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It looks like Republican strategist Cheri Jacobus was batting two for two this Wednesday, first appearing on MSNBC and being apparently clueless that anchor Thomas Roberts is an openly gay man and probably unintentionally insulting him and then later appearing on Erin Burnett's Out Front on CNN, and dismissing Newt Gingrich's lobbying efforts that we dare not call lobbying.

I've heard some sorry defenses of people who basically are willing to sell their souls to do anything for a buck over the years, but Jacobus and her defense of Gingrich here was one of the more pitiful I've heard in a long time. All I know is that as any of us who have been following Newt Gringrich for some time now have known, the man has more baggage both personally and politically than most people who don't follow politics can possibly imagine, and all the happy talk from this panel here on how his doublespeak now doesn't matter much is really ridiculous. Even those supposed "tea partiers" that he's been courting aren't going to be happy about the lobbying for Freddie Mac. And that doesn't even begin to touch on the hypocrisy of him calling for Barney Frank among others to be jailed along with other equally outrageous statements he's made when it comes to Frannie and Freddie.

The rest of them on the panel weren't much better and naturally host Erin Burnett didn't question a one of them on whether Newt is actually a viable candidate, even if he is the new GOP's flavor of the week since they all hate Romney from the bottom of their hearts.

I'm not sure how much more out of touch a group might have to be to consider the type of fees Gringrich charged just business as usual and nothing the peons should get upset about when it comes to income disparity in the United States and something that any of them should be concerned about. That's about what I'd expect from a bunch of overpaid CNN contributors who are in the one percent as well. I'm not sure what else Gingrich or a lot of the rest of them have to do to finally make themselves disqualified from being a serious presidential candidate as this GOP primary race goes on, but sadly I think we're about to find out just how low that standard goes.

Full transcript below the fold.

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Digby wrote today that "They Got Tweety" here. I'd say they already had him. Regardless, here he is on Hardball repeating the Republican talking points that we just have to make spending cuts instead of raising taxes on the rich and that Americans don't want to see taxes go up on the upper earners in America.

Heaven forbid the Villagers would want to see the rich have to suffer in these tough economic times.

On Hardball this afternoon Matthews was talking about "cut-go" with Todd Harris and Steve McMahon, the Tweedledum and Tweedledummer of the Village and he ranted and raved about how both parties promise spending cuts to bring down the deficit but refuse to give any big specific items that would really make a difference. The Republican Harris went on about how "it's going to be tough, it's going to be painful and like I said, I hope entitlements are on the table." (Now keep in mind, they were talking about "cut-go" in the context of raising the debt ceiling, which means Harris is advocating for immediate cuts to "entitlements".)

After Harris babbled for a while about "entitlements" destroying the country, Matthews again said how frustrated he was that Republicans always refuse to say what they will cut --- "give me a couple hundred billion at least, give me somethin' big, they give me nothing. Democrats too, by the way."

McMahon piped up at that and said:

I'll give it to you right now. Democrats are going to come with a bill to take away the tax cuts for people making 250 thousand dollars a year. That's 700 billion dollars that we borrowed ...

Matthews: I hate to break it to you, but that's not a spending cut it's a tax increase.

McMahon: no it's not a spending cut, but it results in revenue that will...

Harris: It's a tax increase!

Matthews: Just remember the difference, it's a tax increase. You ask Americans whether they want that tax increase and a majority will tell you they don't want that tax increase.

As Digby and a lot of others have pointed out recently, that's just not true. Most Americans would like to see taxes raised on the wealthy to balance the budget.

At least McMahon looked like he was laying off of the eggnog today and talking about repealing the tax cuts again instead of austerity measures.

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As John already noted, Republican Todd Harris was on Hardball the yesterday talking about how we need to have "an adult conversation" about cuts to entitlements. What he didn't mention is that Democratic "strategist" Steve McMahon was on there parroting him. So in the spirit of Mr. Amato's post, I've got a big f-u for McMahon... and that goes for your pal Tweety as well. Adult conversation my ass.

Transcript via Digby:

Chris Matthews: Let me talk down the road the big stuff because we all know, gentlemen that the country has a 13 trillion dollar debt and we can talk about economic growth and we can all talk about economic growth the economy, we all know that sometimes it just doesn't grow, some years it just doesn't grow. There's always going to be a business cycle, there's always going to be downturns. So my question to you is, Todd, here's the question. We saw what came out of that bipartisan commission just a few weeks ago. We saw the immediate knee jerk reaction of Nancy Pelosi, we saw the immediate reaction of some of the Republican members of the House. The president did get 14 of the 18 members, of that commission.

Is there a potential that he could cut deals with Coburn who is much respected on issues like fiscal policy and bringing in other leading Democrats as well, recognizing that that the appropriators won't like it, that Pelosi won't like it, that the unions won't like it, that he has to get past those people or he will get nothing done on the fiscal area? If the president waits for the unions, if he waits for the usual interest groups to say yes, it will never get done. He has to form a coalition around them.

Todd Harris (GOP strategist): You're absolutely right and I think the best way to do that will be to include some significant entitlement reform as part of that package

Matthews: Yeah

Todd Harris: .. because there's no way to talk about deficit reduction without doing it. Until people in Washington are ready to have an adult conversation about entitlement all this talk about spending and the deficit is all a bunch of noise, because as we all know that's where the money's going.

Steve McMahon (Democratic strategist): I think you're absolutely right. And for the president this year, coming out and basically saying that we've had some major accomplishments in the past two years and now we have to concentrate on the deficit and getting spending under control and working with Republicans just like he worked with them on the measures he just passed, he'll benefit politically and the country will benefit over the long term. Because we can't afford to continue on the path we're on and it does seem to be that serious people on the left and the right are recognizing the importance of compromise. And the deficit commission had plenty in there for everybody to not like. But there's also a path to fiscal sanity and I think we've got people ready to move that forward.

We've got Senator Corker and Senator Mark Warner in a bipartisan fashion to try to do something in the Senate working on that and I think we're going to see some people like that who come from the business world into politics and who understand finance and understand the implications of what we're doing.

Digby thinks McMahon has been drinking too much Villager egg nog. I don't know what he's been drinking but if he's advising Democrats to go after Social Security and thinks that's a winning political strategy, I've got news for you pal, it's not. Go read the rest of Digby's post for more on the media's coverage on Social Security.

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Far too often I watch or listen to C-SPAN's morning call-in show Washington Journal and just get disgusted with either how severely misinformed some of the callers are, or the guests they have on and whether they're doing a good job of representing progressive policies and not just giving credence to Republican talking points and the lies that are being spread on Fox News and right wing hate talk every day. This was not one of those occasions.

The subject was the potential extension of the Bush tax cuts. The guests were Democratic strategist Steve McMahon and Republican strategist Matt Mackowiak.

There are a few thing I would have pointed out that McMahon did not during this segment, but that said, I think the response of the callers and McMahon to Mackowiak's lies should be taken as an object lesson for anyone that wants to knock down the Republican's ridiculous talking points on tax cuts and job creation. Sadly we can't get anyone in our media to do as good of a job as they did here when Republicans try to lie about tax cuts creating jobs.

So here's how the first call of the segment went.

DEMOCRATIC CALLER TED: Thank you. You’re not entitled to your own facts. You’re entitled to your own opinions. Republicans are wildly inaccurate. 97-98% of small businesses fall below the $250,000 tax limit. But I have two or three quick comments that I wanted to make. There’s no way Republicans are representing their constituents… not representing the people in their districts when it comes to the tax cuts for millionaires and billionaires.

I know some of those people with the millions and billions. They’re not creating jobs. They are investing in the stock market, in properties, all over the country, mountain homes, city homes. When Bush enacted these tax cuts ten years ago it was at a time when it looked like the country would be operating and we were approaching a surplus. You know… god forbid that we have a surplus. I live my life, I operate on a surplus. I know what that is.

There’s no surplus any more. The tax revenues over the ten years from millionaires and billionaires is something to the effect of $700 billion dollars and it’s been shown that, and I wish that Democrats… Republicans need to be more honest, but the Democrats should explain how one dollar nets thirty two cents of every dollar of GDP.

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Republican strategist Todd Harris has some trouble giving Chris Matthews one example of anything Republicans have done that's positive for America in the last 20 years. I'll be curious if he does any better when Matthews has him back on. I'm not counting on it.

MATTHEWS: I just wanted to get the Republican bragging points straight here. So the Republican Party has kept us safe, except for 9/11. Is that the argument? No, really, because you had the worst attack on the American homeland in history, but you`re bragging about your ability to defend the country because you say -- you defended America, except for 9/11. That`s your defense, right?

HARRIS: Look, Chris...

MATTHEWS: That`s the bragging point of the Republican Party for the last -- I asked you to name one thing they`ve done for this country in 15 to 20 years. I`ll keep going back further. And you`re having a hard time giving me an answer. What has the Republican Party...

HARRIS: No, no. I`m...

MATTHEWS: ... done for the country?

HARRIS: I`m not...

MATTHEWS: I`m just -- it`s a good question.

HARRIS: Chris, I`m not having...

MCMAHON: Squandered the surplus.

HARRIS: ... a hard time giving you an answer.

MCMAHON: Don`t forget, squandered the surplus.

HARRIS: When I decide to write a book about the history of the last 20 years of the Republican Party, I`ll be happy to talk to you about that.

MATTHEWS: No, just give me one...

HARRIS: My job is to win elections -- my job is to...

MATTHEWS: Just give me one.

HARRIS: ... win elections in 2010.

MATTHEWS: OK.

HARRIS: And I`m going to keep my eye on the ball.

MCMAHON: He doesn`t have one. He doesn`t have one!

MATTHEWS: Steve McMahon -- Steve McMahon, YouTube is watching. You`re the Republican consultant, one of the best in the country. Tell me what the Republican Party has done for this country in the last 10 to 20 years? Thank you, Steve McMahon.

(LAUGHTER)

MATTHEWS: Thank you, Todd Harris. You got plenty of time, `64 -- we`ll have you back with the answer.