Something absolutely marvelous happened on MSNBC Thursday that could have only been a better Christmas gift to those fighting liberal media bias if the host at the time had been a more prominent person on that so-called “news network.”
When MSNBC Live substitute host Kristen Welker scolded the Guardian’s Glenn Greenwald for appearing to always be defending NSA leaker Edward Snowden, Greenwald marvelously shot back, “I do defend him just like people on MSNBC defend President Obama and his officials and Democratic Party leaders 24 hours a day” (video follows with transcript and commentary):
KRISTEN WELKER, SUBSTITUTE HOST: Well Glenn, some people have looked at journalists who Snowden has chosen to give information, to speak with. It’s a select group of journalists. What do you say to your critics who say that you've become more of a spokesman for Edward Snowden?
GLENN GREENWALD: I think that's ludicrous is what I say to that. Every journalist has an agenda. We're on MSNBC now where close to 24 hours a day the agenda of President Obama and the Democratic Party are promoted, defended, glorified. The agenda of the Republican Party is undermined. That doesn't mean that the people who appear on MSNBC aren't journalists. They are. I think every journalist has a viewpoint. My viewpoint is very clear, I don’t hide it. It’s that I think what Edward Snowden did is very admirable and heroic. But at the same time the ultimate test of a journalist is is what you publish accurate and reliable. And I think with regard to every story that we published over the last six months, there hasn't been a single correction made to any of them. Very few have been called into question. And I think that's the ultimate question when it comes to is this journalism.
I'm not sure that's the ultimate question.
It's one thing for a journalist to have an opinion. It's another for him or her to have an agenda.
The goal of a journalist should be to report the news as accurately and impartially as possible without allowing his or her opinion to interfere with such dissemination.
The problem with MSNBC and much of the media is that the opinions and the agenda have become far more important than relaying news.
Nowhere is this more evident than at MSNBC where it was determined earlier in the year that 85 percent of its broadcasts are indeed commentary versus factual reporting.
Regardless of that, Welker predictably pushed back:
WELKER: Well, I think the point is not so much about MSNBC and what happens here, but more that sometimes when you talk about Edward Snowden you do defend him, and some people wonder if that crosses a line.
GREENWALD: Sure. I do defend him just like people on MSNBC defend President Obama and his officials and Democratic Party leaders 24 hours a day.
WELKER: Not everyone on MSNBC does that 24 hours a day.
GREENWALD: I don’t make any bones about - no, not everybody, but, but a lot, a lot of people on MSNBC do.
Delicious. Absolutely delicious.
Makes you wonder how the shills at MSNBC must feel knowing that someone on their side of the aisle is willing to state - on their own network! - how pathetically biased they are.
(HT Mediaite)
