Fair Moderator for PBS? Tavis Smiley Called Bush a 'Serial Killer'

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By Tim Graham (Bio | Archive)
September 27, 2007 - 13:35 ET
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Many conservatives who feel passionately about reaching out to black voters are infuriated that the Republican front-runners have not consented to a PBS debate hosted by PBS and public-radio talk show host Tavis Smiley. Newt Gingrich assured ABC viewers the other morning that "Tavis Smiley is a very responsible, very clear-cut commentator and analyst. He's going to run a very fair debate." But have these critical voices ever really looked at Smiley’s actual record when it comes to Republicans?

Start with October 24, 2000. Smiley told Geraldo Rivera on CNBC that George W. Bush was a serial killer. "There are, there are some issues on which if you are a voter of color, certainly if you are an African-American, you have a hard time choosing. For example, both of these guys support the death penalty. As far as I’m concerned, Bush in Texas is nothing more than a serial killer." Does Gingrich think that's "responsible" commentary?

On Inauguration Day 2005, ABC's Peter Jennings invited Smiley to comment over video of leftist protesters (and certainly Bush fans, too) being restrained by fencing. Smiley took a whack at Bush's speech about freedom, accusing Bush of being a hypocrite for allowing security fences:

"These pictures are disturbing to me, Peter. This is exactly what I suggested earlier when I tried to make the point that it’s not what you say, it is what you do. And it’s one thing, just an hour or two ago to have a President talking about spreading democracy and freedom around the world, much less at a place called Freedom Plaza, named after one Martin Luther King Jr. And these pictures indicate very clearly that these people are having a very difficult time expressing themselves....I think people around the world, certainly around the country right now, are having a very difficult time juxtaposing the pictures that we’re seeing with the words we heard from the President earlier today, and this is that hypocrisy that [Newsweek’s] Fareed Zakaria spoke of earlier, that other people around the globe look at America and just can’t quite understand."

Jennings respectfully replied to Smiley's assertion: "Point noted."

Back on May 3 on his PBS show, Tavis Smiley pushed around Washington Post columnist David Ignatius demanding he share the leftist outrage over/ Bush’s war in Iraq: Far be it for me to argue with you, but let me just take the devil's advocate position on this, just to press you a little bit more on this. Why shouldn't we be outraged? Why shouldn't we be angry with George Bush? Why shouldn't this be the issue around which we will throw down a gauntlet and be angry? We're losing lives every day, why not this, if any issue, to be just outraged about?"

Smiley demonstrated he wasn’t really just posing the question without believing it. When Ignatius talked about our mistakes in Iraq, Smiley wouldn’t be part of a "we": "But we didn't make those mistakes. George Bush and his administration made those mistakes. So, how do you hold a guy accountable when you send him legislation, he vetoes it, sends it back, and says, 'I dare you to override it?’"

On April 23, he interviewed Bill Moyers about his completely one-sided jeremiad "Buying the War." While he asked Moyers if the show was fair and balanced, Smiley concluded by showing his own bias: "Finally, is it just me or is this administration the most secretive of all time? You've worked in the White House. I wonder to what extent, again, their modus operandi -- which is secrecy at all costs -- has anything to do with the story that you're going to unveil for us on Wednesday night?"

Smiley, on the other hand, very explicitly advertises his support for Bill Clinton and other Democrats. On Monday, Arkansas Blog reported Smiley interviewed Bill Clinton at the Clinton Center in Little Rock on the fiftieth anniversary of desegregation at Central High School. Smiley offered Clinton a platform to bash the racist Republicans:

Smiley welcomed Bill Clinton to the third recording session, in which Clinton gave a brief history lesson in the evolution of the Republican Party from the party of Lincoln to the conservative bastion it is today, which has built its recent successes on the white Southern vote. "The sea change came," Clinton said, "when Reagan declared [for office] in Philadelphia, Miss., talking about states rights." Philadelphia was where three civil rights workers had been murdered. "And the mainstream press thought it was all right." 

Early this month, Smiley hosted a book party for Bill Clinton's new book Giving in Harlem. "He is pushing America to engage in a dialogue to make this a better world," said Smiley, by way of introduction.

Even the leftist site Salon.com knows the Smiley score. Years of commentary on Tom Joyner's incredibly influential black radio show and as host and executive producer of "BET Tonight," a public affairs show that ran from 1996 to 2001, has made Smiley the Negro Larry King (and a multimillionaire). Safe in the knowledge they'd be pelted with loving softballs, everybody who was anybody in black America did his show, including then President Bill Clinton and candidate Gore.

Is this the kind of PBS personality who is an ideal representative of PBS's objectivity and balance?

—Tim Graham is Director of Media Analysis at the Media Research Center.


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Living in LA for most of my

September 27, 2007 - 13:58 ET by fitzfong

Living in LA for most of my life, I am well aware of Tavis Smiley.  He is simply a race-baiting, OJ apologist...nothing more.  The only reason he wasn't totally discredited during and after the OJ murder trial was that he sounded a little more reasonable than Leo Tyrell.  The suggestion that Smiley presents a legitimate forum for Presidential debate is a joke.

Absolutely Agree

September 27, 2007 - 14:37 ET by stratman

I watched Smiley on BET back in the day and will listen to him from time to time on NPR and am amazed he is now regarded as having little bias.  Smiley has learned to subdue his ethnocentric anger and ghetto hipster mannerisms in order to obtain plum positions in the media.  One can still see flashes of the old/original Smiley on occasion when he slips into a "hood" personification when interviewing some celebrities and the atmosphere is loose and easy.

I don't think Smiley is acting, like how some Northerners begin to affect a southern drawl while in the South.  I believe Smiley is displaying his innate character.  The wolf now dons sheep's clothing.  Instead of massacres, Smiley now weilds a surgical blade for more precision biased hits all encouraged and applauded by his friends in the DNC and Lib-ville.

I do think, though, that Smiley can hold his powder for the most part as moderator of a Republican debate.  I don't see him asking something like "The Bush adminidtration lied to the American people to trick us into a war to enrich his cronies in the defense and oil industries and you supported this lie.  Why?"  Yes, he will ask some difficult and potentially uneasy questions, but isn't that what should occur at a debate?  What we should continue to call out for are real debates with real questions and not allowing candidates to wiggle out of answering without challenge.  If they can't handle Smiley then how can we expect them to handle Ahmadinejad or Putin.  Let's see how the candidates think on their feet instead of by rote script.

The flipside to this is to wait and find a more "conducive" moderator.  Maybe that is the right move in the primaries, but when the real battle between Party candidates beginspost-primaries, both sides better be ready to run with the "big dogs" from either side as moderator.

Killing them with kindness isn't working.  Time to get scrappy with the Donkeys.

"The Bush adminidtration

September 27, 2007 - 16:35 ET by fitzfong

"The Bush adminidtration lied to the American people to trick us into a war to enrich his cronies in the defense and oil industries and you supported this lie.  Why?"  Yes, he will ask some difficult and potentially uneasy questions, but isn't that what should occur at a debate?  What we should continue to call out for are real debates with real questions and not allowing candidates to wiggle out of answering without challenge.  If they can't handle Smiley then how can we expect them to handle Ahmadinejad or Putin.  Let's see how the candidates think on their feet instead of by rote script.

Let's face it, stratman, Smiley is too self-focused to ask any kind of question related to the war...unless, of course, he can use it as a cheap backdrop to why Republicans allegedly "don't care about Black people".  With Smiley, everything would be presented in the context of Katrina... how the war supposedly denied necessary resources to victims of Katrina...and how all that shows how Republicans hate black people.  It's all BS!  What's to be gained by indulging PBS and Tavis Smiley on this one?  Contrary to your assertion, Tavis Smiley is not going to ask "some difficult and potentially uneasy questions", he's going to ask partisan, dishonest questions meant to ellicit the outcome Smiley and his PBS employers are looking for.  Smiley is looking to get the same outcome either way...if they show up, Republicans hate black people, if they don't show up, Republicans hate black people.  That's the template Tavis Smiley is working from.  They don't deserve the opportunity to distort the truth for political purposes on our dime. 

"The Bush adminidtration

September 27, 2007 - 16:39 ET by TruthMonger

"The Bush adminidtration lied to the American people to trick us into a war to enrich his cronies in the defense and oil industries and you supported this lie."

And that's bad because...........?

You're not asking me, are

September 27, 2007 - 16:52 ET by fitzfong

You're not asking me, are you?

That was my interpretation

September 27, 2007 - 18:31 ET by stratman

That was my interpretation of what a Leftist question would be to Republican debate candidates.  The "question" would be more expositions and finger-wagging than actual question.

Please do not confuse those words as my beliefs.

If your question is in relation to going to war to protect crude oil supplies for the USA and continued economic and democratic stability in the world, then I would say mankind has gone to war for much less reason(s).

Killing them with kindness isn't working.  Time to get scrappy with the Donkeys.

I do not disagree with you

September 27, 2007 - 18:33 ET by stratman

I do not disagree with you fitzfong.

Killing them with kindness isn't working.  Time to get scrappy with the Donkeys.

Tim, you make very good points, IMO, but...

September 27, 2007 - 14:43 ET by sarcasmo

I STILL think the RINOs should have come and -- since you're providing the free-ammo -- held his feet to the fire on his statements. I don't think avoiding the forum was the answer, since as you say even many conservatives consider Mr. Smiley fair, regardless of the facts.

As for "Is this the kind of PBS personality who is an ideal representative of PBS's objectivity and balance?" my answer is of course, my standard old, sad & weary "yes, and that's why we need to get rid of all federal funding for it."
JMR

Rally online with fans of Dr. Ron Paul.

Did Tavis Smiley call Carter or Clinton a serial Killer?

September 27, 2007 - 15:34 ET by Gary Hall

Did Tavis Smiley call Carter or Clinton a serial Killer? Or Ann Richards (Late TX Democrat Governor).

On the way of suggesting that:

1. Most, if not all of the criminals executed while George Bush was governor of TX, would have been sentenced for their crimes long before he became governor. (seems to be common sense, and I don't have all day - perhaps someone can help).

2. More criminals were executed under Bush's tenure, simply because following the commutation of death sentences of all on death row in 1972, and the subsequent reinstatement of capital punishment in 1976 (?), it took a while for the numbers to build up again. Bush was simply carrying out the law.

A few points:

- All recent presidents have supported the death penalty while in office - this includes Jimmy Carter (who signed it in 1976 in Georgia) and Bill Clinton. Did Tavis Smiley ever single them out and call them serial killers?

- For the record, many people hold Bill Clinton at least partially accountable for the deaths of hundreds of thousands in Rwanda and millions in next door DR Congo - becuase of his complacency. Many, on the left most notably hold Bill Clinton at least partially responsible for ignoring the developing HIV/Aids pandemic in Africa and Indonesia - resulting in millions of deaths. He did next to nothing as President to lead in the intervention. Tavis - any comment? See: Too little, too late - How many times is Bill Clinton going to apologize to Africa?  if there is any doubt as to how even the far left (David Corn of The Nation) felt about such issues - then. Tavis, next time you have Bill or Hillary on - come on, be a chump, ask them an actual question, or two.

- Ann Richards - former Democrat gov of TX has quite a track record as well. Did Tavis Smiley single her out as a serial Killer?

- That the number of executions in Texas continued to increase from Richards to Bush, was a simple by-product of the sentencing beginning again starting in 1977, and the backlog piling up.

- on June 29, 1972, the Supreme Court effectively voided 40 death penalty statutes, thereby commuting the sentences of 629 death row inmates around the country and suspending the death penalty because existing statutes were no longer valid.

- In looking at the first 10 executions carried out in 2000, in Texas, it looks like the average sentencing date was about 1989. It takes years from the sentencing date for the executions to be carried out.

- It would be safe to assume that not a single person executed under Gov. Bush's tenure was sentenced during his term.

-Additionally: 1992-1999: Pace of Executions Increases "In 1992, the number of executions jumped dramatically. Over the next four years, 62 prisoners were executed, an average of fifteen per year.

In 1995, the Texas legislature passed a law requiring certain death-row appeals to be filed concurrently. The intent of this law was to reduce the amount of time prisoners spent on death row waiting for their legal appeals to be pursued. The short-term effect of this new law was that executions virtually stopped while it was being appealed. From March 1996 to January 1997, there was only one execution in the state. However, after the law withstood legal challenge, executions resumed at double their old pace. Over the next three years, there were 92 executions."

- HRW said that 500,000 children died in Iraq because of the sanctions. Sanctions that Bill Clinton deeply supported. The Clinton administration said the sanctions were worth the costs. Fewer children are dying now, Tavis? 

- In fact, since Bush has become president, deaths from wars, civil conflicts and genocide are way down, compared to the last term of the Clinton administration.

Tavis. Where's the joy?

Gee Gary,

September 27, 2007 - 18:46 ET by Blonde

As usual, you trip these liberals up with facts. 

David Gregory, do you know which damn network you lie for? ~ Uncle Jimbo, @Blackfive

 

Blonde

September 27, 2007 - 19:35 ET by Gary Hall

Blonde -- there you are. (;`~>

There are no facts for libs - best I can tell. gary

Execution, a game I can play...

September 27, 2007 - 21:23 ET by Unsane

Indeed, if Bush is a serial killer for using the death penalty, then so is Bill Clements (R, 1979-1983/1987-1991) and Mark White (D, 1983-1987).  (You already mentioned Ann Richards.)  Executions re-started in TX in December 1982 and in 1988 it passed FL as #1 in the number of executions. 

If anything, I am bent that TX didn't go back to The Chair.    

"Flash before my eyes!  Now it's time to die! 

Burning in my brain, I can feel the flame..." - Metallica, "Ride The Lightning"

 

An obseravtion

September 27, 2007 - 15:58 ET by Galvanic

As an infrequent viewer of The Tavis Smiley Show on PBS, I have noticed that whenever he has a Leftist author or Democratic politician or Hollywood activist on the show, he fawns all over them.  And likewise, they respond in kind.  Most of the 'facts' he throws out to the audience are just plain wrong.

Since the Dems stiffed Fox News weeks ago, I see no problem with the Reps stiffing Smiley.  In the end, it won't change one single vote either way..

Are Republican candidates conceding the election?

September 27, 2007 - 16:30 ET by Alfred J. Lemire

Are the Republican candidates conceding the 2008 election? Are they trying to make things difficult for other Republican candidates for office? Their refusal to be questioned by Tavis Smiley tells me that they've thrown in the towel already. Their cry before the first round starts: No mas! 

 This voter supports most of the policies of George W. Bush. But the President's rhetorical deficiencies have hurt his policies and have hurt Republicans. He has also proved a poor judge of people and a weak manager: Donald Rumsfeld gave cause for his sacking in 2003. A successful Republican candidate for President will have to demonstrate an ability to make a good case for policies and the ability to manage people and programs effectively.

One can demonstrate rhetorical skill when taking on Tavis. Tavis Smiley has much energy, as an infrequent listener has noticed, but not much sense. Someone rhetorically strong and deft--how different from G. W. Bush--ought to be able to parry Mr. Smiley's clumsy verbal lunges. So he's a lousy representative of PBS? Fine. Make PBS look bad by refuting likely ignorant and faulty assumptions and notions buried inside Gumbelisms--loaded statements of opinion made to resemble questions. 

tavis offers nothing

September 27, 2007 - 22:19 ET by jondelwiche

The simple fact is Tavis and his crowd have little influence on Republican politics.   They have chosen to vote in 92% blocs for the other party, despite the recent decades of urban decay that has devastated their once proud families.   Inner city areas offer little more safety than the worst places in Iraq--the media whines about civilian deaths there while ignoring the US's 16K annual civilian murders.

Tavis's fans need to embrace the right's principles: stay in school, then a job, then  marriage and then kids.

It is a simple life mission that knows no racial lines.   The votes will follow, and then the candidates seeking them will show at these types of events.

It ain't rocket science:  go where potential votes are.    Tavis has nothing to offer the no-shows, just like a KKK leader wont entice  Barack or Keyes to come to their forums looking for votes. Candidates are too busy to go where they aren't appreciated.     End of story.