With over two years to go until the 2016 presidential election, the media are already trying to ban unflattering topics about Hillary Clinton. From Tuesday morning through Thursday morning, NBC, ABC, and CBS aired 9 full stories – totaling 20 minutes 12 seconds – defending Clinton from health questions raised by Republican strategist Karl Rove.

NBC was first to go after Rove and devoted the most coverage to issue, with 4 stories adding up to 7 minutes 42 seconds of air time. On Tuesday, Today hosts declared that Rove had “stepped a little bit into it” with his “explosive new claims” and Nightly News anchor Brian Williams proclaimed it to be a “nasty” Republican “smear campaign.”

ABC and CBS didn’t pick up on the story until Wednesday morning, with Good Morning America and This Morning reporting on the “backlash” against Rove, emphasizing how he “took some friendly fire” from fellow Republicans on the issue.

Nightly News provided a second night of coverage on Wednesday, giving 63 seconds of uninterrupted air time to Bill Clinton defending his wife. Meanwhile, on ABC’s World News, correspondent Jonathan Karl looked at the issue more critically, noting the lack of public information about Hillary Clinton’s 2012 health scare.

ABC did 3 full stories – totaling 6 minutes 53 seconds – between Wednesday and Thursday, while CBS had 2 full stories totaling 5 minutes 38 seconds in the same time period.

All three network morning shows offered full reports on Thursday.

At the top of Today, co-host Savannah Guthrie announced: “On offense. Bill Clinton firing back at Republican critics who questioned Hillary Clinton’s health.” Introducing the segment later, she touted how the former president was “hitting back at what he considers ridiculous suggestions that Hillary Clinton’s health might impact a potential White House run for her.”

National correspondent Peter Alexander hyped: “You’ve got the Clintons going head-to-head with Karl Rove….Bill Clinton strikes back…The former president mocking comments from Republican strategist Karl Rove, who last week reportedly questioned whether Hillary Clinton may have brain damage.”

Alexander observed: “Reviled by Democrats, Rove, analysts say, was stirring the pot.”

On Good Morning America, Karl heralded: “Bill Clinton also predicted there will be harsher attacks to come against Hillary. And his response sent a clear message to her political opponents, when you take on one Clinton, you’re taking on both of them.”

On CBS This Morning, fill-in co-host Anthony Mason told viewers: “Former President Bill Clinton is defending his wife Hillary Clinton against attacks questioning her health.” Co-host Norah O’Donnell chimed in: “At a forum in Washington on Wednesday, the former President said he is dumbfounded by Rove’s comments.”

In the segment that followed, political director John Dickerson actually saw some success for Rove in raising health questions about the former secretary of state: “If his goal was to get people talking about this a lot earlier and in this kind of weird twilight period where Hillary Clinton isn’t  a candidate, can’t respond as a candidate, but also has to respond because she doesn’t want it out there, so he has succeeded.”

Dickerson also pointed out: “And it’s usually the Democrats who are the ones who are beating up on Republicans. They did it with Bob Dole, Ronald Reagan, and they did it with John McCain.”

The media certainly thought such questions about Republicans were reasonable at the time, but when it comes to Hillary Clinton, it’s off limits.

An agitated Chris Matthews on Wednesday fumed over Karl Rove’s recent questioning of Hillary Clinton’s medical condition. Throwing all the invective he could at the Republican strategist, Matthews reduced Rove’s comments to this: “My theory is he could be almost like a kamikaze pilot in World War II. He could blow up the ship and blow himself up.” The host continued, “Who cares if Karl Rove is known as an SOB? He already is known as an SOB.” [MP3 audio here.]

Closing out the segment, Matthews insisted, “I really do think he’s a kamikaze. And I’m not knocking previous kamikazes…They’re patriotic people. [Rove’s] a killer dog.” He’s not “knocking” “patriotic” kamikaze pilots? All this was a lead-up to the MSNBC anchor’s praise of the “power” of Comedy Central hosts have to take on conservatives: “…The fiercest of them all, Jon Stewart, is tearing the inside out of those on the right, Limbaugh, Rove, and the rest.”

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Matthews delighted over how Stewart and Stephen Colbert are exposing those on the right: “We see chewing and belching on the Benghazi story and Nigeria, that smorgasbord like hogs in a trough.”

The host closed by declaring:

CHRIS MATTHEWS: Name me a politician in either party, or either House of Congress, or any governor, who has the nightly power of Stewart or Colbert to take apart a pomposity like Limbaugh or a circus act like Karl Rove with the sharpness that John and Steven display night after night after night. I say, good for them.”

No journalist can match the power of liberals like Stewart and Colbert? Remember that the next time someone tries to explain away those two as “just comedians.”

A partial transcript of the May 14 segment is below:

5:05

CHRIS MATTHEWS: My theory is he could be almost like a kamikaze pilot in World War II. He could blow up the ship and blow himself up. But who cares? Who cares if Karl Rove is known as an SOB? He already is known as an SOB, but he is in this case being the SOB that, to use the parlance that Wayne said, that dropped the bomb and did it with impunity.

…

MATTHEWS: I really do think he’s a kamikaze. And I’m not knocking previous kamikazes. Okay? Just him. Anyway, thank you, Steve – They’re patriotic people. He’s a killer dog.

…

5:13

MATTHEWS: How Jon Stewart is leading the fight against the bomb throwers on the right. I’m talking about you, El Rushbo and you Karl Rove.

5:58

MATTHEWS: Let me finish tonight with this. I’ve long ago come to the conclusion that SNL and Comedy Central can make or break a politician. SNL and Chevy Chase did it to Gerald Ford, taking an all-American from Michigan and a graduate of Yale Law and converting him into an oaf, a dumb oaf. SNL and Comedy Central have been doing this, maybe they have already done a similar job to Vice President Joe Biden. They made him a prisoner of his gaffes. Fair enough, you can argue. Political satire, rough satire, has been in the political arena since the days when Thomas Nast portrayed Republicans as elephants, Democrats as donkeys. It’s in our partisan blood stream.

But I think it’s escalated now that Comedy Central has grabbed the minds of young voters out there, really grabbed them. There’s a reason why we show you clips in the Sideshow every night of Jon Stewart and Steve Colbert. They’re powerful. They cut to the quick of popular culture. They inhabit that world where people form their opinions of those who would lead us. And right now, as I speak, the fiercest of them all, Jon Stewart, is tearing the inside out of those on the right, Limbaugh, Rove, and the rest. We see chewing and belching on the Benghazi story and Nigeria, that smorgasbord like hogs in a trough.

I have long believed that cable television has come to challenge elected office as a platform for national leadership. Name me a politician in either party, or either House of Congress, or any governor, who has the nightly power of Stewart or Colbert to take apart a pomposity like Limbaugh or a circus act like Karl Rove with the sharpness that John and Steven display night after night after night. I say, good for them.

Wolf Blitzer and his fellow journalists on Wednesday thrilled over how Bill Clinton responded to comments by Karl Rove about Hillary. His reaction was “well done,” “effective” and there’s “nobody better.” Regarding an appearance by Mrs. Clinton, Blitzer enthused, “She does look great, you’ve got to admit.”

On the subject of the former President’s defense of his wife, Gloria Borger touted, “There’s nobody better to do it…There’s  there’s nobody better to answer the charges about brain damage than Bill Clinton.” She added, “He’s a very good surrogate for Hillary Clinton.” [MP3 audio here.] 

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Summing up, Borger praised, “I mean, very well done.”

Regarding jokes Mr. Clinton made, Brianna Keilar hyped, “To do it with humor was effective. I thought it was effective.”

Despite the universal praise of the Clintons, Borger should be commended for pushing back on the idea that Rove’s charges are somehow unique to Republicans:

BORGER: You know, this isn’t rocket science and it’s not limited to Karl Rove. If you remember, during the last campaign, at one point, Harry Reid mentioned that he heard that Mitt Romney had paid no income taxes. Remember that?

[Thanks to MRC intern Connor Williams for the transcript.]

A partial transcript of the May 14 Wolf segment is below:

WOLF BLITZER: Hello, I’m Wolf Blitzer reporting from Washington. Hillary Clinton hits the speaking circuit without mentioning the political fire storm swirling around her. But her husband did. Mrs. Clinton addressed the American Jewish Committee forum in Washington, D.C. today. She did not respond to Republican strategist Karl Rove’s comments that she may have suffered a serious brain injury, but here’s what Bill Clinton said about his wife’s health at a different event here.

BILL CLINTON: She works out every week. She is strong. She’s doing great. As far as I can tell, she’s in better shape than I am. She certainly seems to have more stamina now. And there’s nothing to it. I didn’t even — I was sort of dumfounded. They went to all this trouble to say that she had staged what was a terrible concussion that required six months of very serious work to get over. Something she never low balled with the American people, never tried to pretend didn’t happen. Now they say she’s really got brain damage.

REPORTER: You think they’re just trying —

CLINTON: If she does, I must be in really tough shape because she’s still quicker than I am.

BLITZER: Let’s bring in our chief political analyst Gloria Borger and our senior political correspondent Brianna Keilar. First of all, what do you make of the President the addressing the Karl Rove allegations?

GLORIA BORGER: There’s nobody better to do it. I mean, obviously, as Brianna knows, the Clinton campaign, the Clinton people, I should say, put out a —

BRIANNA KIELAR: Easy to slip there.

BORGER: Yeah, easy, put out a very strong statement about this yesterday. But there’s nobody better to answer the charges about brain damage than Bill Clinton. The way he handled it was kind of offhand. He didn’t dismiss what occurred to her. He’s a very good surrogate for Hillary Clinton. She’s got the stamina, she’s this. And, you know, he turned it around and said now they’ll make it an issue that she’s got brain damage, I mean, very well done.

BLITZER: What do you think?

BRIANNA KEILAR: To do it with humor was effective. I thought it was effective. I will tell you, just having been to so many events because Hillary Clinton, since finishing up her book has really been making the rounds, you can go and you can see, she’s kind of been I think working on some of her political muscles as she gets sort of back into that gear. But there’s really no indication as you watch her at these events and as she keeps a rather busy schedule that there’s anything the matter. What he’s saying really does seem from that point of view as we go and follow her around.

BLITZER: Because you saw her this morning here in Washington at the event. How did she look?

KEILAR: She looked great. She has a lot of — she does seem to have a lot of stamina because we know she’s keeping a schedule and we expect that very much to pick up as her book drops here June 10th.

[…]

BLITZER: Rove didn’t say Hillary Clinton has brain damage. He writes — he hinted it thus giving himself deniability while ensuring that the slur lingers in the public mind which is what he’s been doing his entire career.

BORGER: You know, this isn’t rocket science and it’s not limited to Karl Rove. If you remember, during the last campaign, at one point, Harry Reid mentioned that he heard that Mitt Romney had paid no income taxes. Remember that?

KEILAR: It turned out not to be true.

BORGER: It turned out not to be true.

[…]

WOLF BLITZER: Let me play a little clip of what Hillary Clinton said.

HILLARY CLINTON: The meeting has resumed in Geneva. The goal now is to negotiate a comprehensive agreement that will resolve all of the international community’s concerns. To get there, we will have to be tough, clear eyed and ready to walk away and increase the pressure if need be. No deal is better than a bad deal. [ Applause ] And from —

WOLF BLITZER: She does look great, you’ve got to admit. At that appearance there, she was pretty well received?

KEILAR: Yes, very well received. She’s talking to an audience, keep in mind, the American Jewish Committee, that is very skeptical of what’s going on with Iran. So it was — the fascinating part of watching her today for me was how she was threading the needle as she gets all these attacks from Republicans about her time at the state department, she’s there saying, here’s what I did on Iran and I got them to this point. She’s also talking to a crowd that’s skeptical whether this is going to work with Iran.

On Tuesday’s All In, host Chris Hayes and his guests tackled a chilling and politically loaded subject: which beliefs should disqualify someone from holding public office. Among other things, the group decided that global warming “denialism,” opposition to same-sex marriage, and opposition to a “robust” Voting Rights Act should put a politician outside the mainstream and ruin their chances of holding public office. [Listen to MP3 audio here.]

Hayes seemed excited that politicians might be branded with a figurative scarlet letter for holding beliefs that run counter to his own far-left vision. In fact, he claimed the act of disqualification based on certain beliefs is a “tool of progress,” not something that “constrains consensus.” The host gloated:

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It’s a tool of progress when we say that certain things, like opposing marriage equality, are sort of, like, not the kinds of things that mainstream American politicians –

One of Hayes’ guests cut him off, but he didn’t need to finish that sentence. The point is clear – Hayes has stumbled upon a new way to squelch debate in this country and pave the way for liberal domination of American political thought.

The host was particularly gleeful over the growing acceptance of the theory that human beings are driving climate change. After playing clips of Sen. Marco Rubio expressing skepticism of global warming and then trying to clarify when pressed on the issue, Hayes smirked:

[T]he fascinating aspect of this to me is that it looked to me for the first time in a long time that denialism was looking like a thing that was a disqualifier or at least something to be defensive about in a way I haven’t seen in a while.

One of Hayes’ guests, former New York Times columnist Bob Herbert, agreed:

And I think nowadays it is. I mean, this is an issue that’s – I mean, we’re all threatened by this. I mean, the planet is in danger. Something needs to be done. And I think if you’re just going to deny that this is even occurring, it means that you’re going to be blocking the policies that we need, and it should be a disqualifier.

Hayes even went so far as to call global warming skeptics “really cuckoo.”
Regarding gay marriage, the host was also ready to declare the debate closed. He exulted that he has “never seen an issue go so quickly from a contentious, contested issue that’s at the center of our political debates to one in which opposition to it is quickly becoming taboo.”

But in many parts of the country, gay marriage still is a “contentious, contested issue.” Hayes only wishes it were a settled topic.

By the way, the host placed global warming skepticism and opposition to gay marriage in the same basket as 9/11 Trutherism. During his introduction to this discussion, Hayes mentioned that Van Jones, now a co-host of CNN’s Crossfire, was pressured into resigning from his job in the Obama White House because, among other things, his name appeared on a petition that suggested the George W. Bush administration may have knowingly allowed the 9/11 terrorist attacks to happen. The host failed to mention, of course, that MSNBC colleague Toure has a history of Truther-style statements.

That conspiracy theory is well outside of the mainstream, but it was what prompted Hayes to launch his discussion of other, more conservative beliefs that he wishes society would just laugh away.

Below is a transcript of the segment:

CHRIS HAYES: Van Jones says he never actually signed the 9/11 truther petition that prompted that spout of outrage, and he maintained from the start it did not reflect his actual views. But just that tiny little brush with trutherism was enough to get the guy drummed out of the White House. And all this got me thinking about what exactly should constitute a disqualifier when it comes to those who want to hold public office or even work in the government. Joining me now, Bob Herbert, distinguished senior fellow with Demos; Christina Bellantoni, editor-in-chief of Roll Call; and Richard Kim, executive editor of TheNation.com. I am really interested in the boundaries of taboo and consensus and what are the kinds of things that are the kinds of things that politicians can argue about, and the kinds of things that kind of place them off the table. And  I thought it was interesting to see the Ernst campaign felt that that claim about WMD was an off-the-table kind of claim they had to then deny, which I found to be progress of a sort. Are there certain things you think, Bob, that should be in the kind of off-the-table category that aren’t currently in the off-the-table category?

BOB HERBERT: Sure. I would start with if you don’t have support for a robust Voting Rights Act for example. So if you’re running for national office and you don’t feel that qualified Americans ought to be guaranteed the right to vote, that should disqualify you.

HAYES: Just like Voting Rights Act as a matter of – Voting Rights Act or opposition to Voting Rights Act is off the table. But here’s the thing that’s tricky about that, right, is that no one comes out. You’re right. That is actually rhetorically where we are in American politics insofar as no one will come out and be like, I don’t like the Voting Rights Act, unless, you know, Supreme Court justices. But, right, I think – don’t you agree that if someone – no one would actually come out and say that.

[crosstalk]

HERBERT: – should have to come out and say it. I’m saying you need to be forthright in your support of a robust Voting Rights Act because you need to be forthright in your support of Americans’ right to vote.

HAYES: And Rand Paul has come pretty close.

RICHARD KIM: With the Civil Rights Act, which is not the Voting Rights Act, but that package of civil rights legislation.

HAYES: And that infamous moment on Rachel’s show with the long, torturous, just train wreck of an interview in which he basically said, I’m not that into the public accommodation part of the Civil Rights Act, that was him flirting with precisely the line of the disqualifying.

***

JONATHAN KARL: Let me get this straight. You do not think that human activity, the production of CO2, has caused warming to our planet?

SEN. MARCO RUBIO: I don’t believe that human activity is causing these dramatic changes to our climate the way these scientists are portraying it.

UNIDENTIFIED: What information, reports, studies or otherwise are you relying on to inform and reach your conclusion that human activity is not to blame for climate change?

RUBIO: Well, again, I mean –  headlines notwithstanding, I’ve never disputed that the climate is changing, and I pointed out that climate, to some extent, is always changing. It’s never static.

HAYES: Nice try, Marco Rubio. I’m back with Bob Herbert, Christina Bellantoni, and Richard Kim. And the reason I want to play that, so Rubio – again, he stepped in it on that Jon Karl interview. I think he didn’t think it was going to become a headline. I mean, you can see his passive/aggressive note about headlines notwithstanding. And then today he tried to walk it back in a totally incoherent way. But the fascinating aspect of this to me is that it looked to me for the first time in a long time that denialism was looking like a thing that was a disqualifier or at least something to be defensive about in a way I haven’t seen in a while.

HERBERT: And I think nowadays it is. I mean, this is an issue that’s – I mean, we’re all threatened by this. I mean, the planet is in danger. Something needs to be done. And I think if you’re just going to deny that this is even occurring, it means that you’re going to be blocking the policies that we need, and it should be a disqualifier.

HAYES: And the key here to me is, the conspiratorial thinking it requires to think that thousands of scientists across the globe are engaged in this massive hoax, which is basically what James Inhofe, who’s a sitting U.S. senator, believes, right? The conspiratorial thinking that it takes to believe that is really cuckoo. I mean, that is really out there.

KIM: Okay, I can’t believe I’m going to take the other side on this. So obviously, I don’t believe, you know, these views, and I think they’re sort of lunatic and really dangerous. On the other hand, large percentages of the American population believe that. And don’t they have representation in that political process? And I also worry that if you have this circle of disqualified opinions, and you keep growing that circle, what that rewards is an incentive structure that depends on sort of an absolute certainty of emotion. Like a really kind of intense belief. And to keep feeding that, if the facts on the ground don’t match, you invent a set of facts. And I think, actually, that is what has happened to the Republican Party. They’ve sort of produced this outrage machine.

HAYES: So you’re just saying, like, against litmus tests as a broad –

KIM: I say let the democratic process play out, and people should vote these things down.

CHRISTINA BELLANTONI: On climate, as a specific thing. The candidate that appeals to the business community tends to be the candidate that’ll either win the nomination or win the general election. And so this is an area where you –

HAYES: In the Republican party, in particular.

BELLANTONI: In general, though, you have to be palpable to them to sit in the White House. And so with the business community shifting on this issue or on minimum wage issues or on some other labor issues, that’s where you start to see the shifts. That guides the politician.

HAYES: But what you’re identifying, though, is precisely the nefarious ideological undercurrent of discussions about what’s disqualifying. Because, I mean, that goes hand-in-glove with what Richard is saying. You’re saying the people that actually draw the lines around what’s disqualifying is the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. And like, frankly, that’s what’s going to decide if you’re, like, a whacko.

BELLANTONI: And just watch with immigration reform. I mean, the conversation has completely changed since 2005-2006 when George Bush, people were angry at him in a certain segment of the population because he supported immigration reform. And now it is sort of a moderate Republican view.

HAYES: Or on marriage equality. I mean, that is a place where you really do see –   I have never seen an issue go so quickly from a contentious, contested issue that’s at the center of our political debates to one in which opposition to it is quickly becoming taboo.

HERBERT: Well, the truth is that you can only do this as a hypothetical exercise, and that’s a good example of why. I mean, there was a time when no one could get elected if they were in favor of gay marriage. Now in many elections it’s a disqualifier if you’re opposed to gay marriage.

HAYES: But that makes me hopeful about the power of this kind of – the force of this, as opposed to this being something that constrains consensus, it actually is this tool, right? It’s a tool of progress when we say that certain things, like opposing marriage equality, are sort of, like, not the kinds of things that mainstream American politicians –

KIM: But it’s also a double-edged sword. So things like supporting a 90 percent tax rate, which was once policy in the United States –

HAYES: Right, that’s a very good point.

KIM: – would be a completely disqualifying characteristic for many, many people in this country.

HAYES: If you came forward and said I am for a 90 percent top marginal tax rate, which of course was what it was after World War II and the Eisenhower administration before the first round of tax cuts, you would be – that would be the equivalent.

KIM: Exactly.

— Paul Bremmer is a News Analysis Division intern.