Bill Maher tried to capture what he saw as the Republican reaction to President Obama’s State of the Union address this week with words, calling Republicans “sourpusses” and describing their reaction as “unprecedented.” But he only truly captured what he was trying to say by making this face– at once childish and elderly– as his panel descended into disarray, with Rep. Dana Rohrabacher trying to explain his party’s attitude and Kennedy making the point that parties don’t matter, while a mum Martin Bashir looked on.

Who: Richard Just, Jodi Kantor, Ryan Lizza, moderated by Franklin Foer
What: “The Year of the Herminator: A Panel of Reporters Explain the Weirdest Republican Primary Ever”
Where: New America NYC
When: December 8, 2011
Thumbs: Way Up

The image of President Barack Obama as Colonel Sanders advertising a fried chicken restaurant would immediately be flagged as unacceptably racist, but that seems to be exactly what has popped up in Beijing. The Daily Mail reports that “Obama Fried Chicken,” complete with the President in suspenders and bow tie and the slogan, “We’re so cool, aren’t we?”

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.”

Ron Paul spoke via phone link on this afternoon’s Your World, and doubled down on his previous statement decrying the drone attack that killed al Qaeda cleric Anwar al-Awlaki. He called military strikes against American citizens “very dangerous,” and would only help recruit more al Qaeda members.

Not shockingly, Tea Party favorite Rep. Allen West was not too thrilled with President Obama’s job creating proposal he put forth to Congress last Thursday. Speaking last night to Judge Andrew Napolitano, Rep. West noted that he agreed with some of the President’s ideas, but that the way he encouraged support was “absolutely offensive” to him.

Rep. Jeff Landry held his own quiet little protest last night during President Obama’s big jobs talk. Following not in the footsteps of Rep. Joe Wilson (who was seated two rows ahead of him), the Louisiana representative sat quietly through the speech, holding a sign that read: “DRILLING = JOBS.”

Speaking with Fox Business Network ahead of tonight’s speech, Senior Obama Advisor, Valerie Jarrett, told Peter Barnes that the President will “close loopholes” in his much anticipated jobs bill. “We need to make sure that people that are paying their fair share; that those who can most afford to pay a little bit more do,” she said, adding that, “This should not be controversial.”

After yesterday’s comments against the Tea Party in which he encouraged an audience to “take those son-of-a-bitches out [of office, of course!],” Hoffa found himself in an exclusive interview with possibly the most sympathetic host to his cause he could find: Ed Schultz, who has made the plight of the working class a cornerstone of his program. Predictably, the interview played out like a minefield (no violent rhetoric intended!) for those on the right seeking more evidence against Hoffa, as the latter doubled down on his rhetoric yesterday.

Jon Lovett, award winning comedian and Obama speech writer (“I don’t know if I am a major speech writer for the president,” he jokes in said award winning routine), is escaping the White House for the glitz and glam of the Inland Empire, where he hopes to make a name for himself as a Hollywood screenwriter. “It’s always been a dream of mine to write comedy and be creative,” said the 29-year-old, who is set to move west in mid-September. According to the Washington Post, Lovett has already fielded “interest from studios in a Washington-based political comedy and an updated version of “M.A.S.H.” Did Hollywood just get a little smarter? Or Washington a little less funny?

The President’s Midwestern bus tour has garnered plenty of negative of attention from conservative sources, from the fact that it looks like a campaign tour to the bus’s Canadian origin. On today’s Fox News Watch, the panel argued over whether the President’s current vacation in Martha’s Vineyard following up the tour was good optics, or whether the right’s occupation with both helped the President.

The news of the United States Treasury being downgraded to AA+ rating by Standard & Poor’s seems to have hit Jon Stewart as hard as the rest of us, from the fact that the S&P had given some of the worst mortgage securities great ratings to the market’s decision to sell stocks and collectively invest in “freshly downgraded treasuries.” Expressing what most Americans were likely thinking watching the news all day, Stewart at some point simply threw his hands in the air and asked of the country, “are you f*cking serious?”

There have been so many ridiculous Obama-based products released on the market since 2008. Obama bobbleheads, Obama plates, Obama condoms, and now Obama mints. However, these mints are not exactly pro-Obama. Nicknamed “DisappointMints,” the tin cover asks “This is change?”

The Washington Post recently ran a story on the latest in Obama’s healthcare reform. Soon almost all health insurance plans might be required to offer patients free coverage of prescription birth control, breast pump rentals, counseling for domestic violence and annual wellness exams and HIV tests.

President Barack Obama‘s recent trip to Ireland was highlighted by many by his visit to a local pub during which he consumed a pint of Guinness. After watching footage of Obama’s later speech, Conan O’Brien could only conclude that the President of the United States is a light weight.

More than a month before U.S. military forces launched a deadly raid on Osama bin Laden’s compound Sunday, President Obama ordered the development of multiple military plans aimed at killing or capturing the notorious fugitive leader of al Qaeda.

Obama’s national security team began drawing up several different options back in March, including plans to bomb the Abbottabad compound located 35 miles north of Islamabad, Pakistan’s capital, according to administration officials.

Seth Meyers, taking the podium after Obama, was in his element. He took a few moments to acknowledge how upset he was that the birth certificate issue had been resolved right before the dinner, because now all of his birther material was useless. “Is Joe Biden still the vice president?” he asked. “Because if not I’m down to, like, ‘thank you’ and ‘God bless America’.”

President Obama was introduced with an intentionally cheesy video package (picture Barney Stinson’s video resume from “How I Met Your Mother”) set to Rick Derringer’s “I Am A Real American” and featuring a repeating shot of his birth certificate set against an American flag background. Obama addressed the birther issue in his speech as well, announcing “I am prepared to go a step further…I am releasing my official birth video,” which turned out to be the opening number from The Lion King. The president even had a few choice words for Donald Trump.

As Fox News host Neil Cavuto said after watching Senator Paul Ryan reacted to Obama’s earlier address on reducing the budget deficit “the name calling ensues.” Earlier today President Obama gave a speech on how to best address fiscal responsibility (that may have been soporific to at least one senior White House official) that was predictably received along partisan lines.

After a failed attempt earlier in the week to provide his birth certificate, Donald Trump on Tuesday proved that he is in fact an American citizen. Trump is the latest person to demand that President Obama prove he, too, is an American, and the stunt got people wondering about Trump’s intentions. The birther movement may [...]

With the “kinetic operations” in Libya by American troops fully underway, the media is only beginning to comprehend how to evaluate our intervention in the struggle. The Fox New Watch panel analyzed the response to the invasion by the media in the context of President Obama as peacemaker, and were evenly torn between considering it a pure partisan issue or a matter of the media simply not having enough information to make a move.

Mike Huckabee tends to define himself as a candidate on his social and domestic issues, but despite appearing as a Fox News personality and not 2012 presidential candidate on Red Eye, he took the time to delve into foreign policy. Discussing recently polls showing America’s popularity around the world surging under President Obama, Huckabee disapproved of what he classified as an apologetic foreign policy, and instead proposed America be “feared rather than liked.”

On the heels of Monday’s lively discussion with Niall Ferguson, whose cover story in Newsweek brands President Obama‘s handling of the uprising in Egypt a failure, MSNBC’s Morning Joe returned to the question Tuesday morning with former national security adviser–and Mika Brzezinski‘s Dad–Dr. Zbigniew Brzezinski. Brzezinski dismissed the suggestion that Obama necessarily “blew it.”

The new Fox News show Justice with Judge Jeanine featured an interview with Sarah Palin that was scheduled to air last night. Due to the breaking news developments though, Pirro’s show was preempted, but in this video preview of the interview, Palin had some cheerful comments to share.

The Obama administration really can’t catch a break when it comes to random celebrities. Add to an army that includes Fabio, Snooki, and Jon Voight, among others, Full Metal Jacket star turned GEICO spokesman R. Lee Ermey, who railed at the president’s “socialism” at a Toys 4 Tots charity event this week. With this addition, the anti-Obama celebrity league is sure a list to rival the cast of that Norwegian sitcom promo.