I can only assume you are too young to have watched the shows. There were no NAMBLA spokesmen back then, the group was never going to be allowed to make a case in that time period, so asking the early spokesmen of the Gay Rights movement was the only option. This was still the CNN of Lou Dobbs, Bernard Shaw and the rest. We all watched it because we felt it was fairly balanced, and in its early days they clearly would differentiate between their opinion segments/shows and their straight reporting.
Bernard Shaw today would be considered an Uncle Tom by the left.
Sure, someone who served under Nixon was too young for CNN which came along in 1980.
Your point seems to be that Buchannan and Novak were pushing NAMBLA to the public the same as Donahue.