MRC/NB's Bozell on Hannity & Colmes Re Blogger Advocating Killing Rush; Couric's Slap

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Brent Bozell, President of the Media Research Center which publishes NewsBusters, appeared Monday night on the Fox News Channel's Hannity & Colmes. Topics: The liberal blogger who wants Rush Limbaugh and Ted Nugent killed, a posting reported by WorldNetDaily; and the New York magazine profile of CBS Evening News anchor Katie Couric which reported that, frustrated with her low ratings, she had “slapped” a colleague: “Couric got angry with news editor Jerry Cipriano for using a word she detested -- 'sputum' -- and the staff grew tense when she began slapping him 'over and over and over again' on the arm...” On the blogger, Bozell pointed out how the media and liberals pounced on Ann Coulter, distorting her comment about John Edwards into how she advocated assassinating him when she said no such thing. NB's Coulter items. MRC CyberAlert on NBC's distortion. MRC's June 28 press release.

Video clip (5:25): Real (4.1 MB) or Windows Media (3.4 MB), plus MP3 audio (1.9 MB).

In a profile of Couric in the July 16 edition of New York magazine, Joe Hagan relayed:

....Couric seems determined not to let anyone see her suffer, but according to several people familiar with the situation, she is privately frustrated ("Going through hell," says one producer) and moody about the ratings. The stress has caused her to blow up at her staff for small infractions on the set. During the tuberculosis story in June, Couric got angry with news editor Jerry Cipriano for using a word she detested -- "sputum" -- and the staff grew tense when she began slapping him "over and over and over again" on the arm, according to a source familiar with the scene. It had seemed like a joke at first, but it quickly became clear that she wasn't kidding.

"I sort of slapped him around," Couric admits. "I got mad at him and said, 'You can't do this to me. You have to tell me when you're going to use a word like that.' I was aggravated, there's no question about that." But she says she has a good relationship with Cipriano. "We did ban the word sputum from all future broadcasts. It became kind of a joke."...