Lowery's Clueless-White Prayer: CBS Skips It, ABC, NBC, PBS Feature It
January 22nd, 2009 6:33 PM
Liberal pastor and civil rights leader Joseph Lowery’s strange benediction prayer hoping that one day "white will embrace what is right" wasn’t ignored on the Tuesday night news, but it wasn’t portrayed as at all controversial. CBS skipped over it. But ABC, NBC, and PBS’s NewsHour all featured it, often without interrupting their gauzy promotional tone. Here’s a brief tour of how it unfolded.ABC…
ABC Features Kids Around the World: Obama Means 'Peace' and 'Yes, We C
January 22nd, 2009 10:09 AM
ABC's World News on Wednesday night used limited news time to feature a silly piece with soundbites from naive kids around the world sputtering beauty pageant-like simplicities about how President Barack Obama will bring “world peace” and inspires them to say “yes, we can!” Reporter Jim Sciutto touted how “we heard children around the world expressing hope and fascination with the new American…
ABC: 'National Pride' Made Cold Feel Warmer as Seagulls 'Awed
January 20th, 2009 9:25 PM
Offering the most hyperbolic take of the night on the crowds who attended President Obama's inauguration, on World News ABC's Bill Weir delighted in wondering “can national pride make a freezing day feel warmer?” He decided it can indeed since “never have so many people shivered so long with such joy” while “from above, even the seagulls must have been awed by the blanket of humanity.” Weir was…
ABC: Is CNN’s Gupta Qualified for Surgeon General
January 11th, 2009 1:03 AM
On World News Saturday, during the show’s "A Closer Look" segment, ABC anchor David Muir gave attention to those who question whether CNN’s Dr. Sanjay Gupta has sufficient qualifications to be Barack Obama’s surgeon general. Muir even played a clip of David Letterman poking fun at Gupta twice during the show: "The choice, it was between a Gupta, Dr. Phil, and a guy on Scrubbs. I don’t know what…
ABCNews.com Overlays Bush Picture Into One of Gaza Wreckage
January 9th, 2009 1:46 PM
Correction (Feb. 10, 2009): Corrected from original reporting attributing AP and Getty with the photo editing. In fact it was ABCNews.com, not AP or Getty Images that overlaid the Bush photo on the Gaza rubble photo. AP and Getty Images supplied the respective photos. Thanks to the folks at StinkyJournalism.org for pointing out the error. I guess, since flat-out fauxtography as practiced in 2006…
NBC Commiserates with 'Hard Realities' Obama 'Up Against
January 7th, 2009 9:23 PM
Prompted by the CBO's forecast of a $1.2 trillion annual federal budget deficit, the NBC Nightly News on Wednesday commiserated with the challenge ahead for the incoming President. “On our broadcast tonight, facing facts,” Brian Williams teased, “President-elect Obama confronts the hard realities he's up against, deficits as far as the eye can see.” A dire Williams proceeded to lead with how…
Press Plays 'Obama Distraction' Card Once Again, This Time Over MN and
January 6th, 2009 9:07 AM
Why can't everyone just settle down, get out of the way, get rid of the "distractions," and let Barack Obama do his magic? That seems to be a recurring media meme during this presidential transition period.Here are just a few examples in just the past 30 days: In a December 12 "analysis" piece at Reuters, Steve Holland opened by telling readers that "A political scandal that led to the arrest of…
ABC Frets Over Richardson as 'Distraction' from Obama's Agenda
January 4th, 2009 9:44 PM
ABC anchor Dan Harris led Sunday night's World News with Commerce-nominee Bill Richardson's unexpected withdrawal, but framed the story around worries over Richardson becoming a “distraction” from Barack Obama's agenda. George Stephanopoulos, however, assured him it will only “be a blip.” Harris recited how “Obama is facing trouble abroad, trouble at home, and now trouble in his own cabinet.” So…
ABC Shows Letter Snidely Cracking Bush & Cheney May Steal WH Furniture
December 26th, 2008 12:58 PM
On Monday’s World News, ABC showed a letter written to Barack Obama that made a snide crack charging that President Bush and Vice President Cheney had left Obama a "hell of a mess to clean up," and sarcastically expressing hope that Bush and Cheney would not steal furniture from the White House, as correspondent Kate Snow filed a report about a former school teacher, B.J. Hill, who has spent a…
ABC’s Ultimate Financial Hardship Story: Selling Your Body for Medic
December 19th, 2008 10:56 AM
Just how bad is the economy? ABC's "World News with Charles Gibson" went all the way to Edwardsburg, Mich. to find out. The Dec. 18 broadcast of "World News" highlighted a new economic indicator - the increase in the number of people willing to lend their body to science for money. "We're going to turn next to some of the extreme measures that some Americans are taking because of the…
Stephanopoulos on Cabinet: 'Diversity and Competence without Any Token
December 17th, 2008 10:39 PM
ABC's George Stephanopoulos on Wednesday night hailed President-elect Barack Obama's cabinet, pointing to how his national security team is made up of “coalition builders,” including Hillary Clinton, before praising Obama for how “he has also kept his promise of reaching out beyond Washington for change with younger reformers like Shaun Donovan at HUD, Arne Duncan at Education and Lisa Jackson at…
