Feeling Obama’s Pain. After Barack Obama’s former pastor’s radical remarks at the National Press Club, liberal journalists rallied around the Democratic candidate. Hours after Jeremiah Wright spoke on April 28, NBC’s Brian Williams emphasized those who deemed it a "circus" and a "sideshow," as his NBC Nightly News highlighted the Washington Post’s Jonathan Capehart: "Unfortunately, the victim in all of this is going to be Senator Obama’s campaign."
On CNN, David Gergen decried Wright: "If this man cares one wit about electing an African-American to the highest office in the land, he should get off the national stage." Gergen instructed: "It’s time for him to get off the stage, and frankly, for the media, I suggest, to move on." [Audio/video (1:12): Windows Media (4.78 MB) and MP3 audio (357 kB)]
ABC reporter David Wright (no relation) sympathized with the Senator’s plight on the April 30 Good Morning America: "Imagine having to publicly denounce the minister who married you, who baptized your kids, who prayed with you the day you announced your candidacy....For Obama, whose own father abandoned him as a child, this must have been another painful break." [Audio/video (:53): Windows Media (3.39 MB) and MP3 audio (261 kB)]
On CNN’s Anderson Cooper 360 that night, reporter Suzanne Malveaux was just as gentle with Michelle Obama: "Do you think that your husband has been treated fairly? Are you surprised at how nasty this race has gotten?" [Audio/video (:42): Windows Media (1.46 MB) and MP3 audio (207 kB)]
NBC Hypes Economic Misery. The May 2 NBC Nightly News sought to assess "the toll that rising prices of things like gas and food" is taking on senior citizens. Reporter Chris Jansing spotlighted one elderly couple claiming to have gone without food and "forced...to move out of this blue house and into their van, sleeping on a mattress in the back." Jansing cast them as typical: "Tens of millions of seniors rely primarily on a fixed income to live, and increasingly they’re having to make the kinds of tough decisions they never dreamed they’d have to make." But overall food prices are rising at an annual rate of 5.1 percent, which won’t spawn armies of starving, homeless senior citizens — notwithstanding NBC’s silly election-year hype. [Audio/video (:59): Windows Media (2.02 MB) and MP3 audio (293 kB)]
