What is incredible is that Russert caved in to Dean's refusal to appear together. If the shoe had been on the other foot, they would have told Melman either appear with Dean or you won’t appear at all.
In 2000 NBC proposed to both the Bush and Gore Campaign that they answer questions from Tom Brokaw the last week of the campaign. There was something about the proposal that the Republicans objected to(they were afraid of the liberal bias of NBC and Brokaw would mean softball questions to Gore hardball questions to Bush).
NBC decided to just go ahead despite Republican objections and broadcast only the questions to Gore. So essentially you had a week of free Gore campaign ads disguised as news in the week before the election.
What is incredible is that Russert caved in to Dean's refusal to appear together. If the shoe had been on the other foot, they would have told Melman either appear with Dean or you won’t appear at all.Did Russert even bring up the issue when Dean came on? If he did, I missed it.
..Also If Russert had said to Dean appear with Melman or you do not appear at all, we will just do the whole show with him.
I believe Dean would have backed down the fact that Russert did not force the issue, makes it clear which side he is on.