Free Republic

Face the Nation host Bob Schieffer interrogated Representative Tim Huelskamp (R-KA) on the House Republicans’ tactics to shutdown the government and test the breaching of the debt ceiling, challenging Huelskamp to name what, if anything, such measures had accomplished or were intended to accomplish. “At the end of the day, what we have accomplished?” Huelskamp said. “Not much yet. But we have to focus on Obamacare, and we have to focus on the underlying problem that’s been ignored for years, and that’s too much spending.” “But congressman, don’t you have to focus on keeping the government running?” Schieffer asked. When...

CBS News touts Gallup poll showing supposed decline, ignores own poll showing rapid rise in Tea Party support I told you just a couple of days ago that the Gallup headline of a decline in Tea Party popularity was misleading. The misleading headline, ignoring the details of the poll, was picked up far and wide, Congrats @Gallup for inspiring these 5 misleading anti-Tea Party headlines. The Washington Post yesterday, however, revealed that the Tea Party popularity was rising, Obamacare fight reenergizes tea party movement (emphasis added): "The tea party movement rose to prominence in the early years of Obama’s presidency,...

A new CBS News poll finds more Americans than ever want the Affordable Care Act repealed. According to the poll, 36 percent of Americans want Congress to expand or keep the health care law while 39 percent want Congress to repeal it - the highest percentage seen in CBS News polls. The poll also found a majority of Americans - 54 percent - disapprove of the health care law, 36 percent of Americans approve of it and 10 percent said they don't know about it. The poll also found just 13 percent of Americans say the health care law will...

CBS News reporter, Sharyl Attkisson, one of the very few real reporters left in the mainstream media, appeared on Monday’s O’Reilly Factor, telling Bill O’Reilly that she thinks she knew who hacked her computer (scroll down for video). In the interview, Attkisson begins by explaining that both her personal computer, as well as her CBS work computer would mysteriously turn on in the middle of the night, even though she’d shut them down...

Well, this is interesting. A few months ago, there were whispers that CBS News was becoming, shall we say “testy”? Let’s settle on “testy” with its award-winning, intrepid journalist, Sharyl Attkisson, because…well…she just wouldn’t leave stories alone. First it was the Fast and Furious “non-story” — nothing to see there! Then it was Benghazi — where no one knew anything, no photos from the situation room were available, some stupid video caused death and mayhem, um, scratch that, but what difference did it make, anyway! There she was asking questions and refusing to stop picking at the big bumps showing...

CBS News reporter Sharyl Attkisson revealed in May that her computer had been compromised. When asked about the situation, CBS News responded with a statement that it was conducting an investigation. That investigation has reached the following conclusions, according to CBS News spokeswoman Sonya McNair: “A cyber security firm hired by CBS News has determined through forensic analysis that Sharyl Attkisson’s computer was accessed by an unauthorized, external, unknown party on multiple occasions late in 2012. Evidence suggests this party performed all access remotely using Attkisson’s accounts. While no malicious code was found, forensic analysis revealed an intruder had executed...

On April 8, House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi headlined a Boston conference on ''media reform.'' She was joined by four other congressmen, a senator, two FCC commissioners, a Nobel laureate and numerous liberal journalists. The 2,500-person event was sponsored by a group called Free Press, one of more than 180 different media-related organizations that receives money from liberal billionaire George Soros. Soros, who first made a name for himself in investing and currency trading, now makes his name in politics and policy. Since the 2004 election, the controversial financier has used his influence and billions to push a laundry list...

One of the mainstream media journalists whose pursuit of the truth has been truly tenacious and nonpartisan is CBS News' Sharyl Attkisson. Her tough reporting has made life difficult for everyone from Hillary Clinton to the Bush administration and Congressional Republicans. She's also been relentless on the Obama administration's Fast & Furious gun-running scandal -- and, of course, Benghazi. As we mentioned this week, Attkisson's tough investigative journalism is starting to bother unnamed CBS News executives. Here's Politico's scoop, in case you missed it: But from where Attkisson is sitting, there are actually two Goliaths, one of which is almost...

Writing at American Thinker, Ed Lasky points to Obama National Security Team member Ben Rhodes as the man possibly behind the Benghazi cover-up. Lasky notes that when the Benghazi attacks took place, "CIA career officials clearly and repeatedly identified Al Qaeda and Al Qaeda-linked Islamic terrorists as the culprits behind the murder of four Americans." But the theory is that this news was suppressed because it "would cause embarrassment for the Obama team," which had spent years telling us Al Qaeda's best years were behind it and the "'tide of war' was receding." Lasky asserts that Obama's 2009 Cairo speech...

The biggest Benghazi-related story that took place outside of the House Oversight Committee's hearing room today is this item in Politico, regarding CBS News correspondent Sharyl Attkisson. She's the reporter who famously drew White House officials' profane ire over her unapologetic pursuit of the Fast & Furious scandal story; now she's apparently facing searing criticism from another source: Her own bosses. Why? Because she's been covering the Benghazi story too aggressively. Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you media bias: "Attkisson, who holds a third-degree black belt in taekwondo, takes a fighting stance when she feels she’s being stonewalled. Which...

CBS's Sharyl Attkisson is apparently viewed by network executives as "wading dangerously close to advocacy" in her coverage of the September 11, 2012 terrorist attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, as Politico's Dylan Byers asserted in a Wednesday item. Byers reported that "Attkisson can't get some of her stories on the air, and is thus left feeling marginalized and underutilized." Attkisson's minute-long report about the House Oversight Committee's latest hearing on the attack on Wednesday's CBS This Morning was actually the first time since November 23, 2012 that the journalist reported about the story on air, according a search...

The Benghazi scandal is easy to understand, and that’s what makes it so dangerous for the White House. Simply, the Obama administration’s narrative — that al-Qaeda was on the run, that Hosni Mubarak had to go, and that the Arab Spring was a good thing — was proven false when four brave Americans were killed. Because the administration was a slave to their own narrative, rather than aggressively fighting al-Qaeda, rather than recognizing the $50 billion investment in Mubarak’s stability, and rather than realizing that the upheaval they sponsored in the Middle East empowered Muslim Brotherhood radicals, they lied repeatedly...

The South Korean pop star who took the internet by storm with “Gangnam Style” will be in attendance at Saturday night’s White House Correspondents Dinner as a guest of CBS News. This marks PSY’s second high-profile appearance in D.C., following his performance last year at the White House Christmas concert, which followed controversy over an anti-American song he rapped a few years ago. According to Deadline, PSY will be attending the dinner at the CBS table,

Monday night's CBS Evening News followed CNN and ABC to the ugly decades-old accusations against Pope Francis from his time in Argentina. CBS featured the same critic of Pope Francis that ABC did on Sunday. CNN, meanwhile, was the only one of the three networks to seriously question the accusations. "There are still questions, though, about the Pope's relationship with Argentina's former government, a military dictatorship that kidnapped and killed thousands in the '70s and '80s," reported fill-in anchor Bob Schieffer. CBS centered the story around Francis' accuser, with only one quote in his defense.

RUSH: The College of Cardinals is now entering the Sistine Chapel to begin the conclave to elect the next Vicar of Christ.  For those of you in Rio Linda, that would be the next pope.  For those of you who are Italian, it would be Il Papa.  You may not know this.  Yesterday on CBS, Slay the Nation, they had a roundtable. Bob Schieffer had Washington Post columnist Sally Quinn and Carl Bernstein on from Vanity Fair. Bernstein of Woodward and Bernstein fame. And they were talking about the church, the Catholic Church, and the selection of the new pope....

HOWARD KURTZ, CNN: Bill Plante, you have been patrolling that building since Ronald Reagan. Does the White House press look self-involved and whiny, as I said earlier, complaining about this Tiger incident? BILL PLANTE, CBS NEWS: We have gotten used to being called whiny lap dogs. I've heard it for 30 years. But this is not about a picture of Tiger Woods. This is about access to the president. And access to the president has been cut and pushed and curtailed over every administration I've covered. Here's the nub of it, Howie, this administration has the tools to reach people...

CBS investigative reporter Sharyl Attkisson has been one of the few members of the media willing to hold the Obama Administration’s feet to the fire over Benghazigate. Despite Obama et al.’s toxic mixture of silence, prevarication, and obfuscation, Attkisson has doggedly pursued the truth about the September 2012 attacks that left four Americans dead. Today, she spotlighted the list of questions that the Obama Administration has yet to answer:

This rabble-rousing spew comes via Moonbattery: "The president who came into office speaking in lofty terms about bipartisanship and cooperation can only cement his legacy if he destroys the GOP. If he wants to transform American politics, he must go for the throat. … Obama’s only remaining option is to pulverize. Whether he succeeds in passing legislation or not, given his ambitions, his goal should be to delegitimize his opponents. Through a series of clarifying fights over controversial issues, he can force Republicans to either side with their coalition’s most extreme elements or cause a rift in the party that will...

Condoleezza Rice has been hired as a new regular contributor to CBS News, The New York Times reports. CBS News chairman Jeff Fager and president David Rhodes made the appointment. Rice, who served under President George W. Bush as national security advisor from 2001 to 2005 and secretary of state from 2005 to 2009, is expected to comment regularly on national and international issues.

CBS News has obtained the CIA talking points given to U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice on Sept. 15 regarding the fatal attack on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, Libya, four days earlier. CBS News correspondent Margaret Brennan says the talking points, which were also given to members of the House intelligence committee, make no reference to terrorism being a likely factor in the assault, which left U.S. Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other Americans dead. "Available information suggests that the demonstrations in Benghazi were spontaneously inspired by the U.S. Embassy in Cairo and evolved into a direct assault... There are indications...