CNN's 'Balanced' Coverage of Obama's Support for Gay Marriage: 5 Guests In Favor, 1 Opposed
It didn't take long after President Obama voiced his support for same-sex marriage for CNN to gauge the enthusiasm of those in favor of the move. After the news broke at 3 p.m Wednesday, the first three guests CNN interviewed were all openly-gay and supported Obama's decision. It took well over two hours for a guest to appear who opposed the decision.
And in the three hours of coverage following Obama's "historic" announcement, five of CNN's guests expressed their support for his decision. Only one, Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council, opposed it. And the three openly-gay guests were pampered with soft questions, like "What was your first reaction" and "Did you start to cry?"
In contrast, when Perkins appeared on The Situation Room at 5:35 p.m., anchor Wolf Blitzer challenged his position on homosexuality. "What's wrong with giving gay Americans the same rights as heterosexual Americans?" Blitzer demanded of Perkins. He asked Perkins if he thought people were born gay, and lectured him on the topic.
Blitzer was much, much more sympathetic to lesbian Democratic activist Hilary Rosen. "A lot of my gay friends were moved by what the President had to say," he told her. "So when you heard the President utter those few words, did you get rather emotional? Did you start to cry?" he asked. "Because I've been getting a lot of messages from friends out there saying they actually started to cry, they were that moved."
After the initial news broke of Obama's statement at 3 p.m., the first guest to appear – aside from CNN analysts and reporters – was Michael Cole-Schwartz of the pro-gay Human Rights Campaign. Then at 3:37 p.m. openly-gay columnist LZ Granderson came on the air. He compared the situation gay couples have faced to the struggles of the civil rights movement.
Then during The Situation Room, Wolf Blitzer hosted Hilary Rosen and later on a supposedly-balanced panel of Democratic strategist Paul Begala and GOP strategist Alex Castellanos. Only, Castellanos expressed his admiration and support for Obama's decision.
"Well on this particular issue, I actually don't disagree with the President. I'm on the President's side on this one, and have been for quite a long time," he revealed. "I have to say I admire him [Obama] for standing up for something that he believes in today," he declared.
Blitzer declared it "a historic day. A lot of us will remember what the President of the United States did on this day." Democratic strategist Paul Begala followed by pointing to the camera and saying "Thank you, Mr. President."
- Matt Hadro's blog
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Comments
"A lot of my gay friends were
Submitted by redfish on Wed, 05/09/2012 - 8:05pm.
"A lot of my gay friends were moved by what the President had to say." -- Blitzer
Not all of his gay friends? How many gay friends does he have? Is he talking about Facebook friends?
I felt a movement, too.
Submitted by UpNorth on Wed, 05/09/2012 - 9:12pm.
This was Baracka covering up a colossal screw-up over the underoo bomber. Someone at the WH or in his campaign decided to talk, "off the record", about an ongoing intelligence op, to cover up the blow-back they were getting over the "I killed Osama" ad. They've exposed other intelligence agencies who co-operated with the CIA. Which will, in the end, cause other intelligence services to stop co-operating. But, hey, he got good press from the captive media, who cares about intelligence ops?
So, short of having Ayman Al-Zawahiri in the bag, all that Baracka was left with was his "support" of gay marriage. Unfortunately, he can't do much, other than talk about it.
If gay marriage is as popular
Submitted by okie-pastor on Thu, 05/10/2012 - 12:02pm.
If gay marriage is as popular as the main stream media claims, then why does it keep getting voted against any time it's on the ballot?
FYI: Homosexual advocates usually cite 3 studies to "prove" homosexuality is genetic and not a choice.
Levay's study on hypothalamus
Hammers x chromosome research
Baily and Pillard Study of identical twins who were Homosexual
In all three cases the researchers had a vested interest in a certain outcome because they themselves were homosexuals and their "research" did not hold up to scientific scrutiny anyway.
Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council
Submitted by Jerry Frey on Thu, 05/10/2012 - 1:22am.
Families are comprised of generations: grandma and grandpa, mom and dad, the kids --- not ONE generation!!!
No big deal. Fox News doesn't need 5 guests supporting
Submitted by Rush Fan on Thu, 05/10/2012 - 1:56am.
gay marriage, when they have the big cheese fair and balanced newsman: the one and only Shepard Smith.
Obama is out of the closet in favor of Gay Marriage,
Submitted by Delsa on Thu, 05/10/2012 - 1:55am.
because as my sister puts it, the gay lobby was going to out him if he didn't in addition to pulling their funding.
He had no choice but to evolve sooner rather than later. First he was in favor, then he was evolving, then he was threatened, and now he is fully in favor.
I confess, R F...I haven't been watching Fox much of late, and
Submitted by Jer on Thu, 05/10/2012 - 1:58am.
Shep not at all. Has he been looking that gaunt for very long?
Jer
GOP Attack Strategy
Submitted by Fenwick on Thu, 05/10/2012 - 7:57am.
Let me start this post by noting, once again, that I am gay. I also believe that marriage is between a man and a woman. For tax purposes, inheritance and other legal issues, I think that gay couples should be able to establish domestic partnerships. (Most importantly, I’m a strong proponent of a pure flat tax and the abolishment of confiscatory “death taxes” on wealth that has already been taxed because its main goal is redistribution.) Lastly, I believe that this legal issue falls under the jurisdiction of the states, not the federal government.
Now that I’ve established that, here’s how Romney and the RNC need to approach this issue:
1) Point out that our ever-evolving President has come to pretty much the same conclusion as Sarah Palin, in that he believes this is a state issue.
2) PRESS Obama to discuss how he sees the role of the federal government on this issue. Should gay couples be allowed to file jointly to save on their federal taxes? When a gay person dies, should their partner be able to collect their social security benefits? Should that same surviving “spouse” be able to inherit a sizable estate without having to pay the death tax? If he answers yes to any of these questions, how does he plan to offset the substantial cumulative “cost” of this to federal revenues?
3) Stand back and watch him squirm!
P.S. I also honestly think the Obama campaign is going to dump Biden at an opportune time (he'll leave for "health reasons" and be hailed by the MSM from every direction as he exits) and bring in Cuomo from New York to inject some excitement.