Xmas Meet The Press (when they think No One's watching)

[omega minimo]

Tom Brokaw and Ted Koppel were the guests on Meet The Press on Christmas Day. They were surprisingly candid when they thought no one was watching. NBC ran the first half hour with NO commercial breaks, when they thought no one was watching. Comments on MTP and Chris Matthews show were unusually chatty about “Katrina” (New Orleans) when they thought no one was watching.

link to video and transcript
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3032608/

Early in the show, Russert replayed tape of an NBC journalist in New Orleans:

(Videotape, Thursday, Sept. 1, 2005):
MR. TONY ZUMBADO:  You would never, never imagine what you saw in the Convention Center in New Orleans.  The bathrooms--the way the bathrooms were--there's no food for these folks.  The sanitation was unbelievable. I--the stench in there, it was unbelievable.  Dead people around the walls of the Convention Center, laying in the middle of the street in their dying chairs where they'd died, right there in their lawn chair--they were just covered up, in their wheelchair, covered up, laying there for-- dead.  Babies, two babies, dehydrated and died.  I just tell you, I couldn't take it.  It was unbelievable.
(End videotape)

<snip>

MR. RUSSERT:  Ted Koppel, many people commented that the press seemed to find its voice in the Hurricane Katrina story.

MR. KOPPEL:  Well, I think, just to follow up on what Tom said, that what so shocked people was the sense that we had just seen, 10 months earlier, what happened after the tsunami in Indonesia, and the capacity of the U.S. Air Force to mobilize, the U.S. military, to get supplies halfway around the world in less time, ultimately, than it took the U.S. government to get the federal government to get materiel, to get needed supplies, to get equipment down to New Orleans.  And I think that's what so frightened people in this country, was the sense that, you know, the system broke down.  We know the system can work.  We know we're capable of doing that.  We've done it a hundred times for other countries.  And yet here, where it happened in our own country--and again, I think Tom hit on the point:  We began to hear that on the first couple of days, and I think there were people around the country who were saying, "Come on, there are always people trying to bring racism into everything." But the question had to be asked:  if that had been a section of a city that was populated by middle-class white people, would the response have been the same?

<snip>

Mr. Koppel was quite candid about U.S. foreign policy on Christmas Day (when they thing no one is watching).

MR. RUSSERT:  What do you see?

MR. KOPPEL:  What's intriguing to me, Tim, is we're still talking about the war as though it were in a vacuum, and we're still talking about victory and what is to be achieved as though it were in a vacuum.  And the one thing that we are not talking about, because it somehow seems indelicate or unpolitic or even inappropriate, is the simple fact of the matter that, while we did not go to war because of Iraq's oil, we did, in fact, go to war because it is absolutely essential to the national interest, not only of this country but also of the Europeans and of the Japanese, that the Persian Gulf remains stable.  We have--when I say "we" I mean U.S. administrations going back to the Eisenhower administration--have been intervening in the Persian Gulf in one form or another--we overthrew the Iranian prime minister, Mossadeq--that is, the CIA did--precisely because we felt he was too close to the Communist Party at that time and we were afraid what that would mean if Iran became a Communist state. As long as we had the shah of Iran there, he was our surrogate.  In fact, you may remember the Nixon policy was that the shah would be our surrogate in the Persian Gulf.  When the shah was overthrown, we shifted our chips onto the Saudi board, and then it became the House of Saud that became our representative.  The Saudis are, indeed, troubled.  The royal family of Saudi Arabia is in deep trouble.  Therefore, we need to have a stable Iraq in order to guarantee a stable Persian Gulf, and the name of that game is oil.  Nobody talks about that.

<snip>

Then the subject of a possible pandemic of avian (which Tim Russert pronounced “ah-viahn” like an imported spring water) flu.

MR. RUSSERT:  Ted Koppel, how do you cover a story like that without alarming people and still do your job as a journalist to prepare people?

MR. KOPPEL:  You can't.  You have to alarm people because until people are sufficiently alarmed they're not going to listen to what has to happen.  You know, what you don't hear in that sound bite, and what is rarely spoken of, especially among the politicians, is that the kind of vaccine that would be necessary to treat the avian flu does not exist.  It cannot exist until the strain of avian flu is developed and can be sampled and can be tested and then, and only then, can you begin to develop the vaccine.  In order to develop sufficient quantities of that vaccine, to vaccinate people twice, you're going to need so many hundreds of millions of doses that it will take a minimum of two to three years to get them.  In other words, by the time you get them, it'll be too late to treat most of the people that would get the flu.


So here we were on Christmas Sunday, Meet The Press has two puffed-up (pre-recorded) professional pronouncers pompously pontificating and Koppel has the nerve to say:

“You have to alarm people because until people are sufficiently alarmed they're not going to listen to what has to happen.” 

What’s “alarming” is how candid commentary and unbroken segments free of attention deficit-inducing commercials are only available on holidays when they think no one is watching.

[ClayZ]

1. K & R

:kick:

[Mojorabbit]

2. I found it interesting

that Tom Brokaw and his wife have stored food and water at their "sanctuary "in case of a pandemic.

[omega minimo]

3. Uh huh-- although non-Christians might call theirs "undisclosed location"

:evilgrin:

They were talking about everyone stocking up to prepare to stay home for "two or three weeks" if there were a pandemic.


MR. BROKAW:  Well, we did it for a couple of reasons.  Meredith--we live in New York and we have a house outside of New York and Meredith said, "This is going to be our sanctuary.  We have to be prepared in case something happens." And we did put in a small supply of food and water and...

MR. KOPPEL:  Yeah.

MR. BROKAW:  ...other things to have on the ready.  It's also--the avian flu and the pandemic possibilities are a real commentary on the world in which we're living now.  The mobility of people to move across places that--the crush of population everywhere, how rapidly these things spread.  And I think that leads in this country to a kind of unsettled feeling on the part of a lot of people.  They have so much access to information now.  They don't feel that they have their own sanctuary because it all happens at warp speed and I think politicians are not doing a very good job in my impression.

[linazelle]

4. I saw Koppel and quickly turned it off...after hearing him say that

spying was pretty much Ok because there will definitely be another attack on American soil and the powers that be have to be in a position to say they have done everything possible to avert the inevitable. :eyes:

The whole panel should be tried for treason.

[omega minimo]

5. He was repulsive

MR. KOPPEL:  We do a great job, Tim, of patting ourselves on the backs, not just the media but the great American democracy, for how much we believe in the process of disclosure, of public debate, of fully vetting the issues and deciding them through our elected representatives.  In point of fact, often as not, we don't do that.  Often as not the decision is made that you, the public, simply are not mature enough or sophisticated enough to understand everything that's at stake here.  What scares the heck out of me is that there will be another terrorist attack in this country.  And after the next terrorist attack, if it's anything like 9/11, there won't be any debate about whether the government should have the right to eavesdrop.  The appropriate time to have this discussion, this debate, in Congress, in the media, is now.

MR. BROKAW:  Right.

MR. KOPPEL:  Because after the next event, it'll be Katy, bar the door.  Why didn't you do more?  And the fact of the matter is, in saying we need the debate, I'm not prejudging what the outcome would be.  Quite frankly, I think the outcome may well be that the American public, through its elected representatives, will say, "You know something?  We feel the president needs that right.  He has to have the right to be able to order the wiretapping of terrorist suspects."

MR. RUSSERT:  Let's have the debate.

MR. KOPPEL:  But let's have the debate.  Let's argue these issues out before it's too late.

[omega minimo]

9. BTW Ted, the debate now is why the president abused the powers he had

not whether he needs more. The debate is over whether to impeach this president, sooner, rather than later.

That is "the one thing that (YOU) are not talking about, because it somehow seems indelicate or unpolitic or even inappropriate, is the simple fact of the matter that" the debate is why and how this president broke the law.

:thumbsdown:

[Chevy]

6. 43 million without health care mentioned

and Rusert laughs it up into a comercial break.:spank:

[UTUSN]

7. A thread yesterday said KOPPEL said Shrub would "get it"

I asked for clarification, whether this meant he would be held accountable for the domestic spying or whether he would "get" the message of what he did wrong, and the poster said it was that he would GET AWAY with it. I've read the whole transcript and don't see that there, although there is plenty that these 3 weasels said that was, well, weaselly.

[otohara]

8. I'm Alarmed

at how full of shit these men are - so full of themselves.

[omega minimo]

10. Incredibly arrogant & puffed up-- even when they think no one is watching

Koppel's statement about "alarming" people or else they don't understand what's going on is OUTRAGEOUS. This media uses all sorts of techniques to "alarm" aka scare the shit out of people 24-7 and make them ever more neurotic, disassociated and paranoid.

Just the fact that there were NO commercial breaks puts the lie to any insistence on how you "have to" do media.

:puke:

[Cleita]

11. I've noticed this on holiday weekends before.

It's like the truth starts being told. My theory is that all the CEO's and suits of the media outlets, of the sponsors and in the White House, are somewhere taking a skiing vacation. So those left behind, doing the programming, know that they can say what needs to be said at those times without censure.

They know that, we the public, are watching. It's all of the above that they know aren't watching at those times.

[omega minimo]

12. Right

and those two are already out of the Big Chairs so they can wax philisophic and talk about what "no one's talking about" --even though their previous profession continues to mis/lead the discussion............

Check this out:

MR. RUSSERT:  Is it possible for a president to say just what you did:  "We are going there because we need a stable Middle East because we need ready access to oil supply to continue--our economy to soar"?

MR. KOPPEL:  I think it has to be possible.  I understand why politicians and even statesmen--or maybe that is the difference between a politician and a statesman.  A politician can't do it; a statesman must do it.

:bounce:

You almost have to when you're dealing with the elected representatives of the people.  And we are heading into a crisis, whatever that crisis is, you have to begin by assuming that they're going to do their jobs and do their jobs properly, and that they are responding to us in an honest fashion.  It's only after the fact, it's only after you see that they're not doing it properly, that you can come back with the kind of response that you're talking about.  Now, should we be skeptical?  Do we have a right to ask critical-- not just a right; do we have an obligation to ask critical questions?  And did we fall short of that prior to the Iraq War?  That's a perfectly legitimate point, and I think we all have to plead guilty, to one degree or another, to having been, you know, a little bit soft on the administration beforehand.

(A LITTLE SOFT!?! :wow: )

But in large measure, when the president and his top people tell you, as they did, "Here's our perception of what exists.  Here's our perception of the danger to the United States.  Here's our perception of a relationship between this guy who has weapons of mass destruction and the group that just blew up the Pentagon and the World Trade Center," I don't know that reporters as a whole can sit there and say, "Oh, hokum.  You know, it's just not true."  We can raise questions, and I...

MR. BROKAW:  Given the absence of hard evidence.

MR. KOPPEL:  Hard evidence.  Right.

MR. BROKAW:  There was not--you know, the French intelligence were sharing the same conclusions with the administration.  I thought--I agree with you that I don't think that we pushed hard enough for vigorous debate.  I think that on Capitol Hill that the debate was anemic, at best.  You had--Ted Kennedy and Senator Byrd, really, were the only ones speaking out with any kind of passion in the Senate, the people who...

MR. RUSSERT:  And they were not questioning whether Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction.

MR. BROKAW:  No.  No.  No.

MR. RUSSERT:  That seemed to be a uniformly held belief.

MR. BROKAW:  Right.  Yeah.

MR. KOPPEL:  Nor did the Clinton administration beforehand.

MR. BROKAW:  No.

MR. KOPPEL:  I mean, the only difference between the Clinton administration and the Bush administration was 9/11.

MR. BROKAW:  Right.

MR. KOPPEL:  If 9/11 had happened on Bill Clinton's watch, he would have gone into Iraq.

MR. BROKAW:  Yeah.  Yeah.

:wtf:

"IF 9/11 HAD HAPPENED ON BILL CLINTON'S WATCH, HE WOULD HAVE GONE INTO IRAQ."

"Yeah. Yeah."

Iraq.

[Senator Obama]

13. I especially had a problem with Koppel..

when he said he believed if 911 had happened on Clinton's watch that we'd have gone into Iraq. I think that's bullshit and indicative of the fact that he and the MSM is drinking Bush Koolaid. The media has been a huge failure in informing the public on this war. They were nothing more than Bush parrots leading up to the war failing to offer sufficient objective criticism or give mainstream coverage of the opposition to this war. I puked as both Kopout and Brokaw absolved themselves of their responsibility to deliver critical news reports.

Here's what I believe; we'd have gone to Afghanistan no matter who was President. There is no way a democrat would have initiated an Iraq conquest in response to 911.

Sen. Obama

[tiptoe]

40. "If 9/11..happened on Bill Clinton's watch, he would have gone into Iraq."

How can Koppel have been so blase assertive, non-discriminating and unqualifying on the point...topped by Brokaw chiming in: "Yeah. Yeah."?!

Do Koppel and Brokaw actually contend that Clinton would have received the same intelligence as Bush re Al Qaeda and Iraq, an intelligence esteemed now less to have been "received" and more to have been "contrived" by Bush' people and "fixed to the policy" of attacking Iraq, as per DSM evidence? (Koppel and Brokaw certainly aren't unaware of the DSM, especially after Conyers carried 540,000-signature petition re DSM to the White House gate). To make the assertion that Clinton would have behaved as Bush -- in a context of knowing what they know now about DSM and "fixed intelligence" -- they would now have to be presuming that Clinton's people also 1) would have engaged in intelligence-contrivance to invent a fictional basis for war-mongering and 2) would have chosen to focus on Iraq as well. The latter would require further presumption that Clinton's top people shared Bush' PNACers' target: Did Clinton's "top people" have motivations re Iraq like Bush' PNAC-people did? (Not that I'm aware of)...Or might Clinton have approached the 9/11 problem with investigation, unbiased, without presumption or ulterior motive? Are Koppel and Brokaw also having Russert's cable-viewers believe that Clinton would have done like Bush and ignored and pre-empted Blix' UN investigations re Iraqi WMD claim, and proceeded Blitzkrieg-like into Iraq?? They would be grossly glossing-over the very distinctions that make a difference between "Bush and his top people" (PNAC'ers, intent on invading Iraq since 1998) and Clinton and the motives of his administrative aides; such differences, alone, are reason enough to disabuse oneself of a belief that that Clinton would have done like Bush and "gone into Iraq", if 9/11 had happened on his watch. But even here, the analysis still begs a bigger question wrt to post-9/11 policy: Would 9/11 have happened at all without Bush and his "top people" in office in the first place, i.e. the MIHOP/LIHOP suspicion, arising out of the more-than-curious circumstances of Bush adminstration officials' behavior pre- and post-9/11 attack. Would Clinton's aides similarly have been so "magnificently incompetent"? From the following sentence, one might sense Mr. Koppel could entertain the possibility:

MR. KOPPEL: I mean, the only difference between the Clinton administration and the Bush administration was 9/11.

But Koppel and Brokaw KNOW that statement's not true, as per this example earlier in interview:

MR. BROKAW: There's no way he <Mike Brown> should have had that job, Tim. He just--he simply was not prepared to have that job. Jamie Lee Witt, setting the politics aside, was one of the best appointments that Bill Clinton ever made. He went through Hurricane Andrew and they went through the California earthquakes. And I thought when he first came to Washington that he was probably just an Arkansas crony of the president's. He was first-rate as a FEMA director. And "Good Job Brownie" will be, you know--President Bush will be living with that one for a long time. This guy wouldn't have been, you know, a store manager for Wal-Mart in east Wichita.

(Other examples of Bush appointments that distinguish the quality of his admin from Clinton's, including an SNL skit with Rachel Dratch as Harriet Meiers and http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=104&topic_id=5496479#5498763 )

The assertion by Koppel re Clinton response to 9/11 presumes way too much and seems reckless...almost to the point of inanity. So, perhaps Koppel's point was an intentional, rhetorical absurdity?

(...and maybe Koppel and Brokaw were leading Russert on...to expose Russert for his journalistic bias.)

But in large measure, when the president and his top people tell you, as they did, "Here's our perception of what exists. Here's our perception of the danger to the United States. Here's our perception of a relationship between this guy who has weapons of mass destruction and the group that just blew up the Pentagon and the World Trade Center," I don't know that reporters as a whole can sit there and say, "Oh, hokum. You know, it's just not true." We can raise questions, and I...

MR. BROKAW: Given the absence of hard evidence.

MR. KOPPEL: Hard evidence. Right.

MR. BROKAW: There was not--you know, the French intelligence were sharing the same conclusions with the administration. I thought--I agree with you that I don't think that we pushed hard enough for vigorous debate. I think that on Capitol Hill that the debate was anemic, at best. You had--Ted Kennedy and Senator Byrd, really, were the only ones speaking out with any kind of passion in the Senate, the people who...

MR. RUSSERT: And they were not questioning whether Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction.

MR. BROKAW: No. No. No.

MR. RUSSERT: That seemed to be a uniformly held belief.

MR. BROKAW: Right. Yeah.

MR. KOPPEL: Nor did the Clinton administration beforehand.

MR. BROKAW: No.

MR. KOPPEL: I mean, the only difference between the Clinton administration and the Bush administration was 9/11.

MR. BROKAW: Right.

MR. KOPPEL: If 9/11 had happened on Bill Clinton's watch, he would have gone into Iraq.

MR. BROKAW: Yeah. Yeah.

[Uncle Joe]

17. Can you say corpwhorate owned MSM Whores?

I knew you could.

[omega minimo]

19. Can you make a point without trashtalk?

I'll bet you can.

I'll bet it will be much more EFFECTIVE.

[Uncle Joe]

21. Not when it comes to the corpwhorate owned MSM,

they sold out the American People and I believe referring to them as prostitutes, (to be polite) is taking the high road.

[omega minimo]

23. If you want to be effective, it's worth trying/practicing

because the expression you are making is too easy to write off as pissin in the wind.

The American people sold themselves out by not paying ANY attention when the media buyups and mergers began in the late 70's/early 80's through the 90's until the present. NOW it's trendy to :bounce: and fling poo and screech like monkeys who want a banana.

The global media tribunal laughs.

Like Biafra said, become the media. Practice, practice, practice.

[Uncle Joe]

25. I agree with most of what you say,

however I believe we should have a two pronged approach, the low road and high road, to have meaningful media reform. We can debate the obvious logical merits of our arguments against MSM propaganda, however a certain segment of the American People more obsessed with instant gratification than sustainability will tune us out before our points are made. This is where the low road comes in, I not only speak to D.U.ers with an elevated consciousness such as your self and you do have my respect, I am also speaking to the time space continuum challenged, lurkers, freepers etc. and anyone else, still brainwashed in to believing the liberal media myth.

[omega minimo]

27. Maybe flash cards would help

:evilgrin: a big ole wall chart of a pyramid and who owns what................

"We can debate the obvious logical merits of our arguments against MSM propaganda, however a certain segment of the American People more obsessed with instant gratification than sustainability will tune us out before our points are made."

That segment ain't gonna hear ya anyways.

btw: Today's frurkers talking points seem to be "MSM kool aid." So be on the lookout!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!11

As fer the low road, IMHO one of your "prongs" could be punchy without being sexist (I know I know our favorite hosts do it too; I know folks like to defend "whore" as not-a-gender-slur-- but even DU Rules acknowledge it as "gender-based"). The crude macho bullshit makes it harder to tell who's who, but as your eloquence attests, that's part of the point.

I may be slow, but ah ain't stooooppiddt!!!!!!1

:hi: Happy New Year :toast:

[Uncle Joe]

28. My apologies for any gender offense

on my part, no offense was intended, whenever I think of the word in question, the first thing that comes to my mind is Gannon/Guckert, not Pretty Woman.

In one sense, I am doing a disservice to the prostitutes (male and female) out there, they technically only rent their bodies for a limited period of time, however the corpwhorate owned MSM sold the lives of our fellow Americans down the river and many will not be coming back. This does not take in to account the 30,000-100,000 dead Iraqis killed because our "fourth estate" became a cheerleader sort of like Bush himself, instead of a watchdog. If we do not keep their feet to the fire, I believe they will also sell the very freedoms, which the neocons claim we went to war to defend.

On a lighter note, Peace and Happy New Years to you.

:toast:

[omega minimo]

29. Zackly

"...because our "fourth estate" became a cheerleader sort of like Bush himself, instead of a watchdog."

Zackly why 3 decades of mediamergersandacquisition were of (not) obvious (enough) concern.

MR. RUSSERT:  ...But, Tom, there is a line where people suggested, "Well, during the Iraq War, the press wasn't aggressive enough, but when it came to Katrina, they found themselves and told truth to power."

MR. BROKAW:  Well, there were no gray areas in Katrina.  A lot of what happened during the Iraq War and the lead-up to it was unknowable, and what happened with Katrina was there for everyone to see.  And, in fact, having gone down there several days after Katrina struck--in fact, 10 days after it struck--I was stunned by the fact that it's a lot worse on the ground than it even appeared to be on television.  But the rest of the country was witness to what Reuven Frank, who was the founder of "Huntley-Brinkley," once called television's greatest strength:  It transmits experience.  And that experience came into every home in America, and then the people sat there.  And you had that parish chief on your program, weeping, saying they held--"They didn't come.  They promised they would come and they didn't come."

MR. RUSSERT:  Aaron Broussard.

MR. BROKAW:  And you had the little--Charles Evans saying to Campbell Brown, "It's pitiful down here"--a 10-year-old boy who summed it up better than anyone else, probably, in his kind of naive eloquence.  And everyone got it. It was just--it was indefensible.  So then that's when you hold government accountable.

[WinkyDink]

48. And exactly how do you think even those of us paying attention then

to the mergers and predicting, as Cassandra, dire consequences, ought to have acted?
Storm the Bastille, perhaps?

[omega minimo]

49. Use your imagination

:patriot:

[alfredo]

14. K&R

I was impressed with how matter of fact they were.

[omega minimo]

15. "Matter of fact" is the news business

a matter of facts.......................or it used ta be.

:hi:

[alfredo]

31. We just need to keep the pressure on them to do their job

truthfully and fairly. If they catch shit for pulling Superman's cape, we should be there to support them. If they kiss corporatist ass, they need to be taken behind the woodshed.

[omega minimo]

32. What effect do you think media ownership has?

[alfredo]

47. Whenever there is a coup or military victory, one of the first

things the victors do is seize the media outlets. The media outlets define reality. If they have the churches reinforce this reality their power becomes overwhelming.

This is why it was so important for each one of us to become the media. It seems to have worked, the major outlets have found they cannot ignore us.

[blm]

16. These men know the deal and must have inner fear that they'll be nailed as

complicit for letting BushInc get away with so much when the history of fascism is written.

I always hear these way too late reports as pure CYA for the press, especially Welch's made men - Brokaw and Russert.

[omega minimo]

18. That particular "inner fear" didn't stop them from reinforcing the meme

"9/11 = Iraq"

:evilfrown:

[blm]

20. That's what I mean - They are only NOW, postKatrina, in CYA mode.

And postFitzgerald, too. He really blew the cover of complicity off a few of BushInc's pet reporters.

[omega minimo]

22. Guess that's why they're so pompous

:eyes:

[IkeWarnedUs]

24. Russert, Koppel and Brokaw on Katrina and Michael Brown

MR. RUSSERT: Ted Koppel, you interviewed Michael Brown, the director of FEMA, on "Nightline," and it was so memorable, because he just basically sat there and could not explain exactly what he had done or not done. And it just, when contrasted to what the media were reporting, was breathtaking in his inability to explain why he had not stepped up to this challenge.

MR. KOPPEL: What was so breathtaking, Tim, was he truly didn't seem to be up to speed on what had happened, and even if--and we've all covered stories and been on the scene where there is a crisis under way. Theoretically, you should be best informed when you're closest to the eye of the hurricane, as it were. In point of fact, you're much better off being back a few miles and being able to look at it from a distance. So it didn't surprise me that in some respects we who were a thousand miles away might be better informed than he was. But what surprised me was that none of his staff, apparently, had been listening to the radio or watching television and passing the word on to him, so that he was still--was saw that very moving piece of video from your cameraman at the beginning, at the Convention Center. He clearly didn't know what was happening at the Convention Center, and yet that had been used as one of the refuges for all the people who were unable to get out of the city.

MR. BROKAW: There's no way he should have had that job, Tim. He just--he simply was not prepared to have that job. Jamie Lee Witt, setting the politics aside, was one of the best appointments that Bill Clinton ever made. He went through Hurricane Andrew and they went through the California earthquakes. And I thought when he first came to Washington that he was probably just an Arkansas crony of the president's. He was first-rate as a FEMA director. And "Good Job Brownie" will be, you know--President Bush will be living with that one for a long time. This guy wouldn't have been, you know, a store manager for Wal-Mart in east Wichita.

[omega minimo]

26. "Bushie, yer doin a heckofajob"

:evilfrown:

[omega minimo]

30. Mr. Sensitive

MR. RUSSERT:  On the issue of race, Tom Brokaw, the president's still very sensitive about that.  A few weeks ago, Brian Williams sat down and talked to him.  Let's listen to the president and come back and talk about it.

(Videotape, December 12, 2005):

PRES. GEORGE W. BUSH:  Somebody I heard--you know, a couple of people, you know, said, "Bush didn't respond because of race, because he's a racist," or alleged that.  That is absolutely wrong, and I reject that.  Frankly, that's the kind of thing that--you can call me anything you want, but do not call me a racist.


also from GWB: "Some people call you elites. I call you my base. Heh. Heh heh. Heh heheh."

Happy New Year Everbuddy!!!!!!!!!!!! :toast: :kick:

[newswolf56]

33. Nothing I could possibly add to this superb OP and thread.

The criticism of mass media is spot on, as is the indictment of the public for the shameful indifference that allowed the media monopolies to arise -- even as journalists were warning against their dire consequences. Delighted this OP/thread is being preserved as a Greatest; kicking accordingly.

Message to OM: Well Done!

[omega minimo]

34. To their credit

"...as is the indictment of the public for the shameful indifference that allowed the media monopolies to arise -- even as journalists were warning against their dire consequences."

To their credit, if the public had an inkling by 1996 that the Telecommunications Act in Congress deserved some scrutiny or attention-- where the hell were the stories? During the week that was the hot topic under the Dome, the newspapers buried or killed the story-- I couldn't find it. Consolidated media reporting on media consolidation. "Public airwaves? What's that?" As you say, some journalists may have been warning about consequences, but the story was not in the A section of the paper. What was there was brief and empty of detail.

Here's another nugget to chew on:

MR. RUSSERT:  Ted Koppel, I was reading a Government Accountability Office report.  $20 trillion in government liabilities in 2000.  It's now $43 trillion in 2004--Medicare, Social Security, pensions.

MR. KOPPEL:  Right.

MR. RUSSERT:  And yet you talk about it, people's eyes glaze over.

MR. KOPPEL:  Yeah.

MR. RUSSERT:  How do you make these stories interesting to people?

MR. KOPPEL:  I think the only way you can make them interesting is to bring them down to the individual level.  And the fact of the matter is that when we show one person whose pension has just been taken away from her or him...

MR. RUSSERT:  That's memorable.

MR. KOPPEL:  That's memorable, and you can say, "I identify with that person," or people out there watching your program can say, "I identify with that person."  But, you know, to follow up on Tom's point.  I think the medical care, which is a function of what we're talking about--yes, we have been priding ourselves on having the best medical care in the world--and you know something?  You can get the best medical care in the world, he can get the best medical care in the world, I can.  Most Americans can't.  And there are 43 million Americans who aren't getting any medical care at all.  That is a scandal.  And...

MR. BROKAW:  That is getting attention at least, where people are trying to come to grips with that.  And what was so stunning to me was that the Bush administration, after winning very sizeable popular vote in the 2004 election, put as its highest priority the reform of Social Security and not health care in America because I thought that's where most people were concerned.

MR. RUSSERT:  Agree?

MR. KOPPEL:  Sure.  I'm not gonna disagree with him.  I'm at NBC here.  I got to agree with Brokaw.

MR. RUSSERT:  What a team player.  We're going to take a quick break.  Ted Koppel, Tom Brokaw, we'll be right back after this.


Happy New Year, NW56 :toast:

[newswolf56]

35. A number of individual reporters railed against media monopolization...

from the 1960s onward, among them Nat Hentoff, Alexander Cockburn, the late Jack Newfield, the late Murray Kempton, the late I.F. Stone, the late Jack Anderson -- many more whose names I escape me. It seems to me the magazine Mother Jones ran some very critical reports on the subject, as did The Nation, also possibly Harper's, The New Yorker, Saturday Review, The Reporter, The Progressive etc., and I believe it was David Broder who (before its enactment) wrote a truly scathing series of columns about the implications of the 1996 Telecommunications Act.

The American Newspaper Guild (AFL/CIO), the reporters' and photographers' union, has also been very active in trying to raise public consciousness about the inherent dangers of media monopolies -- one of the main reasons publishers' union-busting efforts are at an all-time intensity.

And you're absolutely right about publishers demanding any reports critical of monopolies (or of capitalism in general) be downplayed or suppressed entirely, which is why the definitive book on the effect of media monopolies, When MBAs Rule the Newsroom (Doug Underwood, Columbia University Press, New York: 1993) is priced at $70 per copy -- to ensure it remains censored from public consciousness.

[omega minimo]

37. Where can I get a copy of "When MBAs Rule The World"?

:evilgrin:

MR. KOPPEL:  I think all the political analysts and the same people who advise our bosses as to what kind of a demographic we need to get on a news program are the same people who are advising the politicians.  They say you come out and tell the truth, "You're gonna get nailed.  Your hide will be nailed to the wall.  I mean, people 50 years from now will admire your courage, but the other guy's gonna win the office."

MR. BROKAW:  I don't agree with that.  I think the--I think that the--there's a longing now...

MR. KOPPEL:  I'm not saying that's what it should be.  I'm saying that's what the advisers...

MR. BROKAW:  No.  I know.  But I think-- they give that kind of advice, I agree with that.  But I think that there's a longing now for people who will acknowledge that they--that there were mistakes made and that we need to reach across lines a lot more and work together.  Doesn't mean you have to give up your ideology or your most cherished beliefs.  But, you know, the great strength of this country is we've always been able to find the center and find our way through our most difficult crises by forming these coalitions, and people, at the end of the day, getting together in the Senate caucus or being summoned down to the White House, and working things out, and saying, "Look, I'll give a little on this if you'll give a little on that," and we're gonna move forward.  There's precious little of that these days.

Note to Democrats: GET RID OF THE HANDLERS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[newswolf56]

44. Amazon.com has it in paperback for $25.50 ($73.50 for the

hardcover version); they also have it used for less than $25. Try your local library first (though a college library would be more likely to have it than a general-circulation library).

[omega minimo]

46. Note to Democrats: GET RID OF THE HANDLERS

Your candidates are too smart to be led by the nose and end up looking "stiff."

Thanks NW-- MBA's seem to be runnin 'bout everything these days....................

:bounce:

[newswolf56]

50. Remember too anything "subversive" requested on inter-library loan...

is automatically reported to the Sicherheitsdeinst and puts you on a watch list -- or such is the inference to be gleaned from the Little Red Book incident at Amherst.

[DemonFighterLives]

36. I wish these paranoid clowns would bunker up with dick

and dubby and get the hell out of our faces.
I don't think Americans need any more threats or epidemics or disasters of any kind. Go have them on your own time in Crawford!
:argh:

[omega minimo]

38. Thanks for breakin it down DFL

:rofl:

Cuttin to the chase always works :hi: Happy Holidays

[DemonFighterLives]

39. Thank You for bringin the news

I hadn't seen the program and posted when I was about halfway through the thread.
In their minds 911 Official Version leads to Iraq and War on Terror ad infinitum which leads to torture and spying on Americans.
Koppel really was shilling for dubya and Brokaw at times seems like he would like to break free, but just ties his tongue and chimes along.
:hide:

Edit Happy Holidays!

[omega minimo]

41. "If 9/11 had happened on Clinton's watch, he would have gone into Iraq"

"In their minds 911 Official Version leads to Iraq and War on Terror ad infinitum which leads to torture and spying on Americans."

"In their minds" may be-- and they made SURE to put it in the public's minds. Absolutely shameful. Catapulting the propaganda.



MR. RUSSERT:  And they were not questioning whether Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction.

MR. BROKAW:  No.  No.  No.

MR. RUSSERT:  That seemed to be a uniformly held belief.

MR. BROKAW:  Right.  Yeah.

MR. KOPPEL:  Nor did the Clinton administration beforehand.

MR. BROKAW:  No.

MR. KOPPEL:  I mean, the only difference between the Clinton administration and the Bush administration was 9/11.

MR. BROKAW:  Right.

MR. KOPPEL:  If 9/11 had happened on Bill Clinton's watch, he would have gone into Iraq.

MR. BROKAW:  Yeah.  Yeah.

[DemonFighterLives]

42. These are not stupid men believing the pretzeldunce's lies

They are accessories!
Bill would not have had 911, I doubt and surely would not have gone on a killing spree in Iraq. Not in my opinion.

[omega minimo]

43. Excuse me

:rofl: "pretzeldunce" :rofl:




ow

[DemonFighterLives]

45. Morning Kick!

:dunce:
:)

[freesqueeze]

51. I Think Russert Might Be Coming Around

He seems a bit less the GOPundit these days.

We may see more of this wriggling away from the destruction they wrought from these types.