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I have very limited experience with the media but I can tell you they set things up:

I was at Union Station on the Wednesday before Thanksgiving several years ago and encountered a news team. Now Amtrack runs many trains on that day and the train station did not have any of those crowds before Thanksgiving crowds they like so much.

They stuck this microphone in my face and started to ask me about all the problems with security and were they being security-conscious. They just wanted a controversial sound bite. I must have been pretty boring because I don't think I was on tv.

Those crowds in Iraq that are so excited when the cameras are on, what do you think they do when the cameras are off.

After this ABC incident, they just won't do live interviews again, too hard to control.

After this ABC incident, they just won't do live interviews again, too hard to control.

I can see it now, from now on ABC live "man on the street" interviews will look like bad 70s "Godzilla" movies. As the folks on camera speak, ABC will overdub their own "reactions" to the questions. No one will notice when the person on TV seems to be talking when they've already completed their answer to the question.

Not only do reporters and news agencies "set things up", they only report what reflects their world-view or agenda. Quick story, my husband's Uncle was coming out of Mass in Washington DC shortly after Pope Benedict was elected, a reporter for the Washington Post asked him "what do you think of the new Pope" and my husbands Uncle says he thinks that it was an excellent choice and that the new Pope will do a wonderful job. You know what that scumbag of a reporter actually said in response? "I'm sorry to hear you say that". "I'm sorry to hear you say that"?, needless to say, the positive words of my husbands Uncle never appeared in the Washington Post article. The slant was almost totally negative. I, for one, am skeptical of almost everything I read in a major newspaper, especially the Washington Post and New York Times.

I thought the ABC live interview was hilarious, I'm still chuckling about it. The reporter couldn't even get the response he wanted by using his leading, biased questions. ABC and the reporter showed condescension, and a lack of respect during this on-air fiasco. They totally underestimated the people they were interviewing. It's like they ASSumed that just because you're black and maybe poor you're stupid and hate Bush and the Federal Government. Now THAT is racist.