Posted on 01/21/2004 2:11:58 PM PST by fight_truth_decay
Media Reality Check. "'Red Meat' Previews 'Angry Campaign'; Reporters Rebuke Tone and Substance of State of the Union While Inviting Democrats to Castigate Bush
Below is the text of a Campaign 2004 Media Reality Check report, by the MRC's Rich Noyes, which was distributed by fax this afternoon. It combines some Tuesday night material, which appeared in today's CyberAlert, with fresh quotes from the Wednesday morning shows.
The pull-out quote in the middle of the faxed page highlights Judy Woodruff's upset on CNN on Monday about how Bush's State of the Union address would distract attention from the Democrats. Monday's CyberAlert offered a full rundown from which Rush Limbaugh read today on his radio show. The text in the box:
Poor Democrats Lost an Hour on CNN "The rest of year and for the last three years the President has dominated the news. Don't the Democrats deserve a few days in the sunshine, if you will?" -- CNN's Judy Woodruff to Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, asking why the State of the Union was scheduled during Democratic primaries, on Inside Politics, January 19.
For more on Woodruff's agenda with Frist: http://www.mediaresearch.org/cyberalerts/2004/cyb20040120.asp#2
Now, the text of the January 21 Media Reality Check fax report:
Both last night and this morning, network reporters found much to fault in President Bush's State of the Union address to Congress. In contrast, the Democrats who were brought in to criticize Bush's approach were largely spared harsh questions — except for John Kerry, who was badgered by ABC's Peter Jennings for being too much like the Republican President.
During ABC's post-speech coverage last night, Jennings hit Kerry with the complaint of a far-left student that the ABC anchor read in an Iowa newspaper. "'If you support John Kerry,'" Jennings read, "'you might as well stay home on Election Day as Bush is already doing a good job of leading America into war and shredding the Constitution.' Your reaction?"
A number of journalists seemed bothered by Bush's tone. Appearing on CNN, Time columnist Joe Klein found it "a remarkably combative speech." Jennings detected "a huge number of hot button issues which are going to be the basis of a very, very potentially angry political campaign." The President "hammered away at a number of issues that are red meat for his conservative constituency," Ted Koppel deplored on Nightline.
This morning, all three broadcast network morning shows challenged White House Chief of Staff Andy Card on Bush's economic proposals. CBS's Harry Smith sounded like a Democratic candidate: "The President says the economy is in recovery. Let's look at the numbers: There's a $500 billion deficit, 43 million Americans without health insurance, 12 million American children living in poverty, record numbers of personal bankruptcies. Is that really an economic recovery?"
A few minutes later, questioning former Clinton press secretary Dee Dee Myers, Smith's co-host Hannah Storm continued pounding the President: "Many described his tone as defiant. Did he need to be that way?"
Over on ABC, Charles Gibson asked Card if "making the tax cuts permanent" was, "in a sense, making deficits in the hundreds of billions of dollars permanent?" Gibson was just as snarky when it came to Iraq: "In 2003, the last third of [Bush's State of the Union] was a recitation of all of Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction. Last night, scant mention of the fact that you haven't found any."
On Today, NBC's Matt Lauer read a condemnatory New York Times editorial to Card: "The President's domestic policy comes down to one disastrous fact: His insistence on huge tax cuts for the wealthy has robbed the country of money it needs to address its problems and has threatened its long term security." Lauer quoted the editorial's liberal question: "Why would Mr. Bush be so determined to do the wrong thing?"
But when it came to the Democrats, Katie Couric saw lots of "expertise." After Wesley Clark condemned Bush's speech, she fawned: "Your big claim to fame has been, so far, your expertise in foreign policy and your military experience....But Senator Kerry is also strong in both of those areas. Is this the worst possible scenario for you, to have John Kerry come out strong out of the Iowa caucuses?"
A few minutes later in an interview with Senate GOP Leader Bill Frist, Couric rued how "the U.S. has lost more than 2 1/4 million jobs since Inauguration Day three years ago....If [new jobs] don't materialize before November, are voters right to blame the President?"
END Reprint of Media Reality Check
-- Brent Baker
"In a New York Times piece on August 13, 2000, the day before the Democratic convention opened in Los Angeles, Nachman, then Executive Producer of ABC's Politically Incorrect, expounded on his belief that most journalists are liberals. An excerpt:
My phone is pulsating like a blender. The calls are from my press buddies. They're all coming, you know, to cover the Democrats. Years ago we'd be talking pegs, angles. Who's gonna defect in some platform fight? What caucus will Reagan try to charm to steal the nomination from Ford? Will Jesse apologize tomorrow night for the Hymietown thing? Dukakis definitely won't pick Bentsen; I got it nailed.
This week the calls are about whether I can get them into the Playboy Mansion soiree and, hey, you're in TV, what about that Streisand thing? Are you, like, going? I'm relieved. Better they're talking parties than politics.
When they talk politics I get irritated. Because most of the media coming to L.A. should wear delegate badges rather than press passes. What's not new is that most newspeople are Democrats, even liberals. One accepted study reported that 91 percent of journalists polled voted for Bill Clinton in 1992; 43 percent of their fellow Americans did so that year.
What is new is that newsies no longer try to keep their politics personal. There was a time when journalists held their political cards very close to the vest. But now they share.
I remember returning to WCBS-TV in New York in the fall of 1994 to run the news department. Election Day arrived, and a Republican was elected governor. The next day the newsroom was in emotional shambles. Remember, most of them are kids. New York governors had been Cuomo or Carey for all the memory they had. Rockefeller was the name of a skating rink.
The kids were keening. I thought I had walked into some large, collective shiva call. The staff was bereft. Those Republican guys, they explained with bewilderment and fear, had, like, taken over the Senate and the House, too. I think I heard a chorus of "Kumbaya" somewhere near the water cooler; I'm all but certain someone shouted "Oh, the humanity!" over by the assignment desk.
The staff shuffled into my office to be consoled. Many of them believed me to be avuncular, another misperception I would have to work on. "Children," I began, "it is true that a Republican is the governor-elect of New York." Someone sniffled. I flipped a box of tissues in his direction. "But you must remember that so are the governors of Massachusetts and Connecticut and New Jersey and California." I pointed out that Republicans had occupied the White House for 28 of the prior 42 years.
There was a collective gasp: they had no idea aliens had landed in so many places....
END of Excerpt of Nachman's New York Times op-ed
A good example of the liberal bias. I remarked to my wife that it sounded almost like a Clinton speech. I didnt find much "red meat" for conservatives except for him standing up for US sovereignty ("no permission slip") and making clear we are in the War on Terror for the duration and will win.
On domestic policy, it sounded like a lot of stuff he wants the Govt to do to help this and that constituency. some of it was conservative-flavored (eg abstinence sex ed) but it was Govt-as-problem-solver a la every Clinton SOTU. Not to mention the praise for: Higher education spending, prescription drug benefit, and immigration proposal.
So Koppel is way way way out of line IMHO. This had some red meat for conservatives, strong defense of our national security interests, and some amount of Govt pandering proposals. A Nice Salad Mix for his big Tent re-election campaign.
Not very Reaganesque ("Government IS the problem!") was it? Sigh....
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