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TYNDALL HEADLINE: HIGHLIGHTS FROM JUNE 23, 2010
Make that two days in a row. Tuesday, for the first time in six weeks the Gulf of Mexico oil disaster did not qualify as Story of the Day on the networks' nightly newscasts. Now again, mirabile dictu, that gushing oil is still not #1. Tuesday featured the insubordinate quotes from the brain trust of Gen Stanley McChrystal, disdaining his civilian superiors. Wednesday saw all three newscasts lead with their White House correspondents, as Commander-in-Chief Barack Obama replaced McChrsytal as commander of the Afghanistan War with his own boss. Meet the new boss, Gen David Petraeus.
TYNDALL PICKS FOR JUNE 23, 2010: CLICK ON GRID ELEMENTS TO SEARCH FOR MATCHING ITEMS
THE TALE OF TWO GENERALS Make that two days in a row. Tuesday, for the first time in six weeks the Gulf of Mexico oil disaster did not qualify as Story of the Day on the networks' nightly newscasts. Now again, mirabile dictu, that gushing oil is still not #1. Tuesday featured the insubordinate quotes from the brain trust of Gen Stanley McChrystal, disdaining his civilian superiors. Wednesday saw all three newscasts lead with their White House correspondents, as Commander-in-Chief Barack Obama replaced McChrsytal as commander of the Afghanistan War with his own boss. Meet the new boss, Gen David Petraeus.
Tuesday, CBS' Lara Logan claimed that the President's entire policy for Afghanistan was dependent on McChrystal staying in command. "The strategy needs McChrystal to fight for it and with so much political opposition in Washington it is unclear that it will be able to survive." The switch from McChrystal to Petraeus contradicted Logan's scenario. "One thing the President made clear," noted NBC's Chuck Todd, "he may be changing commanders but not the mission." CBS' Chip Reid pointed out that Petraeus himself was "a chief architect" of the policy McChrystal had been implementing.
ABC devoted most time to McChrystal. Jake Tapper, its man at the White House, saw the general's career come "to an abrupt and inglorious end." In a Defining Moments feature, anchor Diane Sawyer introduced historian Doris Kearns Goodwin (a longtime consultant for NBC News when Tim Russert was DC Bureau chief) to compare McChrystal & Obama with McClellan & Lincoln, and MacArthur & Truman. The Three Macs! Good Morning America anchor George Stephanopoulos commented that "McChrystal made it easy for the President. He did not put up much of a fight."
ABC's David Muir noted that McChrystal, the son of a general, had a self-image as a "superhuman commander" who famously joined subordinates on commando raids in the dark of night. Muir argued that McChrystal was "a leader, defined by his discipline, now punished for the few moments he wavered from it." That is a controversial reading of the storm caused by the Rolling Stone profile. Rather than indiscipline, it seems that the general's downfall was his decision to surround himself with aides who have no respect for the civilian chain of command. Listen to Muir's quote from McChrystal himself: "The pride I have always taken is when you build a team." His own team sabotaged him.
WHAT FACES PETRAEUS All three Pentagon correspondents turned to the War in Afghanistan, now to be commanded by Gen David Petraeus. ABC's Martha Raddatz told us about a counterinsurgency challenged by "corruption rampant in some areas, slow civilian progress and a very determined enemy." NBC's Jim Miklaszewski reported that both the White House and the Pentagon are "growing increasingly concerned" that the war in Afghanistan is "bogged down." "Stalemate at best," was the assessment from CBS' David Martin. He reported on rifts between the military and diplomats, exemplified in the Rolling Stone article: "McChrystal's final service to his country may have been to force a moment of ugly truth."
As for the troops on the ground, both ABC's Miguel Marquez in Helmand Province with the Marine Corps and NBC's Richard Engel (at the tail of the Miklaszewski videostream) in Kabul perceived Petraeus' impending arrival as a morale booster.
THE BOTTOM LINE OF WANAT David Martin had to do double duty on Afghanistan for CBS as he filed his third update on the Battle of Wanat, which left nine GIs dead in the summer of 2008. Last fall he brought us hellacious battlefield footage; this spring he told us that the Pentagon found dereliction of duty by a trio of officers for leaving the outpost inadequately defended; now the trio has been exonerated. "The bottom line of Wanat is that the United States asked too much of too few soldiers and too many died. That could turn out to be the bottom line of the entire war."
ROBOT SNAFU WORSENS GUSHER While Chuck Todd was reporting on the Commander in Chief and his generals, NBC's other White House correspondent Savannah Guthrie was assigned to report on her network's latest national opinion poll, conducted with The Wall Street Journal. She found Barack Obama's approval at its lowest level to date, 45%, and pointed to disapproval of his handling of the Gulf of Mexico oil disaster as the cause of the most recent decline.
Speaking of the crude oil gushing out of the seabed, all three newscasts told us about the robot submarine that crashed into a containment pipe, shutting off a valve and interrupting the siphoning off of some of the oil. As a result an extra 27K barrels each day are now polluting the gulf waters. Anne Thompson filed for NBC; Kelly Cobiella, her boots stuck in marshland glue, for CBS; Sharyn Alfonsi, on the barrier Chandeleur Islands, for ABC.
In addition, NBC's Mark Potter had bad news from the beaches of Pensacola, where oil came ashore overnight. ABC's Matt Gutman (at the tail of the Alfonsi videostream) brought us "evidence of marine biologists' doomsday scenario"--an unusual feeding frenzy by desperate sharks that indicates that food is disappearing from the sea as plumes of oil are shut off its oxygen.
FUN FROM THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS Anthony Mason had fun on CBS explaining the National Recording Registry of the Library of Congress. It collects audio that represents America's cultural history. Mason called it "a national iPod."
HE PLAYS ONE ON TV Dr Richard Besser, formerly of the Centers of Disease Control, is ABC's in-house physician and is learning to play a journalist on TV.
Who? What? When? Where? Why? should be his next lesson.
Monday he filed a story about a girl with a magnetized prosthetic leg that grows as she grows. He did not tell us where the girl comes from nor where Stanmore Implants, which makes the leg, is from. Now Besser tells us that stem cells from the cornea can be regrown to restore the sight of those who have been accidentally blinded. Who is the blind person? Unidentified. When was sight restored? No timeline. Where did it happen? "In a laboratory."
In both stories, Dr Besser's field reporting consisted of interviewing a European-accented scientist on Skype.
SPORTS MAD Both NBC and CBS assigned correspondents to cover the day's two big sports stories. The USA advanced to the final stages of the World Cup with a single goal in the final minutes of its game with Algeria. John Isner survived to play another day against Nicolas Mahut by playing an undecided seven-hour fifth set at Wimbledon.
That is soccer and tennis, to you.
NBC's Ian Williams filed from South Africa and Jim Maceda filed from London. CBS made neither of its reports--by Jeff Glor and Mark Phillips respectively--available as an online videostream.
Tuesday, CBS' Lara Logan claimed that the President's entire policy for Afghanistan was dependent on McChrystal staying in command. "The strategy needs McChrystal to fight for it and with so much political opposition in Washington it is unclear that it will be able to survive." The switch from McChrystal to Petraeus contradicted Logan's scenario. "One thing the President made clear," noted NBC's Chuck Todd, "he may be changing commanders but not the mission." CBS' Chip Reid pointed out that Petraeus himself was "a chief architect" of the policy McChrystal had been implementing.
ABC devoted most time to McChrystal. Jake Tapper, its man at the White House, saw the general's career come "to an abrupt and inglorious end." In a Defining Moments feature, anchor Diane Sawyer introduced historian Doris Kearns Goodwin (a longtime consultant for NBC News when Tim Russert was DC Bureau chief) to compare McChrystal & Obama with McClellan & Lincoln, and MacArthur & Truman. The Three Macs! Good Morning America anchor George Stephanopoulos commented that "McChrystal made it easy for the President. He did not put up much of a fight."
ABC's David Muir noted that McChrystal, the son of a general, had a self-image as a "superhuman commander" who famously joined subordinates on commando raids in the dark of night. Muir argued that McChrystal was "a leader, defined by his discipline, now punished for the few moments he wavered from it." That is a controversial reading of the storm caused by the Rolling Stone profile. Rather than indiscipline, it seems that the general's downfall was his decision to surround himself with aides who have no respect for the civilian chain of command. Listen to Muir's quote from McChrystal himself: "The pride I have always taken is when you build a team." His own team sabotaged him.
WHAT FACES PETRAEUS All three Pentagon correspondents turned to the War in Afghanistan, now to be commanded by Gen David Petraeus. ABC's Martha Raddatz told us about a counterinsurgency challenged by "corruption rampant in some areas, slow civilian progress and a very determined enemy." NBC's Jim Miklaszewski reported that both the White House and the Pentagon are "growing increasingly concerned" that the war in Afghanistan is "bogged down." "Stalemate at best," was the assessment from CBS' David Martin. He reported on rifts between the military and diplomats, exemplified in the Rolling Stone article: "McChrystal's final service to his country may have been to force a moment of ugly truth."
As for the troops on the ground, both ABC's Miguel Marquez in Helmand Province with the Marine Corps and NBC's Richard Engel (at the tail of the Miklaszewski videostream) in Kabul perceived Petraeus' impending arrival as a morale booster.
THE BOTTOM LINE OF WANAT David Martin had to do double duty on Afghanistan for CBS as he filed his third update on the Battle of Wanat, which left nine GIs dead in the summer of 2008. Last fall he brought us hellacious battlefield footage; this spring he told us that the Pentagon found dereliction of duty by a trio of officers for leaving the outpost inadequately defended; now the trio has been exonerated. "The bottom line of Wanat is that the United States asked too much of too few soldiers and too many died. That could turn out to be the bottom line of the entire war."
ROBOT SNAFU WORSENS GUSHER While Chuck Todd was reporting on the Commander in Chief and his generals, NBC's other White House correspondent Savannah Guthrie was assigned to report on her network's latest national opinion poll, conducted with The Wall Street Journal. She found Barack Obama's approval at its lowest level to date, 45%, and pointed to disapproval of his handling of the Gulf of Mexico oil disaster as the cause of the most recent decline.
Speaking of the crude oil gushing out of the seabed, all three newscasts told us about the robot submarine that crashed into a containment pipe, shutting off a valve and interrupting the siphoning off of some of the oil. As a result an extra 27K barrels each day are now polluting the gulf waters. Anne Thompson filed for NBC; Kelly Cobiella, her boots stuck in marshland glue, for CBS; Sharyn Alfonsi, on the barrier Chandeleur Islands, for ABC.
In addition, NBC's Mark Potter had bad news from the beaches of Pensacola, where oil came ashore overnight. ABC's Matt Gutman (at the tail of the Alfonsi videostream) brought us "evidence of marine biologists' doomsday scenario"--an unusual feeding frenzy by desperate sharks that indicates that food is disappearing from the sea as plumes of oil are shut off its oxygen.
FUN FROM THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS Anthony Mason had fun on CBS explaining the National Recording Registry of the Library of Congress. It collects audio that represents America's cultural history. Mason called it "a national iPod."
HE PLAYS ONE ON TV Dr Richard Besser, formerly of the Centers of Disease Control, is ABC's in-house physician and is learning to play a journalist on TV.
Who? What? When? Where? Why? should be his next lesson.
Monday he filed a story about a girl with a magnetized prosthetic leg that grows as she grows. He did not tell us where the girl comes from nor where Stanmore Implants, which makes the leg, is from. Now Besser tells us that stem cells from the cornea can be regrown to restore the sight of those who have been accidentally blinded. Who is the blind person? Unidentified. When was sight restored? No timeline. Where did it happen? "In a laboratory."
In both stories, Dr Besser's field reporting consisted of interviewing a European-accented scientist on Skype.
SPORTS MAD Both NBC and CBS assigned correspondents to cover the day's two big sports stories. The USA advanced to the final stages of the World Cup with a single goal in the final minutes of its game with Algeria. John Isner survived to play another day against Nicolas Mahut by playing an undecided seven-hour fifth set at Wimbledon.
That is soccer and tennis, to you.
NBC's Ian Williams filed from South Africa and Jim Maceda filed from London. CBS made neither of its reports--by Jeff Glor and Mark Phillips respectively--available as an online videostream.
