Wolf Blitzer actually asked Trump about that amazing Hawaii investigation team and what it is “they can’t believe they’re finding”. Trump refused to directly answer the question other than to repeat his statement. Blitzer cornered him on it, and Trump again refused to answer the question. Meaning that he can’t answer the question.

Van Susteren at least asked the direct question of what Trump would specifically want to see to answer his “questions”. As in, what piece of evidence would finally convince him to go home. And Trump’s only answer was “Good Solid Proof”. Van Susteren called him on this, clearly asking what would constitute “good solid proof”. Trump just repeated his statement, again proving that he couldn’t answer the question.

I agree that the only concession Walker has made is that he didn’t sell his behavior well enough to the public before he did it. But I don’t see that as either him or Kleefisch being particularly apologetic or even chastened much. Instead, they’re blaming the voters of Wisconsin for somehow not understanding what they were up to. Kleefisch in particular has come across as quite smug in the most recent interviews.

I also agree that even if they survive the recall, the damage to their political careers (and to this movement to attack public employee unions) will be considerable. It’s not likely that Walker will get back into office for another term after this – voters who don’t want to deal with the recall will take care of the matter in the next scheduled Governor election.

And that will mark the end of Walker’s political career. It’s pretty clear that he fancied himself another Rick Perry – a younger, photogenic GOP governor with aspirations toward higher office than just the governorship of one state. Had this attack worked, Walker would have fast-tracked himself to the top of the heap. Instead, he’ll become another occasional commentator on Fox News, and probably one of the talking heads that pops up on Hannity’s panel.

Carlson only did this so he could get away with both plugging Klein’s book and re-air some of Hannity’s fawning “interview” of Klein. I wouldn’t be surprised if Hannity told Carlson to make sure this was in the discussion to keep the story alive until Hannity returns next week.

I particularly enjoyed the dramatic presentation that somehow Klein’s book is the victim of a sinister conspiracy rather than being the cheap gossip compilation that Klein has become notorious for peddling.

The idea that it’s Carlson and Bozell doing the shilling for the book only makes the whole thing sillier.

Colin Powell lived up to his role as an elder statesman. He made intelligent statements, even some of which I might disagree with around the edges. But he was very much on top of his facts and on top of the situation. And he did not give Hannity the license or the room to do much past his initial talking points.

I particularly appreciated him saying that he rejected the very premise of the talking point of Obama going on an “apology tour”. In several places, he corrected Hannity and then made the point that it would take too long to point out everything wrong in his statements.

I find it interesting that Fox tried to jump on the idea of Powell not endorsing Obama. But that’s not exactly what he said. He said he has not decided who he will back. He may well back Romney. Or he may go with Obama again. But he hasn’t outright said that he will not support Obama. Readers and viewers of Fox might not know that distinction.

I find it interesting that Crowley has never been asked on Fox about her swipe at Sandra Fluke on the occasion of her engagement. Anytime a Democrat or someone Fox doesn’t like has a verbal gaffe, the clip runs on a loop forever. Crowley makes an openly nasty and demeaning statement and it’s immediately dropped. I’ll give her credit for apologizing – but apologies haven’t earned non-Fox commentators any leeway on that network…

The GOP always goes after the 9th Circuit because they don’t like those judges. Go figure – it’s the least conservative circuit in the country. So any chance they can attack it, they will. Notice how McCarthy snuck in a nasty shot about the 9th Circuit being the most overturned one in the country – something I doubt is actually the case.

Further, the 9th Circuit has made clear that they are holding a legal conference – any non-conference activities like the snorkeling and other fun vacation stuff Van Susteren sniffed about have to be paid for by the individual attendees. This is also not the first time they’ve met in Hawaii – I wouldn’t be surprised if they have a deal with the hotel.

McCarthy’s other nasty shot was to tell the Circuit judges and staff to either have their meeting via teleconference or to hold the get-together in his own district in Bakersfield. Van Susteren herself came up with the novel idea of telling the Circuit to use a high school gymnasium “for free”. As though this would actually be free and forgetting that one big part of the cost of the event is the travel and lodging to put everyone together in a single location. You could hold such an event at any high school (and have to pay for the resources) and you’d still have to get the attendees there.

I’ve gotten to the point where if I see Palin on the tube, I hit fast forward.

I was more interested in Hannity trying to stir something up out of the Breitbart non-story about the high school kid antagonizing his teacher and getting more of a response than he bargained for. Of course, that bit didn’t include all the prior instances of him ringing this bell and pushing the teacher with this stuff.

If things turn out the way they’re shaping up, this could wind up being O’Reilly’s waterboarding moment. You could have a monthly update on whether Hannity has fulfilled his promise to be waterboarded and whether O’Reilly has confirmed that Dick Morris is finished on Fox…

The issue isn’t whether Nixon was smart – he was actually a very smart political animal. Unfortunately, he was also paranoid to a tee and it was this paranoia that ultimately did him in.

The issue is that Stein is trying to say that Nixon was some kind of genius when it came to understanding the presidency – and while Nixon was wily and at times quite effective, he was no genius. If he had been, he never would have been forced from the White House in disgrace.

But on another topic, I found the Dick Morris talk more interesting. Even when pushed by O’Reilly, Morris stuck to his guns that he thinks that Romney will win the election in a landslide. (And it sounds like Hannity is drinking this Kool-Aid too, as he was saying that he thought the presidential campaign would be over very soon since Romney was so far ahead…) O’Reilly actually told Morris “If this doesn’t go the way you’re saying, you’ll be finished. You’ll be lucky to get a job in Topeka. You’re really out on a limb.” Morris, pushed into the corner, chose to double down and insist on a historic defeat for Obama. One wonders if O’Reilly will remember this discussion on the day after the election…

The fact that Hannity can’t find anything else and is now resorting to angrier personal attacks is an indication of how weak he believes his case is for supporting Romney. Interesting that last night Dick Morris referred to Obama as “a drug addict” without any challenge. These guys are really getting frantic if that’s all they have.

Stein’s comments fall under the idea of “contemptuous words” and under the UCMJ have correctly resulted in his removal from the service. He can complain all he wants about it, but he took an oath and then violated it. Open and shut case.

I agree that he’s actually trying to get himself a nice little speaking/talk radio gig where he can sit and opine all day. Good for him. I’m sure there are plenty of KFI-like stations where he can peddle his wares and make nasty comments about Democrats to a receptive audience.

I also agree that if he had done this under Bush, Fox News and the radio pundits would have pilloried him. Just as they did various military people who refused deployment to Iraq or came out against the wars. Interesting that those were bad people for opposing Bush, but this guy is gold because he doesn’t like Obama.

Rove is on shaky ground and he knows it. His own electoral map is not working out the way he was hoping, and he had to actually acknowledge that on the air. (This is another one of those moments that show how frantic Dick Morris is now becoming.)

But the double standard is consistent: If Rove and his PAC put out an attack ad against Obama, they’re “just pointing out the facts” (to the delight of Sean Hannity). If a Democratic PAC puts out an attack ad against Romney, it’s “just politics.” That makes sense, doesn’t it?

Cuccinelli passed up one opportunity here. O’Reilly tried to play the card that the two journalists’ lives are in danger as there were threats made after the attack. Cuccinelli could have made the case that by making this such a public discussion and by publicizing the names of the journalists and putting their photos on the Factor every night, O’Reilly has generated this part of the problem.

The two journalists told their editor that they didn’t want a story done on this. Easy to understand why – it’s embarassing, indeed humiliating to have that kind of thing spread around. And it invites the crazies to respond.

If anyone here is adding to the problem, it’s O’Reilly.

Ellen, I could be wrong on this, but I thought O’Reilly and Morris were talking directly about the statement. Morris tried to dissect the statement to say that since Obama had allowed for state’s rights, it would mean he somehow would get the worst of both worlds. The funny part of the interview came when O’Reilly repeatedly tried to get Morris back on point, only to realize all he was hearing was “Obama’s gonna lose!” At which point, O’Reilly made a bit of a face and terminated the interview.

OTOH with O’Reilly, he let something out that was really nasty during his discussion with Dennis Miller. While telling Miller he thought Jon Lovitz was being disrespectful to the office of the President, he also admitted that he despises what he calls “the far left”. He likes what he calls “liberals” but anyone farther to the left, he despises. How does this line up with him having Cornell West and Tavis Smiley on?

Back to Obama: There’s one basic consistency to his positions that the right wing haters have somehow forgotten. He has consistently stood up for the rights of the groups the right wing would curtail. He had previously stood up for women’s rights to birth control and reproductive choice, where the right wing wanted to get that out of the public health idea (meaning put it back in the closet and have it only available to people wealthy or desperate enough to be able to get it). He had stood up for the rights of working class and rural Americans to vote, where the right wingers would demand more identification as a way of blocking those voters from pulling the lever. He had stood up for the rights of immigrants to not live in fear that every policeman could pull them over to ask for “their papers” in Arizona and elsewhere, while the right wingers wanted to set a precedent of chasing immigrants out of their states through intimidation and harassment.

And in this case, he stood up for the rights of Americans of whatever partnership to be able to have the same family laws apply to them. The point of marriage and civil unions isn’t just to allow someone to have a ceremony, although that’s a part. It’s that the partners have legal standing in the community as such. The right wingers would prefer that those couples have no legal standing. There really isn’t any more to the argument than that.

Of course Cavuto and Fox News want to cut Social Security and Medicare. That’s been a GOP wish list item ever since the programs were started. Doesn’t anyone remember the GW Bush idea of changing Social Security into private accounts in 2004? (And if they’d gotten away with that magic trick, all the retirees would have lost their benefits in the 2008 crash…)

The reality is that both programs can be stabilized for long term with very minor adjustments. This was done under the Reagan Administration with a miniscule tweak to withholding rates. It could be done again, the same way. It’s just that the GOP pundits and hardline congresspeople would rather throw the whole thing out or simply weaken it to the point that it could be removed without the big fight.

O’Reilly is definitely trying to find a false equivalence between the two events. Fox has been on the hunt for a good black-on-white violence story to use as a “gotcha” answer when a liberal brings up the Martin story.

And yes, it’s obviously another Watters ambush. He trespassed onto Finley’s property with his camera crew and demanded he answer questions while he was in his car trying to leave. Of course, if Finley had just left, they would have shot that and reported that he was too scared to answer. Instead, Finley stood his ground – and it looks like they edited this conversation. Something tells me he had more to say to Watters – including the fact that Finley’s own reporters didn’t want the story publicized.

By the way, the fact that the reporters’ lives have been threatened is exactly the situation they were trying to avoid. O’Reilly fanning the embers of this situation has certainly helped focus attention on them – and showing the reporters’ faces in the story makes the problem worse. The fact that O’Reilly doesn’t understand the consequences of his shining a spotlight here is probably similar to his inability to understand that his attacks on George Tiller contributed to that man’s murder.

Ellen, that was during the last freak-out Fox News had about Obama in 2010 – when Hannity was absolutely certain that the Sestak thing was going to become an issue. He never owned up to the fact that it didn’t, and it wasn’t.

The fact of the matter is that the GOP is becoming noticeably desperate. They don’t think their candidate is that strong and they don’t like the way the polls and the economy are trending. So we’re once again hearing the more hysterical attacks.

Let’s take each silly comment by Cain in order:

5. First, Cain says that Obama does nothing but “Blame Others” for his problems. Interesting that the GOP talking points try to blame everything on the Dems or on the media they don’t like (non-Fox) for the economy, etc., and yet Cain forgets to note this.

4. Second, Cain says Romney would never have signed the Affordable Care Act. Except that it was modeled on Romney’s health care law in Massachusetts and the individual mandate came from GOP suggestions that they disavowed once it was being promoted by President Obama.

3. Third, Cain holds Obama personally responsible for the expansion of the budget deficit. He of course has to ignore the overdue accounting of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, and hope that the US government would just sit by and watch the economy completely tank. And had Obama done that, he would have been called another Herbert Hoover. (It’s also interesting that if the President travels, he’s harangued for the expense of it. If the First Lady travels, she’s accused of wasting taxpayer money on vacations. But if they just stayed in the White House and never travelled anywhere, they would be accused of diminishing the presidency by hiding their faces.)

2. Fourth, Cain says it’s Obama’s fault that the US Congress hasn’t been able to reconcile a budget in three years. Let’s see what the real facts are there. For two years, the GOP had just enough votes in the House and Senate to gum up the works on anything unless the Dems voted in lockstep – which they almost never do. In the meantime, the GOP voted no in lockstep on every opportunity. Then when the GOP got control over the House, they began passing every objectionable bill they could, knowing they would not pass the Senate, just to try to gain cheap political points. The Congressional Budget is an unfortunate casualty of all the politicking being done by what may be the most cynical GOP congresses of all time.

1. Finally, Cain says Obama is trying to “attack success” when he asks very wealthy Americans to pay their fair share rather than lower tax rates at a time that the GOP are simultaneously harping on the budget deficit.

And this is the best the GOP can do in making a case for their man? No wonder the desperation is starting to show…

Issa has no credibility and no moral standing to even issue a contempt case. He’s been threatening to do it for some time, and has routinely been disregarded by pretty much everyone. There is no smoking gun here – just the usual scenario of angry GOP House members trying to make more political points during an election year.

Of all the anchors on Fox News, Shepard Smith is the one who really has tried to actually be fair in many of the situations I have seen. Yes, there’s the usual GOP spin from the network, but he has repeatedly stood up when he thought something was wrong.

I don’t agree with him on much, but I do respect that he really does stick up for the principles he believes in – the bit where he dropped the f-bomb to make the point that Americans do not torture is but one great example. And yes, the Katrina example is another.

I think you’re right, Ellen. He’s disgusted that this is the crop the GOP threw up for consideration as presidential candidates this year, and that he has to cheerlead for them on the news. I think many of the candidates have simply outraged him as he sees them as making the GOP look completely out of touch. Santorum and Gingrich’s regular moments of foot-in-mouth syndrome have been enough to set most Fox News people’s teeth on edge. (I had honestly thought both men would be welcomed as commentators on Fox News after the convention but it really feels that they may just be shunted off to the side. Putting them on Fox this year would only be a reminder of their shenanigans in the race.)

With no sarcasm intended at all, I really am concerned that Smith may be ill. That kind of weight loss is totally unhealthy. I can understand changing his diet but this feels like something more serious. It’s one thing to lose 10 or even 20 pounds. It’s another to lose what looks like 40 pounds when you weren’t heavy to start with.