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TYNDALL HEADLINE: HIGHLIGHTS FROM APRIL 29, 2013
The string of ten straight weekdays on top of the news agenda held by the Boston Marathon bombing is finally broken. Another sports story grabbed the top spot: the revelation by Jason Collins in Sports Illustrated that he is gay. Other athletes have come out of the closet in retirement, in individual sports, and in women's sports: Collins, a twelve-year veteran of the National Basketball Association, is the first active male player in one of this country's four major professional team sports to be openly homosexual. CBS and ABC both led with Collins. NBC chose to lead, one more time, with the FBI investigation into the Boston bombs.
TYNDALL PICKS FOR APRIL 29, 2013: CLICK ON GRID ELEMENTS TO SEARCH FOR MATCHING ITEMS
MARATHON HANDS OFF TO HOOPS The string of ten straight weekdays on top of the news agenda held by the Boston Marathon bombing is finally broken. Another sports story grabbed the top spot: the revelation by Jason Collins in Sports Illustrated that he is gay. Other athletes have come out of the closet in retirement, in individual sports, and in women's sports: Collins, a twelve-year veteran of the National Basketball Association, is the first active male player in one of this country's four major professional team sports to be openly homosexual. CBS and ABC both led with Collins. NBC chose to lead, one more time, with the FBI investigation into the Boston bombs.
The Collins story was covered from Los Angeles by NBC's Mike Taibbi and CBS' Ben Tracy, while ABC had Dan Harris file from New York. Harris saw all those shopworn stereotypes about gays being utterly demolished by this seven-foot trash-talking bruiser. CBS anchor Scott Pelley followed up with a briefing from James Brown, of his network's sports division, the host of NFL Today: "Historic." Among the bold names encouraging Collins, NBC's Taibbi cited Chelsea Clinton, his onetime classmate at Stanford University. Bizarrely, Clinton also happens to be a fellow-reporter at NBC News; bizarrely, that connection was something Taibbi did not mention. NBC seems determined to confuse its viewers about Ms Clinton's status. Is she journalist? Or celebrity? Or the network's insider access to a political dynasty?
The Boston story was hardly ignored. The latest updates on the investigation in New England and in the Caucasus were followed in Washington DC by NBC's Pete Williams and CBS' Bob Orr. Look how Orr insinuates that Tamerlan Tsarnaev's widow may have been involved in making the pressure-cooker bombs while he insists that she is no such suspect. ABC had Brian Ross file from New York. All three mentioned the newest sports connection to the case: William Plotnikov, a Canadian boxer, was killed last year by Russian secret police. Confusingly, ABC's Ross called Plotnikov a "professional" boxer even as he showed a picture of him posing as an amateur. NBC next had anchor Brian Williams file a personal profile of Tom Menino, Boston's longtime mayor. Menino was in a hospital bed convalescing from ankle surgery when the marathon took place. Against doctor's orders, he insisted on standing up out of his wheelchair to lead his city's mourning.
The day's third story to receive attention from correspondents on all three newscasts was the recovery from Superstorm Sandy, exactly six months after it hit. As usual, this was a female assignment, handled by ABC's Linsey Davis in Breezy Point, by CBS' Elaine Quijano in The Rockaways, and by NBC's Katy Tur on the Jersey Shore. Uncannily, if you look at the playlist of the 22 reports updating us on Sandy rebuilding filed since the New Year, only three have a man's name on them. Davis' contribution was unusual: hers is the only one of those 22 to appear on the ABC newscast.
NBC rounded out its Sandy coverage with environmental correspondent Anne Thompson taking a wider look at the prospects for beachfront property from coast to coast. The combination of rising sea levels, caused by climate change, and erosion, caused by heavy storms, renders those breathtaking ocean views unsustainable.
MONDAY’S MUSINGS NBC's Andrea Mitchell offered a tip of the hat to The New York Times for its reporting on the mountains of cash doled out to President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan by the spooks at the Central Intelligence Agency. Karzai was apparently shaking down the mullahs in Teheran, too. Note the way Mitchell explains that a non-denial denial is a confirmation.
Last Friday, CBS' Holly Williams provided facetime to opposition leader Ghassan Hitto, Syria's would-be Prime Minister, in exile. Now her colleague Barry Petersen covers the civil war from the point of view of the loyal residents of Damascus, still supporting the Baath regime of President Bashar al-Assad. Kidnapping by criminal gangs is more of a concern than rebel mortars or snipers.
ABC got hold of video from Epic TV on the feud at the top of the world. As many as a hundred sherpas are brawling with a trio of mountaineers -- Simone Moro, Jonathan Griffith and Ueli Steck -- in the rarefied air of Mount Everest. John Donvan narrated the fighting from ABC's bureau in Washington DC.
Last week NBC's Rehema Ellis suggested that students can save on college tuition by heading north of the 49th Parallel. McGill University was her hot pick. Now ABC's Paula Faris touts Ithaca College in her Real Money feature: ask politely for reconsideration and it might cut an extra $30K off its sky-high four-year tuition fees.
Erin Moriarty of CBS' primetime 48 Hours made a rare appearance on the evening newscast for a true-crime update on cruel and unusual punishment in California. That is what its overcrowded prison system amounts to, according to the Supreme Court. See Moriarty's story of the relief that ruling affords to Aaron Collins, a 46-year-old non-violent lifer.
ABC anchor Diane Sawyer also took advantage of the evening newscast to promote a true-crime primetime exclusive of her own. That will be her sitdown with Amanda Knox, the exchange student appealing her murder conviction in Perugia, as she launches her book tour Waiting to be Heard. Ms Knox is apparently astonished that people would look upon her as a murderer once she had been convicted of said crime. Watch Sawyer's report and tell me if there was a single sliver of news to be found in it.
The Collins story was covered from Los Angeles by NBC's Mike Taibbi and CBS' Ben Tracy, while ABC had Dan Harris file from New York. Harris saw all those shopworn stereotypes about gays being utterly demolished by this seven-foot trash-talking bruiser. CBS anchor Scott Pelley followed up with a briefing from James Brown, of his network's sports division, the host of NFL Today: "Historic." Among the bold names encouraging Collins, NBC's Taibbi cited Chelsea Clinton, his onetime classmate at Stanford University. Bizarrely, Clinton also happens to be a fellow-reporter at NBC News; bizarrely, that connection was something Taibbi did not mention. NBC seems determined to confuse its viewers about Ms Clinton's status. Is she journalist? Or celebrity? Or the network's insider access to a political dynasty?
The Boston story was hardly ignored. The latest updates on the investigation in New England and in the Caucasus were followed in Washington DC by NBC's Pete Williams and CBS' Bob Orr. Look how Orr insinuates that Tamerlan Tsarnaev's widow may have been involved in making the pressure-cooker bombs while he insists that she is no such suspect. ABC had Brian Ross file from New York. All three mentioned the newest sports connection to the case: William Plotnikov, a Canadian boxer, was killed last year by Russian secret police. Confusingly, ABC's Ross called Plotnikov a "professional" boxer even as he showed a picture of him posing as an amateur. NBC next had anchor Brian Williams file a personal profile of Tom Menino, Boston's longtime mayor. Menino was in a hospital bed convalescing from ankle surgery when the marathon took place. Against doctor's orders, he insisted on standing up out of his wheelchair to lead his city's mourning.
The day's third story to receive attention from correspondents on all three newscasts was the recovery from Superstorm Sandy, exactly six months after it hit. As usual, this was a female assignment, handled by ABC's Linsey Davis in Breezy Point, by CBS' Elaine Quijano in The Rockaways, and by NBC's Katy Tur on the Jersey Shore. Uncannily, if you look at the playlist of the 22 reports updating us on Sandy rebuilding filed since the New Year, only three have a man's name on them. Davis' contribution was unusual: hers is the only one of those 22 to appear on the ABC newscast.
NBC rounded out its Sandy coverage with environmental correspondent Anne Thompson taking a wider look at the prospects for beachfront property from coast to coast. The combination of rising sea levels, caused by climate change, and erosion, caused by heavy storms, renders those breathtaking ocean views unsustainable.
MONDAY’S MUSINGS NBC's Andrea Mitchell offered a tip of the hat to The New York Times for its reporting on the mountains of cash doled out to President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan by the spooks at the Central Intelligence Agency. Karzai was apparently shaking down the mullahs in Teheran, too. Note the way Mitchell explains that a non-denial denial is a confirmation.
Last Friday, CBS' Holly Williams provided facetime to opposition leader Ghassan Hitto, Syria's would-be Prime Minister, in exile. Now her colleague Barry Petersen covers the civil war from the point of view of the loyal residents of Damascus, still supporting the Baath regime of President Bashar al-Assad. Kidnapping by criminal gangs is more of a concern than rebel mortars or snipers.
ABC got hold of video from Epic TV on the feud at the top of the world. As many as a hundred sherpas are brawling with a trio of mountaineers -- Simone Moro, Jonathan Griffith and Ueli Steck -- in the rarefied air of Mount Everest. John Donvan narrated the fighting from ABC's bureau in Washington DC.
Last week NBC's Rehema Ellis suggested that students can save on college tuition by heading north of the 49th Parallel. McGill University was her hot pick. Now ABC's Paula Faris touts Ithaca College in her Real Money feature: ask politely for reconsideration and it might cut an extra $30K off its sky-high four-year tuition fees.
Erin Moriarty of CBS' primetime 48 Hours made a rare appearance on the evening newscast for a true-crime update on cruel and unusual punishment in California. That is what its overcrowded prison system amounts to, according to the Supreme Court. See Moriarty's story of the relief that ruling affords to Aaron Collins, a 46-year-old non-violent lifer.
ABC anchor Diane Sawyer also took advantage of the evening newscast to promote a true-crime primetime exclusive of her own. That will be her sitdown with Amanda Knox, the exchange student appealing her murder conviction in Perugia, as she launches her book tour Waiting to be Heard. Ms Knox is apparently astonished that people would look upon her as a murderer once she had been convicted of said crime. Watch Sawyer's report and tell me if there was a single sliver of news to be found in it.
