Anthony Mason
As the broadcast network morning newscasts on Saturday caught up with Fox and Friends in giving attention to the renewed probe into the Clinton Foundation by the FBI, CBS This Morning stood out in showcasing the most blatant bias against the investigation as Kathleen Kingsbury of the New York Times was given a forum to prejudge the probe as a "political vendetta." When asked for reaction from co-host Anthony Mason, NYT deputy editorial page editor Kingsbury immediately declared: "I think that -- given the fact that there doesn't seem to be new evidence on the table -- the only conclusion we can come to is that this is a political vendetta brought on by the White House."
After NBC’s Today co-host Savannah Guthrie accused House Speaker Paul Ryan of “living in a fantasy world” on Wednesday for predicting that tax reform legislation would encourage businesses to raise wages for their employees, on Thursday, the network morning show tried its best to deny the reality that several major companies announced that they would be doing exactly that.
For the first time in its 121-year history, the Dow Jones Industrial Average gained more than 5,000 points in a single year, according to CNBC. The major stock index set that record Dec. 18, following a 140-point rally and a new record closing high. CNBC.com also noted that there had been 70 closing highs for the DJIA in 2017.
The U.S. economy grew at a 3.3 percent rate in the third quarter, according to the latest estimate from the Commerce Department’s Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) released Nov. 29.
Guess how much time ABC, CBS and NBC evening news shows gave that good economic news?
Tuesday was a terrible day for Michigan Democratic Representative John Conyers as yet another former staffer came forward to accuse the longtime Congressman of sexual harassment and he was reportedly in talks with the Congressional Black Caucus to possibly resign. But according to the liberal Big Three Networks, none of that was really newsworthy.
The big three networks (ABC, CBS, and NBC) could finally breathe a sigh of relief on Thursday after the corruption trial against Democratic Senator Bob Menendez ended (at least for now) with a mistrial. Since the trial began 71 days ago, the network evening newscasts did everything in their power not to report it, effectively hiding it from their viewers. But Thursday evening saw all three of them find time to highlight Menendez’s good fortune.
Wednesday marked the continuation of the near total blackout on the corruption trial of Democratic New Jersey Senator Bob Menendez by the Big Three Networks (ABC, CBS, and NBC). While none of the networks covered the trial, which was in the middle of jury deliberations, CBS Evening News thought it was a priority to run a 44-second news brief mocking President Trump for drinking from a bottle of water while in the middle of a long speech.
After a shooting in California and another victim of a serial killer in Tampa Bay was found, CBS Evening News described Tuesday as a day filled with bloody gun violence coast to coast. Although accurate, the network tied it all together with a report touting a lawsuit brought by the family members of Sandy Hook victims against Remington Arms claiming company markets to mass shooters. While both ABC and NBC reported on the two shootings, CBS was the only network in the Big Three to highlight the lawsuit.
During Monday’s newscast, CBS Evening News was irritated by President Trump’s position on climate change and how he was putting America at odds with the rest of the world. “At a U.N. climate conference in Germany today, the Trump administration talked up fossil fuels, including coal,” chided Anchor Anthony Mason. “That puts the U.S. at odds with 194 other nations, but some American entrepreneurs and politicians want to make sure the administration does not have the final word.”
In a recent closed-door testimony to the House Intelligence Committee which was leaked, former Donald Trump bodyguard Keith Schiller destroyed one of the more salacious parts of the Clinton/DNC-funded dossier, regarding Trump and Russian prostitutes. Despite Schiller shooting down the rumors, both ABC and CBS spent Thursday evening speculating about the debunked accusations as if there was something to them.
CBS was still in a state of euphoria Wednesday evening after Democrats won big on Election Day the previous night. During CBS Evening News, the network ran two different segments glorifying Democratic victories in Virginia and elsewhere. “Across the country, the 2017 elections saw big wins for a highly diverse group of candidates,” announced anchor Anthony Mason at the start of the second segment.
The U.S. unemployment rate dropped to the lowest level in seventeen years, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ October jobs report. The report also showed 261,000 jobs added, but ABC didn’t bother covering the good economic news on Nov. 3. World News Tonight ignored the report, but found time to cover a study blaming fossil fuels for “man-made” global warming.