I'm not sure what the issue is with the article. As far as I can tell, it's right. There's also a link on the bottom to another instance of Maddow being less than honest.
Well, the article doesn't discuss the actual content of the shows to refute Maddow's assertion (and to be fair, Maddow didn't discuss content either, just the guest list).
I mean, the longest segment was the 4-pundit panel. For all I know, all four of them gushed over how well Bush did in bringing Bin Laden to justice. Hell, since the interview with Donilon was it could have been 1500 words of introduction before the interview.
And of course the article devolves into its obvious biases.
No offense, but compared to the journalistic atrocities committed by FOX employees, Maddow has done little wrong.
Obviously she ain't perfect, and I'm glad people are keeping journalists on their toes, but surely there are far more and worse things perpetrated by FOX that could be discussed in this thread?
No offense, but compared to the journalistic atrocities committed by FOX employees, Maddow has done little wrong.
Obviously she ain't perfect, and I'm glad people are keeping journalists on their toes, but surely there are far more and worse things perpetrated by FOX that could be discussed in this thread?
I'm sorry Maddow is a whiny hack, but really the thread is not "Let bash Fox news". I mean if you want to beat on that dead horse go right ahead. It really isn't going anywhere. Perhaps people are just enjoying beating on a new horse for awhile.
The American media is complete shit on all sides when it comes to actually reporting anything.
Actually, it's SOP for the Sunday shows. Hell, I think they've had a back benching, unimportant Republican Senator with no real power on something like 28 times since the last Presidential election.
McCain, obviously.
Forgive me for thinking Tucker Carlson's piece of shit isn't particularly reputable.
enlightenedbum on
Self-righteousness is incompatible with coalition building.
No offense, but compared to the journalistic atrocities committed by FOX employees, Maddow has done little wrong.
Obviously she ain't perfect, and I'm glad people are keeping journalists on their toes, but surely there are far more and worse things perpetrated by FOX that could be discussed in this thread?
This is "document the atrocities", not "look the other way when Rachel Maddow does it".
That her distortions informed enlightenedbum's views on "the atrocities" is kind of meta for the thread, and that he's not reexamining his claim, but rather attacking the source that attacks Maddow...
OK, here. The roundtable that gets slightly more time than the White House guy? George Will, lying conservative. Liz Cheney, notjob torture enthusiast. Lawrence Wright, journalist and author of a book on Al Qaeda (non-partisan). Tom Ricks, author and journalist, specialist on Iraq (non-partisan).
That's the pervasive problem.
The most liberal of those voices is probably Ricks. Who is "liberal" in the sense that he thought the Iraq War was badly handled.
And The Daily Caller is still a piece of shit, one step above Breitbart.
enlightenedbum on
Self-righteousness is incompatible with coalition building.
OK, here. The roundtable that gets slightly more time than the White House guy? George Will, lying conservative. Liz Cheney, notjob torture enthusiast. Lawrence Wright, journalist and author of a book on Al Qaeda (non-partisan). Tom Ricks, author and journalist, specialist on Iraq (non-partisan).
That's the pervasive problem.
The most liberal of those voices is probably Ricks. Who is "liberal" in the sense that he thought the Iraq War was badly handled.
And The Daily Caller is still a piece of shit, one step above Breitbart.
Yeah, the news media is pretty bad about picking informed and relevant experts with useful contributions for panels. I'm treading on ground that has been said more comically / poignantly before, but "Mom who doesn't vaccinate her kids vs. Head of Epidemiology, Oxford University," is not balanced coverage, because there is only one side to the issue.
OK, here. The roundtable that gets slightly more time than the White House guy? George Will, lying conservative. Liz Cheney, notjob torture enthusiast. Lawrence Wright, journalist and author of a book on Al Qaeda (non-partisan). Tom Ricks, author and journalist, specialist on Iraq (non-partisan).
That's the pervasive problem.
The most liberal of those voices is probably Ricks. Who is "liberal" in the sense that he thought the Iraq War was badly handled.
And The Daily Caller is still a piece of shit, one step above Breitbart.
Yeah, the news media is pretty bad about picking informed and relevant experts with useful contributions for panels. I'm treading on ground that has been said more comically / poignantly before, but "Mom who doesn't vaccinate her kids vs. Head of Epidemiology, Oxford University," is not balanced coverage, because there is only one side to the issue.
My absolute favorite example of this was from several years ago, Fox News. It was a segment on video game violence. I forget who they had in the "OMG, our kids are being turned into mass murderer!" side, probably Jack Thompson, but their "balance" side was random Gamestop employee #237. That is not an exaggeration, either.
OK, here. The roundtable that gets slightly more time than the White House guy? George Will, lying conservative. Liz Cheney, notjob torture enthusiast. Lawrence Wright, journalist and author of a book on Al Qaeda (non-partisan). Tom Ricks, author and journalist, specialist on Iraq (non-partisan).
That's the pervasive problem.
...but that's not the problem that Maddow told you about. It's a separate problem, and I'm not saying it isn't a problem. Maddow (and Steve Benen, who made the distortion in the first place) and you are talking about the composition of Meet the Press' lineup:
"... only Republicans get to come on Meet the Press, and only Republicans can talk about national security."
That's plainly untrue. The Republicans were part of a three-person panel, and that entire segment was shorter than the segment with Donilon, the guy the Obama administration sent over.
Surely if we're documenting the atrocities, saying "look over there!" when when of our people does it reduces this to a dumb partisan exercise.
No offense, but compared to the journalistic atrocities committed by FOX employees, Maddow has done little wrong.
Obviously she ain't perfect, and I'm glad people are keeping journalists on their toes, but surely there are far more and worse things perpetrated by FOX that could be discussed in this thread?
This is "document the atrocities", not "look the other way when Rachel Maddow does it".
That her distortions informed enlightenedbum's views on "the atrocities" is kind of meta for the thread, and that he's not reexamining his claim, but rather attacking the source that attacks Maddow...
This seems problematic to me.
By saying this, I've pretty much mortgaged my soul, but Loren Michael is right.
And now I need to take a shower.
But seriously, she does do some of the things we castigate Fox and friends for. Do they do it more often? Yes. Do they do it more egregiously? YES. Oh hell YES.
But at the end of the day, she's still part of the problem.
The problem ends up being that to be on major network news, To be on anything but UHF, you end up being part of the problem. You sell your soul to the company store. And shit goes downhill from there.
Now the internet can do things to correct that, but the new media ain't going to fix that much. Why? No professional goddamn standards. Which is also the problem with the old media. There are no standards and nobody to enforce them. Except for John Stewart. And one middle-aged comedian ain't gonna stem the tide folks
Well, I was only partially serious in my objection. It was turning into a wall of Maddow hate, which I didn't think fairly represented the media problems worth documenting, nor the spirit of the PA community, so I was trying to spark interest in other atrocities, with some success apparently.
In doing so I made myself fair game and you all rightly pointed out that Maddow shouldn't get a free pass. Plus, while I couldn't think of anything specific at the time I still wanted to get on the record with a little FOX hate.
I totally applaud the struggle for veracity in journalism, and frankly I'm glad you all attacked me, including you fellow Maddow fans that probably feel guilty about it a bit (just leave the "Liberal" card at the front desk on your way out ;-) ).
You were in the right, and I'm glad to admit it, but my purposes were served so my embarrassment is fairly well mitigated.
I doubt it's a topic that anyone else would be really interested, but NPR.
On one hand, I like Car Talk. Despite being not at all car literate.
On the other hand, their early coverage and analysis of the 08-08 War (i.e. the War in South Ossetia) was really goddamn awful. Trainwreck awful. To be fair, their coverage of the CIS countries, including Russia, is generally hit or miss. But the South Ossetian war was particularly bad.
To sum it up, they basically decided, in their coverage of the war, they were going to completely ignore the issue of nationality among Ossetians and Abkhazians leading up to the war. Which, coincidentally, was the whole goddamn reason for the almost 20 years of on-off war. Considering the audience they were explaining it to which, not unreasonably, is pretty much illiterate when it comes to Soviet national delimitation, you literally could have spent the entire war, and the period after, thinking Ossetians were one of the following:
1) A nationality, by the same actual definitions of which Georgians, Ukrainians, and Armenians are nationalities. (hint, NPR, this is the FUCKING answer)
2) The name for a bunch of Georgians living in a town somewhere
3) A religious sect or order
4) A really angry English-style sports hooligan group
In complete seriousness, I think any of the following four answers were as common as the first one, based on almost all of NPR's coverage (and certainly all I heard). What did NPR say? That they were a bunch of supsicious people armed wth rifles who causing trouble for Georgia. As though it's an episode of The Dukes of Hazard. If they elaborated? Well, the real problem is that the precedent it sets if an independent nationality in the CIS has a much more powerful neighbor with interests that come to conflict. Like Georgia and the de facto independent state of S. Ossetia.
Way to fuck up, NPR. You're among the first people outside of Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon to ever say the word "Ossetian" to a large American audience. I know I shouldn't have been surprised, but goddamn it. For once, I would like to be!
Oh, and also way to fuck up and literally take the Georgian propaganda post hook, line, and sinker. NPR seemed particularly bad about this. Saakashvili could have claimed that the Russians were annexing Mars and NPR would have cried, "Oh, my, think of the precedent! What will NATO's response be!" instead of, you know, "What the fuck is wrong with you? Mars?" Meanwhile, Medvedev could say the Earth is round and orbits the sun, and the response would be, "I'm sorry, but this is clearly provocative Kremlin propaganda. We have enough common sense to know that the Ossetians don't really exist, and the Earth is flat and also the center of the known universe."
I hate to admit it, but I really hated that NPR jumped on the "we must go to war with Iraq to be sure they can't use weapons of mass destruction" BS that all the media was spouting in the lead up to the invasion.
The coverage was totally unreasonably pro-war so that even call-in shows had hosts vehemently arguing for war. It sickened me a bit, actually. Then again everyone got that wrong in the media, by alot, until it was too late.
OK, here. The roundtable that gets slightly more time than the White House guy? George Will, lying conservative. Liz Cheney, notjob torture enthusiast. Lawrence Wright, journalist and author of a book on Al Qaeda (non-partisan). Tom Ricks, author and journalist, specialist on Iraq (non-partisan).
That's the pervasive problem.
...but that's not the problem that Maddow told you about. It's a separate problem, and I'm not saying it isn't a problem. Maddow (and Steve Benen, who made the distortion in the first place) and you are talking about the composition of Meet the Press' lineup:
"... only Republicans get to come on Meet the Press, and only Republicans can talk about national security."
That's plainly untrue. The Republicans were part of a three-person panel, and that entire segment was shorter than the segment with Donilon, the guy the Obama administration sent over.
Surely if we're documenting the atrocities, saying "look over there!" when when of our people does it reduces this to a dumb partisan exercise.
This particular examination wasn't Meet the Press. It was This Week. And yes, I may have exaggerated for effect. But when you have that kind of guest composition in your roundtable, the fucking insane one says "WOOOOOOO TORTURE!" and no one is there to challenge her.
Also, it was roughly equal time by word count panel/Donilon. And the panel had four people (you can count them! In the very post you quoted!). To be slightly fair, I believe it is ABC that usually throws in Krugman in their panel, particularly in economic matters. Who is one of two liberal voices you'll pretty much ever see in those panels, the other being Maddow herself on Meet the Press.
[Mild disclaimer: I HATE David Gregory]
On Meet the Press, let's examine the whole damn show. Donilon opens, he is asked about the video that was released over the weekend showing bin Laden watching himself on TV. The usual inane bullshit you'd expect from Gregory. Then a question about whether he was still in operational control of al Qaeda. First analysis question is: do you fear retaliation? There's a back and forth on that. Then Gregory asks if we should declare war on Pakistan, based on Bush's response that anyone harboring terrorists is our enemy and wasn't Pakistan harboring terrorists? Gregory REALLY wants us to bomb them. Then he wants to know if torture helped develop the information. It could totally be true, right? Then he asks about the now famous photo. Then he asks an obvious question about how did the story get so confused in the immediate aftermath. Lastly, he wants to know exactly which SEAL pulled the trigger and if the President asked.
How many of those questions actually deal with US foreign policy? The one about Pakistan, where Gregory buys into Bush's frame about states harboring terrorists and desperately wants another war to cover. And the one about torture. Donilon is pretty gracious about the former President. But most of the questions Gregory asks are all about what happened.
So then we introduce Hayden, Chertoff, and Giuliani. First he asks Hayden what he's learning from all this new information. Then he asks Chertoff what it means that bin Laden was in control. Then asks Giuliani what this means for al Qaeda (because he's an expert, obviously). Chertoff jumps in to answer it, according to NBC's transcript. Asks Chertoff if the interpretation that we shouldn't focus our entire national security policy on Al Qaeda is correct or not. Hayden is asked if he's concerned we didn't capture bin Laden alive. Then he asks them about if torture was the key. He does mention reporting that Khalid Sheik Mohammed revealed jack under torture at this point in the conversation, so +1 to Gregory. Then asks "so there is still this debate that doesn't get settled through killing bin Laden." So you know, -several million. Then he asks a bizarre question about "is it noble [to torture]?" Then he turns again to Pakistan, asking them if they were helpful. And then again if they harboring terrorists. Then asks foreign policy expert Rudy Giuliani how big a deal this is in Pakistan? Asks Hayden about Afghanistan withdrawal, is it a good idea to leave earlier? Then: what happens now? Finally asks Giuliani about the President's trip to Ground Zero, and if he's running for President again.
Look at those questions, they're mostly about what this means for American foreign policy going forward. The Democrat got asked what happened, the Republicans were asked to interpret what it means. They're obviously going to see that through their own ideological lens, so there's a lot of "no, we shouldn't be prosecuted for war crimes." going on.
The last part of the show is devoted to the political ramifications of this with: Bob Woodward (sycophant to the powerful), Doris Kearns Goodwin (lame presidential historian), Katty Kay (BBC reporter, based in DC), and Mike Murphy (Republican strategist). Hey look, a Republican, a historian, and two journalists. Surprise! Anyway, this segment isn't particularly pertinent to the question of only Republicans get to talk about foreign policy, but it's mostly domestic politics. Closest thing is a discussion of public opinion on Afghanistan, which they all agree is negative.
The point is that if you actually analyze the show instead of just looking at some word counts or time counts or even purely at the guest list, Maddow (and my!) hypothesis is correct. Republicans (even clueless motherfuckers like Rudy) are asked to analyze foreign policy, the DNSA was asked almost exclusively about what happened and how. The two questions he's asked about what it means buys into the frame that the former President set up on harboring terrorists, and the torture question is... well it sucks, but doesn't explicitly buy into the Cheney frame. It wants the debate to continue, which from my perspective, is just as abhorrent.
I'm willing to bet, though not willing to go through the transcripts, that the other Sunday shows are similar if slightly better because their anchors aren't as fucking stupid as Gregory. Except Fox News Sunday, of course, which I'm sure is far worse.
enlightenedbum on
Self-righteousness is incompatible with coalition building.
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GoslingLooking Up Soccer In Mongolia Right Now, ProbablyWatertown, WIRegistered Userregular
edited May 2011
So Jim Lehrer is stepping down as the 37-year anchor of PBS Newshour after the June 6th broadcast. He'll still be around, but only for weekly roundups on Fridays.
11 Presidential debate moderations he's done; there almost certainly won't be a 12th. Gigantic shoes to fill and the worst possible place to have to fill them.
Which leads to the question: There are going to be, unless something crazy happens, four moderator seats in the general election (three Presidential and one VP), Lehrer's pretty much always filled one of those seats. Now his seat's open. As of Lehrer's departure, who fills those four seats?
Gosling on
I have a new soccer blog The Minnow Tank. Reading it psychically kicks Sepp Blatter in the bean bag.
I picked up a copy of The Economist a few days back. I was excited because I hardly ever get to read it anymore, and it was even a recent-ish copy!
Then I read an article in it about how brave and awesome Paul Ryan was for his budget proposal, but the RSC proposal, now that is what the US needs, the RSC proposal is just a giant sack of awesome, and then I put down the magazine and cried a little bit.
ElJeffe on
I submitted an entry to Lego Ideas, and if 10,000 people support me, it'll be turned into an actual Lego set!If you'd like to see and support my submission, follow this link.
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FencingsaxIt is difficult to get a man to understand, when his salary depends upon his not understandingGNU Terry PratchettRegistered Userregular
I picked up a copy of The Economist a few days back. I was excited because I hardly ever get to read it anymore, and it was even a recent-ish copy!
Then I read an article in it about how brave and awesome Paul Ryan was for his budget proposal, but the RSC proposal, now that is what the US needs, the RSC proposal is just a giant sack of awesome, and then I put down the magazine and cried a little bit.
The Economist has stepped back a bit from that position, and realized that it was bad. Mention of supply-side economics and unprecedented growth and whatnot. Not to mention that The Economist really does not like our Health Insurance system.
I picked up a copy of The Economist a few days back. I was excited because I hardly ever get to read it anymore, and it was even a recent-ish copy!
Then I read an article in it about how brave and awesome Paul Ryan was for his budget proposal, but the RSC proposal, now that is what the US needs, the RSC proposal is just a giant sack of awesome, and then I put down the magazine and cried a little bit.
The Economist has stepped back a bit from that position, and realized that it was bad. Mention of supply-side economics and unprecedented growth and whatnot. Not to mention that The Economist really does not like our Health Insurance system.
The fact that they were ever taken in by it speaks ill of their reading abilities.
The funny thing is that iirc Maddow's been a panelist on MtP a few times - I felt she was fairly confrontational with the other panelists and it didn't really fit with the tone of the show, maybe there are some sour grapes driving that story.
t enlightenedbum don't forget Donna Brazile is normally on the round table and kind of balances out George Will - I assume she's busy with DNC chair stuff these days.
I picked up a copy of The Economist a few days back. I was excited because I hardly ever get to read it anymore, and it was even a recent-ish copy!
Then I read an article in it about how brave and awesome Paul Ryan was for his budget proposal, but the RSC proposal, now that is what the US needs, the RSC proposal is just a giant sack of awesome, and then I put down the magazine and cried a little bit.
The Economist has stepped back a bit from that position, and realized that it was bad. Mention of supply-side economics and unprecedented growth and whatnot. Not to mention that The Economist really does not like our Health Insurance system.
The fact that they were ever taken in by it speaks ill of their reading abilities.
Yeah, it was a bit scary that they were vocally supportive of the bonus joke option budget proposal.
Maybe they did it for the lulz. Next time we have dueling proposals we'll include "boddah" and see if they go for it.
ElJeffe on
I submitted an entry to Lego Ideas, and if 10,000 people support me, it'll be turned into an actual Lego set!If you'd like to see and support my submission, follow this link.
I picked up a copy of The Economist a few days back. I was excited because I hardly ever get to read it anymore, and it was even a recent-ish copy!
Then I read an article in it about how brave and awesome Paul Ryan was for his budget proposal, but the RSC proposal, now that is what the US needs, the RSC proposal is just a giant sack of awesome, and then I put down the magazine and cried a little bit.
The Economist has stepped back a bit from that position, and realized that it was bad. Mention of supply-side economics and unprecedented growth and whatnot. Not to mention that The Economist really does not like our Health Insurance system.
The fact that they were ever taken in by it speaks ill of their reading abilities.
Yeah, it was a bit scary that they were vocally supportive of the bonus joke option budget proposal.
Maybe they did it for the lulz. Next time we have dueling proposals we'll include "boddah" and see if they go for it.
Was it in one of the op-ed type things? Cause some of the people in those are dumb as shit "fiscally conservative" types who'd fit right in inside the beltway.
They had a bunch of pieces on the state of the US economy, and that was one of them. It wasn't clearly labeled as op-ed, and seemed to be a standard article, but I could be mistaken.
ElJeffe on
I submitted an entry to Lego Ideas, and if 10,000 people support me, it'll be turned into an actual Lego set!If you'd like to see and support my submission, follow this link.
They had a bunch of pieces on the state of the US economy, and that was one of them. It wasn't clearly labeled as op-ed, and seemed to be a standard article, but I could be mistaken.
If it's a bunch of pieces, it might be a sort of "Here's X's and Y's and Z's opinion on this" sort of thing.
One of the things that annoys me about the Economist is they seem to do that alot. Take an issue, have a bunch of their people right their takes on it (often without saying who's writing it) and then just slap it in there.
It's basically on op-ed but not called one. But then, so is most stuff that's analysis.
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"Orkses never lose a battle. If we win we win, if we die we die fightin so it don't count. If we runs for it we don't die neither, cos we can come back for annuver go, see!".
Realistically, it has nothing to do with this thread, but I just remembered about it and it's honestly the funniest thing I've seen (well, heard) on any kind of news program in years.
During an episode of On Point maybe two months ago, one of the guests was trying to say something (ridiculous, iirc) and Tom Ashbrook kept trying to interject and argue with him during his pauses. The guy kept talking, and finally boiled over and literally shushed the host of the show. I was sitting in my car laughing over what had just happened for like five minutes straight.
Has anyone quoted the paper on how there are barely any liberals, libertarians, or conservatives left in American media/politics, and how political groups and ideologies go to shit long before they get the slightest scrap of legitimacy?
It was really good. It had examples and quotes and stuff. It actually explained why conservatives think that wall street is filled with evil godless commies.
I thought a lot of journalists are liberal but the companies they work for are typically conservative and have a fair amount of control over what is aired.
I've had an idea bout the media in America for a while, and I'm wondering what you guys think of it:
In the First Amendment, the Press is given some pretty ironclad protection. In return for that protection, shouldn't they have a duty to actually provide accurate, as-close-to-unbiased-as-is-feasible news, not just chase profits?
The profit motive has always seemed to me to be the thing ruining the American media, devolving it into extremely partisan, biased, factless feel-good-about-our-positionfests.
It's often seemed kind of stupid to me that, as a state-protected business, they have absolutely no responsibility to the state, and run just like any other business.
I'm real big on impinging on journalistic freedoms with laws, but I think a lot of journalists would tell you that the drive for viewers/subscribers is certainly doing so via their bosses.
You could make a government run news channel and have the other shows compete against it, but it would have considerable credibility issues since it may be seen as nothing more than a propaganda wing of the government (and Im sure the current news media would waste no time in painting it as such, although Ive never heard them say anything about Voice of America which is as far as I know a government run radio/news thing). Dont get me wrong, the BBC is generally seen as pretty excellent, but I have a feeling that a government news outlet would receive the same warm welcome universal healthcare got.
CSPAN is more like a documentary than a news channel. Its probably better than a news channel, but at the same time it doesnt provide the context that a typical news channel can provide.
Which is more what you'd need if you want the idea to work.
Or something like forcing any corporation with a broadcast license to spend x% on a news organization that they can't recoup any profits from.
Which has it's own host of accounting issues, if nothing else, but is basically the only way I can see it working. You've got to create well funded news organizations that no one can make a profit off of.
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I mean, the longest segment was the 4-pundit panel. For all I know, all four of them gushed over how well Bush did in bringing Bin Laden to justice. Hell, since the interview with Donilon was it could have been 1500 words of introduction before the interview.
And of course the article devolves into its obvious biases.
No offense, but compared to the journalistic atrocities committed by FOX employees, Maddow has done little wrong.
Obviously she ain't perfect, and I'm glad people are keeping journalists on their toes, but surely there are far more and worse things perpetrated by FOX that could be discussed in this thread?
I'm sorry Maddow is a whiny hack, but really the thread is not "Let bash Fox news". I mean if you want to beat on that dead horse go right ahead. It really isn't going anywhere. Perhaps people are just enjoying beating on a new horse for awhile.
The American media is complete shit on all sides when it comes to actually reporting anything.
McCain, obviously.
Forgive me for thinking Tucker Carlson's piece of shit isn't particularly reputable.
This is "document the atrocities", not "look the other way when Rachel Maddow does it".
That her distortions informed enlightenedbum's views on "the atrocities" is kind of meta for the thread, and that he's not reexamining his claim, but rather attacking the source that attacks Maddow...
This seems problematic to me.
That's the pervasive problem.
The most liberal of those voices is probably Ricks. Who is "liberal" in the sense that he thought the Iraq War was badly handled.
And The Daily Caller is still a piece of shit, one step above Breitbart.
Yeah, the news media is pretty bad about picking informed and relevant experts with useful contributions for panels. I'm treading on ground that has been said more comically / poignantly before, but "Mom who doesn't vaccinate her kids vs. Head of Epidemiology, Oxford University," is not balanced coverage, because there is only one side to the issue.
My absolute favorite example of this was from several years ago, Fox News. It was a segment on video game violence. I forget who they had in the "OMG, our kids are being turned into mass murderer!" side, probably Jack Thompson, but their "balance" side was random Gamestop employee #237. That is not an exaggeration, either.
...but that's not the problem that Maddow told you about. It's a separate problem, and I'm not saying it isn't a problem. Maddow (and Steve Benen, who made the distortion in the first place) and you are talking about the composition of Meet the Press' lineup:
"... only Republicans get to come on Meet the Press, and only Republicans can talk about national security."
That's plainly untrue. The Republicans were part of a three-person panel, and that entire segment was shorter than the segment with Donilon, the guy the Obama administration sent over.
Surely if we're documenting the atrocities, saying "look over there!" when when of our people does it reduces this to a dumb partisan exercise.
By saying this, I've pretty much mortgaged my soul, but Loren Michael is right.
And now I need to take a shower.
But seriously, she does do some of the things we castigate Fox and friends for. Do they do it more often? Yes. Do they do it more egregiously? YES. Oh hell YES.
But at the end of the day, she's still part of the problem.
The problem ends up being that to be on major network news, To be on anything but UHF, you end up being part of the problem. You sell your soul to the company store. And shit goes downhill from there.
Now the internet can do things to correct that, but the new media ain't going to fix that much. Why? No professional goddamn standards. Which is also the problem with the old media. There are no standards and nobody to enforce them. Except for John Stewart. And one middle-aged comedian ain't gonna stem the tide folks
In doing so I made myself fair game and you all rightly pointed out that Maddow shouldn't get a free pass. Plus, while I couldn't think of anything specific at the time I still wanted to get on the record with a little FOX hate.
I totally applaud the struggle for veracity in journalism, and frankly I'm glad you all attacked me, including you fellow Maddow fans that probably feel guilty about it a bit (just leave the "Liberal" card at the front desk on your way out ;-) ).
You were in the right, and I'm glad to admit it, but my purposes were served so my embarrassment is fairly well mitigated.
On one hand, I like Car Talk. Despite being not at all car literate.
On the other hand, their early coverage and analysis of the 08-08 War (i.e. the War in South Ossetia) was really goddamn awful. Trainwreck awful. To be fair, their coverage of the CIS countries, including Russia, is generally hit or miss. But the South Ossetian war was particularly bad.
To sum it up, they basically decided, in their coverage of the war, they were going to completely ignore the issue of nationality among Ossetians and Abkhazians leading up to the war. Which, coincidentally, was the whole goddamn reason for the almost 20 years of on-off war. Considering the audience they were explaining it to which, not unreasonably, is pretty much illiterate when it comes to Soviet national delimitation, you literally could have spent the entire war, and the period after, thinking Ossetians were one of the following:
1) A nationality, by the same actual definitions of which Georgians, Ukrainians, and Armenians are nationalities. (hint, NPR, this is the FUCKING answer)
2) The name for a bunch of Georgians living in a town somewhere
3) A religious sect or order
4) A really angry English-style sports hooligan group
In complete seriousness, I think any of the following four answers were as common as the first one, based on almost all of NPR's coverage (and certainly all I heard). What did NPR say? That they were a bunch of supsicious people armed wth rifles who causing trouble for Georgia. As though it's an episode of The Dukes of Hazard. If they elaborated? Well, the real problem is that the precedent it sets if an independent nationality in the CIS has a much more powerful neighbor with interests that come to conflict. Like Georgia and the de facto independent state of S. Ossetia.
Way to fuck up, NPR. You're among the first people outside of Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon to ever say the word "Ossetian" to a large American audience. I know I shouldn't have been surprised, but goddamn it. For once, I would like to be!
Oh, and also way to fuck up and literally take the Georgian propaganda post hook, line, and sinker. NPR seemed particularly bad about this. Saakashvili could have claimed that the Russians were annexing Mars and NPR would have cried, "Oh, my, think of the precedent! What will NATO's response be!" instead of, you know, "What the fuck is wrong with you? Mars?" Meanwhile, Medvedev could say the Earth is round and orbits the sun, and the response would be, "I'm sorry, but this is clearly provocative Kremlin propaganda. We have enough common sense to know that the Ossetians don't really exist, and the Earth is flat and also the center of the known universe."
The coverage was totally unreasonably pro-war so that even call-in shows had hosts vehemently arguing for war. It sickened me a bit, actually. Then again everyone got that wrong in the media, by alot, until it was too late.
This particular examination wasn't Meet the Press. It was This Week. And yes, I may have exaggerated for effect. But when you have that kind of guest composition in your roundtable, the fucking insane one says "WOOOOOOO TORTURE!" and no one is there to challenge her.
Also, it was roughly equal time by word count panel/Donilon. And the panel had four people (you can count them! In the very post you quoted!). To be slightly fair, I believe it is ABC that usually throws in Krugman in their panel, particularly in economic matters. Who is one of two liberal voices you'll pretty much ever see in those panels, the other being Maddow herself on Meet the Press.
[Mild disclaimer: I HATE David Gregory]
On Meet the Press, let's examine the whole damn show. Donilon opens, he is asked about the video that was released over the weekend showing bin Laden watching himself on TV. The usual inane bullshit you'd expect from Gregory. Then a question about whether he was still in operational control of al Qaeda. First analysis question is: do you fear retaliation? There's a back and forth on that. Then Gregory asks if we should declare war on Pakistan, based on Bush's response that anyone harboring terrorists is our enemy and wasn't Pakistan harboring terrorists? Gregory REALLY wants us to bomb them. Then he wants to know if torture helped develop the information. It could totally be true, right? Then he asks about the now famous photo. Then he asks an obvious question about how did the story get so confused in the immediate aftermath. Lastly, he wants to know exactly which SEAL pulled the trigger and if the President asked.
How many of those questions actually deal with US foreign policy? The one about Pakistan, where Gregory buys into Bush's frame about states harboring terrorists and desperately wants another war to cover. And the one about torture. Donilon is pretty gracious about the former President. But most of the questions Gregory asks are all about what happened.
So then we introduce Hayden, Chertoff, and Giuliani. First he asks Hayden what he's learning from all this new information. Then he asks Chertoff what it means that bin Laden was in control. Then asks Giuliani what this means for al Qaeda (because he's an expert, obviously). Chertoff jumps in to answer it, according to NBC's transcript. Asks Chertoff if the interpretation that we shouldn't focus our entire national security policy on Al Qaeda is correct or not. Hayden is asked if he's concerned we didn't capture bin Laden alive. Then he asks them about if torture was the key. He does mention reporting that Khalid Sheik Mohammed revealed jack under torture at this point in the conversation, so +1 to Gregory. Then asks "so there is still this debate that doesn't get settled through killing bin Laden." So you know, -several million. Then he asks a bizarre question about "is it noble [to torture]?" Then he turns again to Pakistan, asking them if they were helpful. And then again if they harboring terrorists. Then asks foreign policy expert Rudy Giuliani how big a deal this is in Pakistan? Asks Hayden about Afghanistan withdrawal, is it a good idea to leave earlier? Then: what happens now? Finally asks Giuliani about the President's trip to Ground Zero, and if he's running for President again.
Look at those questions, they're mostly about what this means for American foreign policy going forward. The Democrat got asked what happened, the Republicans were asked to interpret what it means. They're obviously going to see that through their own ideological lens, so there's a lot of "no, we shouldn't be prosecuted for war crimes." going on.
The last part of the show is devoted to the political ramifications of this with: Bob Woodward (sycophant to the powerful), Doris Kearns Goodwin (lame presidential historian), Katty Kay (BBC reporter, based in DC), and Mike Murphy (Republican strategist). Hey look, a Republican, a historian, and two journalists. Surprise! Anyway, this segment isn't particularly pertinent to the question of only Republicans get to talk about foreign policy, but it's mostly domestic politics. Closest thing is a discussion of public opinion on Afghanistan, which they all agree is negative.
The point is that if you actually analyze the show instead of just looking at some word counts or time counts or even purely at the guest list, Maddow (and my!) hypothesis is correct. Republicans (even clueless motherfuckers like Rudy) are asked to analyze foreign policy, the DNSA was asked almost exclusively about what happened and how. The two questions he's asked about what it means buys into the frame that the former President set up on harboring terrorists, and the torture question is... well it sucks, but doesn't explicitly buy into the Cheney frame. It wants the debate to continue, which from my perspective, is just as abhorrent.
I'm willing to bet, though not willing to go through the transcripts, that the other Sunday shows are similar if slightly better because their anchors aren't as fucking stupid as Gregory. Except Fox News Sunday, of course, which I'm sure is far worse.
11 Presidential debate moderations he's done; there almost certainly won't be a 12th. Gigantic shoes to fill and the worst possible place to have to fill them.
Which leads to the question: There are going to be, unless something crazy happens, four moderator seats in the general election (three Presidential and one VP), Lehrer's pretty much always filled one of those seats. Now his seat's open. As of Lehrer's departure, who fills those four seats?
Panels were roughly 50/50, in theory, but of course the journalists were economic illiterates on This Week, so Krugman had to go it alone.
Then I read an article in it about how brave and awesome Paul Ryan was for his budget proposal, but the RSC proposal, now that is what the US needs, the RSC proposal is just a giant sack of awesome, and then I put down the magazine and cried a little bit.
The fact that they were ever taken in by it speaks ill of their reading abilities.
t enlightenedbum don't forget Donna Brazile is normally on the round table and kind of balances out George Will - I assume she's busy with DNC chair stuff these days.
Yeah, it was a bit scary that they were vocally supportive of the bonus joke option budget proposal.
Maybe they did it for the lulz. Next time we have dueling proposals we'll include "boddah" and see if they go for it.
Was it in one of the op-ed type things? Cause some of the people in those are dumb as shit "fiscally conservative" types who'd fit right in inside the beltway.
If it's a bunch of pieces, it might be a sort of "Here's X's and Y's and Z's opinion on this" sort of thing.
One of the things that annoys me about the Economist is they seem to do that alot. Take an issue, have a bunch of their people right their takes on it (often without saying who's writing it) and then just slap it in there.
It's basically on op-ed but not called one. But then, so is most stuff that's analysis.
It gives him praise for "leadership" while noting obvious flaws in the plan.
Edit: Or maybe this one from the same issue.
"Orkses never lose a battle. If we win we win, if we die we die fightin so it don't count. If we runs for it we don't die neither, cos we can come back for annuver go, see!".
During an episode of On Point maybe two months ago, one of the guests was trying to say something (ridiculous, iirc) and Tom Ashbrook kept trying to interject and argue with him during his pauses. The guy kept talking, and finally boiled over and literally shushed the host of the show. I was sitting in my car laughing over what had just happened for like five minutes straight.
It was really good. It had examples and quotes and stuff. It actually explained why conservatives think that wall street is filled with evil godless commies.
I also thought conservatives
In the First Amendment, the Press is given some pretty ironclad protection. In return for that protection, shouldn't they have a duty to actually provide accurate, as-close-to-unbiased-as-is-feasible news, not just chase profits?
The profit motive has always seemed to me to be the thing ruining the American media, devolving it into extremely partisan, biased, factless feel-good-about-our-positionfests.
It's often seemed kind of stupid to me that, as a state-protected business, they have absolutely no responsibility to the state, and run just like any other business.
I'm real big on impinging on journalistic freedoms with laws, but I think a lot of journalists would tell you that the drive for viewers/subscribers is certainly doing so via their bosses.
CSPAN isn't government run, it's run by the non-profit National Cable Satellite Corporation.
Or something like forcing any corporation with a broadcast license to spend x% on a news organization that they can't recoup any profits from.
Which has it's own host of accounting issues, if nothing else, but is basically the only way I can see it working. You've got to create well funded news organizations that no one can make a profit off of.
CSPAN is basically the house charity for the cable industry. It's the national version of a local public access channel.