The View‘s Elisabeth Hasselbeck is none too happy with how the folks at NBC handled last night’s GOP debate in Florida, calling the debate “crappy” and accusing the network of displaying an anti-Republican bias.

Chris Matthews went head-to-head with flailing Republican presidential candidate Newt Gingrich. Gingrich had strong words for fellow GOP opponent Mitt Romney. “He’s not going to be the nominee,” Gingrich boldly declared.

Whether or not you find yourself in line, politically, with the opinions espoused by MSNBC’s Chris Matthews, can we all agree here that, when the man is on, he is ON? I almost wish I could bottle his passion up in a bottle and spritz it on some of his more boring colleagues, who shall remain nameless… or on some influential names on the other side of the fence who either aren’t outraged at The Trumping of the GOP, or who are and choose to remain quiet.

Reality television star Donald Trump is teaming up with right-wing news outlet Newsmax to moderate the December 27th presidential debate in Des Moines, Iowa.

Thanksgiving Day is among the most challenging days for Mediaite editors to find subjects to cover. The site’s “bread and butter” are topics that come from the intersection of media and politics, but on this day we also like to join the rest of the nation by taking pause, and giving thanks to how fortunate we all are. So finding a clip that simultaneously hits notes of spirited political discourse and Thanksgiving cheer (basted with a healthy dose of pastiche nostalgia) is something of a holiday miracle.

The Congressional Super-Committee which rose out of last summer’s debt deadlock in Congress has a deadline approaching, and it appears nowhere near cutting a budget deal with hours to the deadline. With that in mind, both the Democratic and Republican chairs of the committee– Sen. Patty Murray and Rep. Jeb Hensarling, respectively–took to the Sunday talk show circuit to explain their impending failure, with Sen. Murray blaming Republicans for not having a mentality of “shared sacrifice” while Rep. Hensarling argued Democrats wanted to raise taxes exorbitantly.

George Will really doesn’t like Newt Gingrich. On the This Week round table this morning, Will began his comments on Gingrich, now a frontrunner, by stating that his candidate “embodies everything disagreeable about modern Washington,” going on to laugh at the idea that Gingrich was hired by Freddie Mac as a “historian,” and, as a final blow, speaking more glowingly of even Rep. Ron Paul than of Gingrich.

A new poll from Fox News contains a wealth of fascinating results, but I have to agree with Dave Weigel that the most eye-catching is the fact that Republican primary voters most trust Newt Gingrich to carry the nuclear football, and by a wide margin over his rivals. Gingrich tops closest competitor Mitt Romney 30%-17% for nuclear trustworthiness, but the existence of this question in a field that includes Rick Perry and Michele Bachmann is, itself, a chilling prospect.

On Sean Hannity‘s show Tuesday night, Ann Coulter warned the GOP that they should be careful in who they select as the nominee, suggesting that Mitt Romney would be the best choice to run out as the nominee. “[Barack Obama]‘s going to be tough to beat. The idea that we’ll just pick the most right-wing candidate without any concern about who’s going to win is suicidal for the Republican party.”

On The Last Word, host Lawrence O’Donnell said that Herman Cain may be making the rounds on Fox News shows, but he has less to say about the harassment allegations against him when up against “real reporters.” He brought on Touré to discuss Cain’s recent revelation to Georgia Republicans that a forthcoming report would vindicate and absolve him of the allegations against him, although the discussion veered towards the topic of Cain’s special “role” within his party.

Televangelist and mogul Pat Robertson — a man whose name is practically synonymous with the Religious Right — likely took 700 Club viewers by surprise today when he opined that the Republican base is losing support by “pushing” what he described as “an extreme position.” Robertson expressed worry that Republican front runners are going to [...]

Thursday night on the Daily Show, Jon Stewart tackled the big headline of the day: The death of Muammar Gaddafi… Specifically, the right’s reaction to the former dictator’s passing.
Stewart kicked things off by offering a “Dic-Tip.” (Ay, you guys… D: D: D: ) His advice to dictators? “Don’t hide in holes.” Because you will be found and probably killed, and people may celebrate by tossing their young children while others fire guns into the air.

It’s a given that cable news talking heads charged with guiding political discussion have to weigh in on presidential debates. And, since everyone out there in cablenewsland is talking about the same thing, it often falls on hosts and their writers to come up with a fresh, new angle through which to view these debates so they’re not merely rehashing the same thing everyone else has been saying all throughout the day. Since we’re in the habit of giving mad props where mad props are due, kudos are due to Rachel Maddow and her team for discussing the debate and its participants in a way that was, you know. Different!

Democrats are not the reason the Tea Party exists. But by ignoring the Tea Party — or in many cases, mocking it — until it was far too late, Democrats were ill-prepared to deal with the fallout that led to an unmerciful electoral defeat in the 2010 midterm elections. For instance, at one point Democrats were doing Republicans’ work for them. They figured tying the Tea Party to Republicans would yield a negative reaction from voters. Nope, not really. Instead, the Tea Party energized the Republican base and created the wave that rode the GOP to victory.

Have you noticed that there seems to be a revolving door at the top of the GOP presidential polls? First it was Michele Bachmann, replaced shortly by Rick Perry, only to be supplanted by Herman Cain and/or Mitt Romney (depending on the poll you are reading.) You know who else has noticed this? Morning Joe co-host Joe Scarborough who repeated his “flavor of the month” mantra in an entertaining exhibition of “I told you so” style commentary.

In New Hamshire news being covered on The Rachel Maddow Show, the state is planning to hold a Republican primary in early December instead of in January or February as it usually does. This, announced Maddow, has the makings of Granite State / Rock feud (Rocky is an accepted nickname for people named Rachel, right? Sure it is.) because it means that Iowa will also have to have an earlier caucus, possibly as early as November and Americans will spend an entire year, pretty much, voting on its next president.

Well its probably safe to assume that Sarah Palin won’t be endorsing Jon Huntsman for the GOP nomination, and not just because they may have different political views within the GOP platform. The former governor appeared on The View earlier today, and was pressed by the Sherri Shepard (and other later Barbara Walters) on if he could survive by running a “nice and civil” campaign. Huntsman first demurred, saying that there was “too much drama and theater in politics” before hitting Palin for “stringing people along.”

Did Michele Bachmann agree that President Barack Obama should be impeached? Video footage of her meeting well-wishers after an Iowa stump speech shows the nominee hopeful nodding and agreeing after being asked, “When will we impeach him and get him out of the way?”

ABC News is reporting that Sarah Palin has announced via a letter to her supporters that she will NOT be running or President. This ends months (if not years) of speculation on will she or won’t she with regard to her plans to run for the highest office in the United States. There were many indicators suggesting that she would not be running, and this letter published today confirms that idea.

In an interview with the New Hampshire Union-Leader, which was broadcast in full on CSPAN, Mitt Romney argued that audience moderation — a point of particular interest this campaign season — is not a part of his job as a presidential hopeful. “I haven’t made it my practice to listen to the cheers and the views and then to try and correct the people on their expressions of their views,” he said, arguing that he would can his line while letting all voices, disagreeable and not, be heard.

Will New Jersey Governor Chris Christie announce plans to run for President by entering the 2012 campaign? A relatively hasty press conference was called late last night to announce his political plans, and the early speculation is that he will reaffirm his countless previous statements that he will NOT throw his hat into the ring, at least this time around. Of course, given the history of New Jersey gubernatorial press conferences set in Trenton, there’s not telling WHAT he could announce, so its probably a smart idea to watch the announcement below, via the live streaming video below:

Looks like Newt Gingrich is just going to tell it straight from now on. Speaking in regards of his fellow GOP hopefuls, he went ahead and explained that he would make the better president because he is smarter. As he explained, “They’re nice people, but they don’t have the knowledge to do something like this on this scale.” The president’s job, you see, “is enormously complicated.”

Herman Cain must be feeling pretty good coming off that Florida straw poll, because word has it he’s looking long. The Daily Caller reports today that, even though not everyone really thinks he’ll get so far as to need one, the Godfather’s pizza magnate has already planned his inauguration. It will be a demure thing, Cain promises. He will waste not his time nor your money on gaudy, star-studded inagurual events. If he is elected, that is.

The Northeast’s wealthy aren’t feeling the current crop of GOP hopefuls and an influential few of the wealthiest have taken out their wallets in hopes of rectifying the race. The Meet the Draft Christie committee, a small but powerful collective of Republican-leaning donors and activists, are pushing to get New Jersey Governor Chris Christie jump into the race — explains it, these men “are Rich. They are unattached. They are looking for a little excitement.” How many millions of dollars boring is Mitt Romney, really?

An oft heard refrain around GOP election headquarters around the nation these days is “broaden the tax base,” as a rejoinder to President Obama‘s repeated desire for the super-wealthy to “pay their fair share” with a higher tax rate. Stephen Colbert illustrated this particular narrative through a series of news clips before focusing on the idea that nearly 50% of all Americans don’t pay any taxes (turns out they make less than $20,000 a year.)