade. It’s a drug war, and then — but next month it’s a trade war, but now it’s a drug war. It was incomprehensible, and he was also trying to say that numbers, the job numbers that came in less than expected are somehow good news.

They’re destroying the economy, and they’re making it harder and harder for Americans to afford things. That’s where we need to keep the focus. That’s why we lost the last election because we weren’t razor-focused on — laser-focused on the high cost of living, and what they’re doing now is just making it so much worse in the administration, and that’s really what we needed to emphasize.

KARL: You’ve made it clear you’re opposed to these tariffs. Is there anything that Democrats can do to stand in the way?

SCHIFF: Well, look. I think we need to bring home to the American people what these tariffs are going to mean. They voted for Donald Trump supposedly because they wanted lower prices, and these tariffs are just going to drive prices up. I think they already are.

In California, the top issue for people is they need more housing. They need more affordable housing. Well, if you begin by deporting construction workers and then you continue by raising costs on construction materials like lumber, you’re just driving those housing prices even further beyond the means of most Americans. So this is deeply destructive what they’re doing. We need to make that case to the American people because they’re going to feel it, but, you know, taking our eye off the ball I think is very dangerous, and so let’s be focused on what matters most to Americans.

Let’s point out all the destructive harms they’re doing with, you know, the cutting of services, the slashing of the Medicaid and what that’s going to mean for increased health costs and less access for people. That, to me, is the winning case to make.

KARL: I’m going to be talking shortly to UAW president Sean Fain. He was obviously, you know, a big supporter of Kamala Harris, a prominent speaker at your Democraticconvention over the summer.

He likes Trump’s tariffs.

Is there a risk that in your opposition to this — and I mean you, the party’s opposition to this — that Democrats could lose even more ground among working-class Americans?

SCHIFF: Oh, look, I read Shawn’s statement. I think he doesn’t favor tariffs if they’re about drug or unrelated policy, and I think it may make sense to look at targeted actions that can — we can take to bring back American jobs like auto jobs.

But these are cross the board tariffs that are indiscriminate, that that are imposed one day and taken down the next.

I can tell you the effect that they’re having in California because I talk to people — I talked to citrus farmers for example who still haven’t recovered the market share they lost during the first Trump administration with these tariff wars.

So I think these broad, indiscriminate and on again, off again tariffs don’t help anyone.

KARL: I mean, we’ll —

SCHIFF: They don’t help farmers. They don’t help auto workers. They’re a mistake.

KARL: I mean, we’ll — we’ll talk to him in a few minutes, but I mean, he seemed to be saying that he favored these, you know, broad tariffs on Canada and Mexico, and also didn’t seem troubled by the one-month pause.

But — but let me — let me ask you more broadly on — on the Democratic response. Here’s what James Carville had by way of suggestion to how Democrats should handle this moment. It was somewhat counterintuitive.

He said: With no clear leader to voice our opposition and no control in any branch of government, it’s time for Democrats to embark on the most daring political mover — maneuver in the history of our party. Roll over and play dead. Allow Republicans to crumble beneath their own weight and make the American people miss us.

Is that a possible course of action?

SCHIFF: You know, I have great respect for James Carville, but I don’t agree with him on this. I do think that that the abundant corruption of the Trump administration, the self-dealing, the inconsistency, the economic decline that they’re advancing with their inconsistent and half-hazard policies, yes, will cause the administration to collapse of its own weight.

But that’s I think, first of all, not an answer to what Democrats need to do, which is we need to have our own broad, bold agenda to improve the economic well-being of Americans, to answer really the central question I think at the heart of our political challenges which is, if you’re working hard in America, can you still earn a good living?

We need to be advancing policies and making the arguments about what we have to offer, not simply standing back and letting them collapse over their own corrupt weight.

To me, that’s not enough. We need to effectively use litigation as we are. We need to effectively use communication to talk to new people in new ways, as we are. So I — I don’t agree with that philosophy.

KARL: One approach we’re seeing from — from your governor, from Gavin Newsom, he’s got this new podcast. He made some waves by bringing conservative commentator Charlie Kirk on the debut of his podcast.

Let me play you a little section on this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHARLIE KIRK, CONSERVATIVE COMMENTATOR: Would you do something like that? Would you say no men in female sports?

GOV. GAVIN NEWSOM (D), CALIFORNIA: Well, it’s — I think it’s an issue of fairness. I completely agree with you on that. It is an issue of fairness.

KIRK: So —

NEWSOM: It’s deeply unfair.

There’s also a humility and grace, you know, that — that these poor people are more likely to commit suicide, have anxiety and depression. And the way that people talk down to vulnerable communities is an issue that I have a hard time with as well.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KARL: I mean, I guess, first, what would you think about Newsom sitting down with Charlie Kirk? But more importantly, do you think — do you agree with those in your party who say it is time for Democrats to have a different approach to transgender issues?

SCHIFF: Well, first of all, I agree that we should be broadening our reach and talking to people we haven’t been talking to. I’m not sure that I would start with Charlie Kirk.

But I also think, as I was mentioning earlier, that we need to keep the focus on what matters most to the American people, and that is the economy. We need to be talking to people about how we’re going to improve their quality of life, and we can make sure that if they’re working hard, they’re earning a good living, to the degree that we get after — we get away from focusing on those things I think it’s a mistake.

In terms of the particular issue that the governor was talking about — look, I played in sports. Our kids played in sports. I want all young people to have the experience of playing in sports, every young person.

And I want those sports to be fair. I want those sports to be safe, and I have confidence that local schools and local communities can make those decisions without the federal government making them for them.

(CROSSTALK)

KARL: But is he right on that? Is — is he right on that?

SCHIFF: I think to the degree — to — well, to the degree though, I think as a — as a political matter, that we remove the focus from where most Americans are concerned and that is they’re concerned about their ability to provide for their family. I think to degree that we get away from that, that’s a mistake.

KARL: OK. All right. Senator Schiff, thank you very much for joining us on “This Week.”

 

Bias by omission on the PBS weekly news roundtable Washington Week with The Atlantic, as the panel of journalists played dumb about why Trump would cancel federal grant money from Columbia University, describing it as a typical Trumpian power grab. Whatever could have been happening there recently to validate such a move?

(Besides months of anti-Semitic campouts last year and the harassment of Jewish students and the chanting of homicidal slogans in the wake of Hamas’s terrorist invasion of Israel, of course.)

But this public television show skipped all that, making it seem Trump was just targeting an elite university because that’s what MAGA does.

Under a chyron that read “Revenge and Retribution,” guest moderator Franklin Foer addressed the panel.

Franklin Foer: I want to just talk about a few events which may have slipped under the radar this week but seem pretty darn significant to me. So, Donald Trump signed an executive order stripping lawyers at the firm Perkins Coie, which had represented Hillary Clinton in 2016, of their security clearances and other privileges, which follows a similar executive order which he signed stripping those same privileges of Covington Burling, who’d worked pro bono with Jack Smith.

Then earlier today the administration stopped a huge number of grants and funds that were going to Columbia University to punish them. Dan, I just want — just what`s the pattern? What are we seeing when we see all these things lined up together?

Dan Balz, Washington Post: Well, I mean, we’re seeing what he promised, which is retribution and some measure of revenge against the people that he thinks did him wrong over the last four years. They’ve been quite systematic about that. They’ve done it through the whole Justice Department in a variety of ways. And now they’ve broadened it out into the private sector, if you will, and into the universities.

I don’t think there’s any doubt that Columbia is not the last university that`s going to see funds stripped from them. I think many, particularly elite universities, feel that they are on notice. He’s done things to try to rein in the press, or to target the press, as we know, particularly the things that have gone on with the press pool. And all of this is part of his effort to dominate everything about the federal government and to accrue as much power in his hands as he can.

Actually, Columbia University’s funding was pulled after months of antisemitic harassment (including chants of “intifada” and “long live the intifada”) and death threats against Jewish students and their supporters on the school’s campus in Manhattan since the Hamas terrorist assault on Israel and the resulting war in Gaza, with ineffectual at best response from Columbia to the attacks both on students and on campus property, including disrupting classes, breaking windows, and barricading themselves inside campus buildings.

Even considering it was another busy week of news, Washington Week should have taken the time to explain just why Columbia was being punished, and not leave viewers with the implication that Trump was just punishing Columbia for being a bunch of liberal elitists (which they are).

As CBS News reported, “The Trump administration moved Friday to cancel $400 million in grants and contracts to Columbia University, citing “the school’s continued inaction in the face of persistent harassment of Jewish students.”

CBS quoted Secretary of Education Linda McMahon: “Since October 7, Jewish students have faced relentless violence, intimidation, and antisemitic harassment on their campuses – only to be ignored by those who are supposed to protect them.”

Proving the validity of Trump’s actions, Reuters quoted Columbia’s interim president Katrina Armstrong bowing to the Trump administration’s concerns in a statement issued late Friday: “I want to assure the entire Columbia community that we are committed to working with the federal government to address their legitimate concerns.”

One of the weirdest things that leftists can say in the second Trump term is that there’s not an opposition media to Trump. On Saturday’s The Weekend on MSNBC — which is peak opposition media to Trump — Molly Jong-Fast dropped this flop-bomb:

“There is not the same strong mainstream non-partisan media there was in 2016. So it has fallen on a lot of these Democrats to narrate what’s happening, to explain what they’ve seen in the last 7 weeks. If they don’t do it, no one else will.”

Sipping something loopy out of the Jong-Flask. https://t.co/Ij8iFMoF4I
— Tim Graham (@TimJGraham) March 9, 2025
Does MSNBC count as an outlet that was “mainstream nonpartisan media” in 2016? If so, what’s changed? How is the so-called “mainstream” space “much, much smaller”? Is MSNBC acknowledging that they’re neither mainstream, or nonpartisan?

The question from Michael Steele was on Trump’s tariff tactics, and “how do Democrats thread this needle narratively to help Americans contextualize what’s happening to them?” This context is crazy-pants. There’s no “mainstream” media any more, so Bernie Sanders has to have town-hall meetings in red states to fix things. 

There’s somehow no anti-Trump, anti-Republican media any more, so Democrat politicians will “have to just continually sort of narrate what’s happening for voters, because if they don’t do it, no one else will.”

On the lefty faux-Twitter site Bluesky, Jong-Fast doubled down: “I think I’m right.”

The liberal media had a predictably sour reaction to President Trump’s speech to Congress, with journalists deploring it as a “polarizing,” “partisan” “festival of meanness.” Yet exactly one year ago, these same networks used Joe Biden’s 2024 State of the Union speech to dishonestly proclaim the obviously faltering 81-year-old was brimming with energy and ready for a second term.

As we all now know, last March’s post-SOTU happy talk was nothing but hot air. In July, Biden withdrew as a candidate after an embarrassing debate performance proved he was no longer up to the job.

Yet barely four months earlier, media spinners were busy painting an untrue picture of Biden’s capabilities. On March 6, 2024, the day before what would turn out to be Biden’s last State of the Union speech, MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough crudely proclaimed: “I’m about to tell you the truth. And F-you if you can’t handle the truth. This version of Biden intellectually, analytically, is the best Biden ever. Not a close second….If it weren’t the truth, I wouldn’t say it.”

The next night, after Biden yelled his way through a 67-minute long speech, journalists insisted that all was well. “This was a great night for Joe Biden,” ABC’s Jonathan Karl proclaimed. “That was a forceful and feisty State of the Union address!” anchor Geoff Bennett enthusiastically agreed on PBS.

“This seemed to me to be a speech designed first and foremost to show that Joe Biden has the stamina and the fire in the belly to go another four years,” CBS’s Nancy Cordes added during her network’s prime time coverage.

“It was like a punch in the face to every Republican in the room,” MSNBC’s Nicolle Wallace gleefully pronounced. “Everybody knows that this was a great speech.”

“A lot of Democrats over the past few weeks have been panicking. I’ll bet the vast majority of them feel better tonight, because the President did hit hard,” correspondent Terry Moran insisted over on ABC.

“I think Joe Biden woke up this morning, had a cup of coffee and had his Wheaties. He was definitely there to fight,” MSNBC’s Joy Reid cheered.

Over on CNN, anchor Jake Tapper — now the co-author of a forthcoming book, Original Sin, about the “disastrous” “cover-up” of Biden’s “decline” — said he saw a “sharp” President Biden: “His presentation, his enunciation, of course, is not as clear as it once was a decade or two ago. His mind did seem fairly sharp.”

Co-host Dana Bash concurred. “He certainly met the moment….[Members of his party] wanted him to be a fighter and — boy — fight, did he deliver.”

The positive spin continued the next morning. CBS Mornings began by highlighting Biden’s fire — Gayle King headlined how “President Biden delivers a fiery State of the Union address,” just before co-host Tony Dokoupil touted a “pretty fired-up” Joe Biden.

“This was a feisty speech that, at times, felt more like a rowdy campaign event than a traditional State of the Union address,” ABC’s Mary Bruce argued the next day on Good Morning America. “The President trying to show voters he is ready for a fight and has what it takes to serve another four years.”

“President Biden delivering a mix of energy, humor, combativeness as well as plenty of ad-libs directed at his Republican critics,” praised White House correspondent Peter Alexander on Today. NBC’s Kristen Welker said “thrilled” Democrats were “breathing a sigh of relief…because the President was strong, because he was energetic, because he took on Donald Trump within the first four minutes of starting this speech.”

The gang on ABC’s The View eagerly promoted Biden’s supposed energy. “I thought he was fabulous. I pictured Trump just going nuts watching it,” co-host Joy Behar exclaimed.

“I have been saying for months and months and months that Joe Biden is old, yes, he’s slower of step, yes, but he is far from being incoherent, from having dementia, from not being in charge. Yesterday he showed he is engaged. He was impassioned. He was pissed off! ‘Scranton Joe’ showed up and fought,” thundered co-host Ana Navarro.

That was in March. Barely 100 days later, Biden’s inability was exposed for tens of millions of voters to see with their own eyes, a fatal blow to his already ailing campaign. Yet while Joe Biden has now finally shuffled off the political stage, his enablers in the liberal media continue to spin the news — as if they still have a shred of credibility.

For more examples from our flashback series, which we call the NewsBusters Time Machine, go here.
  

Journalist James Bennet, formerly of the New York Times and once considered the “heir apparent” to run the paper, before being forced out amid a left-wing staff revolt in 2020, recently gave a talk for The Point, a Chicago-based scholarly magazine, titled “Is There a Mainstream Media?”

Bennet garnered the attention of media-bias mavens in 2023 with his 17,000-word essay for his current employers at The Economist magazine. Bennet, who is no conservative, discussed the intolerant illiberalism that has infected his old paper in recent years and that forced him out of his job as Editorial Page Editor in 2020. That came after a staff revolt triggered by Bennet running an op-ed by Republican Sen. Tom Cotton of Arkansas that called upon President Donald Trump to use troops to quell violence connected to Black Lives Matter protests after George Floyd’s death. Cotton’s offending piece, “Send In the Troops,” was quickly weighed down with an apologetic Editor’s Note.

Bennet’s talk at The Point took a wide-screen view, alluding to various structural and economic explanations for the decline in public trust in what he called the “institutional media,” such as the rise of the web, the corresponding decline in ad revenue, and the resulting turn toward maintaining a partisan subscriber base. But Bennet also saw a harmful lurch to the left in the crop of new, young journalists. Recounting his return to the Times in 2016 after a long stint with The Atlantic, he found everything was changing for the worse:

I was brought in to do a version at the Times of what we’d done at the Atlantic: digitize the opinion operation and widen the range of views to better reflect the breadth and richness of American debate. People at the paper were perfectly happy with most of that. I never got an objection from inside the Times to new voices I brought in from the left, but almost every time we hired or even published a conservative, it upset at least some of the staff, starting actually from near the beginning, when I hired Bret Stephens, who was already a Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist and at the time, one of the most eloquent critics of Donald Trump. But some of his views were just seen as beyond the pale by some of our colleagues, and they felt free to go after him on Twitter.

I lasted four years in that job until we published the Tom Cotton piece. It’s a funny thing to work for an institution you really believed in for nineteen years, and what you’re known for is getting fired from it. But that’s where I am. And you can challenge my view of what happened. But that episode was just one of the more extreme of many clashes within the Times and other newsrooms, which continue to this day, between the old institutional values and the new ascendant ones.

Bennet even suggested that Hamas leaders got more understanding treatment in the newsroom than did the democratically elected Donald Trump.

….I was the bureau chief in Jerusalem. It was during the Second Intifada, and I spent a lot of time in Gaza interviewing Hamas leaders and members of Hamas. It was just a basic part of my job to understand and report on their worldview, to inform Times readers of it, better equip them to deal with it and our governments deal with it. I never got attacked by my colleagues for doing that kind of work. It was seen as a basic part of our job. But after the election of Donald Trump, doing that kind of journalism about our fellow citizens was seen as morally wrong, “platforming” dangerous people and ideas. And that distorted the coverage and therefore readers’ understanding of life in America.

A church near Seattle, Washington is being forced to violate the commandment “thou shalt not kill,” by subsidizing the murder of pre-born babies. 

Cedar Park Assembly of God sued Washington to stop a state law that requires churches to fund abortions in their health care plans for employees, reports LifeNews. If they don’t comply, the state will cancel their plan.

Their attorneys at Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) argued the state’s so-called Reproductive Parity Act clearly violated Cedar Park’s constitutionally protected religious freedoms. The church was even backed by 18 outside states who support life. 

But after a lower court rejected their attempt to at least carve out a religious exemption to the act, a federal appeals court doubled down on its decision in favor of Washington. 

In a 2-1 ruling, the San Francisco- based 9th Circuit Court of Appeals claimed Cedar Park lacked the “necessary standing” to challenge the abortion requirement, because they can simply find a different plan that allows them to exclude the killing of babies. 

But finding an affordable plan that doesn’t require abortion coverage isn’t so easy. 

One dissenting circuit judge called Cedar Park’s situation a “Catch 22” between violating its religious and moral beliefs or canceling its health plans which would violate both state and federal law. 

“The 9th Circuit is way out on a limb here. Every other court to consider a similar case in the past—from district courts to the U.S. Supreme Court and even the 9th Circuit itself (as the dissenting judge noted)—has granted standing,” wrote ADF President Kristen Waggoner in a post on X.

I just learned that the 9th Circuit has issued a shocking opinion in the case of a Washington church that is being forced to fund abortion.
Cedar Park Assembly of God challenged the WA state law that requires nearly all health plans to cover abortion. In today’s 2-1 ruling, the…
— Kristen Waggoner (@KristenWaggoner) March 6, 2025

She assured her followers Cedar Park’s fight isn’t over. According to LifeNews, they will appeal to a full court next.

NPR typically hates everything about Fox News, so it was shocking when snobby Weekend Edition Saturday host Scott Simon interviewed Fox late-night host Greg Gutfeld. It’s much more typical for NPR to toss roses at Stephen Colbert when he’s selling a new cookbook on non-commercial radio. Oh, and then add a 45-minute Fresh Air interview on top of that. Ka-ching! 

Simon began by noting the ratings: “Greg Gutfeld dominates late-night comedy. His show, Gutfeld!, on Fox, airs an hour earlier than his rivals but has a larger audience than those of Colbert, Kimmel, Fallon or The Daily Show.” 

Then he noted the ideology, unlike Colbert. He has “conservative comics” on his show, and engages in “insult conservatism.” (Please recall all the insult liberalism all over late night — not to mention all over NPR shows like Wait! Wait! Don’t Tell Me!…like when they insulted Fox’s Peter Doocy.)

SCOTT SIMON: I bet you’ve read and heard some of the labels applied to your comedy — insult conservatism, mean, provocative. Do you want to give us another label? What do you think of those?

GREG GUTFELD: Fun. It’s fun. Anytime somebody describes something as mean, it’s because it doesn’t align with their beliefs, and they’re kind of upset about it, but also, they kind of wish that they had the freedom to say it as well. I take it as a badge of honor if somebody says that I’m being mean, and I’m just having fun.

They noted he mocked Wlodomyr Zelensky for having a “Napoleon complex,” and he joked about how this was fun because he himself is short. 

Then Simon started running clips of Gutfeld! that fit “insult conservatism,” apparently. For example, “According to a new survey, nearly 10% of U.S. adults identify as LGBTQ. The other 90% identify as who gives a [expletive].” Gutfeld explained:

GUTFELD: What I meant to get at is that nobody cares. I actually have a very serious, I guess, philosophy about identity politics. I think it’s a terrible thing to lead with. I am all for being an individual. And when you start talking about these characteristics that define you, it’s actually not defining you at all. And you can see the misery on people’s faces who kind of buy into identity politics.

 

Then Simon played an Asian-drivers joke, which he said was “trafficking in identity humor.”  This spurred a contentious conversation: 

SIMON: I got to play another clip view of you, to you, again, though.

GUTFELD: Sure.

SIMON: ‘Cause there’s something I read and – I saw the other day in which you were trafficking in identity humor, if that’s what it is, yourself. Let’s play that clip.

(SOUNDBITE OF TV SHOW, “GUTFELD!”)

GUTFELD: A large number of Asian voters in San Francisco have announced they are walking away from the Democratic Party. Well, thank God, they’re not driving away, or we’d all be in danger.

(CHEERING)

GUTFELD: Applauding a racist? You’re terrible (laughter).

Yes. There you go, huh? That’s a terrible joke, Scott. A terrible joke…

SIMON: Honesty…

GUTFELD: …Which is why it’s couched…

SIMON: …I think it is. Yeah.

GUTFELD: …Yeah – why it was couched as something a racist would say. And I disown that, so what more can you say?

SIMON: Wait. Let me get this straight. You disown the joke that you just said?

GUTFELD: Yeah. Didn’t you hear it? I said it was a racist…

SIMON: Yeah, of course I did.

GUTFELD: …A racist would say that. Keep up, Scott (laughter).

SIMON: Well, I’m…

GUTFELD: See, this is what’s great, is I’m explaining – I have to explain this show to you, which is actually more entertaining to me than anything. It’s like, I don’t find this funny at all. That’s the point. You need to get outside your bubble, Scott. Have…

SIMON: Well…

GUTFELD: …Some fun.

SIMON: But I mean, we began the conversation…

GUTFELD: (Laughter).

SIMON: …By you saying, you know, that your humor was about fun.

GUTFELD: And it is.

SIMON: I mean, a racist joke?

GUTFELD: If you don’t find it fun, that’s OK. Scott, it’s all right if you don’t…

SIMON: What I…

GUTFELD: …Like it.

SIMON: I have a peculiar…

GUTFELD: It’s OK.

SIMON: …Sense of humor, so don’t judge anything by me.

GUTFELD: (Laughter).

SIMON: But I…

GUTFELD: What did you say? I’m sorry. I missed it. I missed what you said at the moment.

SIMON: I said I have a peculiar sense of humor, so don’t judge the success…

GUTFELD: (Laughter).

SIMON: …You’re having by me, OK? But I just – I got to tell you I found that joke racist.

GUTFELD: Well, that’s why I said a racist would say. So we’re in agreement, Scott. It’s funny. I’m trying to explain this to you (laughter).

SIMON: All right.

GUTFELD: Didn’t you – maybe you didn’t hear that part. Did you hear the part?

SIMON: Oh, I did hear…

GUTFELD: Did you hear that part where I said…

SIMON: …I did hear that part but just saying that it’s racist doesn’t mean it’s OK to tell.

GUTFELD: Oh, so it’s not OK to tell something?

SIMON: Constitutionally, I would defend your right. But…

GUTFELD: Thank you so much. I appreciate that.

SIMON: But in terms of – God forbid – taste, decency – decency. Let’s even forget taste – decency.

GUTFELD: Yeah. Some things – you know what? Some things you’re not going to like. In fact, I’m certain there are many things in my show you’re not going to like. Yeah. That’s your right. And there are a lot of jokes that just aren’t funny to some people. But to other people, they are funny. Those make me laugh. And they make me laugh because I’m pointing out how upsetting it is to people like you. Even when I point it out, it’s still upsetting to you. I find that funny. It’s a meta joke, if you will.

SIMON: People like me?

GUTFELD: (Laughter).

SIMON: There you go with that…

GUTFELD: Yes.

SIMON: …Identity stuff again.

GUTFELD: Exactly. You NPR, kale-sniffing vegetarians. I’m joking. I actually like kale.

The discussion concluded with Gutfeld making a very serious point about the power of the leftist media. 

SIMON: Let me ask you one more question. You’re always punching left and not punching up at powerful people.

GUTFELD: Ooh, that’s an interesting point. You said, I’m always punching left, not up at powerful people.

SIMON: Well, powerful people…

GUTFELD: So you’re insinuating…

SIMON: …Powerful at the moment. Powerful people…

GUTFELD: Well, let’s put it this way. The most powerful people are in the media. They’ve controlled the megaphone for years. They’re 95% left wing. That is my target, and it will always be my target. I’m interested in the people that manipulate the narrative. That is all I’m going for. I actually don’t even give crap about politicians because they are just interchangeable. I’m more interested in the people that try to brainwash us every day. And I think everybody – because of the rise of the internet and social media – has become an expert in media because finally something was written about them.

And for millions of people, it was Trump supporters. Trump supporters were being written about, and they’re like, I’m not a racist. I’ll go out of my way to help people. If your car’s pulled over on the side of the road, I’m the guy that’s going to change the tire. Why am I called a white supremacist? So you see that that is what I’m going for, which is that we’ve – in this day and age, and a lot of credit to Trump for calling out fake news. We have seen behind the curtain. We see how the sausage is made. And boy, there’s some ugly stuff in that sausage, Scott — making me think about, you know, going vegetarian.

NPR would never ask Colbert about how under Biden he was just “punching right, not up at powerful people.”

The New York Times can’t seem to make up its mind on the First Amendment.

Here is the Times promoting censorious Andrew Marantz on the subject of free speech in 2019: 

Free Speech Is Killing Us

Noxious language online is causing real-world violence. What can we do about it?

Got it? Free speech was a problem for the Times in 2019.

But now? Here’s this Times headline from just this month of March, 2025: 

‘People Are Going Silent’: Fearing Retribution, Trump Critics Muzzle Themselves

People say they are intimidated by online attacks from the president, concerned about harm to their businesses or worried about the safety of their families.

This Times story proclaims: 

More than six weeks into the second Trump administration, there is a chill spreading over political debate in Washington and beyond.

Got that? In 2019 The Times was alarmed, spreading the notion that “Free Speech Is Killing Us.” Now there was a reason to elect Joe Biden and get that threatening Trump guy dictator out of the White House and silence his minions.

Now, a mere six years later in 2025, The Times frets that “People Are Going Silent” because – wouldn’t you know – that nasty Trump guy is back in the White House and his minions are intimidating Americans into silence.

What a difference six years makes! 

The real problem here is that the American Left hates dissent from whatever is the hot topic on the left wing agenda of the moment.

As if to underline the point, one story after another has leaked recently on the ongoing turmoil at The Washington Post because – OMG! – owner Jeff Bezos wants more conservatives on the Op-Ed pages.

This daring, ohhhhh so terrible idea has resulted in headline after headline, beginning with the news in 2024 that Bezos would not have the Post endorse Kamala Harris for president, choosing silence on the issue with no endorsement of either Harris or candidate Trump.

This resulted in headlines like this one from CNN: 

The Washington Post is in deep turmoil as Bezos remains silent on non-endorsement

Once 2024 was in the history books and 2025 had dawned, the “turmoil” stories out of the Post kept coming.

Why? Because publisher Bezos had the horrific idea to publish some conservative opinion on the Post Op-Ed pages. Leading to headlines like this one from the Times: 

Bezos Orders Washington Post Opinion Section to Embrace ‘Personal Liberties and Free Markets’

David Shipley, The Post’s opinion editor, is resigning after trying to persuade Jeff Bezos to reconsider the new direction. 

One could go on and on with similar headlines. The central point is clear: The American Left despises free speech and wants to silence it, whether in the Washington Post or anywhere else where disagreement over an issue that is a favorite of the Left surfaces.

We’ll have to see if the Bezos order is actually followed. Last year, the Post didn’t formally endorse Kamala, but the editorial board kept slamming Trump as the worst possible choice, so there was no doubt where they stood. 

Move away from journalism in Washington and head north to New York City. There, on the leftist-filled campuses of Columbia and Barnard universities, one headline after another tells the tale of leftist pro-Palestinian students trying to shut down the free speech of pro-Israel students. Examples:

From the Times of Israel: 

Barnard College expels 2 students who disrupted Israel history class last month

Anti-Israel student coalition at US institution shares footage of activists interrupting class, saying course ‘legitimizes the Zionist entity’; Hillel president praises expulsion

TIME magazine:

Investigations at Columbia University Clash with Concerns about Free Speech on Campus 

The list of these stories are endless, filling the Internet. But the theme is always – always, always, always – the same: The Left will passionately defend the free speech of “pro-Palestinian” actors even as they suppress the free speech of their opponents. 

It could be leftists inside The Washington Post. It could be leftists at prestigious American universities. Heaven knows the arena where this obsession with suppressing a dissenting (conservative?) point of view will surface.

But at this point, make no mistake. Surface it will. And the answer to this anti-free speech mania from the Left, whether inside a major American newspaper, an Ivy League university or anywhere else, is for believers in free speech to stand up and speak out.

Being quiet is not an option.