You’re an NBC Nightly News producer working on a story on a sensitive, controversial topic. Journalistic standards demand that, whatever your personal opinions, you seek expert opinions from serious professionals on all sides of the issue. So naturally, the only person you interview agrees with you and has been honored by an organization that boasts “the largest handmade vulva door frame in America.”
Like I said, you work for NBC News.
Interesting: Cuba's Bureau of Tourism sponsored a three-minute promo on today's Morning Joe. Oh, wait, no. That was NBC itself, in the person of Kate Snow, with a smiley, unrelentingly upbeat segment promoting the glories of tourism in Cuba that will now be possible for Americans under President Obama's executive order relaxing former restrictions.
Snow's segment—entitled 'Bienvenidos a Cuba' just like a travelogue—had it all: beaches, dancing in the streets, cigars, rum, beer and all those nifty vintage cars potentially available to collectors. So, you ask, what did Snow have to say about the repressive Communist regime that continues to rule Cuba? Nada, naturally. Don't harsh the Cohiba mellow, compadre!
The Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare, started creating even more headaches for both employers and employees across the country beginning Jan. 1, 2015.
That was the day Obamacare’s employer mandate went into effect, requiring companies with 100 or more workers to provide health insurance to at least 70 percent of their employees. Mandates for smaller businesses will be introduced in 2016 in addition to increased mandates for larger companies, according to The Washington Post.
On Friday, Meet the Press moderator Chuck Todd insisted that Tuesday’s midterm election seemed like a ‘hold-your-nose’ election and on Sunday’s Today, the NBC News Political Director threw even more cold water on the GOP’s chances of winning the Senate. Todd pointed out how he “ran into a bunch of voters that said I'm tired of the hold-your-nose vote. Forget it. I’m going to vote none of the above. I’m going to vote for one of these third party candidates.”
NBC Nightly News showered praise on President Obama regarding his Ebola response on Tuesday night, declaring that Obama was “hitting back” and “[came] out swinging in this fight over quarantines” against those who demanded and then implemented quarantines for aid workers returning from West Africa.
The rhetoric followed NBC’s Today from Tuesday morning in which Matt Lauer slammed Republican New Jersey Governor Chris Christie for quarantining health care workers that return to the United States through his state after treating those stricken with Ebola in Africa.
On Tuesday, only NBC's Today covered Israel's heavy criticism of the Obama administration's effort to pushed a Hamas-backed cease-fire plan in Gaza. At the top of the broadcast, co-host Savannah Guthrie proclaimed: "...the Obama administration goes on the defensive after Israeli media rip John Kerry's efforts to make peace." [Listen to the audio or watch the video after the jump]
In the report that followed, correspondent Kate Snow observed: "The public and the press seem to have turned on Kerry. Take a look at the headline in this morning's paper. 'Obama and Kerry,' it says, 'are playing with fire.'"
Leading off Saturday's NBC Nightly News, fill-in anchor Kate Snow declared: "Healthy choices? Big challenges ahead for when the new health care law takes effect. Will you have to change your doctor?" However, in the report that followed, not one word was mentioned of President Obama's repeated promise that people would be able to keep their own doctor under the new law. [Listen to the audio or watch the video after the jump]
Introducing the segment, Snow reiterated: "When the Affordable Health Care Act goes into effect on October 1, a lot of Americans around retirement age will have some challenging choices to make. Like, should they switch to a new kind of health care coverage? And if they do, will that mean changing doctors?"
In a pair of back-to-back stories leading off Wednesday's NBC Nightly News, House Republicans were painted as villains for briefly delaying a vote on Hurricane Sandy relief. First, Capitol Hill correspondent Kelly O'Donnell declared: "Stunned Democrats and Republicans could not believe that their hometown suffering could be ignored."
In the next report, correspondent Anne Thompson decried the move: "Where the reminders of Sandy are still all too vivid, today frustration turned to fury....the House of Representatives' failure to vote is just one more body blow."
On Tuesday's NBC Nightly News, hours before the House of Representatives approved a deal to avert the fiscal cliff, chief White House correspondent Chuck Todd wrung his hands over Republican opposition to the lopsided legislation that increased taxes and offered no spending cuts: "I think we're in the last throes of sort of the typical theatrics that have become the norm for Washington over the last couple of years. And there is going to be a few more shenanigans before the night is over." [Listen to the audio or watch the video after the jump]
That was in response to fill-in anchor Kate Snow observing: "There are some voices out there saying, 'Good for the House Republicans, they're standing on their principles.' But there are also a lot of voices saying, 'How much longer is this going to take?'" Todd lamented: "Well, it may be a new year but old habits are dying hard with this congress." He reiterated: "It could be a real mess. But I do think we're in the last throes of sort of the Washington shenanigans."
Opening an hour-long special on the Mormon Church for Thursday's NBC Rock Center, anchor Brian Williams proclaimed to viewers: "Most Americans say they know next to nothing about the Mormon Church. Tonight, a rare look inside the lives of modern Mormon families....A church still dealing with the issue of polygamy....And other issues of inequality."
Teasing a report on the history of the Church, Williams promised to answer the question of "why so many Americans still today are suspicious of the religion." Introducing that portion of the broadcast, Williams touted pop culture mocking the faith, starting with a clip of Fox's Family Guy in which lead character Peter Griffin declares: "I'm going to be a Mormon....Come on, nailing a different wife every night. That's a no-brainer."
Uniquely among the broadcast network evening newscasts, on Friday's NBC Nightly News, substitute host Kate Snow briefly noted that it was former President George W. Bush's 66th birthday, and that the former President was in Africa as part of an effort to fight against cancer on the Third World continent. Snow read the item:
Now that Colorado is enduring one of the worst wildfires in its history, liberals are pointing to man-made global warming as the culprit. On Thursday's NBC Nightly News, correspondent Anne Thompson hyped the "dire" and lasting impact of the fires on the environment and pointed toward man-made global warming as the probable cause.
The "increasingly bigger" fires, Thompson said, are "Leading some to question if this wildfire season is worse because of climate change." One of her experts, a professor from the University of Arizona, proclaimed that “we won’t see these forests coming back in our lifetime or even our grandchildren’s life times.” [Video coming soon. MP3 audio here.]