Down Steeply Since Late Jan., Big 3 Evening Newscasts Stuck at Low Sum
September 17th, 2009 5:16 PM
After a summer swoon, you would think that the evening newscasts of the Big 3 networks would start to recover a bit now that many Americans are back from vacations, kids are back in school, and fall routines are getting established or re-established. So far, you would be wrong. It's early, and there's still plenty of time this fall to recover, but during the time period after Labor Day, the…
NBC: 'Blunt' Carter 'Prompted Us to Reexamine Our Assumptions About Ra
September 16th, 2009 9:48 PM
An evening after trumpeting President Jimmy Carter's racism charge (“An overwhelming portion of the intensely demonstrated animosity toward President Barack Obama is based on the fact that he is a black man”), NBC led Wednesday night with the “fallout” as Andrea Mitchell proposed that though “many thought” the “racial divisions” were “healed by the election of the first African-American President…
CBS and NBC Finally Catch Up to ACORN Scandal; Express Sympathy for th
September 16th, 2009 12:48 PM
In the first story on CBS since the scandal broke last week, on Tuesday’s Evening News, anchor Katie Couric reported: "The grassroots community organization called ACORN helps low-income Americans find affordable housing and gets tens of millions of dollars in government funding. But as Cynthia Bowers reports, that may be coming to an end after a scandal caught on tape."After showing undercover…
ABC: Obama Critics 'Driven By Refusal to Accept Black President'; NBC
September 15th, 2009 9:27 PM
ABC and NBC on Tuesday night joined the effort to undermine the anti-Obama tea party participants by smearing them as racists as ABC framed a story around the proposition “some prominent Obama supporters are now saying” the opposition to Obama is “driven, in part, by a refusal to accept a black President,” while NBC anchor Brian Williams touted how “former President Carter spoke up and spoke out…
ABC’s Bill Weir Frets Over 9/12 Rally Rage and ‘Anger;' Worries Ab
September 14th, 2009 6:04 PM
Over the weekend, ABC provided hyperbolic, worried reporting on the 9/12 protest in Washington D.C. And while the other networks had mixed results, Good Morning America co-host Bill Weir opened the program on Saturday by fretting, "This morning, outrage. Protesters descend on Washington to rally against the President's health care plan. As civility gives way to shouting, what's fueling all this…
CBS Skips Killing of Pro-Life Activist; ABC Sees ‘Flip Side’ to Ki
September 12th, 2009 3:08 PM
Katie Couric’s CBS Evening News on Friday omitted any mention of the murder of pro-life activist Jim Pouillon in Michigan, despite having discussed the murder of abortionist George Tiller on the June 1, June 2 and June 9 newscasts (and then referencing the killing as a recent “hate crime” in a June 10 report on the shooting at Washington, D.C.’s Holocaust Museum).Both ABC’s World News and the NBC…
Network Echo Chamber: Appalled by Ugly 'Shout Heard 'Round the World
September 10th, 2009 9:41 PM
Media minds think alike. ABC: “It was the shout heard 'round the world.” CBS: “It was the shout heard 'round the world.” NBC, slightly creative: “The outburst heard 'round the world” and the “heckle heard 'round the world.” Congressman Joe Wilson's “you lie” shout during President Obama's Wednesday address to Congress on health care animated the Thursday evening newscasts, though it at least…
'Republican Right's First Scalp,' Nets Portray Van Jones as Victim of
September 6th, 2009 9:07 PM
Instead of focusing on how the Obama administration found it appropriate to hire a man who added his name to a petition asserting the Bush administration deliberately allowed the 9/11 attacks to occur -- or the incompetence displayed in not knowing about it -- ABC and NBC on Sunday night painted Van Jones as a victim, “a target for conservatives,” while “the Republican Right” claimed “its first…
Reliable Sources Gushes Over Sawyer, No Mention of GMA's Ratings
September 6th, 2009 12:08 PM
Howard Kurtz opened Sunday's "Reliable Sources" with a lovefest for the promotion of ABC's Diane Sawyer to replace Charles Gibson on "World News Tonight."Mysteriously, there was absolutely no discussion about how Sawyer's "Good Morning America" is constantly second in the ratings to NBC's "Today" show, nor was there mention of how Katie Couric regularly bested Sawyer in the morning but has been a…
Media's Coverage of 'Birthers' Greatly Outweighs Van Jones Coverage
September 5th, 2009 12:12 PM
The contrast between the virtual silence of major news outlets on Green Jobs Czar Van Jones’s belief in the Bush Administration’s complicity in the 9/11 attacks and the hubbub made about those who believe the President is not an American citizen casts light on the politicized attitudes of the mainstream media. NewsBusters has noted how the story has been ignored by the television media. Byron…
ABC & NBC Continue Van Jones Blackout, Instead Tout Obama's 'Transpare
September 4th, 2009 9:51 PM
ABC and NBC on Friday night, even after White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs was forced to address the topic, continued their blackout of the radical and America-hating conspiracy views of Van Jones, the “Special Advisor for Green Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation” on the White House's Council on Environmental Quality. Instead of taking up how five years ago Jones signed the 911truth.org…
Obama School Talk Push Back Framed Around Exasperation Over 'Hyper-Par
September 3rd, 2009 8:59 PM
The ABC and NBC anchors on Thursday night framed stories, on the controversy over President Obama's upcoming Tuesday address to the nations' schoolchildren accompanied by a Department of Education recommendation that teachers have their students “write letters to themselves about what they can do to help the President,” through the prism of Obama as a victim of unfair presumptions. “It seemed…
