Sarah Palin Again Hits The 'Lamestream Media' And Republican Congressman Darrell Issa Wants To Investigate The White House (Or Does He?!)

Hi everyone. Well, I'm afraid tonight went a bit off the rails. Disappointing. Oh well. I guess the best place to begin is the beginning. To the bullet points!

• Did you hear? Sarah Palin made up crap, got called on it, and then played the victim of the 'lamestream media." Must be a day that ends in 'Y'! Seriously, this is in no way new.
  

• Back story: Palin went off on the Federal Reserve, claiming 'pump priming' will push rising grocery prices even higher. A "Wall Street Journal" reporter called her out, noting prices haven't actually risen. She then did what she always does: spin and attack. (I haven't looked into this at all, and I'm loathe to even hint at agreeing with Palin, but it does kinda seem like prices have risen.)

• So anyway, apparently this deserves a whole segment. I mean, don't get me wrong. Yay for calling out and all, but uh, she does this all the time. It's kind of her thing. Why does this one merit a segment? At this point can't we just fact-check and move on? She's not even an elected official.
  

• Anderson Cooper was being kinda weird throughout. He had that whole wide-eye "can you believe this?" tone going on (yes, yes we believe it!), and then sorta gave us a little lecture about words mattering. Erm, we know.

• Our anchor: "Now, supporters of Sarah Palin will say this story is nitpicking, much ado about nothing, a gotcha attack by both "The Wall Street Journal" and I guess now by me." Well, I am as far from a supporter as you can get, and while I don't think it's a gotcha attack, I do think having an entire lead segment about something that she does every damn day is a little much, especially given that she holds no office. Hold her accountable, yes. Don't go overboard.

• Speaking of overboard, we have to talk about this, yo! We're joined by David Gergen and Dana Loesch. I have to say, I'm seriously disappointed that 360 continues to have Loesch on the show, and quite frankly I find it a little insulting to the viewers. We're told that she's the editor of BigJournalism.com, but we're not told that the blog is part of Andrew Breitbart's franchise. Remember him? The smear merchant with no credibility? Yeah, well, Loesch is one of his people, which apparently 360 thinks is good enough for their viewers.
  

• This is a woman who once implied that Anderson got where he is by "riding the Vanderbilt coattails." She cleans herself up real nice for primetime, but on the Internet she's a different story. I get why they book her. I really do. She's pretty, articulate (not to be confused with having good arguments), and doesn't bring the crazy. I'm just so sick of these tea party-type pundits getting away with being one person online and another person on the teevee. You don't see that with David Gergen. If he puts out a blog post, it will contain the same tone and ideas of what you'd hear him discuss anywhere. Dana's continued presence on the show tells me they either haven't done their research, or they simply don't have respect for the viewers. Surely there are more credible conservatives.

• The Gerg pushing back on Anderson was a bit interesting.

• Anderson: "I do find it interesting, though, that she, like a lot of politicians -- and it's not just her, and it's Republicans and Democrats -- people don't admit when they make a mistake. And I don't get -- I think, frankly, people, the voting public, would like it if somebody just said, well, look, yes, look, OK, I made an error, we all make errors, rather than attacking the messenger." He's such a Pollyanna sometimes. Sure I'd love to live in that world, but I don't think it ever existed in the first place. He's acting like this behavior is new or something.

• Moving on, we learn that Congressman Darrell Issa is probably going to be running the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform (subpoena power, baby!). Through some montage action we're shown that Campaign Issa was going to investigate the pants off Obama. Newly Elected Issa? Not so much. Walk back time! Or is it? The Congressman still has plans to hold a boat-load of hearings.

• For discussion, we have Jeffrey Toobin, Cornell Belcher, and Erick Erickson. Oh yay, we're two for two with the right-wingers I loathe. Where's Ed Rollins these days? Or what about Frum? Frum has no friends now, right? He'd probably love to come on!
  

• Jeffrey and Cornell get much love from me for this segment. Anderson? He can go sit in the corner. The dude will just not stop pushing the balance meme. Do we need an intervention here or what? He brought up the hearings that Henry Waxman held, which is a perfectly legitimate thing to do, but then he gives examples (are superweeds an outgrowth of USDA biotech policy?) and acts like we're supposed to think they're as crazy as going after the New Black Panther Party. Thank God for Toobin doing some smacking down.

• Cornell: "Anderson,, I have got to push back on you here, because you're trying to make it seem like it's equal. He's talking about doing 280 investigations in one year, more than what Waxman did in two years, so it's a little different." Called him flat out on fake balance. I think I love this guy.
  

• Erickson: "Ninety percent of the American public has never even heard of Darrell Issa. And they certainly don't know what he said on the campaign trail." I basically disagree with everything Erick has said, but I'd bet money he's right on this one.
  

• Oh look, more pimping of Parker Spitzer. Seriously guys, give it up.

• So, they waste our time with all this pontification, and stick actual news about the BP oil spill in the 360 Bulletin. Yeah, that makes sense.
  

• Part of the news mentioned was that there's worry the oil has made it into the food chain. Anderson: "It's interesting, the story about the oil entering the food chain. It's important to point out, you know, that they do test the stuff very carefully, and there have been no reports of problems. I was in New Orleans this weekend, went to a lot of restaurants, ate seafood just about every night, had oysters, and the food is as great as ever. So I hope the people don't read that and cancel trips." Then adding: "Because the food is safe and it tastes better than ever." I actually found this a little irresponsible. Mention that rigorous testing is done, sure, but I think our anchor is letting his love for New Orleans cloud his judgment. He's a journalist; not a member of the tourism board. And while he can say that he himself feels the food is safe enough to eat, he shouldn't be using his position to make such a declarative statement. Can anyone at this point really know that the food is safe?
  

• I think that's all for me. Clearly I've done enough damage already. The show could have been better.