MSNBC Presses Obama on Campaign Promises

MSNBC ^

[boughtwithaprice]

While much attention has been paid to the feud between the Fox News Channel and the White House, the Obama administration is now facing criticism of a different sort from Ms. Maddow, Keith Olbermann and other progressive hosts on MSNBC, who are using their nightly news-and-views-casts to measure what she calls “the distance between Obama’s rhetoric and his actions.”

While they may agree with much of what Mr. Obama says, they have pressed him to keep his campaign promises about health care, civil liberties and other issues.

“I don’t think our audience is looking for unequivocal ‘rah-rah,’ ” said Ms. Maddow, who calls herself a liberal but not a Democrat.

The spectacle of Democrats sniping at one another is not new, but having a TV home for it is. MSNBC — sometimes critically called the “home team” for supporters of Mr. Obama — has even hit upon the theme with a promotional tagline, “pushing back on the president,” in commercials for “Hardball,” Chris Matthews’s political hour.

“Our job is not to echo the president’s talking points,” said Phil Griffin, the president of MSNBC. “Our job is to hold whoever’s in power’s feet to the fire.”

[Lancey Howard]

Uh-oh, is the honeymoon over??

Please....

Come 2012, these scumbag Democrat newsrooms will once again do everything in their power to get their Kenyan communist re-elected. Take that to the bank.

[boughtwithaprice]

mods: source should be NY Times, not MSNBC

[USArmySpouse]

MSNBC is delusional. In that article, they actually seem to think they represent the “middle” of the country. Wow.

[Osage Orange]

The problem is they have to be smart enough to know it.........

[Carley]

Your mom never met the likes of Chrissy Matthews and the rest of the klan on msnbc

[WesternMA]

I agree. The story would be much more credible if it had come from anyone other than MSNBC.

[AnotherUnixGeek]

While much attention has been paid to the feud between the Fox News Channel and the White House, the Obama administration is now facing criticism of a different sort from Ms. Maddow, Keith Olbermann and other progressive hosts on MSNBC, who are using their nightly news-and-views-casts to measure what she calls “the distance between Obama’s rhetoric and his actions.”

This is where conservatives can take a lesson. Maybe it's because conservatives don't expect much from government in the first place, but when Bush was enacting No Child Left Behind and the massive Medicare drug benefit and Hastert and Delay were overseeing earmarks for bridges to nowhere, conservatives just withdrew in disgust. Liberals stay on their elected officials to stick to their stated principals.

[Mannaggia l'America]

“I don’t think our audience is looking for unequivocal ‘rah-rah,’ ” said Ms. Maddow, who calls herself a liberal but not a Democrat.

Maddow is a chick? Didn't know that... ;-)

[AnotherUnixGeek]

I view this to be a tactic to help Obama. If they criticize him from the left, it makes him look more “centrist” to the great unwashed.

It certainly can't help MSNBC's viewership share. As you say, MSNBC's going after him from his left - and most Americans are waking up to the fact they are to the right of Obama.

[smonk]

why is a lesbian like maddow getting upset over an issue like “reproductive rights”? it would seem that she dealt herself out of that game a long time ago.

[fireman15]

These MSNBC morons take their orders directly from the Whitehouse. This is a leftist head game. Polls are showing that more people are now claiming to be conservative than liberal so MSNBC is just trying to help the president look like he is more conservative than they want him to be. It is all a sham.