Justin's Political Corner

The legendary newscaster will leave TV journalism next summer

For decades, Barbara Walters has inspired millions with her groundbreaking interviews — but after 37 years with ABC News, the newscaster is announcing on “The View” Monday that next summer, she will retire from TV journalism. Until then, she will continue to anchor and report for ABC News, appear on “The View,” and anchor specials throughout the year including a “20 Years of 10 Most Fascinating People” special in December, an Oscars special, and a May career retrospective.

Walters will remain Executive Producer of “The View,” the show she created in 1997.

“I am very happy with my decision and look forward to a wonderful and special year ahead both on ‘The View’ and with ABC News,” she said. “I created ‘The View’ and am delighted it will last beyond my leaving it.”

Walters began her career in 1961 at NBC’s “Today Show,” where she eventually became a co-host.

Two foundations that have been described as “the dark money ATM of the right” have spent more than $1 million combined funding a non-profit organization whose primary function is distributing libertarian education materials featuring Fox Business host John Stossel.

Donors Trust and Donors Capital Fund, the affiliated funding groups, were until recently obscure entities. But over the past month a series of reports havedetailed how those organizations have paid out more than $400 million to over 1,000 conservative groups since their 1999 founding. Those reports have described how the two organizations have allowed wealthy individuals to discreetly underwrite trending conservative causes likeclimate change denial.

The groups have also been the primary funders behind an effort to flood American classrooms with packaged libertarian lessons branded with John Stossel’s mustachioed face. In 2011, Donors Trust gave $540,000 to the Philadelphia-based Center for Independent Thought (CIT), with the funds earmarked for the distribution of “Stossel in the Classroom” teaching materials, according to IRS filings obtained by Mother Jones. 

“Stossel in the Classroom” began in 1999 when Stossel was still with ABC News. It was seeded with financial support from the libertarian Palmer R. Chitester Fund and grew slowly until CIT took over the program in the mid-2000s.

CIT was a natural home for “Stossel in the Classroom.” Founded with Koch money as the Libertarian Review Foundation in the 1970s, real estate developer Howard Rich took control of the organization in 1990 and gave it its current name. Rich is part of the libertarian donor elite,  founded Americans for Limited Government, and sits on the board at Cato, the Club for Growth, and the Friedman Center for Educational Choice. (Rich’s wife, Andrea, runs CIT, but does not draw a salary.)

At the same time the group took over “Stossel,” new right-wing funding began flowing into its coffers. While Donors Trust was its main sponsor in 2011, it has also received money from Donors Capital Fund ($500,000 from 2007 to 2010) and foundations linked to the Koch brothers.

The purpose of groups like Donors Trust and Donors Capital Fund is to allow wealthy benefactors to support conservative causes anonymously. The Tides Foundation is a liberal analogue, donating millions of dollars to left-leaning groups (including Media Matters).  According to Mother Jones, whose non-profit arm has also received Tides funding, “Donors Trust’s strategic intent is far narrower and more coherent than Tides’. The groups funded by Donors Trust more or less pursue the same agenda—eliminate regulations, kneecap unions, shrink government, and transfer more power to the private sector.”

The Center for Public Integrity produced this graphic detailing the flow of money in recent years from Koch-backed and other right-wing foundations through Donors Trust to a variety of conservative groups:

CIT’s funders — whoever they are — will find nothing in their program’s activities to make them question their investment in helping produce the next generation of libertarians.

The new caretakers built a slick new website, archived more videos spanning Stossel’s career, instituted a professional organization of requests and distribution, and began producing specially designed economics DVDs and teaching guides.

The program now offers hundreds of free clips from Stossel’s shows and specials that claim to seriously address a range of academic subjects, including Art (“Why does Hollywood Hate Capitalism?”), Biology (“Debunking Food Myths”), and History (“The Real Story of Thanksgiving,” which explains “how the Pilgrims were hurt by sharing”).

“Stossel in the Classroom” also produces libertarian economics courses. The small team of economists that writes materials such as “Making Economics Come Alive with John Stossel” has multiple close ties to the Stavros Center for the Advancement of Free Enterprise and Economic Education at Florida State University.

The videos on the site are stacked with pundits echoing Stossel’s radical laissez-faire views. A typical lesson pairs videos of Fox Business pundits tearing into a regulatory effort — a video on the 2011 health care law features serial liar Betsy McCaughey and industrial-fan entrepreneur Bob Luddy — with teacher’s guides that ask if government regulation is necessary. 

h/t: MMFA

PPP’s annual poll on TV news finds that there’s only one source more Americans trust than distrust: PBS. 52% of voters say they trust PBS to only 29% who don’t trust it. The other seven outlets we polled on are all distrusted by a plurality of voters.

When it comes to asking Americans which single outlet they trust the most and least out of the ones we polled on, Fox News once again wins both honors. 34% say it’s the one they trust the most, compared to 13% for PBS, 12% for CNN, 11% for ABC, 8% for MSNBC, 6% for CBS, and 5% each for Comedy Central and NBC. Fox News is the choice of 67% of Republicans, while Democrats basically split their allegiances four ways between ABC and CNN, both at 17%, and MSNBC and PBS, both at 16%.

Even more Americans identify Fox News as the outlet they trust the least- 39% give its that designation to 14% for MSNBC, 13% for CNN, 12% for Comedy Central, 5% for ABC and CBS, 3% for NBC, and 1% for PBS. 60% of Democrats give it their lowest marks while Republicans split between MSNBC (24%), CNN (19%), and Comedy Central (14%) on that front.

Full results

H/T: Public Policy Polling

On Sunday, economist Paul Krugman hit back against GOP claims that public sector employment has increased under Obama, and that such jobs consist mainly of wasteful bureaucrats and somehow count less economically than private sector ones. Back in September it was tea party Senator Rand Paul (R-KY) toeing that line, and this morning it was former Republican gubernatorial candidate Carly Fiorina.

The exchange commenced immediately after Krugman made the point that, had government employment in the current recovery followed the same path it followed under previous recessions in the Bush and Reagan years, unemployment now would be slightly above 6 percent:

CARLY FIORINA: I think it’s important to remember, when we talk about the economy, that a private sector job and a public sector job are not the same things. They’re not equivalent. I’m not saying public sector jobs aren’t important. But a private sector job pays for itself. A private sector job creates other jobs. A public sector job is paid for by taxpayers. […]

PAUL KRUGMAN: But when we say public sector jobs, it is not a bureaucrat in Washington, D.C.

FIORINA: Oh, it is, actually.

KRUGMAN: When we talk about public sector jobs — when we look at the ones that have been lost in large numbers in this — it’s basically school teachers. Don’t think about bureaucrats. It’s school teachers. What we’ve laid off hundreds of thousands of school teachers.

And when we talk about the cuts in public spending that have happened, they are not, you know, some god awful who knows what. It’s actually public investment. It’s largely fixing potholes and repairing bridges.

So, you know, you have this image of these wasteful bureaucrats doing god knows what. What we’ve seen is an incredible drought of basic infrastructure, and laying off hundreds of thousands of school teachers.

FIORINA: It is a fact that virtually every department in every organization in Washington, D.C. has seen its budget increase for the last 40 years. That money is being paid to hire people. The number of people who are — of course there are some teachers…

KRUGMAN: The vast bulk of public sector employees are at the state and local level. They are largely school teachers plus police officers plus firefighters. And your notion that it’s all these bureaucrats — that’s a myth that’s used…

FIORINA: It’s not a myth, it’s a fact. It’s not a myth, it’s a fact. We don’t have enough private escort job creation.

It’s a myth. Public sector jobs at the federal level have actually remained pretty stable over the last forty years. They began and ended the period around approximately 2.8 million, with a bounce to about 3.1 million circa-1990. Public sector jobs at the state and local levels increased significantly over those forty years, peaking at a bit over 19 million total when President Obama entered office. (They’ve fallen since, accounting for the decline in overall public employment.) But nearly all of that growth was in teachers and support staff for the education system, who now total nearly 7 million of those state and local workers.

The other major categories of jobs in state and local public employment are, as Krugman noted, police, firefighters, health care workers, and maintenance workers and drivers for the country’s transportation infrastructure. And the overall population of the country has also been growing, so even though the raw number of state and local workers increased significantly, the ratio of those workers to the overall population did not — 59 per 1000 in 1980 versus 65 per 1000 today.

h/t: Jeff Spross at Think Progress Economy

ABC News’ White House correspondent is leaving the network for a new role at CNN.

He will host a new weekday program on CNN and serve as chief White House correspondent for the network beginning in 2013, CNN said in a statement on Thursday.

“We are thrilled to have Jake join CNN and take the helm of a brand new weekday program,” said CNN executive vice-president Ken Jautz. “Jake is an exceptional reporter and communicator, and we look forward to developing a program that takes advantage of all of his strengths, his passion and his knowledge of national issues and events.”

His departure now comes as ABC News shows no indication that it will appoint a new host for “This Week” anytime soon. When George Stepanopoulos stepped down as host in 2010, many thought that Tapper would replace him. Tapper was the interim host, but Christiane Amanpour was chosen to host the show instead. When she stepped down in 2011, Tapper was passed over again.

ABC News announced Tapper’s departure in a statement Thursday. Jon Karl, formerly senior political correspondent, will become the network’s new chief White House correspondent.

h/t: Huffington Post

ABC again invited CNN contributor and conservative pundit Dana Loesch to be part of its This Week roundtable, even though she has promoted a conspiracy theory that her CNN co-workers described as “McCarthy-like.”

On her radio show earlier this week, Loesch promoted the fringe idea that Hillary Clinton aide Huma Abedin “is essentially a member of the female version of the Muslim Brotherhood, the Muslim Sisterhood.” The comment was the subject of a letter circulated by Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN) attacking Abedin.

Similarly, Loesch attacked a caller to her show this week who said she opposed Chick-Fil-A management’s stance against gay marriage, telling her that “I know you hate Christ.” Loesch claimed that as a supporter of marriage equality, the woman could not be a Christian. Polls over the last decades have shown declining opposition to same-sex marriage among evangelicals, and among Americans in general.

From the 07.29.2012 edition of ABC’s This Week:

But Loesch nevertheless repeated the claim on This Week, saying, “obviously the CEO is a Christian, people are shocked that he’s for traditional marriage? It just doesn’t make sense to me.”

ABC News President Ben Sherwood said, in the wake of errors in and disputes over his network’s coverage of the shootings at The Dark Knight Rises in Colorado, his network had no immediate plans to change standards and practices, but would look at how to make sure staff followed them in tense breaking news situations.

Sherwood faced sharp questioning from the Television Critics Association at a presentation in California on Thursday about Brian Ross’s initial report that a man who shared the name of the accused shooter was a member of a Tea Party group, and about reports that ABC News had mischaracterized the reaction of the suspect’s mother when she was called for comment about his involvement. In the former case, the James Holmes Ross identified as a Tea Party member was not the same James Holmes who will be tried for the murders of twelve people at an Aurora theater. And Holmes’ mother has suggested that her remarks to ABC News that “Yes, you’ve got the right person,” were meant to confirm that she was, in fact, his mother, not to indicate that she believed it likely that her son would have committed the crimes of which he is accused.

Sherwood said that Ross has personally apologized to the man he misidentified on-air, but said that he would not be suspended, sanctioned or formally reprimanded, though Sherwood said “I had a very serious and stern conversation with him, and I can assure you that Brian feels sick about this.”

And Sherwood was reluctant to directly address whether the network would judge Holmes’ political affiliations, if any prove to exist, relevant to their coverage of the story.

h/t: Alyssa Rosenberg at Think Progress

PPP’s 3rd annual TV news trust poll (2011 version here, 2010 version here) finds that Fox News tops the list for both the source Americans trust the most and the one they trust the least.

Fox is the most trusted TV news source for 34% of voters, followed by PBS at 17%, CNN at 12%, ABC News at 11%, CBS News at 8%, MSNBC at 5%, and Comedy Central and NBC each at 4%.

68% of Republicans pick Fox as their most trusted source, with no one else even hitting double digits. Democrats split closely three ways with PBS at 21%, ABC News at 19%, and CNN at 17%. Despite having a reputation for appealing to the left MSNBC actually polls in only 6th place among Democrats at 8%, finishing slightly behind even Fox News’ 9%. Independents split almost evenly between Fox News (29%) and PBS (27%).

Fox is also the least trusted TV news source for 34% of voters, followed by Comedy Central at 16%, MSNBC at 15%, CNN at 11%, ABC News at 7%, CBS News at 5%, PBS at 2%, and NBC News at 1%.

Democrats (53-17 over Comedy Central) and independents (44-13 over Comedy Central) both overwhelmingly say Fox is their least trusted news source. Republicans go for MSNBC by a 28-23 margin over CNN, followed by Comedy Central at 18% and ABC News at 10%.

Some results:

Q1 Do you trust ABC News, or not?

• Trust it
•  37% 
• …………………………………………………….
• Do not trust it
•  40% 
• …………………………………………..
• Not sure 22% 

………………………………………………….

Q2 Do you trust CBS News, or not?

• Trust it
•  40% 
• …………………………………………………….
• Do not trust it
•  42% 
• …………………………………………..
• Not sure 18% 

………………………………………………….

Q3 Do you trust CNN, or not?

• Trust it
•  43% 
• …………………………………………………….
• Do not trust it
•  39% 
• …………………………………………..
• Not sure 18% 
• ………………………………………………….

Q4 Do you trust Comedy Central, or not?

• Trust it
•  28% 
• …………………………………………………….
• Do not trust it
•  46% 
• …………………………………………..
• Not sure 26% 
• ………………………………………………….

Q5 Do you trust Fox News, or not?

• Trust it
•  45% 
• …………………………………………………….
• Do not trust it
•  42% 
• …………………………………………..
• Not sure 13% 
• ………………………………………………….

Q6 Do you trust MSNBC, or not?

• Trust it
•  38% 
• …………………………………………………….
• Do not trust it
•  43% 
• …………………………………………..
• Not sure 19% 
• ………………………………………………….

Q7 Do you trust NBC News, or not?

• Trust it
•  44% 
• …………………………………………………….
• Do not trust it
•  38% 
• …………………………………………..
• Not sure 17% 
• ………………………………………………….

Q8 Do you trust PBS, or not?

• Trust it
•  52% 
• …………………………………………………….
• Do not trust it
•  30% 
• …………………………………………..
• Not sure 17% 
• ………………………………………………….

Q9 Which TV news outlet do you trust the most: 

ABC News, CBS News, CNN, Comedy Central, 

Fox News, MSNBC, NBC News, or PBS?

• ABC News 11% 
• ………………………………………………
• CBS News  8% 
• ………………………………………………
• CNN 12% 
• ……………………………………………………….
• Comedy Central
•   4% 
• ……………………………………….
• Fox News 34% 
• ………………………………………………..
• MSNBC  5% 
• …………………………………………………..
• NBC News  4% 
• ………………………………………………
• PBS 17% 
• ……………………………………………………….
• Someone else/Not sure  4% 
• …………………………….

Q10 Working from the same list of choices, which 

TV news outlet do you trust the least?

• ABC News  7% 
• ………………………………………………
• CBS News  5% 
• ………………………………………………
• CNN 11% 
• ……………………………………………………….
• Comedy Central
•  16% 
• ……………………………………….
• Fox News 34% 
• ………………………………………………..
• MSNBC 15% 
• …………………………………………………..
• NBC News  1% 
• ………………………………………………
• PBS  2% 
• ……………………………………………………….
• Someone else/Not sure  9%

-For the second year in a row PBS easily comes out ahead as the outlet the most people trust, even if it isn’t necessarily the one they trust the most.

-In general trust in television news has been on the rise over the last two years. Trust in NBC News is up 15 points compared to 2010, CBS and ABC News are both up by 12 points, and CNN is up by 6 points. The only outlet in worse shape than it was 2 years ago is Fox News, which is down 9 points. But they’re still headed in the right direction- they’re up 7 points from 2011 after dropping by 16 points between 2010 and 2011.

-Democrats trust everything- except Fox News. NBC does the best with them at +50 (67/17), followed by PBS and CNN at +49 (66/17 and 65/16 respectively), ABC at +38 (57/19), CBS at +35 (58/23), MSNBC at +33 (56/23), and even Comedy Central at +4 (36/32). Fox News comes in at -36 (25/61).

-Republicans meanwhile don’t trust anything except Fox News. PBS comes the closest to breaking even among non-Fox outlets, although not very close, at -30 (26/56).  It’s followed by CNN at -49 (18/67), MSNBC at -51 (18/69), NBC at -52 (17/69), CBS at -54 (17/71), ABC at -56 (14/70), and Comedy Central at -59 (12/71). But Fox News comes in at a stellar 73/17.

Independents are with the Democrats. They trust everything except Fox News. Main takeaway from this poll: tv news has become just as polarizing as the political parties in this country.

Full results here

h/t: PPP.