Couric Pouts Over Gates Distraction: 'Just as He Was Pushing So Hard f

July 24th, 2009 9:16 PM
ABC, CBS and NBC all led Friday night with President Obama’s decision to appear in the White House press room to backtrack on the fury he inflamed by presuming “stupidity” by the police in the Professor Henry Gates alleged “racial profiling” incident, but only Katie Couric trumpeted Obama’s appearance in the White House briefing room -- which the CBS Evening News ran for an uninterrupted four…

CBS Adds Fuel to the Racism Fire Stoked By Gates Arrest

July 24th, 2009 10:55 AM
Now that President Obama has weighed in on the arrest of Harvard Professor Henry Louis Gates, it seems a metaphysical certitude news media will milk this story for all it's worth.On Thursday, the CBS "Evening News" did exactly that by first opening its program with the President's statement made during Wednesday's press conference, and then following it with a segment on how this incident "…

Nets Fail to ID Party of Pols Arrested in NJ; CNN Misleads Its Viewers

July 23rd, 2009 11:13 PM
Continuing a well-established pattern, the broadcast network evening newscasts all failed to point out the party affiliation of the major New Jersey office-holders amongst the 44 people the FBI arrested Thursday for corruption. As the AP pointed out, all but one are Democrats:  “Among the 44 people arrested were the mayors of Hoboken, Ridgefield and Secaucus, Jersey City's deputy mayor, and two…

BMI Special Report: UnCritical Condition Finds Proponents of ObamaCare

July 22nd, 2009 4:46 PM

CBS Early Show Uses Obama Volunteer to Promote Health Care Reform

July 22nd, 2009 4:31 PM
While reporting on President Obama’s efforts to pass health care reform legislation on Wednesday’s CBS Early Show, co-host Maggie Rodriguez cited one person who would benefit from the plan: "Debby Smith from Virginia...lost her job back in 2006, and lost her health care benefits, and says that she can't afford the $700 a month that it would cost take to pay for her own insurance."What Rodriguez…

In CBS Interview Obama Claims Unemployment ‘Exceeded Everybody's Exp

July 22nd, 2009 3:36 PM
During an interview with CBS Evening News anchor Katie Couric on Tuesday, President Obama defended the administration’s handling of the economy: "nobody...anticipated that in the first three months, we would lose 700,000 jobs per month...the severity and the depth of the recession was something that, you know, really exceeded everybody's expectations."However, on the February 6 Evening News,…

CBS’s Couric Sympathizes With Obama: ‘Is Your Confidence Ever Shak

July 22nd, 2009 1:15 PM
In her Tuesday interview with President Obama, CBS Evening News anchor Katie Couric wondered: "You're so confident, Mr. President, and so focused. Is your confidence ever shaken? Do you ever wake up and say, ‘Damn, this is hard. Damn, I'm not going to get the things done I want to get done and it’s just too politicized to really get accomplished the big things I want to accomplish’?" [audio…

Night After Slamming DeMint as 'Incendiary,' Couric Makes Same Point t

July 21st, 2009 8:47 PM
A night after CBS slammed as “incendiary” Senator Jim DeMint's observation that if Republicans are able to block Obama's health care push, “it will be his Waterloo, it will break him,” CBS anchor Katie Couric adopted the same assumption as she expressed worry to the President: “Are you concerned at all that if health care reform fails it will be a huge and devastating setback to your presidency…

O'Reilly: Cronkite 'Had No Use for' Dan Rather, Said He 'Shouldn't Suc

July 21st, 2009 7:05 AM
On Monday’s The O’Reilly Factor, FNC host Bill O’Reilly asserted that former CBS Evening News anchor Walter Cronkite "had no use for" his successor, and was "bitter about being replaced by [Dan] Rather." Citing an interview from a few years after Rather raplaced Cronkite on the Evening News, O’Reilly recounted that Cronkite expressed his view that Rather "shouldn’t succeed." O’Reilly: "He didn't…

CBS Discredits Steele and DeMint on ObamaCare as 'Harsh' and 'Incendia

July 20th, 2009 8:49 PM
For the second weekday in a row, Katie Couric teased the CBS Evening News on Monday night by delivering President Obama's aggressive retorts to critics of his health plan as reporter Chip Reid pitched in to help, discrediting critics by disparaging their perspectives as “harsh” and “incendiary” attacks -- all before Couric caught up with ABC and NBC from the night before and promoted Ted Kennedy'…

Couric: Like Cronkite, I Get 'Grief From Both Sides Of Aisle

July 20th, 2009 7:59 AM
Katie Couric provided some comic relief on this morning's Early Show, preaching the importance of objectivity in reporting.  As evidence of her impartiality, the CBS Evening News anchor cited the fact that, as did Cronkite, she has gotten "grief from both sides of the aisle."Now I suppose some of the more radical elements of the Red Army Faction might have found something to quibble with in…

Text of Revealing Video Coverage from AP on Cronkite's Death

July 18th, 2009 6:21 PM

CBS Spins Setback for Obama on Health Into 'Warning from the President

July 18th, 2009 3:06 PM
A night after CBS and NBC skipped the assessment from the chief of the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) that the Senate and House health plans won't meet President Obama's pledge to not increase deficit spending, the two networks caught up only when Obama, reacting to “anxiety” even from Democrats, addressed the setback to his quest late Friday. CBS anchor Katie Couric spun the bad news for…

Cronkite's First 'CBS Evening News' Broadcast

July 18th, 2009 12:45 PM
In 1992, CBS "Up to the Minute" put together some clips of Walter Cronkite's first "CBS Evening News" broadcast on September 2, 1963 (h/t NBer Gary Hall, and don't miss hilarious Johnny Carson sketch about Cronkite in comments section):