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TYNDALL HEADLINE: HIGHLIGHTS FROM JANUARY 17, 2011
It looked as though the weekend would provide an appropriate bookend to the voluminous coverage of the tragedy in Tucson last week. After all, as shooting sprees go, it was relatively well contained, with only six fatalities. It was newsworthy because one of those shot happened to be a congresswoman, but Gabrielle Giffords was wounded not killed. So the networks had the opportunity to start this week afresh. But no, back to Tucson they went as all three newscasts led with an hospital update on Giffords' medical condition. ABC had a self-promoting motive for its decision, having snared an Excusive with Mark Kelly, Giffords' astronaut husband. NBC and CBS had no ulterior motive--and so, also, no excuse. Substitute anchor Harry Smith sat in on CBS.
TYNDALL PICKS FOR JANUARY 17, 2011: CLICK ON GRID ELEMENTS TO SEARCH FOR MATCHING ITEMS
BACK TO TUCSON ONE MORE TIME It looked as though the weekend would provide an appropriate bookend to the voluminous coverage of the tragedy in Tucson last week. After all, as shooting sprees go, it was relatively well contained, with only six fatalities. It was newsworthy because one of those shot happened to be a congresswoman, but Gabrielle Giffords was wounded not killed. So the networks had the opportunity to start this week afresh. But no, back to Tucson they went as all three newscasts led with an hospital update on Giffords' medical condition. ABC had a self-promoting motive for its decision, having snared an Excusive with Mark Kelly, Giffords' astronaut husband. NBC and CBS had no ulterior motive--and so, also, no excuse. Substitute anchor Harry Smith sat in on CBS.
The Congresswoman & the Astronaut was the title of ABC's 20/20 primetime special brought to us by anchor Diane Sawyer. She kicked off with husband Kelly's tale of his brain-damaged wife rubbing his neck as he sat by her bedside in the intensive care unit. Sawyer also consulted Good Morning America anchor George Stephanopoulos about their network's opinion poll on Tucson: hear what the country thinks of Barack Obama's memorial tribute, Sarah Palin's criticism of blood libel, the conduct of the news media, and the prospects for gun control legislation.
All three networks had their correspondents attend that encouraging medical press conference on Giffords' convalescence: ABC's David Muir, CBS' Ben Tracy and NBC's Kristen Welker. Rep Giffords may leave the hospital to start rehab therapy in weeks, or even days. CBS' Tracy rounded out his report with snippets from Tucson's "still raw" atmosphere. He showed a clip from the Genocide School video that Jared Loughner, the accused killer, made of the community college that suspended him; and he told us about the You're Dead threat that Eric Fuller, one of those injured, hurled at a local organizer of the Tea Party. Fuller is now under psychiatric care, "very remorseful," according to a friend.
PLAYING DOMINOES Finally one of the three networks has a correspondent on the streets of Tunis to cover the so-called Jasmine Revolution. NBC's John Ray found renewed street protests against the coalition government installed in Tunisia after President Zine Ben Ali was ousted: "The crowds were smaller than a week ago but the anger just as intense…They believe now that their revolution is being betrayed so the unrest continues." From London, CBS' Mark Phillips voiced over a graphic that literally showed a series of giant toppling dominoes, spreading across the southern Mediterranean from Mauritania. Martha Raddatz offered the view from Washington for ABC: "Not so fast," she advised, predicting survival for Hosni Mubarak in Egypt and King Abdullah in Jordan, allies of the United States both. "Leaders in the region will be keeping a close eye on these protests. As one analyst told me, you might see a crackdown on protesters--but also a lowering of food prices to keep the people happy."
ENGEL MUSCLES IN ON PALMER’S TURF, DELIVERS BAFFLING SOUNDBITE Mostly, coverage of Iran's nuclear program is not concerned with the facts on the ground but with strategic concerns inside-the-Beltway. Of the 43 reports filed on all three newscasts over the past four years, fully 26 have had a Washington DC dateline, mostly either the Pentagon or the White House. Only eleven have originated from a abroad, a beat that has been all-but owned by Elizabeth Palmer of CBS, who is responsible for seven of them. Now Richard Engel muscles in on Palmer's turf with an Exclusive tour of the Teheran Research Reactor, which was built by US engineers for the Shah of Iran to produce medical isotopes. Engel was told that nuclear facility's output treats 850,000 cancer patients.
Naturally, NBC's Engel was not interested in healthcare reporting. He wanted to know about November's assassination of a nuclear scientist in the streets of Teheran (which CBS' Palmer did cover) and in cyber-sabotage of Iran's uranium enrichment by the Stuxnet computer worm (which The New York Times covered but no network newscast has picked up on). You listen to Engel's soundbites with nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili: clearly he blames the assassination on Zionists; as for Stuxnet, who knows what he admits to and what amounts to No Comment?
WHAT’S UP, BABY DOC? When Baby Doc returned to Haiti, NBC sent Kerry Sanders to Port-au-Prince while Kelly Cobiella narrated the video feed from CBS' bureau in Miami. NBC's Sanders recapped Jean-Claude Duvalier's 15-year "iron fist" rule starting as a 19-year-old in 1971: "His feared private police force, the Tonton Macoutes, silenced opponents by machete or guns." Recalled CBS' Cobiella: "Haitians danced in the streets when Duvalier fled the country in 1986--but that was then. Now, with more than 800,000 living in tent cities, a deadly cholera outbreak and riots over a disputed presidential election, some look back on Duvalier's rule and remember security and stability. But most do not remember it at all." Duvalier expects to stay in Haiti for three days, Cobiella reported.
I-DEJA VU It was almost exactly two years ago that Steve Jobs took a leave of absence for health reasons from his job as Chief Executive of Apple Computer. Back then all three newscasts assigned a correspondent to cover it: ABC used Neal Karlinsky, CBS used Anthony Mason and NBC consulted CNBC, who assigned Maria Bartiromo. Back then Jobs was given credit for inventing the iPhone and the iPod. "Analysts say Jobs is Apple," declared ABC's Karlinsky. "To investors, Steve Jobs is Apple, CBS' Mason chimed in.
Now, Jobs takes a leave of absence for health reasons from his job as Chief Executive of Apple Computer. All three newscasts assigned a correspondent to cover it: ABC used Karlinsky, CBS used Mason and NBC consulted CNBC, who assigned Jon Fortt. Jobs gets credit for inventing the iPad and the iPhone and the iPod. "Few companies' fortunes are as closely tied to their CEO as Apple," averred ABC's Karlinsky. How did CBS' Mason put it? "No other CEO is more closely tied to his company's success than Steve Jobs."
CATFISH FOOD FIGHT Last November, NBC had Jeff Rossen file an Investigation into the safety of imports of catfish, shrimp, crabmeat and talapia, alleging that fish farms in Vietnam and other east Asian countries use toxic antibiotics and sewage-polluted waters. Rossen revealed that the FDA tests less than 2% of imported seafood for safety; seafood importers responded that this was a trade issue being raised by domestic fish farms, not a safety problem at all. Fast forward three months and CBS' Mark Strassmann takes a trip to Greensboro, the Catfish Capital of Alabama: "American farmers say unlike their fish, foreign catfish is suspect, full of antibiotics and other chemicals banned to American farmers as unhealthy." They want increased USDA inspection of imports; seafood importers respond that this was a trade issue being raised by domestic fish farms, not a safety problem at all.
EX-ABCER RON JR HAPPENS TO BE NO EMBARRASSMENT--ABC Ron Reagan, an MSNBC analyst, attracted publicity for his book Friday from NBC's John Yang by speculating that his father showed first signs of looming Alzheimer's Disease while he was still in the Oval Office. Now talkradio host Michael Reagan has responded to that claim with a fraternal insult, twittering that his half-brother is an "embarrassment" and Ron Jr, a onetime correspondent for Good Morning America, showed up on ABC's morning show to defend himself. ABC's Sharyn Alfonsi played referee between the two brothers thus: Mild Cognitive Impairment is likely the correct diagnosis of Ronald Reagan's verbal stumbles while he was President. Within five years, roughly half of those who show symptoms of MCI go on to develop full-blown Alzheimer's Disease. The President falls into that category, so his son Ron happened to have been correct in spotting signs--but he had a 50% chance of being incorrect.
HAPPY MARTIN LUTHER KING DAY For CBS' Assignment America series Steve Hartman visited the students of Simsbury High School along Connecticut's onetime Tobacco Road. They have made A Man Who Changed the World, a documentary about the teenage students from Morehouse College who used to be summertime migrant workers in the tobacco fields. They included a young MLK, who recalled returning home to Atlanta: "It was a bitter feeling going back to segregation. It was hard to understand why I could ride wherever I pleased on the train from New York to Washington--and then had to change to a Jim Crow car at the nation's capital."
ABC's Steve Osunsami accompanied public broadcasting journalist Charlayne Hunter-Gault back to her alma mater in Athens Ga, to mark the 50th anniversary of her matriculation at the University of Georgia, its first black student. "She still remembers the smallest details: how cold it was; how cold they were; the smell of tear gas; and the brick that came crashing through her window." The university still has a statewide reputation as an unwelcoming place for black students, Osunsami pointed out. Hunter-Gault hopes they attend anyway.
CONTENT CREEP FROM THE AYEM TIMESLOT (CONTD) Amy Chua's book Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother, a self-congratulatory paean to her own take-no-prisoners style of parenting, landed free publicity from NBC's Rehema Ellis by way of Chua's much-linked Wall Street Journal article entitled "Why Chinese Mothers are Superior." Ellis traveled to New Haven to chat with Sophia and Louisa, the daughters of Yale Law School's Tiger Mother. How did Lulu, then aged twelve, respond to a regimen of no sleepovers, no playdates, no television, no computer games? The girl rebelled and her mother relented.
The Congresswoman & the Astronaut was the title of ABC's 20/20 primetime special brought to us by anchor Diane Sawyer. She kicked off with husband Kelly's tale of his brain-damaged wife rubbing his neck as he sat by her bedside in the intensive care unit. Sawyer also consulted Good Morning America anchor George Stephanopoulos about their network's opinion poll on Tucson: hear what the country thinks of Barack Obama's memorial tribute, Sarah Palin's criticism of blood libel, the conduct of the news media, and the prospects for gun control legislation.
All three networks had their correspondents attend that encouraging medical press conference on Giffords' convalescence: ABC's David Muir, CBS' Ben Tracy and NBC's Kristen Welker. Rep Giffords may leave the hospital to start rehab therapy in weeks, or even days. CBS' Tracy rounded out his report with snippets from Tucson's "still raw" atmosphere. He showed a clip from the Genocide School video that Jared Loughner, the accused killer, made of the community college that suspended him; and he told us about the You're Dead threat that Eric Fuller, one of those injured, hurled at a local organizer of the Tea Party. Fuller is now under psychiatric care, "very remorseful," according to a friend.
PLAYING DOMINOES Finally one of the three networks has a correspondent on the streets of Tunis to cover the so-called Jasmine Revolution. NBC's John Ray found renewed street protests against the coalition government installed in Tunisia after President Zine Ben Ali was ousted: "The crowds were smaller than a week ago but the anger just as intense…They believe now that their revolution is being betrayed so the unrest continues." From London, CBS' Mark Phillips voiced over a graphic that literally showed a series of giant toppling dominoes, spreading across the southern Mediterranean from Mauritania. Martha Raddatz offered the view from Washington for ABC: "Not so fast," she advised, predicting survival for Hosni Mubarak in Egypt and King Abdullah in Jordan, allies of the United States both. "Leaders in the region will be keeping a close eye on these protests. As one analyst told me, you might see a crackdown on protesters--but also a lowering of food prices to keep the people happy."
ENGEL MUSCLES IN ON PALMER’S TURF, DELIVERS BAFFLING SOUNDBITE Mostly, coverage of Iran's nuclear program is not concerned with the facts on the ground but with strategic concerns inside-the-Beltway. Of the 43 reports filed on all three newscasts over the past four years, fully 26 have had a Washington DC dateline, mostly either the Pentagon or the White House. Only eleven have originated from a abroad, a beat that has been all-but owned by Elizabeth Palmer of CBS, who is responsible for seven of them. Now Richard Engel muscles in on Palmer's turf with an Exclusive tour of the Teheran Research Reactor, which was built by US engineers for the Shah of Iran to produce medical isotopes. Engel was told that nuclear facility's output treats 850,000 cancer patients.
Naturally, NBC's Engel was not interested in healthcare reporting. He wanted to know about November's assassination of a nuclear scientist in the streets of Teheran (which CBS' Palmer did cover) and in cyber-sabotage of Iran's uranium enrichment by the Stuxnet computer worm (which The New York Times covered but no network newscast has picked up on). You listen to Engel's soundbites with nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili: clearly he blames the assassination on Zionists; as for Stuxnet, who knows what he admits to and what amounts to No Comment?
WHAT’S UP, BABY DOC? When Baby Doc returned to Haiti, NBC sent Kerry Sanders to Port-au-Prince while Kelly Cobiella narrated the video feed from CBS' bureau in Miami. NBC's Sanders recapped Jean-Claude Duvalier's 15-year "iron fist" rule starting as a 19-year-old in 1971: "His feared private police force, the Tonton Macoutes, silenced opponents by machete or guns." Recalled CBS' Cobiella: "Haitians danced in the streets when Duvalier fled the country in 1986--but that was then. Now, with more than 800,000 living in tent cities, a deadly cholera outbreak and riots over a disputed presidential election, some look back on Duvalier's rule and remember security and stability. But most do not remember it at all." Duvalier expects to stay in Haiti for three days, Cobiella reported.
I-DEJA VU It was almost exactly two years ago that Steve Jobs took a leave of absence for health reasons from his job as Chief Executive of Apple Computer. Back then all three newscasts assigned a correspondent to cover it: ABC used Neal Karlinsky, CBS used Anthony Mason and NBC consulted CNBC, who assigned Maria Bartiromo. Back then Jobs was given credit for inventing the iPhone and the iPod. "Analysts say Jobs is Apple," declared ABC's Karlinsky. "To investors, Steve Jobs is Apple, CBS' Mason chimed in.
Now, Jobs takes a leave of absence for health reasons from his job as Chief Executive of Apple Computer. All three newscasts assigned a correspondent to cover it: ABC used Karlinsky, CBS used Mason and NBC consulted CNBC, who assigned Jon Fortt. Jobs gets credit for inventing the iPad and the iPhone and the iPod. "Few companies' fortunes are as closely tied to their CEO as Apple," averred ABC's Karlinsky. How did CBS' Mason put it? "No other CEO is more closely tied to his company's success than Steve Jobs."
CATFISH FOOD FIGHT Last November, NBC had Jeff Rossen file an Investigation into the safety of imports of catfish, shrimp, crabmeat and talapia, alleging that fish farms in Vietnam and other east Asian countries use toxic antibiotics and sewage-polluted waters. Rossen revealed that the FDA tests less than 2% of imported seafood for safety; seafood importers responded that this was a trade issue being raised by domestic fish farms, not a safety problem at all. Fast forward three months and CBS' Mark Strassmann takes a trip to Greensboro, the Catfish Capital of Alabama: "American farmers say unlike their fish, foreign catfish is suspect, full of antibiotics and other chemicals banned to American farmers as unhealthy." They want increased USDA inspection of imports; seafood importers respond that this was a trade issue being raised by domestic fish farms, not a safety problem at all.
EX-ABCER RON JR HAPPENS TO BE NO EMBARRASSMENT--ABC Ron Reagan, an MSNBC analyst, attracted publicity for his book Friday from NBC's John Yang by speculating that his father showed first signs of looming Alzheimer's Disease while he was still in the Oval Office. Now talkradio host Michael Reagan has responded to that claim with a fraternal insult, twittering that his half-brother is an "embarrassment" and Ron Jr, a onetime correspondent for Good Morning America, showed up on ABC's morning show to defend himself. ABC's Sharyn Alfonsi played referee between the two brothers thus: Mild Cognitive Impairment is likely the correct diagnosis of Ronald Reagan's verbal stumbles while he was President. Within five years, roughly half of those who show symptoms of MCI go on to develop full-blown Alzheimer's Disease. The President falls into that category, so his son Ron happened to have been correct in spotting signs--but he had a 50% chance of being incorrect.
HAPPY MARTIN LUTHER KING DAY For CBS' Assignment America series Steve Hartman visited the students of Simsbury High School along Connecticut's onetime Tobacco Road. They have made A Man Who Changed the World, a documentary about the teenage students from Morehouse College who used to be summertime migrant workers in the tobacco fields. They included a young MLK, who recalled returning home to Atlanta: "It was a bitter feeling going back to segregation. It was hard to understand why I could ride wherever I pleased on the train from New York to Washington--and then had to change to a Jim Crow car at the nation's capital."
ABC's Steve Osunsami accompanied public broadcasting journalist Charlayne Hunter-Gault back to her alma mater in Athens Ga, to mark the 50th anniversary of her matriculation at the University of Georgia, its first black student. "She still remembers the smallest details: how cold it was; how cold they were; the smell of tear gas; and the brick that came crashing through her window." The university still has a statewide reputation as an unwelcoming place for black students, Osunsami pointed out. Hunter-Gault hopes they attend anyway.
CONTENT CREEP FROM THE AYEM TIMESLOT (CONTD) Amy Chua's book Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother, a self-congratulatory paean to her own take-no-prisoners style of parenting, landed free publicity from NBC's Rehema Ellis by way of Chua's much-linked Wall Street Journal article entitled "Why Chinese Mothers are Superior." Ellis traveled to New Haven to chat with Sophia and Louisa, the daughters of Yale Law School's Tiger Mother. How did Lulu, then aged twelve, respond to a regimen of no sleepovers, no playdates, no television, no computer games? The girl rebelled and her mother relented.
