Networks Cite Imaginary “Cuts” as Federal Budget Continues to Soar
February 7th, 2006 12:03 AM
Federal spending has soared 33 percent since 2001 and will continue to surge under President Bush’s budget proposal released Monday afternoon, yet network reporters referred to imaginary “cuts” in programs and departments. On World News Tonight, ABC’s Martha Raddatz outlined Bush’s proposal to increase defense and homeland security spending before she asked: “How to pay for all this? There are…
CBS Skips How Public Sees Media as “Harder” on Bush, Democrats
February 4th, 2006 7:35 PM
Introducing a Friday CBS Evening News story on the state of the media, part of a week-long “The State of...” series prompted by the annual State of the Union address, anchor Bob Schieffer pointed to how a CBS News/New York Times poll found that “most Americans have at least some confidence in the media, and more than two out of three [69 percent] believe the stories the media report are accurate…
ABC and CBS Ignore Plunge in Unemployment Rate to Lowest Since Before
February 4th, 2006 12:36 AM
The Bureau of Labor Statistics announced Friday that the unemployment rate for January fell by 0.2 percent from December, down to 4.7 percent, the lowest level since July of 2001. But viewers of ABC’s World News Tonight and CBS Evening News on Friday night heard nothing about it, though ABC had time for another full story on the “cartoon outrage” by Muslims and a full piece on an Institute for…
CBS’s Reminder: “Don't Forget that Other Washington Scandal, CIA L
January 31st, 2006 12:01 AM
CBS decided that the night before President Bush’s State of the Union address would be a good time to launch its “State of the...” series with a look at the "State of the Scandals," a judgment which allowed the CBS Evening News to revive the Plame case. Gloria Borger insisted that “on the eve of the President's State of the Union speech, official Washington is distracted, not by policy debates…
Schieffer Asks Bush If U.S. “Losing Moral High Ground?”& Touts
January 27th, 2006 7:56 PM
Bob Schieffer mostly posed unobjectionable questions on the news of the day (Hamas, Iran, etc.) to President George W. Bush in an interview conducted Friday and then excerpted on the CBS Evening News. But he did pose three inquiries from the agenda of the left which caught my attention. Schieffer wanted to know, in reference to NSA eavesdropping, if Bush thinks “there is anything that a…
CBS Evening News, But Not Web Site, Picks Up on Majority Backing of Ea
January 27th, 2006 12:05 AM
Despite the decision by the editors of CBSNews.com not to highlight the finding in a new CBS News/New York Times poll, of how 61 percent believe President Bush authorized wiretaps in order to “fight terrorism,” with just 29 percent saying he did it just to “expand the powers of the presidency,” on Thursday's CBS Evening News John Roberts alerted viewers to the finding. Roberts relayed: “On the…
Media Make Their Priorities Crystal Clear – Bring Back Hurricane Kat
January 25th, 2006 2:28 PM
There’s an old rule in marketing – stick to what sells. Lately, it appears that America’s media are doing exactly that.Since the significant rebound in the president’s poll numbers from their October lows, along with an apparent lack of outrage by the public concerning the Jack Abramoff lobbying scandal and revelations of domestic eavesdropping by the National Security Agency, the media seem to…
For Third Time in Under Two Weeks CBS Warns Alito Will Move SCOTUS
January 24th, 2006 8:14 PM
For the third time in fewer than two weeks, the CBS Evening News on Tuesday night made sure that viewers realize how the confirmation of Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito would move the court “to the right.” (Neither ABC or NBC have shown such concern for alerting viewers as to the ideological direction of the Supreme Court.) Anchor Bob Schieffer recalled how “the President promised during the…
CBS and NBC Spike Independent Counsel's Report on Clintonite Obstructi
January 20th, 2006 12:03 AM
In his report released Thursday on Henry Cisneros, Clinton's HUD Secretary for several years who had pled guilty in 1999 to some charges, Independent Counsel David Barrett asserted that his probe was hindered by Clinton administration officials, even after they left office. But the CBS Evening News and NBC Nightly News, which had time for some hardly hot news stories, such as a popular…
Nets Label Assisted-Suicide Opponents But Avoid Tagging Far-Left Group
January 18th, 2006 12:50 AM
The broadcast network evening newscasts on Tuesday night refrained from applying any ideological tag to the far-left group of lawyers, who represent terror suspects at Guantanamo and elsewhere, which filed a lawsuit against the NSA's program to eavesdrop on communications between terrorists abroad and people inside the U.S., but none hesitated to place a conservative label on those opposed to…
CBS’s 60 Minutes to Extol John Murtha in Piece by Iraq War Opponent
January 13th, 2006 8:03 PM
The media’s idolizing of Democratic Congressman John Murtha, who in November advocated withdrawing from Iraq, will continue on Sunday’s 60 Minutes, which will feature a segment on him and his supposedly prescient forecast that most troops will soon leave Iraq, by Mike Wallace, a journalist who has already made clear that he shares Murtha’s view of the war. In late November on FNC, Wallace…
