Bianna Golodryga
On Tuesday, The Hollywood Reporter released an extensive poll on the news habits of consumers plus a poll of 51 cable and broadcast network news hosts and late-night comedy hosts. In the full blog, check out the seven areas that The Hollywood Reporter article on their own poll didn’t have quite the time to do a deep dive on.
On Thursday, the network morning shows were aghast that President Trump would accuse the news media of incivility and divisiveness, even as they repeatedly suggested that his rhetoric was to blame for mail bombs being sent to prominent Democrats. Reporters ignored recent polling that found people across the political spectrum agreed that the press was one of the main sources of division in the country.
The co-hosts of CBS This Morning on Tuesday plotted strategy for the Democrats in the 2018 midterms, talking to the liberal co-hosts of the podcast Pod Save America, Jon Favreau and Dan Pfeiffer. Together, they wanted to know just what Democrats could do to take the House and the Senate. This Morning co-host John Dickerson asked, “To the extent that Democrats can have a message, what should it be in the last two months?”
Already looking past November’s midterm elections to the 2020 presidential race, on Wednesday, the hosts of CBS This Morning treated former San Antonio Mayor Julian Castro to a fawning softball interview in which they repeatedly urged the Democrat to run in two years and wondered how he could help mobilize liberal voters in the coming weeks.
Who better than Chelsea Clinton, the daughter of accused rapist Bill Clinton, to talk about the allegations against Brett Kavanaugh? In an interview, CBS This Morning co-hosts on Wednesday NEVER mentioned the awkwardness of talking to Chelsea about a powerful man abusing women. Awkwardly avoiding women like Juanita Broaddrick, Gennifer Flowers and others, Gayle King instead asked about different claims of assault:
After having spent their entire Thursday listening to testimonies from Dr. Christine Blasey Ford and Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh, the mood on CBS’s panel seemed to be one of resignation and even admission by some of them that Kavanaugh appears headed for confirmation. Right after the hearing ended, chief legal correspondent Jan Crawford observed that “[p]eople saying that she looked credible on both sides” and while it seemed grim for Kavanaugh’s chances this morning, Kavanaugh’s came through, thus leading to a “shift in the room.”
In contrast to the lunacy and character assassination of Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh on CNN and MSNBC, CBS’s reacted to Kavanaugh’s opening statement Thursday afternoon by calling it “searing, painful and tearful opening remarks” filled with “authenticity” that made one wonder “how you ever fake that” as his life has been ruined.
During an interview with USA Today Washington Bureau Chief Susan Page on Friday’s CBS This Morning, fill-in co-host Bianna Golodryga expressed concern that the anonymous anti-Trump op/ed published in The New York Times would contribute to the public’s “erosion of trust” in the news media.
Monday's Today show displayed the latest example of how the journalistic definition of "controversy" is when liberal activists are offended. In the aftermath of singing legend Aretha Franklin's funeral. the Today show aired a full report highlighting complaints against two of the event's pastors that came from the left, but the show still ignored the more offensive on-stage presence of Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan.
Over the weekend, allegations of domestic violence by Democratic Minnesota Congressman Keith Ellison surfaced claiming he “emotionally and physically” abused his then-longtime girlfriend Karen Monahan. The allegations were serious enough for news outlets like Fox News and CNN to cover but ABC and NBC failed to do so. And while they covered the story Monday morning, CBS dropped it come that evening.
Network journalists have a long history of gushing about Barack Obama’s world travels. This was true when he was president and it’s true now. CBS This Morning on Tuesday covered Obama’s trip to South Africa and touted the “Obama fever” that is spreading.
In Friday night’s installment of bias by omission, NBC Nightly News chose not to cover a deadly suicide bombing in Pakistan at a political rally that left over 120 people dead while this same newscast and the CBS Evening News didn’t fit into their newscasts time for a news brief to pay homage to the now-identified U.S. soldier who died a day earlier in Afghanistan.