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TYNDALL HEADLINE: HIGHLIGHTS FROM APRIL 29, 2008
For only the second time since the end of February, George Bush used his bully pulpit to grab the lead spot on a network newscast. The President's confession that he has no "magic wand" that could slash the price of gasoline was NBC's selection to kick off the day's news. NBC was alone in treating Bush as the agenda setter. Both ABC and CBS assigned that role to Barack Obama as the Presidential candidate declared himself "outraged" at the National Press Club comments of his longtime minister Jeremiah Wright, calling them "rants." Accordingly Obama qualified as Story of the Day. By the way, on the other occasion in the last two months when the White House topped the news, it was not the President's doing, but the Pope's. Benedict XVI made headlines when he came visiting.
TYNDALL PICKS FOR APRIL 29, 2008: CLICK ON GRID ELEMENTS TO SEARCH FOR MATCHING ITEMS
BULLY PULPIT TRUMPED BY PREACHER For only the second time since the end of February, George Bush used his bully pulpit to grab the lead spot on a network newscast. The President's confession that he has no "magic wand" that could slash the price of gasoline was NBC's selection to kick off the day's news. NBC was alone in treating Bush as the agenda setter. Both ABC and CBS assigned that role to Barack Obama as the Presidential candidate declared himself "outraged" at the National Press Club comments of his longtime minister Jeremiah Wright, calling them "rants." Accordingly Obama qualified as Story of the Day. By the way, on the other occasion in the last two months when the White House topped the news, it was not the President's doing, but the Pope's. Benedict XVI made headlines when he came visiting.
The correspondents on the campaign trail were struck by Obama's unwonted display of emotion. CBS' Dean Reynolds called him "shocked, angered and clearly anguished" while NBC's Lee Cowan noted that "he unloaded on the Rev Wright like never before" calling it a "somber, almost angry response." ABC's David Wright (embargoed link) concluded that "clearly Obama did not relish disowning the pastor." Both ABC's Wright and CBS' Reynolds listed specific issues over which Obama contradicted the minister: the US government did not deliberately infect African-Americans with HIV/AIDS; the Nation of Islam's Louis Farrakhan is not praiseworthy; the foreign policy of the United States does not amount to terrorism. But it was the Rev Wright's insinuation that Obama had not been sincere in his previous criticisms, "just a political move," as CBS' Reynolds put it, that "really struck a nerve."
Obama's formal repudiation of the Rev Wright's comments warranted analysis in the horse race style on all three newscasts. CBS' Jeff Greenfield explained its necessity: "Wright's occupation of center stage was blocking everything else about Obama." ABC anchor Charles Gibson pointed out to his colleague George Stephanopoulos that the comments that Obama now finds fault with were not newly minted by the minister. Why the outrage now? Stephanopoulos pointed to Wright's high visibility: Obama's campaign "realized this was posing a mortal threat." NBC anchor Brian Williams asked Tim Russert whether any other frontrunning Presidential candidacy had been thus damaged not by his own words but by "an external force," the words of an associate. "Nothing of this magnitude," Russert opined. He called this "public divorce" from a spiritual advisor "unprecedented."
I am sure Russert must be mistaken. This cannot be the crowning example of guilt by association in the history of Presidential politics. Can anyone suggest counterexamples?
ANWR, AMTRAK, ETHANOL President George Bush's proposed remedy for the high price of oil, NBC's John Yang reported, was to "build more refineries and allow drilling in the protected Alaskan wilderness." Why had he not implemented those two policies during his seven years in office? He "spread some of the blame to Congress" for its opposition. ABC's Betsy Stark (embargoed link) consulted her panel of energy experts and they contradicted the President's theory: "It is not Congress but big oil companies--which reported record profits again this week--that have been reluctant to build new refineries." As for the summer holiday for the federal gasoline tax proposed by Presidential candidate John McCain and seconded by Hillary Rodham Clinton, "Bush would not commit," CBS' Jim Axelrod observed. Barack Obama calls the holiday "a gimmick."
That gasoline tax is levied to fund maintenance and improvements to highways. To kick off NBC's Falling Apart series Monday, Kevin Tibbles joined commuter Stacey Rubin for the morning rush hour through potholes towards the Emerald City of Chicago to dramatize an infrastructure in "midlife crisis." Muttered Tibbles to his host: "This ain't the Yellow Brick Road!" "No it ain't." Next Tom Costello boarded a New York bound Acela high speed train in Boston. With "skyrocketing fuel prices, congested highways and air travel gridlock," Amtrak ridership has increased by 11% over the last year. The railroad seeks $1.3bn in extra annual federal funding for the following wish list: extend the northeast corridor from Washington DC to Charlotte NC; add Acela routes in Florida, Texas and California; and turn Chicago into a high-speed hub with spokes to St Louis, Detroit and Cleveland.
Also on NBC, Anne Thompson looked at a component of Bush's energy plan that he has managed to get Congress to pass: the scheme to produce 20bn gallons of ethanol from processed corn by 2015. As early as next year, Thompson reported, fully 32% of the nation's corn harvest will be converted into fuel rather than used for food. She ticked off the adverse consequences: higher feed prices for cattle, chickens and hogs; a shortfall in wheat and soybeans as farmland is converted to corn; rising food prices "sparking consumer discontent here and riots around the world." Ethanol, concluded Thompson, is turning "from a fuel of the future to a political pariah."
BLOOD MONEY There was a couple of stories on Capitol Hill deemed worthy of coverage by a correspondent. CBS' Thalia Assuras attended a rally for a new GI Bill for military veterans. "Military recruiting ads virtually promise a college education," she stated, yet nowadays benefits have "plummeted," covering barely half the cost of tuition at a state-run university, with no stipend for housing or books. The proposed legislation would restore college aid to 1940s levels, "which covered all costs for World War II veterans." ABC's Elisabeth Leamy attended House hearings into Heparin, the blood thinning medication made by Baxter Pharmaceuticals used during dialysis. The drug has killed 81 patients because of tainted ingredients imported by Baxter from China. The Food & Drug Administration believes that Changzhou SPI, the company that makes Heparin's active ingredient "intentionally substituted a chemically similar compound to save money," Leamy reported. "Until this crisis the FDA had never inspected the Chinese plant."
CARRIER EYES QUDS FORCE From the Pentagon, CBS' David Martin covered the USNavy's decision to deploy a second aircraft carrier to the Persian Gulf. "The last thing the Pentagon wants is another war," he reassured us, before explaining why we should be worried anyway. The problem for the US military is apparently Iran's Quds Force, "which directs operations in Iraq" and is accused of smuggling weapons to be used against occupation forces there. When Chairman Mike Mullen of the Joint Chiefs of Staff stated, "I have reserve capability and particularly in our navy and our air force," he was hinting that a missile target could be the Quds Force headquarters, Martin suggested. The State Department "has begun drafting an ultimatum" to Teheran and Iraq's Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki "is expected to confront the Iranians with evidence of their meddling and demand a halt."
ELSEWHERE… An unsual storm system for the mid-Atlantic coast spawned a cluster of tornadoes that tore through Suffolk Va. CBS' Susan Roberts and ABC's David Kerley toured the damage. No one was killed…the Centers for Disease Control found that as many as one quarter of all toddlers do not receive their entire regimen of immunization shots according to the recommended schedule. ABC's John McKenzie blamed the shortfall on measles outbreaks in California, Arizona and Wisconsin. NBC's in-house physician Nancy Snyderman explained the epidemiology: for epidemics to be prevented fully 90% of a population must be properly immunized…Rockstar Games released the fourth version of its Grand Theft Auto videogame. CBS' Daniel Sieberg expects it to sell 6m copies, grossing $400m, which would exceed this year's biggest Hollywood movie box office hit.
MENTIONED IN PASSING The network newscasts do not assign correspondents to all of the news of the day. If Tyndall Report readers come across videostreamed reports online of stories that were mentioned only in passing, post the link in comments for us to check out.
Today's examples: the Marine Corps fought further south in Afghanistan than usual, taking on Taliban guerrillas in Garmser…US military rocket attacks on Baghdad's Sadr City neighborhood killed 25 people, many of them civilians…Tariq Aziz, the senior diplomat in Saddam Hussein's Iraqi government, has been put on trial for ordering summary executions…when a cargo container ship capsized in the Pacific Ocean it may have caused water damage to 400 news cars, turning them into potential lemons. Mazda junked them all to be on the safe side…fewer American workers are planning a summer vacation than at any time in the last 30 years.
The correspondents on the campaign trail were struck by Obama's unwonted display of emotion. CBS' Dean Reynolds called him "shocked, angered and clearly anguished" while NBC's Lee Cowan noted that "he unloaded on the Rev Wright like never before" calling it a "somber, almost angry response." ABC's David Wright (embargoed link) concluded that "clearly Obama did not relish disowning the pastor." Both ABC's Wright and CBS' Reynolds listed specific issues over which Obama contradicted the minister: the US government did not deliberately infect African-Americans with HIV/AIDS; the Nation of Islam's Louis Farrakhan is not praiseworthy; the foreign policy of the United States does not amount to terrorism. But it was the Rev Wright's insinuation that Obama had not been sincere in his previous criticisms, "just a political move," as CBS' Reynolds put it, that "really struck a nerve."
Obama's formal repudiation of the Rev Wright's comments warranted analysis in the horse race style on all three newscasts. CBS' Jeff Greenfield explained its necessity: "Wright's occupation of center stage was blocking everything else about Obama." ABC anchor Charles Gibson pointed out to his colleague George Stephanopoulos that the comments that Obama now finds fault with were not newly minted by the minister. Why the outrage now? Stephanopoulos pointed to Wright's high visibility: Obama's campaign "realized this was posing a mortal threat." NBC anchor Brian Williams asked Tim Russert whether any other frontrunning Presidential candidacy had been thus damaged not by his own words but by "an external force," the words of an associate. "Nothing of this magnitude," Russert opined. He called this "public divorce" from a spiritual advisor "unprecedented."
I am sure Russert must be mistaken. This cannot be the crowning example of guilt by association in the history of Presidential politics. Can anyone suggest counterexamples?
ANWR, AMTRAK, ETHANOL President George Bush's proposed remedy for the high price of oil, NBC's John Yang reported, was to "build more refineries and allow drilling in the protected Alaskan wilderness." Why had he not implemented those two policies during his seven years in office? He "spread some of the blame to Congress" for its opposition. ABC's Betsy Stark (embargoed link) consulted her panel of energy experts and they contradicted the President's theory: "It is not Congress but big oil companies--which reported record profits again this week--that have been reluctant to build new refineries." As for the summer holiday for the federal gasoline tax proposed by Presidential candidate John McCain and seconded by Hillary Rodham Clinton, "Bush would not commit," CBS' Jim Axelrod observed. Barack Obama calls the holiday "a gimmick."
That gasoline tax is levied to fund maintenance and improvements to highways. To kick off NBC's Falling Apart series Monday, Kevin Tibbles joined commuter Stacey Rubin for the morning rush hour through potholes towards the Emerald City of Chicago to dramatize an infrastructure in "midlife crisis." Muttered Tibbles to his host: "This ain't the Yellow Brick Road!" "No it ain't." Next Tom Costello boarded a New York bound Acela high speed train in Boston. With "skyrocketing fuel prices, congested highways and air travel gridlock," Amtrak ridership has increased by 11% over the last year. The railroad seeks $1.3bn in extra annual federal funding for the following wish list: extend the northeast corridor from Washington DC to Charlotte NC; add Acela routes in Florida, Texas and California; and turn Chicago into a high-speed hub with spokes to St Louis, Detroit and Cleveland.
Also on NBC, Anne Thompson looked at a component of Bush's energy plan that he has managed to get Congress to pass: the scheme to produce 20bn gallons of ethanol from processed corn by 2015. As early as next year, Thompson reported, fully 32% of the nation's corn harvest will be converted into fuel rather than used for food. She ticked off the adverse consequences: higher feed prices for cattle, chickens and hogs; a shortfall in wheat and soybeans as farmland is converted to corn; rising food prices "sparking consumer discontent here and riots around the world." Ethanol, concluded Thompson, is turning "from a fuel of the future to a political pariah."
BLOOD MONEY There was a couple of stories on Capitol Hill deemed worthy of coverage by a correspondent. CBS' Thalia Assuras attended a rally for a new GI Bill for military veterans. "Military recruiting ads virtually promise a college education," she stated, yet nowadays benefits have "plummeted," covering barely half the cost of tuition at a state-run university, with no stipend for housing or books. The proposed legislation would restore college aid to 1940s levels, "which covered all costs for World War II veterans." ABC's Elisabeth Leamy attended House hearings into Heparin, the blood thinning medication made by Baxter Pharmaceuticals used during dialysis. The drug has killed 81 patients because of tainted ingredients imported by Baxter from China. The Food & Drug Administration believes that Changzhou SPI, the company that makes Heparin's active ingredient "intentionally substituted a chemically similar compound to save money," Leamy reported. "Until this crisis the FDA had never inspected the Chinese plant."
CARRIER EYES QUDS FORCE From the Pentagon, CBS' David Martin covered the USNavy's decision to deploy a second aircraft carrier to the Persian Gulf. "The last thing the Pentagon wants is another war," he reassured us, before explaining why we should be worried anyway. The problem for the US military is apparently Iran's Quds Force, "which directs operations in Iraq" and is accused of smuggling weapons to be used against occupation forces there. When Chairman Mike Mullen of the Joint Chiefs of Staff stated, "I have reserve capability and particularly in our navy and our air force," he was hinting that a missile target could be the Quds Force headquarters, Martin suggested. The State Department "has begun drafting an ultimatum" to Teheran and Iraq's Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki "is expected to confront the Iranians with evidence of their meddling and demand a halt."
ELSEWHERE… An unsual storm system for the mid-Atlantic coast spawned a cluster of tornadoes that tore through Suffolk Va. CBS' Susan Roberts and ABC's David Kerley toured the damage. No one was killed…the Centers for Disease Control found that as many as one quarter of all toddlers do not receive their entire regimen of immunization shots according to the recommended schedule. ABC's John McKenzie blamed the shortfall on measles outbreaks in California, Arizona and Wisconsin. NBC's in-house physician Nancy Snyderman explained the epidemiology: for epidemics to be prevented fully 90% of a population must be properly immunized…Rockstar Games released the fourth version of its Grand Theft Auto videogame. CBS' Daniel Sieberg expects it to sell 6m copies, grossing $400m, which would exceed this year's biggest Hollywood movie box office hit.
MENTIONED IN PASSING The network newscasts do not assign correspondents to all of the news of the day. If Tyndall Report readers come across videostreamed reports online of stories that were mentioned only in passing, post the link in comments for us to check out.
Today's examples: the Marine Corps fought further south in Afghanistan than usual, taking on Taliban guerrillas in Garmser…US military rocket attacks on Baghdad's Sadr City neighborhood killed 25 people, many of them civilians…Tariq Aziz, the senior diplomat in Saddam Hussein's Iraqi government, has been put on trial for ordering summary executions…when a cargo container ship capsized in the Pacific Ocean it may have caused water damage to 400 news cars, turning them into potential lemons. Mazda junked them all to be on the safe side…fewer American workers are planning a summer vacation than at any time in the last 30 years.
