Posted on 11/19/2003 9:04:34 AM PST by lightning
1) Silencing the silent majority in Britain. A poll published in the left-wing Guardian newspaper in London discovered that 62 percent see the U.S. as "a force for good, not evil" and, by 43 percent to 36 percent, more welcome than don't Bush's visit. CNN's Aaron Brown noted a Guardian headline, "Majority Backs Bush Visit," then sarcastically mused: "A cynic might say yes, all the better to protest." The other networks on Tuesday night stressed protest and anger at Bush over the more cordial poll numbers. ABC's Peter Jennings asserted that "a very large segment of the British public is opposed to Mr. Bush." CBS highlighted an MP who fretted about "the dumb and dumber show across London." NBC's Dawna Friesen insisted that "anti-Bush and anti-war feelings run deep among many here."
2) The "moderate" Dick Gephardt? In the midst of a story Tuesday night on the decision on gay marriage by the Massachusetts Supreme Court, NBC's Jim Avila tagged Gephardt as a "moderate." Avila maintained that while Bush backers "are virtually united in their opposition" to gay marriage, Democrats "are split," with "liberals like Dennis Kucinich, who support gay marriage" and "moderates, like Richard Gephardt, who stopped short of backing gay marriage." But in 2002, Gephardt earned higher liberal approval (90 percent) than did Kucinich (80 percent) from Americans for Democratic Action.
3) CNN's Aaron Brown fretted Tuesday night about how the Massachusetts Supreme Court decision, on how there is a right to gay marriage, may cause an anti-gay marriage backlash. He opened NewsNight by asking if the decision could create "a political rallying cry for those who oppose such things" and, thus, could become "the wedge issue of the campaign ahead?"
4) The morning after Rush Limbaugh returned to the airwaves, ABC's Charles Gibson described Bill Clinton's sexual escapades, which were followed by lying and obfuscation, as a "human weakness" as he recalled on Good Morning America how "I certainly have heard him [Limbaugh] being very hard on the weaknesses of human beings, particularly obviously Bill Clinton," and told guest Bill Bennett: "It seems to me something like that has to change." CBS's Harry Smith similarly insulted Limbaugh and then wished for a gentler and more liberal Limbaugh, pressing a guest on Tuesday's Early Show: "Empathy has never been one of Rush's strongest suits. Do you detect anything in his broadcast yesterday that would suggest that Rush is now going to become a kinder-gentler Rush Limbaugh?"
5) Rush Limbaugh a money launderer? ABC's Brian Ross, on Tuesday night and Wednesday morning, put into play the charge that in supposedly getting envelopes from his bank with $9,900 in cash to pay for his drug habit, just below the $10,000 in cash which requires a report to the IRS, "Limbaugh may have violated state money-laundering laws." Ross ominously added: "A conviction on such charges in Florida could mean up to 30 years in prison."
6) Senate Republicans may have held a 40-hour filibuster to drum up media coverage of the unprecedented Democratic tactic of obstructing Bush nominees by employing a filibuster threat with the use of the 60-vote cloture motion, but the news magazines could only muster a dismissive paragraph or two. In U.S. News & World Report, Terence Samuel sneered: "They would just not shut up...And what on earth were they droning on about?...Senate Republicans threw a hissy fit because they're frustrated at Dems for holding up four of President Bush's nominees to the federal bench."
7) A St. Petersburg Times story on Tuesday noted criticism of Peter Jennings by "the Washington, D.C., conservative watchdog group Media Research Center, which calls Jennings 'Palestine Pete' in one Web page it maintains." Jennings insisted to TV critic Eric Deggans that "I'm not any more skeptical about Republican administrations than I am about Democratic administrations." But he proudly recalled his pre-war hostility toward Bush's Iraq policy: "'I think it's one of the things of which I am rather proud about ABC News: that many of the questions being asked now about the venture in Iraq are questions we asked before the war,' Jennings said. 'And (they were asked) in a sometimes overheated environment in which patriotism and nationalism have been big issues.'"
On the other hand, I enjoy watching them squirm and try to turn positive news into a condition of malaise. That takes real creativity.
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