Hmmm….wonder where NBC’s Luke Russert could have possibly found his “slow-walking” source.

Russert: “A #GOP aide tells me of the offer with entitlement/tax reform: ‘The WH needs to move on the spending side and quit slow-walking this.’”

Fox News’ Shannon Bream: “Boehner’s office: ‘The longer the White House slow-walks this process, the closer our economy gets to the fiscal cliff.’

BuzzFeed’s Zeke Miller: “Boehner: Reports indicate that the president has adopted a deliberate strategy to slow-walk our economyright to the edge of the fiscal cliff.”

And then, whoa! Straight from the horse’s mouth:

Speaker John Boehner: “Democrats’ #slowwalk strategy on #fiscalcliff threatens the economy”

John Boehner: “Dems’ #fiscalcliff #slowwalk is unfair to taxpayers, #smallbiz and all those looking for work.”

The U.S Senate voted today against ratifying a U.N. treaty that proponents said would offer international protection for people with disabilities. Critics of the bill (mostly Republicans) believed the bill would infringe on American sovereignty.

Sixty-seven votes were needed for the measure to pass. It fell short 61 to 38. In the aftermath of the vote, Twitter lit up with some generally depressing imagery.

We’ve compiled them here, though they may not be 100 percent factually accurate in their content.

Read more

Like many outlets, Politico wrote up the age dust-up between NBC’s Luke Russert and House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi from a Wednesday morning press briefing. Luke wondered if the 70 plussers in the Democratic leadership are holding back a more youthful party. Nancy, none too pleased, attempted to scold him like a child. In the end, she entertained his question.

But it’s those candid commenters who are intriguing. They have much advice for young Luke and a lot to say about his late father, Tim Russert. Here’s a sampling. We’ve bolded the best parts.

Against him…

Ginny: “Here’s hoping Luke’s mom has a chat w/him.”

Mary: “Russert would have gotten a pass if he asked the same question to old farts like Mitch McConnell and Harry Reid, but he has never done so, and has had plenty of opportunities. He only asked that question to Nancy Pelosi so it does look like a double standard.”

Neil: “Luke Russert is a tremendous hack. Its such a shame the media gave him a free pass because they loved his dad so much. I don’t rag on reporters or public personalities very much, but when it comes to Russert, it just reeks of a ridiculously underqualified dip getting a HUGE leg up simply because of his father’s legacy.”

Doug: “To be blunt, Luke Russert is the poster boy of what’s wrong with media nepotism. He continues to be as clueless and superficial in his analysis as when he first got his job — out of the blue and with no qualifications whatsoever — just after his father died. NBC should be ashamed.”

Wendy: “Luke Russert got his ass handed back to him. Any more questions, punk?”

For him… Read more

When The Guardian‘s and Salon‘s Jim Newell and obvious daredevil Dylan Byers of Politico contemplated venturing out last night on Capitol Hill, an older journo had words of wisdom.

You could tell Newell was getting restless when he wrote, “I guess the dearth of DC storm tweeters means nothing too bad is happening! (In Columbia Heights at least or wherever you fuckers live).”

Around 10:30 p.m. when Byers announced that he was contemplating heading out, Newell jumped at the chance to hang out with such a cool cat. Byers: “Alright, folks, venturing out for a Capitol Hill #Sandy report. Pictures TK. Can’t promise anything like New York.” Newell: “Are you going to the actual Hill or just around the neighborhood?” he asked. “I kind of want to go out and see too.”

Byers soon wound up at Tunnicliff’s Tavern. UPDATE and CORRECTION: Around 2:30 p.m. we heard back from Newell, who said he never made it out last night. Why did he take so damn long getting back to us? “Sorry, I was sleeping,” he replied. (We have changed the copy to reflect that Newell never made it to the bar.)

But not without sound advice from The Guardian‘s Richard Adams… Read more

Politico brass has to be grinning ear to ear today as a new survey has them clobbering many other publications on Capitol Hill.

“POLITICO ranks No. 1 among Capitol Hill publications, both in print and online, in the latest Erdos & Morgan survey of congressional and executive branch opinion leaders,” a morning release from Politico states. “The survey, released Thursday, shows POLITICO ahead of Congressional Quarterly, The Hill, National Journal and Roll Call in terms of which publication these influentials read and visit the most.”

“Politico’s mission is to provide political and policy professionals the agenda-setting breaking news and smart, timely analysis they need to do their jobs,” said Chief Operating Officer Kim Kingsley. “Ranking so high in this well-respected survey proves that we’ve been successful in that mission.”

Politico Pro Editor-in-Chief Tim Grieve (voted in FBDC’s Summer Superlatives as having the biggest temper in D.C.) also gushed on the matter in a canned quote that really isn’t worth reading but we’ll give it to you anyway… Read more

Presumed GOP Presidential nominee Mitt Romney has been getting a boatload of bad international press. This morning Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-Md.) pointed this out to CNN’s Soledad O’Brien on the morning program “Starting Point.”

“I would summarize it: not ready for primetime,” Cummings told her in a morning interview. “Clearly, the comment in England about the Olympics — you would think that someone who dealt with the Olympics here in the United States would be much mor esensitive with regard to those kind of issues to go into a country and criticize the organizers. Then I found the Palestinian comment to be quite offensive and I can understand the feelings of the Palestinians. And now, this fellow here in Poland, making the comment that he made.” Cummings acted like the press really can’t be blamed. “You’ve got a really frustrated press corp that have only had three questions answered by Mr. Romney during the trip.”

Cummings was referring to Romney Press Sec. Rick Gorka cussing at reporters in Poland.

Apart from his day job, the congressman partakes in a little journalism. He writes a bi-weekly column for The Baltimore Afro-American, more commonly referred to as The Afro. The weekly newspaper was founded by a former slave.

Watch the segment here.

Congratulations are in order for New York mag’s Frank Rich and the crew at HBO’s Veep. The send-up of Washington politics just picked up Emmy nominations for Outstanding Comedy Series,  Outstanding Lead Actress in a Comedy Series for star Julia Louis-Dreyfus, and Outstanding Casting for a Comedy Series.

Rich is an executive producer for the show and by far one of the most likable Media Beat guests we’ve had, so we couldn’t think of a better person to get such an honor. Don’t believe me? Check out the video for yourself.

Part 2: Frank Rich Compares New York Times and New York Magazine
Part 3: Frank Rich on the ‘Great Theater’ of Politics and Pop Culture

It’s another homecoming for a member of CQ Roll Call‘s sales team. Mary Cadwallader, who worked for CQ Roll Call for five years between 2005 and 2010, is returning to the publication after making the rounds at a variety of political pubs such as The Hill (two years) and most recently Talking Points Memo, where she was VP of Sales for about 10 minutes (no, no, actually two months. Hey, at least she gave her two weeks notice.)

Cadwallader was welcomed back by Beth Bronder, who recently fled Bloomberg to also return to her old stomping grounds.

See the internal memo…

Read more

Two of Washington’s news sources are hooking up to cover the battle for control of Congress. C-SPAN and NJ today announced a partnership that will make NJ reporters and editors regular contributors to C-SPAN’s coverage of the 2012 U.S. House and Senate campaigns.

C-SPAN, however, is not beholden to one outlet. They will continuing airing, for instance, Politico reality livestream shows, despite the fact that Politico and NJ would be hard-pressed to partner up for anything.

Beginning this week, C-SPAN’s coverage of the congressional campaigns will feature contributions from NJ‘s editorial team. In turn, NJ staff will help provide the context to C-SPAN’s simulcasts of more than 100 individual Senate/House debates from local TV stations across the nation.

Additionally…C-SPAN will cover NJ editorial meetings with Congressional candidates, and briefings that examine key congressional races.

During  the conventions this summer, C-SPAN plans to air live NJ “Daily Morning Briefings” (in Tampa for the Republicans, August 27-30; and in Charlotte for the Democrats, Sept. 3-6), as well as NJ’s “Path to Power” event at each convention, focused on how each presidential candidate would govern after the election.