Debates

In a post headlined “To See Mike Pence as ‘Normal’ Is to Grade on a Generous Curve,” Steve Benen, who's also the primary blogger for the TRMS website, sought to demolish the idea that Tuesday night’s vice presidential debate will feature what Politico called “two conventional pols.” “As a matter of tone and temperament, Mike Pence is hardly scary: the governor is a mild-mannered, soft-spoken…

As the Republican National Committee's Sean Spicer appeared as a guest on Tuesday's New Day, co-host Chris Cuomo pressed him over Republican attacks against Democratic running mate Tim Kaine's record on crime, and his history of involvement as a missionary with a priest in Honduras with marxist leanings. Cuomo dismissively invoked the Willie Horton ads from the 1988 presidential candidate as…

On Tuesday’s NBC Today, correspondent Peter Alexander provided viewers with a timeline of vice presidential debates over the years. However, the one-sided segment repeatedly portrayed Democratic running mates as victors while dismissing the Republicans as sexist, bungling, or full of “malarkey.”

Ahead of Tuesday night’s vice presidential debate, NBC’s Today spent the morning putting all the pressure on Indiana Governor Mike Pence to “clean up” after Donald Trump and predicted that the Republican running mate would be stuck on “defense” all evening. 

On Saturday's New Day on CNN, during discussions of the possibility that Donald Trump will make an issue of Hillary Clinton's treatment of women who were involved with her husband Bill Clinton, CNN political commentator Errol Louis ignored the existence of several sexual assault accusations made against Bill Clinton which could be brought up as the CNN commentator portrayed Hillary Clinton's…

There’s been a lot of talk in the past few days about “presidential temperament,” and where that quality is concerned, Brian Beutler firmly believes that President Obama has the right stuff. In a Friday piece, Beutler lauded Obama’s "unflappable" performance at CNN’s military-themed presidential town hall Wednesday at Fort Lee in Virginia. By contrast, Beutler opined, Donald Trump "lost his…

On Monday, we noted the latest Rasmussen Reports survey found that 46 percent of those surveyed felt the debate moderators would assist Hillary Clinton – something that happened with liberal Lester Holt in Monday’s debate. On Friday, Rasmussen has a new survey of 1,000 likely voters demonstrating a major distrust in media-elite “fact checking” of the candidates:

On Thursday's Good Morning America, ABC co-anchor Amy Robach excitedly previewed the season premiere of NBC's Saturday Night Live which is expected to have fun with the first presidential debate. But, as she recalled politicians from the past that the show has been famous for lambasting, she only cited Republicans as being among her favorites.

Daniel Halper at the New York Post reported on the close ties between the Democrats and CBS News as we near the vice presidential debate on October 4, moderated by CBS correspondent Elaine Quijano: Hillary Clinton’s running mate, Sen. Tim Kaine, is being prepped for the vice presidential debate by Bob Barnett, the husband of CBS correspondent Rita Braver — just as another CBS correspondent and…

While recapping Monday’s presidential debate and trying to fact-check Donald Trump, MSNBC host Rachel Maddow seemed not to have all her ducks in a row on Tuesday when it came to slamming Trump for supposedly lying about Bill Clinton signing the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) when she argued it was actually George H.W. Bush.

Following the first presidential debate between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump, Clinton’s campaign manager, Robby Mook, appeared on The View to praise Clinton. Mook faced softball questions from all but former Fox News contributor Jedediah Bila.

South Park again parodied the presidential election between "Giant Douche and Turd Sandwich" in season 20’s third episode, “The Damned.” Two nights after the country’s first presidential debate, South Park had its own between Mr. Garrison and Hillary Clinton. The show mocked Hillary’s reliance on political advisors and scripted sound bites.

After NBC’s Today spent three straight days scolding Donald Trump for even thinking about mentioning Bill Clinton’s habitual mistreatment of women, on Wednesday, the morning show had no trouble doing the Clinton campaign’s bidding by touting allegations of Trump’s “sexist behavior.”

Unlike a lot of his fellow liberals, Jonathan Chait doesn’t believe presidential-debate moderators should be on-camera fact-checkers, but Chait’s reason for opposing the idea is unambiguously anti-conservative. In an item posted a few hours prior to Monday night’s Clinton-Trump clash, Chait argued that the way Republicans dealt with Candy Crowley’s intervention in a 2012 Romney-Obama debate “…