Conservative watchdog group Media Research Center found MSNBC commentator Chris Matthews to be the pundit who “lamented liberal losses” the most out of the mainstream election coverage Tuesday night. MRC Vice President Brent Baker said Matthews pulled off the night’s biggest media gaffe.
“I think it probably would be Chris Matthews asking Michele Bachmann if she would use subpoena power to investigate members of Congress as to whether they’re un-American,” Baker said.
MRC was observing election coverage to see who “smeared Tea Party wins the worst,” as well as to see which commentators took swipes at “Mama Grizzlies and victorious female conservatives.”
Baker told The Daily Caller that, though he thinks CBS and ABC bit their tongues better than NBC, it was clear their anchors were upset and tense about the election results, especially the Senate victories by Florida’s Marco Rubio and Kentucky’s Rand Paul, two of the Tea Party movement’s biggest stars. However, he said MRC’s staff wasn’t surprised by much Tuesday night in terms of election coverage.
“CBS and ABC were rather restrained in their angst,” Baker said. “They were pretty straightforward and weren’t nearly as bad as NBC was.”
As for cable networks, Baker said CNN’s election coverage was far too complicated to understand.
“They’ve got like 12 people commenting at the same time,” Baker said. “They’ve got like all kinds of people on there – it’s kind of out of control.”
Baker said the media will try to focus on some of the GOP’s few failures Tuesday night to suggest the country was actually not that anti-Democrat.
“Reid won in Nevada and, of course, Boxer won in California, they’re going to say this whole backlash has been overplayed by the media and that the country is not as anti-Democrat as once thought,” Baker said. “As for the Republican House, the out-party always does well in off-years.”
Even though Paul and Rubio are headed to Washington, D.C., as representatives of the Tea Party movement, Baker said folks should expect media to continue labeling the anti-establishment sentiment as “extremist.”
“The first time Rand Paul does something to go against [Senate Minority Leader Mitch] McConnell, the right will call him an extremist,” Baker said. “Whereas, if Rand Paul becomes a party player and will play ball with McConnell, he’ll fit in with the Republican policies.”
Baker added that a few races, like the New York gubernatorial race, received high levels of unwarranted media attention. He said Carl Paladino never had a shot of beating Andrew Cuomo.
As for the level of coverage Delaware’s Tea Party darling Christine O’Donnell was getting, Baker said it was overblown and over-exaggerated.
“The whole thing was silly because no poll showed she was ever even close, so basically, the race was a no-contest,” Baker said. “But, she got far more coverage than was necessary. Where was the story about the guy up in Wisconsin, Ron Johnson?”