Bush Guilty of "Hurling Insults" at Castro; Warnings to "Distract" Attention?; NBC Exploited Kid's Letter to Bush; Hezbollah Terrorist?; Gephardt's Excuse: I Was Just Parroting Katie Couric 1) ABC's Terry Moran claimed that President Bush "took a hard rhetorical line on Fidel Castro, hurling insults at the Cuban leader." The insult? Apparently that Bush referred to Castro as "a relic from another era who has turned a beautiful island into a prison." 2) ABC, CBS and NBC on Monday night raised claims that new Bush administration warnings about terrorist attacks are an effort to "distract" or "deflect" attention from controversy... continue reading
Stephanopoulos: "For the Most Part," White House Hasn't Lied; Clift: Bush Credibility Hurt; Media Beast's "Phony" Scandal; Koppel's Rationality; CNN's Anti-Embargo Mantra 1) "For the most part, the White House has not lied here," George Stephanopoulos charged on Sunday's This Week in a discussion about the August 2001 intelligence briefing for the President. He's certainly an expert on White House lying. Last week Peter Jennings insisted Stephanopoulos has made a clean break from politics and "proved himself as a journalist." 2) Newsweek's Eleanor Clift gleefully declared on the McLaughlin Group over the weekend: "This is a big problem for the... continue reading
Back to today's CyberAlert Gumbel Joined "When Did He Know It?" Mantra; Dan Rather Fears Being "Necklaced...the Flaming Tire of Lack of Patriotism" 1) Friday morning Bryant Gumbel set up Dick Gephardt: "What did the President know and when did he know it has a familiar ring to it. To your mind, what are the questions that are upper-most?" NBC's Katie Couric talked about "warnings President Bush received" and how "the controversy over what could have been done to prevent the attacks of September 11th intensifies." ABC featured a victims' representative who said they were all "very angry" about not... continue reading
Networks Apoplectic About a White House Cover-Up; CBS and NBC Ignored How Congress Knew; White House Should Have Refused Comment?; Blood in Water at Press Briefing 1) NBC's Tom Brokaw demanded: "What did the President know and when did he know it in the days before 9/11?" CBS's Dan Rather painted a White House somehow backtracking out of a cover-up as they "spent this day trying to explain what President Bush knew about terror threats" and "why the President never shared what he knew with the public." ABC's Peter Jennings portrayed widespread concern around the nation: "All over the country... continue reading
Bush "Knew" of Impending Attack?; Embargo Dashes Hope of Cubans; Lockhart & Gore as Fundraising Ethics Authorities; Walters Not Upset by Photo Use; Hollywood Hobby: Stripping in Front of Kids 1) CBS first reported that the CIA Director had warned President Bush "that an attack by Osama bin Laden could involve the hijacking of U.S. aircraft." But while CBS's David Martin put his scoop into the context of intelligence failures, lamenting how that was "as close as U.S. intelligence came to alerting the President to an airliner attack," hours later CNN's Judy Woodruff turned it into a definitive statement about... continue reading
Back to today's CyberAlert Treating It as a Bush Cover-Up: "What Did He Know and When Did He Know It?" > The ABC, CBS and CNN morning shows opened Thursday by treating the disclosure, that the CIA had told President Bush some vague information about how al Qaeda might be looking to hijack a plane, as if it were evidence of some sort of scandalous cover-up of how the Bush administration "knew" in advance of the terrorist attacks. Both ABC's Charlie Gibson and NBC's Katie Couric opened their shows by provocatively asking: "What did he know and when did he... continue reading
Networks Hyped "Controversy" Over Bush Photo Use; Davis "Forced" to Raise Taxes; Another Begala Shot at Bush's Legitimacy; ABC: 1984 Most Popular Book in Cuba; West Wing Plot: Sue Network News 1) The networks jumped on Democratic complaints about Republicans raising money by offering a September 11th photo of President Bush. "Controversy surrounds" it declared ABC anchor Elizabeth Vargas. Dan Rather wondered "whether the use of this photo crosses the line of bad taste." Most over the top, this on ABCNews.com: "A Republican fund-raising pitch is luring contributors by offering White House photographs of President Bush taken aboard Air Force... continue reading
CNN Effused Over Cuba's Great Schools & Health Care; No Retort to Carter on CBS & NBC; "No Hard Evidence" for U.S. Charge Against Cuba; NBC Boosted Liberal Award Given by the Kennedys 1) On CNN's Monday night "Live from Havana," anchor Kate Snow fretted about the "hard line" views of President Bush and Cubans in Miami, as she hoped Jimmy Carter's visit might "moderate" the Cuban-Americans. She touted the "successes" of Cubans under Fidel Castro and she praised their schools and admired how "every Cuban has a primary care physician" who gets "to know their patients and even make... continue reading
CNN: "Every Cuban Has a Family Doctor"; CBS: Bush's "Hard Line" Inhibiting "Positive Moves by Castro"; ABC: "U.S. Embargo...Has Fueled a Bitter Feud"; Gun Rights View "Doesn't Make Any Sense"; Juan Williams: Quayle "Spoke the Truth" 1) Castro's wonderful "safety net." From Havana on Saturday, CNN's Kate Snow expressed awe at how youngsters get "incredible training" in athletics which leads to "all kinds of" Olympic medals. She oozed with envy over "how every Cuban has a family doctor. You cannot go without health care here because there's a system set up, a safety net, where, if you live in a... continue reading
Spending Equals Commitment to Education; CBS Back to Global Warming; Chomsky Accurately Tagged as "Left Wing"; NBC: Maybe Quayle Was Right About Murphy Brown ; 1992 Blasts at Quayle 1) Spending equals commitment to an issue, Washington Post reporter Mike Allen assumed in framing his May 9 story: "President Bush wants to campaign for the next six months as a champion of education, but he has a problem: He has proposed a budget that cuts, freezes and eliminates scores of school programs." 2) A week-and-a-half after the CBS Evening News warned of global cooling, Dan Rather was back to affixing... continue reading