CNN is set to air a documentary titled "Her Name Was Steven" on March 13 and 14, which sympathetically follows the "gender reassignment" process of former Largo, Florida city manager Steven Stanton. The network has boldly advertised the documentary as being about "one person’s struggle to live an authentic life."

One of the producers of the documentary, Rose Arce, made no secret that she sympathized with the subject of the film. During a panel discussion featuring Stanton at the 2008 Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association convention, Arce described the public hearings over Stanton’s job as Largo city manager (which ultimately led to his dismissal from his job) as a "Salem witch trial environment."

Prior to its premiere on cable television, CNN screened "Her Name Was Steven" at several film festivals to "appreciative audiences," according to a Turner Broadcasting press release. One such screening took place at the 2009 Reel Affirmations: The Nation’s LGBT Film Festival in Washington, DC. The film festival’s website included a promotional text about the documentary apparently provided by CNN, which trumpeted how the film "explores the quiet moments as [Steven] Stanton remakes her body - all the time trying to keep her thoughts and feelings focused on what she knows she must do….CNN is with her through love, loss, sex and self, and the extraordinary journey of one woman whose name was Steven."

The pro-transgender aspect of "Her Name Was Steven" has been picked up by several movie reviewers. Brian Lowry of Variety lauded the film for being "thoughtful," and noted that the excerpts from Stanton’s video diary that the documentary includes were "immensely helpful in fostering understanding regarding his emotional state and sense of discovery during the process." Glenn Garvin of the Miami Herald also used the "thoughtful" label for the documentary. An earlier Miami Herald review noted that Stanton’s son Travis "exhibits a remarkable ease with his father’s transformation…offering a ray of hope for tolerance."

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CNN’s Jim Acosta omitted the left-wing affiliation of pro-ObamaCare protesters during a report on Wednesday’s American Morning, referring to them as only "health care advocates and labor groups." Acosta, like his colleague Nancy Cordes at CBS, also highlighted child protester Marcelas Owens, and labeled him a "brave young man."

Kiran Chetry and John Roberts introduced Acosta’s report, and the anchors also failed to mention the political bent of the protest, which was organized by the Health Care for America Now coalition (HCAN’s members include the AFL-CIO, NAACP, and Planned Parenthood). Chetry remarked that "thousands though rallied in Washington against what they call ‘insurance industry bullying.’" Roberts stated that the demonstration was "one for the books."

The correspondent continued the generic language, using his "health care advocates and labor groups" label at the beginning of the report. He twice noted how the target of the protesters, health insurance executives, were meeting in a high-end hotel: "They [the protesters] wanted the health insurance industry to learn one thing at their conference this week- renting out space inside a big luxury hotel doesn’t mean you can keep the reform debate from getting really loud….the protesters tried to push and shove their way inside this ritzy hotel- that’s where the industry was holding its annual policy conference."

Near the end of the report, Acosta played a clip of his interview of Owens, whom he questioned as the fifth-grader was demonstrating outside the hotel:

ACOSTA (voice-over): Among the demonstrators, 10-year-old Marcelas Owens was protesting for his mother who he says lost a battle with a lung condition that got worse right after she lost her job and her health insurance.

ACOSTA (on-camera): Does any of it make any sense to you?

MARCELAS OWENS, HEALTH CARE REFORM ACTIVIST: Not really, because my mother, she was sick, and she was sick to the point that she should have gotten the medical attention, even if she didn’t have health care or not.

ACOSTA (live): Brave young man there

The network has a track record of slanting towards pro-ObamaCare protesters. Back in August 2009, CNN ran a glowing documentary-style segment on another pro-ObamaCare rally organized by the HCAN coalition.

The full transcript of Jim Acosta’s report, which aired 41 minutes into the 6 am Eastern hour of Wednesday’s American Morning:

CHETRY: President Obama, as we know, is rolling up his sleeves, hitting the streets, talking up his final push for health care reform. Meantime, thousands though rallied in Washington against what they call ‘insurance industry bullying.’

ROBERTS: They were there to make a mass citizens’ arrest.

Our Jim Acosta is live in Washington for us this morning. Jim, you’re awfully familiar with the health care debate. You’ve done a lot of coverage.

ACOSTA: Yeah.

ROBERTS: This was one for the books, wasn’t it?

ACOSTA: It got a little wild out there, John and Kiran, and the health care advocates and labor groups who staged this rally, they wanted the health insurance industry to learn one thing at their conference this week- renting out space inside a big luxury hotel doesn’t mean you can keep the reform debate from getting really loud.

ACOSTA (voice-over): (protesters chanting) The swarms of protesters marching through the streets of Washington in favor of health care reform wanted to do more than just make some noise.

RICHARD KIRSCH, HEALTH CARE FOR AMERICA NOW: Are we going to arrest these corporate criminals?

CROWD: Yes!

KIRSCH: Are we going to send them packing?

CROWD: Yes!

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Now, raise your right hand, and repeat after me-

ACOSTA: The organizers of the rally informally deputized the crowd to make a citizens’ arrest of the executives of several major health insurance companies. Then, carrying wild West-style ‘wanted’ posters, showing the faces of insurance companies’ CEOs, the protesters tried to push and shove their way inside this ritzy hotel- that’s where the industry was holding its annual policy conference.

ACOSTA (on-camera): Where we’re standing right now is where the protesters are actually trying to enter the conference that the insurance industry is holding right here in Washington. Police are standing in the way trying to hold back what is a massive crowd.

ACOSTA (voice-over): Police did grab a few protesters but released them minutes later. The insurance industry spokesman said he’s seen these tactics before.

ACOSTA (on-camera): Do you think this is getting out of control when you see ‘wanted’ posters for insurance companies’ CEOs? Isn’t that getting out of control?

ROBERT ZIRCHELBACH, SPOKESMAN, AMERICA’S HEALTH INSURANCE PLANS: You know, we don’t pay a lot of attention to all the different things that people are posting on websites and on the blogs, and the different attention. You know, we’re focused on what we can do as an industry to make the health care system work better.

ACOSTA (voice-over): Not everybody at the conference was from the industry. Health care expert Mark Pauly said the current reform bill before Congress would actually be better than nothing.

MARK PAULY, WHARTON SCHOOL OF BUSINESS, UNIV. OF PENNSYLVANIA: A better attitude is probably to pass something and fix it up later. Although-

ACOSTA (on-camera): It’s not the perspective of the folks who are running this conference.

PAULY: I guess not. I mean, it’s gotten to the point where it’s a dear thing, I think, whether it be better to scrap it and start over. But I’d be willing to work with anything.

ACOSTA (voice-over): Among the demonstrators, 10-year-old Marcelas Owens was protesting for his mother who he says lost a battle with a lung condition that got worse right after she lost her job and her health insurance.

ACOSTA (on-camera): Does any of it make any sense to you?

MARCELAS OWENS, HEALTH CARE REFORM ACTIVIST: Not really, because my mother, she was sick, and she was sick to the point that she should have gotten the medical attention, even if she didn’t have health care or not.

ACOSTA (live): Brave young man there, and the insurance industry is well aware that Congress is closing in on a vote on health care. The closing session at the industry’s conference this week is on public opinion on reform. John and Kiran, they are well aware that the Congress is closing in on what is a very crucial vote.

CHETRY: All right. Maybe we’ll see more protests like that one.

ACOSTA: And we will later today. We’re expecting a week of this stuff here in Washington. So, fasten your seat belts.

ROBERTS: All right. Jim, thanks so much for that.

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On Tuesday’s Newsroom, CNN’s Tony Harris applied liberal thinking on race to the unemployment rate, speculating if the debate over jobs would change if whites were out of work like minorities were: "I wonder what the discussion about jobs in this country would be like if the rate of white unemployment in this country was, say 15, 16 percent, as it is for African-Americans."

Harris brought up the race issue during a segment with Don Peck of The Atlantic 42 minutes into the 11 am Eastern hour. Peck recently wrote an article for the publication on "how a new jobless era will transform America." Besides bringing up the unemployment rate of blacks, the CNN anchor also cited the 12-13 percent unemployment rate of Hispanics, and then quoted from Peck’s article: "Make the point here- expand on the comment, ‘It will leave an indelible comment on many blue-collar white men and on white culture.’ What do you mean by that?"

The deputy managing editor for The Atlantic first expressed his agreement with Harris: "Well, first of all, I think you’re right to say if the unemployment rate were higher for all white people, I think the conversation would be different, and that’s what’s so important to recognize." He continued by highlighting the impact of unemployment on marriage and family life.

PECK: There are certain groups within the U.S. that have really dramatically-elevated unemployment rates- young people, minorities, and, as you mentioned, blue-collar white men as well. You know, this has been called the ‘man-cession,’ and that’s accurate. Three-quarters of all job losses have been to men, in part, because construction, finance, and manufacturing have all really imploded, and- you know, when men are out of work for a long time, they are particularly badly affected, and that affects many things beyond them personally. Marriages tend to sour when men are unemployed for long periods of time. Men often don’t pick up their share of the housework on average when they lose their jobs, and- you know, the happiness of husbands and wives are closely related, so the misery spreads throughout the home.

Two-thirds of all divorces are legally initiated by women, so I talked to a lot of family experts who really believe that there are likely to be a wave of divorces in the coming years, especially if this period of blue-collar male unemployment persists.

[H/t: MRC Intern Alex Fitzsimmons]

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CNN’s Kate Bolduan aired a slanted report on Catholic Charities of Washington’s decision to no longer offer benefits to spouses of new employees on Saturday’s Newsroom, playing four sound bites from proponents of same-sex "marriage" and none from opponents. Bolduan also omitted the liberal affiliation of one of the homosexual "marriage" advocates.

During the report, which first aired 11 minutes into the 10 pm Eastern hour (and reran during the 1 pm Eastern hour on Monday), the correspondent noted how homosexual couples could get their civil marriage licenses in DC starting on Tuesday, and that there was "controversial fallout" from the move: "Catholic Charities, the social services arm of the Archdiocese of Washington, just announced it will no longer offer health benefits to spouses of any new employees or current employees who aren’t already covered under its plan. As a result, the nonprofit is effectively avoiding having to give benefits to same-sex partners, keeping with the Church’s opposition to same-sex marriage."

Bolduan spent the rest of her report playing the four clips from the supporters of legal homosexual "marriage." Three came from Chris Hinkle, who was labeled a "gay Catholic activist" on-screen and described by the correspondent as "gay and a practicing Catholic" (who admitted he wasn’t practicing the Church’s teaching on sexuality by maintaining a relationship with her "partner" for 10 years), and the remaining one came from Chris Korzen of Catholics United. CNN mentioned Korzen’s organization on-screen, but Bolduan didn’t mention their liberal affiliation, nor that he served as an organizer for the left-wing Service Employees International Union.

BOLDAUN (on-camera): How long have you and your partner been together?

CHRIS HINKLE, GAY CATHOLIC ACTIVIST: We’ve been together for 10 years.

BOLDUAN (voice-over): Chris Hinkle is gay and a practicing Catholic. He lives in Virginia and worships in Washington. Hinkle views the developments in D.C. as two steps forward, and quickly, two steps back for the gay and lesbian community and its strained relationship with the Catholic Church.

BOLDUAN (on-camera): Why is it disappointing to you?

HINKLE: It’s a slap in the face. Yeah, it’s prejudice.

BOLDUAN: Catholic Charities declined to comment, but the Archdiocese of Washington made a point to say that less than 10 percent of Catholic Charities employees take part in its health insurance program, suggesting that a small portion of the staff will be affected by the change in policy.

BOLDUAN (voice-over): And in a statement, the archdiocese says, ‘This approach allows Catholic Charities to continue to provide services to the 68,000 people it now cares for in the city, to comply with the city’s new requirements and to remain faithful to our Catholic identity.’ A stance some Catholics say is damaging the Church’s public image.

CHRIS KORZEN, DIRECTOR, CATHOLICS UNITED: They’re getting a view of the Church that isn’t necessarily consistent with our values. We don’t say that people don’t deserve health insurance because they happen to be in a certain kind of marriage or a certain kind of relationship. That’s just not what we teach.

BOLDUAN: The very same message Chris Hinkle is trying to send as he fights for acceptance.

HINKLE: I want people to treat others with justice. That is a message that I think Jesus Christ himself had exemplified.

BOLDUAN (on-camera): And in today’s world, you think that applies to health care, as well as the right to marry?

HINKLE: Absolutely it does. Absolutely.

The CNN correspondent did read the excerpt from the Archdiocese of Washington’s statement, but she couldn’t seem to find any orthodox Catholics who would vouch for the Church’s teaching on marriage and sexuality.

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On Monday’s Newsroom, CNN’s Kyra Phillips sympathetically interviewed a woman who unapologetically Tweeted her chemically-induced abortion as it happened. Instead of offering the pro-life viewpoint, Phillips lamented how her guest received "e-mails and the responses [which] were so brutal." The anchor later admitted that she "didn’t want to get into a debate about abortion."

During the interview, Phillips tossed softball questions at blogger Angie Jackson, who is known on Twitter as "antitheistangie," or "Angie the Anti-Theist" on her blog (Phillips didn’t mention her guest’s political or philosophical outlook during the entire segment). After playing a clip of Jackson from YouTube.com, Phillips first asked, "So, Angie- you know, did it take a while to come to a comfort zone, that you wanted to do this? Tell me how you eventually decided, this is how I’m going to do it and I’m going to let everybody see it happen."

Once the "anti-theist" blogger gave her initial answer, Phillips played another clip of her guest from YouTube, where the blogger flatly admitted, "Yes, it had the potential for that embryo to become a fetus, to become a person….But it was more likely to kill me, and you’re not going to shame me….I do not feel sorry that I saved my life. I do not feel sorry that I stayed here for myself, for my boyfriend, for my kid that I’ve already got."

Later, the anchor brought up the "brutal" responses Jackson received in response to her live-Tweeting her abortion, and instead of reading one of them, or even offering the pro-life view, she just vaguely described the intensity of the posts and openly sympathized with her guest:

PHILLIPS: As you well know, we’ve been looking at all the various comments, both negative and positive to what you did, and these are really harsh. But people wrote in and said- they called you all kinds of names, from being a whore to someone who just couldn’t keep her legs closed. They called you a baby killer. I mean, it’s even hard for me to say these things because some of those- the e-mails and the responses were so brutal. How did that make you feel? Did that bother you? Did it make you think twice about what you did?

After two final softball questions, the anchor brought on CNN senior medical correspondent Elizabeth Cohen and flatly admitted that she didn’t want to bring in any opposing viewpoint into the previous segment: "…[A]s you can imagine, we received a lot of response about even doing this story because abortion is such a controversial issue, and we really didn’t want to get into a debate about abortion, but rather, look at what people are doing now, using social networking, and it brought about a lot of questions about RU-486 that we don’t hear a lot about."

The full transcript of Kyra Phillips interview of Angie Jackson, which began one minute into the 10 am Eastern hour of Monday’s Newsroom program:

PHILLIPS: Here’s something you don’t see or hear every day- an abortion play-by-play. Not exactly something to Tweet about, is it? But Angie Jackson did. She actually put it on YouTube, too. Take a listen to the very public abortion that’s gotten more than 125,000 YouTube hits.

ANGIE JACKSON (from YouTube.com): Yeah, I’m having an abortion right now. It’s not that bad. It’s not that scary. It’s basically like a miscarriage. I’m live-Tweeting my abortion on Twitter, not for some publicity stunt or attention or to justify this to myself. I am at peace with my decision.

PHILLIPS: So what motivated Angie to end her pregnancy? She says she used an IUD for birth control, but it failed. She also said that her pregnancy nearly killed her, and her doctor told her not to have another child. So the 27-year-old Florida woman took the abortion pill RU-486, putting this private information out there for everyone to see, and it’s gotten a lot of reaction- positive, negative, even threatening. So why Tweet about it?

Angie joins me now live from Tampa. So, Angie- you know, did it take a while to come to a comfort zone, that you wanted to do this? Tell me how you eventually decided, this is how I’m going to do it and I’m going to let everybody see it happen.

JACKSON: Well, thank you so much for having me. I’m a blogger, and I’m actually writing a book, ‘Birth and Death: Life of a Newborn Cult’ about my experiences, and I talk about a lot of controversial or hot button issues every day. So for me, this wasn’t even that different. This was just an extension of continuing to talk openly about taboo subjects in a way that, just by sharing my own story, allows other people to share theirs or to talk about how they feel.

PHILLIPS: Let’s go ahead and look at another chunk of that live-Tweeting that you did as you were having an abortion.

JACKSON (from YouTube.com): Yes, it had the potential for that embryo to become a fetus, to become a person- hypothetically. It could have been a person that was made up of my boyfriend and my DNA. But it was more likely to kill me, and you’re not going to shame me. You’re not going to silence me. I do not feel sorry that I saved my life. I do not feel sorry that I stayed here for myself, for my boyfriend, for my kid that I’ve already got.

PHILLIPS: What did your doctor say was going to happen to you if you tried to carry that child?

JACKSON: Well, when I had my son, who is four now, I had a tremendously difficult pregnancy and 98-hour back labor, and my doctors advised me to avoid becoming pregnant again, which is why I had an IUD inserted in my cervix. However, there is no 100-percent effective form of contraception, not even tubal ligation or vasectomy. And so, I had prepared that if I became pregnant anyway, I would have an abortion because the risks were too high for me to continue a pregnancy.

PHILLIPS: As you well know, we’ve been looking at all the various comments, both negative and positive to what you did, and these are really harsh. But people wrote in and said- they called you all kinds of names, from being a whore to someone who just couldn’t keep her legs closed. They called you a baby killer. I mean, it’s even hard for me to say these things because some of those- the e-mails and the responses were so brutal. How did that make you feel? Did that bother you? Did it make you think twice about what you did?

JACKSON: Actually, if anything, it showed me more how important it is to talk about taboo things or to talk about personal things. One- about half of American women will have an unintended pregnancy before the age of 45, and one in three American women will have an abortion sometime during their childbearing years. And yet, this is something we almost never talk about, or at least we talk about the political aspects, but not the individual women. Some of the heat that I’ve gotten has certainly showed me what the cost of that silence is, is that when a woman does want to discuss it, she’s- the reaction is quite strong.

PHILLIPS: What would you do if you got pregnant again?

JACKSON: Of course, the goal is to avoid that, but- I mean, my health conditions have not changed, and if I was pregnant again, I would, of course, have another abortion.

PHILLIPS: Final question: what made you decide to do the RU- 486? Is that something you discussed with your boyfriend? How quick did you make that decision? Why that route?

JACKSON: Sure. I investigated - I looked at a couple of websites, one of which is imnotsorry.net, which includes a lot of personal abortion stories, and I read how different women had felt. I thought that the RU-486 abortion-by-pill at home would be a more natural and comfortable experience. I was also too early in my pregnancy to be eligible for a surgical abortion. I was only four weeks. And so, RU- 486 was the medically-recommended choice.

PHILLIPS: Angie Jackson, very interesting. It definitely caught our attention. I actually didn’t believe that you actually did it until I saw it, and it’s pretty fascinating, the reasons that you have for doing it. And we’re going to follow the video and the continued responses that you’ve gotten. You’ve also received a lot of support for what you did, as well, to sort of demystify what it’s like to have an abortion- interesting. Angie Jackson, thanks for your time.

JACKSON: Thank you so much for having me.

PHILLIPS: All right. We heard Angie’s story. Let’s talk more about her method of abortion, this RU-486 pill.

And joining us to talk more about that, also about getting access to it, the safety of it, CNN medical correspondent Elizabeth Cohen. And, as you can imagine, we received a lot of response about even doing this story because abortion is such a controversial issue, and we really didn’t want to get into a debate about abortion, but rather, look at what people are doing now, using social networking, and it brought about a lot of questions about RU-486 that we don’t hear a lot about.

ELIZABETH COHEN: Right. I think there’s some confusion. People might think it’s the morning after pill. But this is something very different. This is a way that you can have an abortion up until about nine weeks pregnant. That’s according to Planned Parenthood. So up until nine weeks pregnant, you can use RU-486, which is also called Mifeprex. It’s basically a way to have an abortion via a drug, rather than having a surgical abortion, and the way that it works is that a woman takes a pill that kills the pregnancy, and then three days later, she takes a pill that expels that pregnancy. So that’s the way that it works.

PHILLIPS: What are the risks?

COHEN: There are some serious risks. About one in every 100,000 women who takes this has a fatal infection, a kind of infection called sepsis. So there are some serious risks, and that’s why places like Planned Parenthood really spell it out on their website that you take these pills at home, as Angie Jackson just said , but you have to follow up, usually about 14 days after you’ve started the process. So this has to be medically supervised. You don’t just go home and do it. You have to keep up with your doctor.

PHILLIPS: And a lot of people were confused that wrote in, thinking it was illegal, but it is legal-

COHEN: It’s legal.

PHILLIPS: I mean, she went to Planned Parenthood and got it.

COHEN: Right, it’s legal. Planned Parenthood offers it. There are probably other people that offer it, too, but it’s legal in all 50 states.

PHILLIPS: Elizabeth Cohen, thanks for the insight.

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The AC360 blog on CNN.com capped a leftward trend during the week of March 1 with a post on Friday from Obama supporter Tanya Acker, who accused pro-life activists of "racial paternalism" for highlighting the high abortion rate among blacks. Earlier in the week, the blog promoted the latest anti-conservative study from the Southern Poverty Law Center and sought anti-Jim Bunning sob stories.

Acker, an AC360 contributor who has ranted against John Boehner and Sarah Palin, and lauded Van Jones in recent weeks on her Twitter account, blasted "anti-choice activists" in the blog entry titled "Thank you very much, but we can think for ourselves: African-American women and choice." The attorney and Obama supporter (the AC360 blog mentioned this detail at the beginning of her May 9, 2008 entry, but it hasn’t come up since) wasted no time in insinuating that racism motivated a new pro-life billboard campaign noting the high black abortion rate:

In an attempt to exploit racial fears and perhaps assume for themselves the broad legitimacy of a civil rights movement, anti-choice activists are now targeting African-Americans – claiming that the exercise of reproductive freedom by African-American women is effecting a ‘genocide’ in the African-American community….While I do not dispute the sincerity of many in the pro-life movement, this attempt is cynical, misguided, and dangerous.

Later in the column, the CNN contributor went out of the way to defend the work of Planned Parenthood in minority communities. She also leveled her "racial paternalism" argument against pro-lifers.

While anti-choice activists may condemn the location of family planning clinics, such as Planned Parenthood, in these communities, this condemnation is itself further evidence of their cynicism – and of their indifference to the actual health care needs of low-income women (a disproportionate number of whom are African-American). The majority of health care services provided by Planned Parenthood, for instance, are non-abortion related and include cancer screening, STD testing, and other preventive health services. We may agree to disagree about the morality of abortion but I do hope there is no legitimate disagreement about the need for low-income women to have access to these health resources.

There is yet another element of this campaign that I find particularly unsettling. Implicit in this strategy is the assumption that the womb of an African-American woman is somehow "community property" – and that our family planning and reproductive decisions cannot properly be based upon individual choices and circumstances but must instead take into account the need to "propagate the race." It seems as if anti-choice strategists are suggesting that African-American women need to be saved from themselves and their own freely made choices – or worse yet, that the African-American community needs to be saved from its women. Forgive me, but the time for that sort of racial paternalism is long since past.

There are real issues of concern affecting African-Americans today – inadequate access to health care, disproportionate incarceration rates, a substandard public education system (which is the only option for many of its children), and numerous others. Cynical attempts to exploit those problems so as to gain advantage in a contentious debate are no substitute for the real attention our community deserves.

Acker’s argument echoed that of Dr. Artis Cash of Al Sharpton’s National Action Network, who appeared on the February 24 edition of American Morning opposite Catherine Davis, director of minority outreach for Georgia Right to Life. Cash blasted pro-lifers during the panel discussion: "…For this organization to demoralize and criminalize the African-American female is just uncalled for….I don’t know how this group could come in and now change our agenda when we have an agenda. Our agenda is that double-digit unemployment that exists in the black community."

Three days earlier, on March 2, the AC360 blog excerpted the latest report by Mark Potok of Southern Poverty Law Center which connected the tea party movement to an "an explosion of new extremist groups and activism across the nation." The same day, the blog also sought responses from people who have lost their unemployment benefits due to Senator Jim Bunning’s opposition to a $10 billion emergency measure: "Have you lost your unemployment benefits as a result? We want to hear from you! Let us know."

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On Thursday’s Newsroom, CNN anchor Ali Velshi unexpectedly supported Starbucks’ decision to stand by its policy of letting gun-owning customers openly-carry their weapons in states where it is legal to do so. Despite hinting he didn’t see the need for guns in coffee shops, Velshi stated it was "better for businesses not to weigh into this unwinnable debate."

The anchor weighed in on the Starbucks controversy during a commentary at the end of the 2 pm Eastern hour. Velshi didn’t mention that it was specifically the Brady Campaign for Prevent Gun Violence that was pushing for the company to turn its coffeehouses into "gun-free zones," as reported by the AP on Thursday. He only stated that "gun control advocates want Starbucks to take a stand." The CNN anchor also omitted that in its statement on the controversy, Starbucks requested that "all interested parties to refrain from putting Starbucks or our partners into the middle of this divisive issue."

VELSHI: This one has me puzzled. If you walk into your local Starbucks and you see someone packing heat, are you walking out? A lot of people wouldn’t. In fact, a matter of fact, a lot of people are making a point of walking into Starbucks carrying guns in states where it is legal to do so in public. Now, that sparked protests from gun control advocates and kudos from pro-gun groups.
                                
Here’s my question: do you really need a gun at Starbucks? Should you really mix your caffeine with bullets? That aside, Starbucks says its stores simply follow state laws and it is legal to carry weapons in 43 states. But businesses still have the right to prohibit customers from carrying guns inside, and gun control advocates want Starbucks to take a stand. Why? I think it’s better for businesses not to weigh into this unwinnable debate. Are we going to see a checkerboard of businesses saying, yes, bring your gun in; no, you can’t bring guns in?

Let’s face it: taking a stand either way would invite more protesters than customers, and inviting more people to try and prove some point, rather than people trying to buy your product. And isn’t it better to save the steam for the lattes and not get your customer steamed? Let’s all have a grand- grande dose of tolerance.

Velshi telling gun control advocates to be tolerant? You might not suspect that kind of stance from him, given that he labeled Senator Jim Bunning an "embarrassment" earlier in the week on March 1, and celebrated the one year anniversary of the Obama stimulus with a cake on February 17.

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John Roberts and Kiran Chetry omitted mentioning that Annabel Park, the founder of the so-called Coffee Party, worked as a volunteer for President Barack Obama’s presidential campaign, during an interview on Wednesday’s American Morning. The anchors also didn’t mention Park’s past work for the liberal New York Times.

Roberts and Chetry interviewed the Coffee Party USA founder at the bottom of the 8 am Eastern hour. After an initial question about the origin of the name, the two asked about the principles of the nascent movement and if health care "reform" was going to be a major issue for it. In her last question to Park, Chetry did ask if the Coffee Party had any ties to a political party: "[T]he tea party movement really, in some ways, has been a challenge to Republicans to move more toward fiscal conservative ideals. Are you aligned with a party? I mean, as we know, passing health care reform has been a huge goal of liberal Democrats for decades. Are you aligned with the Democrats, trying to get them more to move to the left when it comes to health care?"

The founder denied that her movement was aligned to any party, and actually criticized the longstanding two-party system in the United States as being "incredibly outdated." In reality, as William A. Jacobson of Legal Insurrection blog exposed, Park worked for one of the two parties, as an organizer and operator of the United for Obama video channel on YouTube (NewsBuster P. J. Gladnick blogged about Jacobson’s expose on Tuesday evening). As the United for Obama page admits, "We are a network of Obama volunteers from all across the country and from all backgrounds working together to support Obama’s message of unity and change….Some of us are filmmakers and we created this page to amplify Obama’s message on YouTube…The filmmakers include…Annabel Park…"

Jacobson also noted that Park once worked as a Strategy Analyst for the New York Times. Even Reuters, while also omitting the founder’s past work for the Obama campaign in a blog entry on Tuesday, noted that the Coffee Party was a movement of the left. Roberts and Chetry didn’t even bother to mention that during the segment.

The full transcript of John Roberts and Kiran Chetry’s interview of Annabel Park on Wednesday’s American Morning:

CHETRY: Well, the tea party movement- we’ve heard a lot about it recently- and it’s been spreading like wildfire with tens of thousands turning out for rallies and also protests. Well, now, there is a new political movement. It’s also gaining some steam. It’s called the Coffee Party USA.

ROBERTS: And while the two share similar names and a frustration with gridlock in Washington, the similarities may end there.

The founder of the Coffee Party USA, Annabel Park, joins us now live from Washington. Annabel, great to see you this morning. The question many people might have, right off the bat, is- tea party has gotten some historical context to it. Why the name, the Coffee Party, and why the need?

ANNABEL PARK: Right. First of all, I love coffee, though at times, I definitely like tea as well. But there is actually a historical reference as well. During the American Revolution, after they dumped tea into the harbor, they actually declared coffee the national drink. That was the solution to the problem. So I associate coffee, not only with solutions, but also with people working- working hard, because we need to wake up and work hard to get our government to represent us. So-

CHETRY: All right. Annabel, what are some of the principles? What do you guys stand for? Where do you want to see change in Washington?

PARK: Well, we basically, just like in the American Revolution, we’re looking for real representation. We don’t feel represented by our government right now, and we don’t really feel represented well by the media either. So it’s kind of a simple call to action for people to wake up and take control over their future and demand representation, and it requires people standing up and speaking up, and that’s what we’re encouraging people to do by getting together and start the conversation going.

ROBERTS: We should point out, Annabel, that all of this started on your Facebook page-

PARK: Yes.

ROBERTS: Which now has 64,000 fans. It’s just been around for a few weeks as well. But we also noticed, too, there’s a little survey on there. Sixty-one percent of people who have responded to the survey say that health care is their number one issue. Is this a political movement that could be built around health care as an issue?

PARK: Well, I think what’s happening is people are responding to what happened in the past year with the health care debate, because it was something that is obviously very important to many Americans, and it was reflected in the 2008 election. And since we feel like the health care debate showed not only that we are very divided country, but there’s something really wrong with our political process. We kind of got to see the innards of the political process, and realize there’s something very broken, and I think that’s what we’re responding to, not only the negativity that we see in the rhetoric and the discussions, but the fact that it’s- there’s just something very wrong with- kind of the system, the entire political system. So we want that change. We want that addressed, because it doesn’t matter what issue it is- we can’t make progress if we can’t even talk to one another. So we want to really focus on the political culture.

CHETRY: And it is interesting, because the tea party movement really, in some ways, has been a challenge to Republicans to move more toward fiscal conservative ideals. Are you aligned with a party? I mean, as we know, passing health care reform has been a huge goal of liberal Democrats for decades. Are you aligned with the Democrats, trying to get them more to move to the left when it comes to health care?

PARK: No. I wouldn’t say we’re aligned with the Democrats or Republicans or any party. In fact, I think most of us feel that kind of that two-party system is an incredibly outdated system. It encourages people to think of politics as a kind of game, like a football game, in which there are two sides, and it’s a zero-sum situation. If one person wins, the other person loses, and that’s really not a healthy way to conduct collective decision making. That’s not a democracy. Democracy should start with the sense that we’re a community, and we share common goals and values, and that there’s such a thing as a common good that we’re all working towards, and the two-party system really doesn’t encourage that way of thinking about it. It’s about winning and losing, and we’re really tired of it.

ROBERTS: All right. It’s called the Coffee Party. It’s a brand- new political movement. Annabel Park, the founder, thank you for joining us this morning. We’ll keep watching this real closely.

PARK: Thank you.

CHETRY: Good to talk to you this morning, Annabel.

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On Tuesday’s Rick’s List on CNN, Rick Sanchez again hinted that Texas Governor Rick Perry is a racist. Sanchez, reacting to the distinct possibility that Perry would win the Republican gubernatorial primary, referenced a comment he made at a tea party rally in 2009: "He was talking about states’ rights. States’ rights is, to most people of color, a racist term" [audio clip available here].

The CNN anchor discussed the Republican primary with Wayne Slater of the Dallas Morning News. He asked the journalist, "Perry’s going to win this thing, right?" After Slater noted how Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison lost her early lead in the polls over Perry, Sanchez responded, with some shock, "Why? I mean- you know, when he came out with his comment. Remember, you and I talked about it when he said it. I mean, he was all about secession from the union. He was talking about states’ rights. States’ rights is, to most people of color, a racist term, and I thought he had hurt himself. Why wasn’t she able to, kind of, jump on that and use it?"

Slater explained that the typical Republican primary voter in Texas is "very conservative," and that Perry had actually won the nomination race after he had made his "states’ rights" remark at the tea party. This didn’t calm Sanchez, however, and he followed up by asking, "Well, but shouldn’t we be frightened by that?"

This isn’t the first time that the anchor has leveled this insinuation against the Texas governor. Exactly six months earlier, on the September 2, 2009 edition of CNN’s Newsroom, he made the same argument during a segment with CNN political analyst Roland Martin. When Martin stated that Perry had to be "very careful when you start talking about states’ rights" and referenced segregationist Mississippi Governor Ross Barnett, Sanchez replied, "‘States’ rights’ has racist overtones- I’ll say it for you."

The transcript of the relevant portion of Rick Sanchez’s segment with Wayne Slater, starting at the 44 minutes into the 4 pm Eastern hour mark:

SANCHEZ: [Rick] Perry’s going to win this thing, right?

SLATER: It appears- certainly, if not tomorrow, it appears he would win in a runoff. That’s really the- what’s going to happen tomorrow- tonight.   Whether or not Rick Perry can win without a runoff- 50% plus one vote would get him there- one year ago, Rick Perry, double-digit lead over Kay Bailey Hutchison- I mean, Kay Bailey Hutchison with a double-digit lead over Rick Perry. Right now, Rick Perry, double-digit lead over Kay Bailey Hutchison- this was a collapse by the senior senator from Texas.
                    
SANCHEZ: Why? I mean- you know, when he came out with his comment. Remember, you and I talked about it when he said it. I mean, he was all about secession from the union. He was talking about states’ rights. States’ rights is, to most people of color, a racist term-

SLATER: Yeah.

SANCHEZ: And I thought he had hurt himself. Why wasn’t she able to, kind of, jump on that and use it?

SLATER: Well, the key here is to understand who- what voters we’re talking about. These are Republican primary voters in a Republican primary, a very conservative constituency, and it’s interesting, because on the day that Rick Perry made the comments about secession here in Austin at a tea party rally, Kay Bailey Hutchison was in Houston at a fundraiser, stepped outside, stepped into a car with an aide, and when she heard about what Rick Perry had said- this was last April- she said, Rick Perry has just lost this race. In fact, Rick, we now know that that’s when Rick Perry won the race among these conservative Republican primary-goers.

SANCHEZ: Well, but shouldn’t we be frightened by that?

SLATER (laughs) Well, are you frightened by democracy?

SANCHEZ: Well-

SLATER: Glenn Beck will be all over you if you’re fighting by- well, you know, look, this is a-

SANCHEZ: (laughs) It wouldn’t be the first time.

SLATER: Well, here’s the deal. I mean, the deal is that Texans really don’t want to secede.

SANCHEZ: Right.

SLATER: You lived here. You know that Texans don’t want to secede.

SANCHEZ: Right.

SLATER: What they hear in the word ’secession’ is a kind of code that says, heck with the government, stick it to the government-

SANCHEZ: Yeah.

SLATER: And that’s really- it’s really about Texas exceptionalism.

SANCHEZ: And we’re hearing that, by the way, from the coast of Maine to the tip of San Diego, from Key West to Seattle. So yeah, that’s not particularly a Texas thing. I guess it’s all a matter of degrees, as they say in Texas. Everything’s a little bigger, Wayne (Slater laughs).

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Just days after Rick Sanchez and his producer asked for "hardship stories" online, CNN’s Anderson Cooper 360 program on Tuesday looked for people who have lost their unemployment benefits due to Republican Senator Jim Bunning’s opposition to a $10 billion emergency measure which would have extended benefits.

The unsigned entry on the AC360 blog, which was posted on Tuesday afternoon, first recapped how Democrats attacked Bunning for blocking the unanimous consent of the measure. In the last sentence of the entry, the unnamed author asked readers of CNN.com to reply for their sob stories:

The unemployed will now stop getting checks once they run out of their state benefits or current tier of federal benefits.

Top Democrats tore into one of their Republican counterparts yesterday for blocking an extension of unemployment benefits that would provide assistance to millions of jobless Americans.

The Senate adjourned last week without approving extensions of cash and health insurance benefits for the unemployed after Sen. Jim Bunning, R-Kentucky, blocked the measure by insisting that Congress first pay for the $10 billion package. The emergency measure needed unanimous consent to pass.

Bunning, who is retiring at the end of this year, said he doesn’t oppose extending the programs, he just doesn’t want to add to the deficit. Democrats claim the bill is an emergency measure that should not be subject to new rules requiring that legislation not expand the deficit.

Have you lost your unemployment benefits as a result? We want to hear from you! Let us know.

On February 26, Sanchez’s producer solicited for a broader set of "hardship stories" on Twitter: "Today Rick’s looking 4 hardship stories: financial, med., trouble w/ (BROKEN?) govt., family, etc Keep short, maybe will read on air." The CNN anchor ended up reading a few Tweets of such stories at the beginning of his program.

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