Posted on 12/26/2012 7:11:04 PM PST by Kaslin
I know there are questions on my beat larger and more pressing than who’s worse as a TV journalist, Chelsea Clinton or Jenna Bush Hager, the presidentially-connected, pretend correspondents at NBC News.
But I continue to be fascinated by a network news division putting someone as outrageously unqualified as Clinton on a prime-time newsmagazine. I watched her again last week in a softer-than-soft piece on a weight loss program started by Pastor Rick Warren at his Saddleback Church, and I can say with absolute certainty that she has not improved one lick in the last year. In fact, I think she is worse than when she started this job for which NBC News President Steve Capus said “it’s as if she had been preparing her whole life.”
That’s why I read with such fascination a piece at Politico this week suggesting Clinton was ready for the “next act” in her life.
Here’s the nut graph: “Family friends and supporters says Chelsea Clinton, who has evolved from a frizzy-haired little girl in the White House to a self-assured public figure in her own right, is ready to play an increasingly larger role in the national debate and may emerge as a pre-2016 surrogate of sorts as her mom mulls her future plans.”
The piece is filled with quotes from those family friends and supporters describing Clinton as “incredibly articulate and human…charmingly personal while at the same time substantively deep.”
If true, it’s amazing how none of that manages to work its way into her on-air work for NBC with such programs as Rock Center.
In the Warren piece, for example, the pastor said he had a goal of losing 90 pounds and had already dropped 50.
“So, you’re over the 50 yard line,” she said.
No, that would only be like crossing the 50 yard line if a football field was 90 yards instead of 100 yards long. The fact that NBC left her response in suggests how bad the rest of her on-camera verbal interaction with Warren must have been. Or, maybe the producers have simply given up on making her look like she is in any way worthy of a network correspondent’s job.
But I see hope in the Politico piece.
My first reaction to it was: “What, after her year of such great triumphs as an NBC News special correspondent, she’s accomplished all anyone can hope to accomplish on TV, and it’s time to move on in search of bigger stages and greater challenges? Did I miss something here, or is this some higher level of Washington spin that’s beyond a simple, country media critic like me?”
But my second reaction now is: “Those family friends and supporters don’t talk to the press unless they are serving some higher Clinton purpose. Could this piece be part of an effort to grease the skids for an announcement saying Clinton is leaving NBC News? It is, after all, coming up on a year since the network extended her initial deal. And you can’t walk away letting people think you flopped – even if that is what you did.”
Too bad Mittens didn’t win. He could have given her his 1st interview in the oval office. That would really irritate the ‘pros.’
New reality show idea.
Chelsea, Meg McCain, the Romney boys, the Bush girls, all on an island, Hunger games style.
GREAT IDEA!!!
The piece is filled with quotes from those family friends and supporters describing Clinton as “incredibly articulate and human…charmingly personal while at the same time substantively deep.”
wonderful, another little intellectual from the oligarchy to rule over us and tell us how to life. She better play nice president post turtles spawn
I think it’s very mean-spirited to even joke about doing something like that to Chelsea. What her dad did or her mom did are not her fault. I don’t care for her politics, and I certainly don’t think she’s a great journalist, but I also know that she’s just a product of the parents who raised her, and I don’t think the children of politicians should be held responsible for the transgressions of their parents. I watched the Rick Warren piece, and I thought she did a decent job, but my overwhelming feeling was that NBC would never have a less-than-attractive female “journalist” on air for a show like that if it weren’t a (liberal) politico’s child. However, it’s not Chelsea’s fault that such decisions are made, and attacking her personally in such a harsh and vicious way as you suggest crosses the line. What’s next? Should we confront the Obama girls with photos of Larry Sinclair?
Journalism is dead and the only qualification for being a propagandist is to be a celebrity.
a job that remains unfilled since she left.”””
I maintain that the job was ‘unfilled ‘ when Michelle was there.
It was just a method of giving the Obama’s tons of money in reparations.
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