Chuck Todd

Friday

The Spectator

Plane crash tragedy exposes other close calls

Amid the tragedy of a deadly plane and helicopter crash at Washington, DC’s Ronald Reagan National Airport that has shaken the entire country, it’s becoming increasingly clear how many close calls have been avoided over the years — and that changes may be coming to the status quo.While it’s been almost two decades since the last major commercial airline crash in America, reports are beginning to emerge about how many near misses have happened, especially in DC’s busy airspace.Just days before an army helicopter collided with the plane coming in from Wichita, Kansas, several other planes had already aborted landings at Reagan due to helicopters in the way.

Wednesday

Stephen L. Miller

Welcome to the era of personality media

Several high-priced journalists have begun experimenting with selling themselves instead of a corporate media brand. Chris Cillizza and Mark Halperin have both started Substack ventures without having the branding back-up of CNN or Bloomberg. The pair follow in the footsteps of Megyn Kelly, who has been enormously successful in launching her own brand. Don Lemon has been confined to social media as well.Last year, Washington Post tech reporter Taylor Lorenz left corporate media behind to create her own outlet, although I would argue her audience and branding were separate from that of the Post.

Wednesday

Ben Domenech

After Ronna, Republicans should ignore NBC

NBC News’s decision to ditch Ronna McDaniel after the hissy fit thrown collectively by Chuck Todd, Joe Scarborough, Jen Psaki, Nicolle Wallace, Rachel Maddow and more should be more than enough evidence to support a commitment from the Republican National Committee and its new leadership: there is no working with NBC. Not on debates, not on town halls, not even on campaign season interviews. There’s no point in creating content for a network that finds even the most generic Republican figure so vile and scary that they don’t even want her in the building. Obviously this is an unenforceable commitment, and someone like Chris Christie or Larry Hogan will assuredly ignore it.

ronna mcdaniel nbc

Tuesday

Stephen L. Miller

There are no good guys at NBC

Former Republican National Committee chairwoman Ronna Romney McDaniel was invited to the cafeteria, where she was promptly told by the cool kids that she can’t sit with them. The news cycle sits on day five of what has been a week- and weekend-long struggle session over NBC’s hiring of McDaniel to provide election-year analysis. Which leads us to wonder: are there any adults still working at NBC and MSNBC? McDaniel’s hiring simply could not stand with the elite of MSNBC like Chuck Todd, Joe Scarborough and Nicolle Wallace (all former political operatives) as they issued on-air apologies over NBC management to hire someone so closely attuned to a political party they don’t belong to. Jen Psaki would like a word.

Friday

Cockburn

Biden uses human shields to avoid Pelosi

NBC anchors play with traffic Spotted: NBC News anchors Chuck Todd and Hallie Jackson furiously waving cars under a parking garage gate after the State of the Union address. Cars started to pile up at a broken pay station before an enthusiastic Jackson, who hosts Hallie Jackson NOW, yelled down the ramp for everyone to line up bumper-to-bumper so they could follow each other out before the gate closed in between cars.  “I feel bad,” Jackson lamented as one car missed the cutoff. Joe Biden uses human shields to avoid Pelosi: source Never fear, “Uncommitted” voters. It turns out Joe Biden may have more in common with Hamas than previously thought.

Thursday

Amber Duke

The media’s ignorant attempt to cover Christians

When you work in the media as a practicing Catholic, there are few things more hilarious than watching fellow journalists repeatedly fail miserably to get even basic components of your faith correct. I will never forget seeing NBC News’s Chuck Todd tweet this about Good Friday in 2018:  I’m a bit hokey when it comes to “Good Friday.” I don’t mean disrespect to the religious aspect of the day, but I love the idea of reminding folks that any day can become “good,” all it takes is a little selflessness on our own part. Works EVERY time. Oof. Surely holding the elevator door for someone in your high-rise apartment building comes nowhere near Christ’s sacrificial death on the cross for all of humanity and its sins.

Tuesday

Stephen L. Miller

Chuck Todd’s send-off from Meet the Press was a mercy killing

Chuck Todd’s departure from Meet the Press this weekend was not a victorious send-off as much as it was a mercy killing. When Kristen Welker was handed a debate in 2020, it felt like only a matter of time before NBC escorted Chuck into the car and drove him out the woods. The most striking thing about Todd’s time as Meet the Press host, following the ouster of David Gregory, is just how un-striking it was. The most significant thing to happen on the show came courtesy of a guest, with Kellyanne Conway coining the phrase "alternative facts" during an appearance. Yet Meet the Press was almost Sunday morning appointment viewing under Tim Russert, who died suddenly in 2008, and it had steadily declined since then.

Tuesday

Amber Duke

Cut! Weekend news shows give Barr and Pompeo the chop

The communications teams at the State Department and Department of Justice spent the past couple of days trying to correct their record after the respective heads of their agencies were taken out of context by two Sunday news programs. CBS's 60 Minutes and NBC's Meet the Press both used deceptive editing to smear their subjects in a banner weekend for media bias. Attorney General Bill Barr was the first to get clipped on Meet the Press. Anchor Chuck Todd claimed that Barr would not defend the DoJ's decision to drop charges against former Trump campaign official Michael Flynn based on a shortened version of an answer he gave about the topic to CBS News's Catherine Herridge. Herridge asked Barr, 'When history looks back on this decision, how do you think it will be written?

Attorney General William Barr

Tuesday

Justin Caruso

MSNBC’s dreamworld Democratic party

Sen. Bernie Sanders is the Democratic frontrunner, and boy, MSNBC is not happy.As the Nevada caucus results rolled in Saturday, commentators on the network, visibly annoyed, compared a Sanders victory to France being invaded by Nazi Germany, warned of his supporters using 'dark arts', said that it might be better for moderate Democrats if Trump won instead of Sanders, and called Sanders voters a 'squeaky, angry minority'.Chris Matthews, who was responsible for the off-color World War Two analogy (and is now facing calls to step down over it), also recently panicked on air about being executed in Central Park by 'Castro and the Reds' when discussing why Sanders calls himself a socialist.

msnbc