Trying to do some cheerleading for President Obama on Friday, NBC's Today touted the First Daughters as a major boon to his reelection, as co-host Matt Lauer proclaimed: "...with the ele ction just about five months away, Malia and Sasha are stepping forward a little bit. So are they a good way to connect with voters?...are they his secret weapon in the upcoming campaign?" Introducing the pro-Obama fluff as legitimate news, co-host Ann Curry talked about the President as if he were a summer action flick: "Like most parents, President Obama loves talking about his kids. But during an election... continue reading
In Aaron Sorkin’s new HBO drama The Newsroom , the lead character Will McAvoy, played by actor Jeff Daniels, rattles off America’s failings and blasts that “It’s not the greatest country in the world.” It’s an opinion of America that CBS This Morning co-anchor Charlie Rose admitted, on his Thursday night PBS show, he shares. Rose invited on Sorkin, Daniels and actress Emily Mortimer to promote the show about a disgruntled cable news anchor and told Sorkin he agreed with McAvoy’s and presumably Sorkin’s dim view of America: “I mean this is your definition of the world right there. And... continue reading
Trying to quickly move past the Obama administration's Fast and Furious gun-walking scandal, Thursday's ABC and CBS evening newscasts dropped the story completely while NBC's Nightly News only followed up with a scant 30 seconds of coverage. That 30 seconds on NBC consisted of anchor Brian Williams noting, "Fallout today in that fight between congressional Republicans and Attorney General Eric Holder," and explaining: "Speaker John Boehner signaled his backing for the action and hinted that the White House's use of executive privilege might involve some sort of a coverup." Williams wrapped up the brief report by making sure to include... continue reading
World News anchor Diane Sawyer has a habit of showcasing fawning, deeply irrelevant stories on prominent Democrats. She continued this pattern on Thursday, informing viewers that Hillary Clinton wore flamboyant, purple glasses at a recent ceremony. Sawyer hyped that this was " proof that nobody does unplugged quite like the Secretary of State." The host insisted that the over-the-top glasses highlight Clinton's "master class in letting your hair down." Sawyer recapped, "These past few months, we've been watching her swig a beer, brandish a scrunchy without apology and makeup-free and telling everybody she doesn't care what they think." What didn't... continue reading
On Thursday's NBC Rock Center , just days after calling for more liberal media bias against conservatives, left-wing screen writer Aaron Sorkin dismissed the idea that he has a reputation as an outspoken liberal: "I don't know so much about my being known for my liberal politics .... I don't have very much political sophistication at all." [ Listen to the audio ] Correspondent Savannah Guthrie skeptically replied: "Really, you're not known for your liberal politics?" Sorkin argued: "I don't feel that way about myself. Maybe I am. I've met activists, I'm not one of them. You know, they'll march... continue reading
Steve Kornacki, who will debut as a new MSNBC host on Monday , appeared on Hardball , Thursday, to smear conservative opposition to Eric Holder and Barack Obama as racist. Asked why some on the right oppose the attorney general, Kornacki derided the "caricature of Obama" as a "secret black radical" who is trying to "take away rights or...money from, you know, from white people." [MP3 audio here .] Kornacki saw an "aspect of race and culture" to the conservative disdain. In a discussion of the Fast and Furious scandal, Kornacki simplified, "...Y ou take, you know, prominent, you know,... continue reading
On June 13, the CBS Evening News devoted a story by David Martin to the Afghanistan death count reaching 2,000, as Martin interviewed a mother of a fallen Marine. CBS was alone. There was no story last week on the Afghanistan death “milestone” on ABC, NBC, the PBS NewsHour – or even on the MSNBC programs found in Nexis, including Rachel “Our Military’s In a Perilous Drift” Maddow. But the networks were all more aggressive when the 2,000 mark arrived in Iraq on October 25, 2005. The Big Three networks devoted 14 morning and evening news stories to the death... continue reading
Leading off Wednesday's NBC Nightly News , anchor Brian Williams could barely conceal his contempt for Attorney General Eric Holder being held in contempt by the House Government Oversight Committee: "Washington has blown up into a caustic partisan fight....And for those not following the complexities of all of it, it ju st looks like more of our broken politics and vicious fights now out in the open." NBC News should be included in the category of "those not following the complexities of all of it" when it comes to covering the Fast and Furious gun running scandal at the heart... continue reading
ABC and NBC's morning shows on Thursday actually noticed something interesting was happening with the Fast and Furious scandal. Both networks covered the vote by a House committee to hold Attorney General Eric Holder in contempt. However, Good Morning America and Today spent more time focusing on a heat wave hitting the east coast than they did the controversy involving a murdered border agent. Good Morning America allowed a scant minute and 21 seconds for Fast and Furious, but that was only after first touting, for two minutes and 49 seconds, warm weather in the summer. NBC's Today featured a... continue reading
Writer/producer Aaron Sorkin, whose new drama, Newsroom , about a cable news anchor -- which debuts this Sunday night on HBO -- proved in a USA Today piece he lives in a fantasy world. First, he maintained that when watching broadcast network news “I don’t see the liberal bias — and I’m trying to — that I hear about,” insisting: “What I do see is a bias toward fairness, a bias toward neutrality...” Second, in the imaginary world he created for HBO, he inserts liberal bias by having his lead character castigate the Tea Party from the left, which –... continue reading