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TYNDALL HEADLINE: HIGHLIGHTS FROM JANUARY 23, 2009
Barack Obama's weeklong headline streak was broken by ABC. The only network newscast in the last five days not to lead with the new President and his administration was anchored by substitute Diane Sawyer. Instead she chose the approval by the Food & Drug Administration for Geron Corporation, a biotech firm, to conduct clinical trials using human embryo stem cells on newly paralyzed spinal cord patients. Otherwise Obama's dominance continued unabated. The Story of the Day saw the new First Family settling in at the White House. NBC led with the President's negotiations with Congressional leaders over fiscal stimulus for the economy. For the third straight day, CBS chose a round-up of Obama's busy daily calendar.
TYNDALL PICKS FOR JANUARY 23, 2009: CLICK ON GRID ELEMENTS TO SEARCH FOR MATCHING ITEMS
NEW PRESIDENT GRADED BY SUNDAY MORNING ANCHORS Barack Obama's weeklong headline streak was broken by ABC. The only network newscast in the last five days not to lead with the new President and his administration was anchored by substitute Diane Sawyer. Instead she chose the approval by the Food & Drug Administration for Geron Corporation, a biotech firm, to conduct clinical trials using human embryo stem cells on newly paralyzed spinal cord patients. Otherwise Obama's dominance continued unabated. The Story of the Day saw the new First Family settling in at the White House. NBC led with the President's negotiations with Congressional leaders over fiscal stimulus for the economy. For the third straight day, CBS chose a round-up of Obama's busy daily calendar.
CBS' White House correspondent Chip Reid checked off the President's economic talks, his reversal of his predecessor's global funding policy for family planning and his continuation of George Bush's cross-border raids from Afghanistan into Pakistan. Reid reported that a pair of missiles killed "at least one al-Qaeda operative." From the Pentagon on NBC, Jim Miklaszewski spelled out the lethality that lay behind Reid's "at least" euphemism: the drone attack reportedly killed 14 people in Pakistan, only five of whom were "militants." Miklaszewski did not identify the other nine that the CIA terminated.
ABC's George Stephanopoulos (embargoed link) of This Week lavished praise on Obama's first week in office as "disciplined and strategic" in its implementation of his campaign slogan of Change. Stephanopoulos highlighted Obama's commitment to open government, to new ethics rules and to dismantling the legal foundation for his predecessor's War on Terrorism. He conceded, however, that Obama's bid to halt the revolving door between Beltway lobbying firms and government bureaucracies was "meeting hard reality." The role of deputy at the Pentagon "is a highly specialized job that only about a dozen people in the country can fill." Obama's nominee, William Lynn, happens to be a lobbyist, so he became his first ethics exception.
Stephanopoulos' Sunday morning competitors also both pitched in on the President's first week. Bob Schieffer (no link) of CBS' Face the Nation called Obama's program "ambitious" and opined that "the huge crowds that came to Washington have changed the tone here" making its passage more likely. David Gregory of NBC's Meet the Press focused on fiscal stimulus and the potential closing of the Guantanamo Bay detention center, calling the question of what to do with those inmates "a big concern." By contrast, NBC's Miklaszewski Thursday estimated that fewer than 20 of Guantanamo's inmates posed problems. Gregory contrasted critics of the $825bn spending plan: those conservatives who criticize its excesses do "not appear significant enough;" whereas those "on the left" who criticize its caution emphasize that "the government is really the spender of last resort" amid consumer belt-tightening.
SEARCHING FOR EVIDENCE OF BIPARTISANSHIP White House correspondents at ABC and NBC focused on Barack Obama's talks with Congressional leaders on that fiscal boost of $825bn. "House Republicans gripe they have barely been consulted on the stimulus package," reported ABC's Jake Tapper, so they submitted a "wish list" of tax cuts to the President. When they disagreed on income tax rates, Tapper told us that the President told the GOPers: "I won. So I think on that one I trump you." Tapper asked White House press secretary Robert Gibbs whether all of the spending is "truly stimulative" and whether the House bill was really bipartisan. Gibbs answered the first question in the affirmative and ignored the second.
NBC's Savannah Guthrie publicized Republican objections to lines of spending that, they claim, will not stimulate the economy quickly. She ticked off school meals, and parks improvements, and coupons to modernize television sets, and vehicle purchases. In total those GOP items amounted to $2.2bn out of the $825bn total--closer to cavils than true complaints.
STATE OF THE STATES NBC's Chris Jansing demonstrated the need for federal grants among state governments. "An unprecedented 46 states now have budget deficits," she reckoned, as revenue from sales taxes and income taxes go down and demand for services increases: 34 states have announced layoffs; 28 are cutting education aid; 21 are reducing programs for the elderly and the disabled. CBS and ABC also assigned correspondents to cover state government stories--but they focused on personalities not budgets. ABC's John Berman saw the end of the Empire State "soap opera" as former First Daughter Caroline Kennedy was not named by Gov David Paterson to the Senate seat vacated by Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton. Berman called it a "twisted he-said-she-said about why Kennedy bowed out of contention." Meet the new junior senator from New York: Kirsten Gillibrand. CBS' Dean Reynolds brought us Rod Blagojevich, the Governor of the Land of Lincoln, who has decided to boycott his own impeachment trial. He warned that only he stands between the people of Illinois and a "whopping huge tax increase" should he be removed from office. This is how he characterized the mood of frontier justice in the state's Senate: "Before we hang him let us give him a fair trial. Then we shall hang him."
WAITING FOR STEM CELL GO AHEAD The Geron Corporation's human embryo stem cell experiment was covered by ABC's John McKenzie and NBC's Robert Bazell. Bazell pointed out that Geron's was among the few stem cell projects that have been active over the past eight years. When then-President George Bush banned federal funding for research in 2001, "the effect was to stop much of the science." The Geron experiment has the limited goal of finding out whether the injection of the embryonic cells, already performed on paralyzed rats, is "safe in people," ABC's McKenzie explained, rather than being designed for actual therapy. It will first be tested on eight or ten recently injured spinal cord patients. NBC's Bazell predicted that the ban on federal funding for such research may be revoked "as early as next week."
USING CRAYONS IN THE WAR ON TERRORISM The debate over the wisdom of closing the Guantanamo Bay detention center continues apace. Thursday, Jan Crawford Greenburg covered criticisms of the closure on ABC's A Closer Look while CBS' David Martin outlined the negatives of its opening in the first place. Now ABC's Brian Ross brings us footage of a Saudi Arabian "terror rehab" clinic in a "former royal family retreat outside Riyadh." Released Guantanamo inmates receive religious re-education and government incentives--a new home and a car--if they commit themselves to renouncing terrorist tactics. Ross mocked the rehab for including art therapy using "crayons and paper." From the Pentagon, NBC's Jim Miklaszewski cited statistics that seven out of every eight inmates released from Guantanamo Bay to date have decided to reject al-Qaeda--which means that 61 of the 525 are militants to this day. Exhibit A among those 61 is Said Ali al-Shihri, who is believed to have organized the bombing of the United States Embassy in Yemen in September 2008. The time spent at Guantanamo Bay, Miklaszewski explained, elevates former inmates "to hero status with al-Qaeda."
FIGHTING AFGHANISTAN’S SHIFTING WEB Elizabeth Palmer of CBS, who reported from Kabul on Wednesday on the United States' plan for military reinforcements in Afghanistan, now turns to the training of the local army: 6,000 recruits go through basic training every ten weeks. She warned that it is a "country of fragile loyalties" and that some of the new soldiers "could quite easily switch sides." Palmer also pointed out that the Taliban is not the same party that governed the country in 2001. "The organization splintered and has become much more complex" since it was ousted from power. Rather than a coherent group, the so-called Taliban is "a shifting web" including Islamic extremists, fighters who "hate foreigners," drug smugglers and "villagers just desperate for a job."
CHANNELING WEST WING Both ABC and NBC decided to close the week with a West Wing feature. NBC's Making a Difference consisted of former First Daughters Jenna and Barbara Bush reading their letter of advice to their successors Sasha and Malia Obama. Remember, the Bush twins advised, that their father is their father "not the sketch in the paper or a part of the skit on television." As for the Obama sisters' father, Diane Sawyer chose his personal aide Reggie Love to be ABC's Person of the Week. "Personal aide" is the job title for what used to be called a gentleman's gentleman as Love, a one-time college athlete at Duke University, tends to Presidential needs. Here is Obama's praise for the 26-year-old: "I have hipped him to Aretha Franklin and John Coltrane and he in turn has downloaded Jay-Z and Lil Wayne and some of those folks so that I am, you know, not a complete fuddy-duddy." In POTUS-speak, Sawyer told us, Love is the Body Man.
CBS' White House correspondent Chip Reid checked off the President's economic talks, his reversal of his predecessor's global funding policy for family planning and his continuation of George Bush's cross-border raids from Afghanistan into Pakistan. Reid reported that a pair of missiles killed "at least one al-Qaeda operative." From the Pentagon on NBC, Jim Miklaszewski spelled out the lethality that lay behind Reid's "at least" euphemism: the drone attack reportedly killed 14 people in Pakistan, only five of whom were "militants." Miklaszewski did not identify the other nine that the CIA terminated.
ABC's George Stephanopoulos (embargoed link) of This Week lavished praise on Obama's first week in office as "disciplined and strategic" in its implementation of his campaign slogan of Change. Stephanopoulos highlighted Obama's commitment to open government, to new ethics rules and to dismantling the legal foundation for his predecessor's War on Terrorism. He conceded, however, that Obama's bid to halt the revolving door between Beltway lobbying firms and government bureaucracies was "meeting hard reality." The role of deputy at the Pentagon "is a highly specialized job that only about a dozen people in the country can fill." Obama's nominee, William Lynn, happens to be a lobbyist, so he became his first ethics exception.
Stephanopoulos' Sunday morning competitors also both pitched in on the President's first week. Bob Schieffer (no link) of CBS' Face the Nation called Obama's program "ambitious" and opined that "the huge crowds that came to Washington have changed the tone here" making its passage more likely. David Gregory of NBC's Meet the Press focused on fiscal stimulus and the potential closing of the Guantanamo Bay detention center, calling the question of what to do with those inmates "a big concern." By contrast, NBC's Miklaszewski Thursday estimated that fewer than 20 of Guantanamo's inmates posed problems. Gregory contrasted critics of the $825bn spending plan: those conservatives who criticize its excesses do "not appear significant enough;" whereas those "on the left" who criticize its caution emphasize that "the government is really the spender of last resort" amid consumer belt-tightening.
SEARCHING FOR EVIDENCE OF BIPARTISANSHIP White House correspondents at ABC and NBC focused on Barack Obama's talks with Congressional leaders on that fiscal boost of $825bn. "House Republicans gripe they have barely been consulted on the stimulus package," reported ABC's Jake Tapper, so they submitted a "wish list" of tax cuts to the President. When they disagreed on income tax rates, Tapper told us that the President told the GOPers: "I won. So I think on that one I trump you." Tapper asked White House press secretary Robert Gibbs whether all of the spending is "truly stimulative" and whether the House bill was really bipartisan. Gibbs answered the first question in the affirmative and ignored the second.
NBC's Savannah Guthrie publicized Republican objections to lines of spending that, they claim, will not stimulate the economy quickly. She ticked off school meals, and parks improvements, and coupons to modernize television sets, and vehicle purchases. In total those GOP items amounted to $2.2bn out of the $825bn total--closer to cavils than true complaints.
STATE OF THE STATES NBC's Chris Jansing demonstrated the need for federal grants among state governments. "An unprecedented 46 states now have budget deficits," she reckoned, as revenue from sales taxes and income taxes go down and demand for services increases: 34 states have announced layoffs; 28 are cutting education aid; 21 are reducing programs for the elderly and the disabled. CBS and ABC also assigned correspondents to cover state government stories--but they focused on personalities not budgets. ABC's John Berman saw the end of the Empire State "soap opera" as former First Daughter Caroline Kennedy was not named by Gov David Paterson to the Senate seat vacated by Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton. Berman called it a "twisted he-said-she-said about why Kennedy bowed out of contention." Meet the new junior senator from New York: Kirsten Gillibrand. CBS' Dean Reynolds brought us Rod Blagojevich, the Governor of the Land of Lincoln, who has decided to boycott his own impeachment trial. He warned that only he stands between the people of Illinois and a "whopping huge tax increase" should he be removed from office. This is how he characterized the mood of frontier justice in the state's Senate: "Before we hang him let us give him a fair trial. Then we shall hang him."
WAITING FOR STEM CELL GO AHEAD The Geron Corporation's human embryo stem cell experiment was covered by ABC's John McKenzie and NBC's Robert Bazell. Bazell pointed out that Geron's was among the few stem cell projects that have been active over the past eight years. When then-President George Bush banned federal funding for research in 2001, "the effect was to stop much of the science." The Geron experiment has the limited goal of finding out whether the injection of the embryonic cells, already performed on paralyzed rats, is "safe in people," ABC's McKenzie explained, rather than being designed for actual therapy. It will first be tested on eight or ten recently injured spinal cord patients. NBC's Bazell predicted that the ban on federal funding for such research may be revoked "as early as next week."
USING CRAYONS IN THE WAR ON TERRORISM The debate over the wisdom of closing the Guantanamo Bay detention center continues apace. Thursday, Jan Crawford Greenburg covered criticisms of the closure on ABC's A Closer Look while CBS' David Martin outlined the negatives of its opening in the first place. Now ABC's Brian Ross brings us footage of a Saudi Arabian "terror rehab" clinic in a "former royal family retreat outside Riyadh." Released Guantanamo inmates receive religious re-education and government incentives--a new home and a car--if they commit themselves to renouncing terrorist tactics. Ross mocked the rehab for including art therapy using "crayons and paper." From the Pentagon, NBC's Jim Miklaszewski cited statistics that seven out of every eight inmates released from Guantanamo Bay to date have decided to reject al-Qaeda--which means that 61 of the 525 are militants to this day. Exhibit A among those 61 is Said Ali al-Shihri, who is believed to have organized the bombing of the United States Embassy in Yemen in September 2008. The time spent at Guantanamo Bay, Miklaszewski explained, elevates former inmates "to hero status with al-Qaeda."
FIGHTING AFGHANISTAN’S SHIFTING WEB Elizabeth Palmer of CBS, who reported from Kabul on Wednesday on the United States' plan for military reinforcements in Afghanistan, now turns to the training of the local army: 6,000 recruits go through basic training every ten weeks. She warned that it is a "country of fragile loyalties" and that some of the new soldiers "could quite easily switch sides." Palmer also pointed out that the Taliban is not the same party that governed the country in 2001. "The organization splintered and has become much more complex" since it was ousted from power. Rather than a coherent group, the so-called Taliban is "a shifting web" including Islamic extremists, fighters who "hate foreigners," drug smugglers and "villagers just desperate for a job."
CHANNELING WEST WING Both ABC and NBC decided to close the week with a West Wing feature. NBC's Making a Difference consisted of former First Daughters Jenna and Barbara Bush reading their letter of advice to their successors Sasha and Malia Obama. Remember, the Bush twins advised, that their father is their father "not the sketch in the paper or a part of the skit on television." As for the Obama sisters' father, Diane Sawyer chose his personal aide Reggie Love to be ABC's Person of the Week. "Personal aide" is the job title for what used to be called a gentleman's gentleman as Love, a one-time college athlete at Duke University, tends to Presidential needs. Here is Obama's praise for the 26-year-old: "I have hipped him to Aretha Franklin and John Coltrane and he in turn has downloaded Jay-Z and Lil Wayne and some of those folks so that I am, you know, not a complete fuddy-duddy." In POTUS-speak, Sawyer told us, Love is the Body Man.
