Brian Williams on The Huffington Post

Brian Williams Increasingly Comfortable With His Funny Side

2009-11-23T03:06:08Z

So last month, days before heading on an intense reporting trip to Afghanistan, Williams appeared on the NPR news quiz show "Wait, Wait . . . Don't Tell Me," cracking up the audience with a Bill Clinton impersonation. Host Peter Sagal dubbed him "the funniest man to jockey an anchor desk."

Williams' growing comfort with that title comes as he approaches his fifth anniversary as anchor of "NBC Nightly News," which has cemented its rank as the most-watched evening newscast during his tenure. More remarkably, at a time when ABC's "World News" and " CBS Evening News" have continued to shed viewers, "Nightly News" has gone the other direction: After two straight seasons of ratings gains, the newscast is up again this season, averaging 8.5 million viewers, a 3% boost over the same period last year.

Brian Williams Accepts Cronkite Award, Says Cronkite Wouldn't "Have Cracked Through" In Today's Media Landscape

2009-11-18T17:53:16Z

PHOENIX — NBC newsman Brian Williams said Wednesday he's not sure if Walter Cronkite would have succeeded in the age of cable news, blogs and Twitter.

"I am convinced that had he come along today, I don't think he would have cracked through. I think there's too much noise, too much to cut through for a modest man from Missouri," Williams told an audience in Phoenix. "But God and history combined to give him to us right when we needed him."

Jim Luce: NBC's Brian Williams: Changing the World for the Better

2009-11-13T16:39:22Z

Several weeks ago Brian
Williams profiled the children of the Afghan Child Education and Care
Organization (AFCECO) and its founder Andeisha Farid in Kabul, Afghanistan for NBC Nightly News’ segment Making a Difference (video).

Brian is anchor and
managing editor of the NBC Nightly News
based in New York. Last week, his show, including
the segment Making a Difference, had
9.5 million viewers. The show spikes up
to 11 million viewers frequently.

I had interviewed the
orphanage’s founder Andeisha of Kabul in New York in September and have followed
her progress carefully. I knew immediately
that Brian’s focus would have an enormous impact on her good work.

As founder of Orphans International Worldwide, I am familiar
with running homes for children around the world – and the difficult task of
raising the fund necessary to do so.

What I did not grasp
about the piece on Making a Difference was
what an enormous difference it would
make – with so many contributions that flooded over the Internet to fund the
kids there from Brian’s generous viewers.
He thanked them the following week (video).

I wanted to speak with
Brian about how good that must make him feel – and how this sense of
responsibility must now shape his life – so I asked him to call me, and he did. Brian told me:

I was
really revved to do a piece on this orphanage in Afghanistan. I wanted it to be seen by as many people as
possible – and luckily it was. I was so
grateful – we raised much more for those children than we had thought possible.

I do
pieces on different topics. We were in
Kabul when there was a huge loss of life at the U.N. and I wanted to do a story
after that which was ‘nice and hopeful.’
We had one day to do this feature piece, and it all just came together.

Sitting
there in our rental house in Kabul, I realized I had a personal enough relationship
with our viewers – who I felt could be very generous – to ask them to help
these kids. And they did!

The
cultural differences and similarities in the orphanage were enormous. Little girls are little girls anywhere in the
world. Thank God I have parented two
children, so it was the most natural of moments.

Switching
glasses with them, seeing them draw stars and hearts… The children were so tactile, kind, loving,
affectionate, and gracious.

I saw a
picture of Paul Stevers there on the wall, the founder of CharityHelp International
in the U.S. that provides a bridge between child sponsors and the children
there.

The kids
had a politeness, and order, a discipline – not like in Annie, but an attitude of accepting real responsibility – the way I
was raised. It was so real.

On his blog, Brian had
posted the following after his viewers had been so generous:

I want to
say thank you -- and to express my ongoing appreciation at the amazing
generosity of our viewers. We did a
follow-up on the orphanage in Afghanistan.

I was only
home from work for a few hours when we learned they had already received 500
e-mails from Nightly News viewers -- many of them offering donations and
pledges to sponsor a child.

It is
immensely gratifying, and I’m beyond words in expressing my thanks and appreciation
on behalf of the lovely children we met over there.

Brian Williams received individualized cards
from each of the children in Kabul.

“Although some are
one-time gifts, our experience tells us that many of the child sponsors will
continue to give for the next few years so the benefits of Brian’s efforts are
very substantial and will enable AFCECO to care for many more children,” Paul
Stevers, founder of CharityHelp
International, told me.

CharityHelp
International is the Internet bridge that connects the children to child
sponsors around the world. Orphans
International Worldwide, the charity I founded, relies on CharityHelp to fund
our kids in Haiti, Indonesia, and Sri Lanka.

“Security is an enormous
issue in Kabul,” Brian told me. “In
Kabul, importance is measured by the size of your gate and the number of guns
you have. I hope the orphanage there will
be able to spend more on security,” Brian added.

Clearly, the segment Making a Difference is making a
difference. From one night a week, the
segment now airs up to five times a week.

“It was my wife’s idea,
honestly,” Brian shared. “With the
economy sinking, she said, ‘Someone, somewhere is doing spectacular acts of
kindness – go capture them!’ And we
did,” Brian told me.

Making a Difference features mostly ordinary people, although it
has begun to also focus on celebrities using their visibility to also help
humanity.

Quintessential thought leaders
and global citizen Brian Williams on the streets of Kabul.

Brian replaced Tom
Brokaw, one of his mentors, in 2004. Previously,
Brian was the network’s chief White House correspondent and host of The News with Brian Williams on CNBC and
MSNBC.

After studying at
college, Brian took an internship with the administration of President Jimmy
Carter. He holds an honorary doctor of
humane letters degree from one of my favorite schools, Bates College, and an
honorary Doctor of Journalism degree from Ohio State University.

NBC Night News anchor Brian Williams
frequently reports from Afghanistan.

Brian is the most
honored network evening news anchor. He
has received four Edward R. Murrow awards, his fifth Emmy award, the
DuPont-Columbia University award and the industry's highest honor, the George
Foster Peabody award.

Most were given for his
work in New Orleans while covering Hurricane Katrina and its aftermath, and all
were awarded to Brian in only his second year on the job.

Brian Williams of NBC Nightly
News with Afghani children in Kabul.

Brian was the first and
only network evening news anchor to report from New Orleans before Hurricane
Katrina hit and was the only network news anchor to report from the Superdome
during the storm. He remained in New Orleans to report on the aftermath and
destruction of Hurricane Katrina.

In 2006, Brian joined
Bono, traveling to three countries in Africa — Nigeria, Mali, and Ghana — to
report on the major issues facing the continent, including HIV/AIDS, poverty,
disease, and crushing debt.

In 1994, Brian was named
NBC News Chief White House correspondent. Accompanying President Clinton aboard
Air Force One, Brian circled the world several times, covering virtually every
foreign and domestic trip by the President until 1996.

On perhaps one of the
most historic trips of the Clinton presidency, Brian was the only television
news correspondent to accompany three U.S. presidents — Clinton, Bush, and
Carter — to Yitzhak Rabin's funeral in Israel.

Brian is a member of the
Council on Foreign Relations in New York, and is also a member of the Board of
Directors of the Congressional Medal of Honor Foundation. He has lectured at Columbia University School
of Journalism and the Lyndon Baines Johnson Presidential Library in Austin,
Texas.

In 2007, Brian was
listed among Time Magazine’s 100 Most
Influential People in The World. He
lives in New Canaan, Connecticut, with his wife, Jane Stoddard Williams.

There is a reason “When
breaking news happens, America turns to NBC
Nightly News with Brian Williams."
America trusts Brian the way we once trusted Walter Cronkite.

“Walter Cronkite was the
architect for what this show has become,” Brian told me. “Walter’s level of professionalism is what I
strive for every day.”

“I have been luckier
than most two have had two North Stars to follow – Walter Cronkite and Tom
Brokaw,” Brian admitted.

Like Walter and Tom, Brian
is the quintessential thought leaders and global citizen – and has thousands of
fans on Facebook
from around the world to prove it.

Today Brian Williams has
an enormous power – and a parallel responsibility – to help humanity.

Luckily for all of us, he
knows this well – and is highly focused on doing all that he can in his
position to change our world for the better.

Alicia Keys Works With Keep A Child Alive, Featured on "Making A Difference"

2009-11-10T17:02:52Z

Alicia Keys was featured on "NBC Nightly News" tonight as part of their "Making A Difference" series. Though the series typically focuses on ordinary people doing extraordinary things, this week's segments feature celebrities and how they're giving back.

Lester Holt talked with Alicia Keys about her work with Keep A Child Alive, providing drugs and aid to people living with HIV/AIDS in Africa. Holt also traveled to South Africa with Keys to meet some of the children she's helped in an orphanage.

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Jon Bon Jovi On NBC Nightly News: Making A Difference Through Foundation

2009-11-09T19:42:33Z

As previously mentioned on Impact, NBC Nightly News is devoting a week of "Make A Difference" segments to profiling celebrities and their charitable efforts.

Monday's segment is on Jon Bon Jovi and the millions of dollars he's used to help impoverished families in Philadelphia and New Jersey as part of the Jon Bon Jovi Soul Foundation.

The foundation places low income and special needs families into apartments in Newark on a temporary basis until they can find jobs. It's often the first time that many of the beneficiaries have had a home of their own.

Bon Jovi encourages people who've benefited from the Soul Foundation to use what they have as a force for good in the world.

"I say 'Here, it's yours. You know, now take care of it. Do the right thing. Pay it forward. Go to job training. Go to classes that are provided here. Learn a job.'"

When Williams asked Bon Jovi if individuals can make a difference in their communities, the rock star was emphatic.

"I'm a firm believer, Brian, in the power of We. I say that over and over. The government can't do it alone. The private sector can't do it alone. But, with the power of We...Yeah, I do think that we can make a difference."

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NBC Nightly News "Making A Difference" Week Profiles Celebrity Causes

2009-11-09T13:02:49Z

All this week, NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams will be featuring celebrities who "make a difference" in local communities and around the world. Featuring Jon Bon Jovi, Alicia Keys, Halle Berry, Tim McGraw and Glenn Close, the "Make A Difference" series will profile several organizations working for several causes, such as poverty, HIV/AIDS and mental illness.

Typically, the series features what the show considers "ordinary people doing extraordinary things." This week is special, in that a different segment in the "Make A Difference" series will be broadcast each night, featuring celebrities and their causes.

Monday's feature is Jon Bon Jovi and the Jon Bon Jovi Soul Foundation, which helps to move impoverished families into homes, primarily in Philadelphia and New Jersey.

Watch Brian Williams' interview with Jon Bon Jovi:

On Tuesday, Lester Holt visits with Alicia Keys in New York and pursues the positive effects of her work with Keep A Child Alive in South Africa, fighting the spread of HIV/AIDS.

On Wednesday, Glenn Close is interviewed on her work with Fountain House, a group that brings hope to people with mental illnesses. Close's sister, who has bipolar disorder, will be featured in the segment.

The Jenesse Center provides resources for victims of domestic violence, and Thursday's segment will detail Halle Berry's work raising money as part of their Year of Giving Campaign.

The series concludes on Friday with the Neighbor's Keeper Foundation, founded by country star Tim McGraw and his wife Faith Hill to help victims of Hurricane Katrina.

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Brian Williams From Afghanistan: How Kabul Changed Overnight, What The Troops Think, & Why He Had To Go

2009-10-30T11:44:38Z

"NBC Nightly News" anchor and managing editor Brian Williams conducted an e-mail Q&A with the Huffington Post from Afghanistan, where he has been reporting from all week. Williams wrote his responses to the Huffington Post's questions Friday in Kabul.

Huffington Post: How are things different now vs. your last visit in June 2008?
Brian Williams: Things are different depending where you go in Afghanistan. So far on this trip, we've visited a U.S. Army Special Forces mountain outpost (better), Bagram Airfield (Same), and Kabul (worse). They are all narrow slices of a huge military effort inside a huge country. There are 35,000 villages in this nation, roughly the size of Texas -- and no two villages are alike.

HP: Does this feel like any of your Iraq trips? As in, does Afghanistan today feel like Iraq from 2004? 2006?
BW: Again, it depends on where you are and what you're doing. While the U.S. strategy is much more about "hearts and minds" these days in terms of big-picture theory, generally the Afghanistan we encountered on this trip seems tighter and more militant and militarized.

Yesterday the ride from Bagram to Kabul felt very Baghdad-like. We made the trip in armored vehicles with heavy security. The mechanics of the motorcade felt very similar to how the same type of journey would be undertaken in the urban areas of Iraq: we spaced the vehicles out, as to avoid getting bunched up and trapped in traffic (and vulnerable to attack or ambush). Our drivers and guards (and passengers who know what to look for by dint of experience) have all become hyper-aware of the same things you look for in Iraq: idle men by the side of the road who seem unusually interested in us, any changes in road pavement (that might indicate a newly-buried IED) and any objects like plastic jugs, dead animals, lumber -- anything that could be stuffed with explosives. Potholes are to be avoided, and when possible, drivers should follow in the tracks of the vehicle immediately in front of them. Similarly, here in Kabul, the attack on the U.N. compound was a wake-up call for security -- and we are taking steps for our own safety that we frankly would not have done 6 months ago.

HP: Did Richard Engel almost being on one of those helicopters that crashed drive home the dangers of covering war?
BW: Richard's experience (getting bumped from a helicopter flight that later crashed) was no different from the airport interviews we've seen in the States...people holding boarding passes from doomed flights, which for whatever reason they never boarded. Richard is brave but not reckless, fearless but never dangerous. There is a price to pay for covering our nation's dual wars. In Afghanistan especially, helicopters are de facto busses with rotors. They are the primary means of getting around. A flight on a Chinook or a Blackhawk is fairly routine. Even as a part-time visitor to war zones, I've gotten so that I sit in the same seat every time (right rear of the Blackhawk, right side midships on the Chinook) and I now handle the five-point harness latch and the headset microphone and crew intercom like a grizzled veteran. Richard has been on too many missions to count. He has had many close calls, and this was another one. No one loves his job more...no one loves life more. When I leave here to fly back to New York and resume my life and work, Richard stays behind here to do his job. He will spend as many hours flying in helicopters during the month of November as I will driving in my car back home.

HP: There's all this talk of making the cities more secure. Is there any sense that the people in the cities want the foreign troops there?
BW: Whereas some of the locals in Iraq (depending on the circumstances) will often be comforted to see U.S. dismounted infantry patrols, (in ways they were not until fairly recently) and will ask them for help and to stay with them, the situation here in Afghanistan is different. The two societies are vastly different. It is not helped by the fact that U.S. forces often take a very aggressive posture -- arriving in small towns in massive armored vehicles with machine gun turrets, each infantryman with his hands on his M-4 rifle in front of him...and often on the trigger with the safety off. Of course there's a reason for this: they get shot at and killed, and they are soldiers in an unforgiving place -- surrounded by an enemy they often can't see. So its a Catch-22 of sorts. It made big news here when Gen. McCrystal started the practice of removing his body armor while on walkabouts, or when meeting with local leaders. By his reasoning, the locals aren't wearing such armor. It should also be pointed out that he gets around in a massive, armored SUV with security vehicles in tow, dismounted infantry flanking him and able to unleash fearsome amounts of suppressing fire, and air support overhead whenever he is out and about. Even when U.S. troops are handing out something "good" -- food supplies, medicine, school supplies for the Afghan children, its not as if local villagers tending to their goats on a Thursday afternoon sit around thinking, "If only a dismounted platoon of heavily-armed American soldiers would come visit us today, preferably accompanied by an armored mechanized column...". The rumored/leaked Obama plan to concentrate on the population centers would essentially cede huge tracts of the countryside to the Taliban -- and it would reverse some hard-fought gains made by some military units who have been in almost daily firefights, often for control of mere acres at a time. Its not like it would be the first change in military policy for either war.

HP: How have the increased attacks in Kabul affected the atmosphere in the streets? Do people go out less, visit restaurants less? The UN is now on lockdown -- is the whole city?
BW: Kabul has changed -- a little bit, but literally overnight. The U.N. attack was a huge wakeup call. As I indicated, Kabul has hardened and tightened -- its much more about security now that the Taliban has "entered the battle space" with such a brazen attack. Richard Engel talks wistfully about the street life and nightlife here -- and he's talking about 6 months ago! There's a plan afoot for several of us to visit a local bar tonight -- but if we decide to go, we have to bring plain clothed security and have armored vehicles standing by outside and at the ready. Our security guys (the best I've ever worked with) already nixed our request to visit an open-air market that we visited without incident 16 months ago. It has changed here. Friday is a holiday, so street traffic is light (we just came back from a tightly-choreographed and heavily-guarded 2-hour outing to cover a story for tonight's Nightly News broadcast) but it doesn't feel locked down in any way.

HP: Have you gotten a sense of the troops' attitudes towards the war, Obama, McChrystal, etc.?
BW: Its hard to speak to the attitudes of uniformed personnel about their commanding generals or their Commander in Chief. This volunteer force, in keeping with military doctrine and chain of command training, is extraordinarily mission-oriented. They don't spend much of their time ruminating about McCrystal's plan or Obama's deliberations. They do not, however, like limbo...and I did hear a few complaints that the review process was taking too long. In the meantime, they do their jobs. There is also the usual disparities among personnel in uniform: two days ago, the Lance Corporal who drove us in a shuttle bus from our Chinook to the barracks at the air base never greeted us, made eye contact or turned down the hip hop music blaring from his stereo. He was just doing his job...the absolute bare minimum. We don't know what else is going on in his life. From there, we saw the other extreme, in a meeting with the 2-star General in charge of the 82nd Airborne and the entire military district surrounding the Kabul region. In that meeting was a Colonel I had previously met at Al Faw Palace in Iraq at the height of that war, another Colonel widely rumored to be on a fast track to Brigadier General -- and some of the sharpest, most squared-away officers the Army has to offer, male and female.

You've really got to WANT to cover this story. Its remote and its dangerous. Its difficult and expensive to get here, to broadcast television from here...even to drive across town. It is so much easier to stay in my office and newsroom at 30 Rockefeller Plaza in New York, and go home at the end of the day. Instead, I'm writing this in a dimly-lit room inside a barricaded, heavily-protected compound in Kabul, wearing boots covered in ash from the fire that consumed the U.N. Here on my desk is the military MRE (meal ready-to-eat) that I will happily consume for dinner. This is something I volunteer for -- and demand to do -- because its essential to understanding of this story. To be in my job for the past 5 years and NOT have a ground-level familiarity with both of our nation's ongoing wars would be reckless, I think. Getting to know the military -- sleeping where they sleep, eating what they eat, going on patrol with them, learning about their lives here and at home -- has been one of the great blessings of my life...and anybody who knows me knows I feel that way. Its one thing to post an opinion on the web about what the U.S. is doing here, from the comfort and safety of home...and its quite another to be here and experience it...and come back and do it again and again. For all the pejoratives attached to the MSM label, it also means we have the money and means to get over here and report what we see and experience. Our viewers can make their own judgments. That's the way its supposed to work.

Below, view photos from Williams' trip in Afghanistan, courtesy NBC News:

Watch Williams' vlogs from Afghanistan below:

"We're in the middle of an earthquake"

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

UN guesthouse a "war zone"

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

Behind-the-scenes at Bagram Airfield

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

View more photos/blogs/vlogs from Williams' Afghanistan trip

Michael Russnow: Obama's Big Question: To Go or Not to Go, Copenhagen That is

2009-09-29T19:59:50Z

To paraphrase William Shakespeare's renowned query, made more appropriate since it took place in Denmark, the big question is why there is so much furor posed in the Main Stream Media citing Obama's mostly Republican critics over the president's decision to help Chicago win its bid for the 2016 Summer Olympics?

Obama's choice to attend the International Olympic Committee meeting in Copenhagen, in tandem with wife Michelle and prominent Chicago residents such as Oprah, is in line with other world leaders, such as Britain's prime minister Tony Blair who went much further to Singapore to secure London as the venue in 2012 and Russia's Vladimir Putin who flew an even greater distance to Guatemala when he successfully scored the 2014 Winter Olympics for the city of Sochi in his nation.

It may well be that these government leaders upped the ante regarding the expectations of the IOC delegates and it seems a small price to pay considering the relatively scant time Obama will attend to Chicago's big pitch.

Yet his Republican antagonists insist Obama's action will take time away from what they deem more significant undertakings, such as -- are you ready for a big laugh -- health care reform, which they have been sabotaging from the outset. They assert in their continuing and mostly lockstep reasoning that Obama is wasting time on such a "frivolous" enterprise rather than addressing the nuclear build-up in Iran, our economic quagmire and the continuing mess in Afghanistan.

Indeed, Senator Christopher Bond (R-Missouri) found it "baffling that he (Obama) has time to go to be on (sic) Copenhagen, to be on the Letterman show and almost every other channel except the Food Channel and Fox, but he doesn't have time to talk to General McChrystal."

In fact, as the White House points out, Obama regularly consults with McChrystal, the Afghanistan commander, but what do facts matter when the key agenda on the part of most Republican leaders is to run Obama down at every opportunity? Yet the newspapers (consider today's main story in the Los Angeles Times) and broadcast/cable programs, such as those hosted by Anderson Cooper and Lou Dobbs on CNN, Brian Williams on NBC, Charlie Gibson and Diane Sawyer on ABC, Katie Couric on CBS and Bill O'Reilly on Fox News have allowed what should have been a relatively apolitical and harmless action to be debated as possible irresponsibility on the part of the president.

And why? Obama is expected to be in Copenhagen for only several hours, and during the eight plus hours in the air to and from Washington he will be able to study reports and be in telephonic contact with everyone he needs, which is how he conducts much of his business in the first place.

It's not as if he's suddenly taking a weekend holiday and will be spending the day cavorting at Tivoli Gardens, and another traveling to Funen Island, the home of Hans Christian Andersen. His critics make it appear that, even during his relatively brief trip abroad, he will be totally incommunicado from pleading requests for his time by heads of state, cabinet secretaries and congressional leaders.

This brouhaha is nonsense and the only downside is if Chicago doesn't get the bid. Frankly, I'm not sure it will, considering the superior glamour of chief opponent Rio de Janeiro and the fact that South America has never hosted the games. And if that happens Obama will lose a bit of sparkle, but, as an advance warning to the Limbaugh fanatics and GOP doomsayers, I'd say so what? Obama is not a miracle maker and, hell, he will have tried. However, there's a stronger possibility that Chicago has little chance at all if he doesn't make the attempt.

And during it all he and the government will continue to perform any necessary actions. But this is a point the Republicans continuously deflect, because truth for them is lately in short supply.

Michael Russnow's website is www.ramproductionsinternational.com

"NBC Nightly News" Easily Wins 2008-2009 Season, Up Year-Over-Year

2009-09-24T09:24:45Z

While the conventional wisdom says the evening news is dying, "NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams" actually grew year-over-year, easily winning the 2008-2009 season ratings race in the process.

"NBC Nightly News" averaged 8.609 million total viewers, 10% more than ABC's second-place "World News" (7.818 million) and 42% more than the "CBS Evening News" (6.053 million).

What's more impressive, though, is the NBC broadcast's year-over-year growth. "Nightly News" added 88,000 total viewers for the 2008-2009 season, while ABC's "World News" lost 363,000 viewers and the "CBS Evening News" lost 103,000 viewers.

Steven G. Brant: Health Care, Character, Journalism, and America's Future

2009-09-13T05:25:16Z

President Obama made two very important speeches last Wednesday.

Most people heard about his speech on health care reform to a joint session of Congress, and for good reason.

By talking not just about health care but about the heart and spirit of the late Senator Ted Kennedy and, from there, the character of our country, President Obama challenged Congress to embody those qualities of compassion and community that the American people, themselves, so frequently demonstrate when their neighbors are in danger.

Here's what President Obama said:

...That large-heartedness -- that concern and regard for the plight of others -- is not a partisan feeling. It is not a Republican or a Democratic feeling. It...is part of the American character. Our ability to stand in other people's shoes. A recognition that we are all in this together; that when fortune turns against one of us, others are there to lend a helping hand. A belief that in this country, hard work and responsibility should be rewarded by some measure of security and fair play; and an acknowledgement that sometimes government has to step in to help deliver on that promise...that without the leavening hand of wise policy, markets can crash, monopolies can stifle competition, and the vulnerable can be exploited... We did not come to fear the future. We came here to shape it. I still believe we can act even when it's hard. I still believe we can replace acrimony with civility, and gridlock with progress. I still believe we can do great things, and that here and now we will meet history's test... Because that is who we are. That is our calling. That is our character.

But President Obama's other speech was Wednesday morning here in New York... at the memorial to Walter Cronkite.

And in paying tribute to Walter Cronkite, President Obama issued another challenge. With the spirit and morality of Walter Cronkite as his guide, President Obama called on America's journalists -- and the media executives for whom they work -- to recommit themselves to the standards of journalism that Walter Cronkite practiced... and in so doing, to help the American people be the best informed citizens they can be.

Here are some key passengers from President Obama's remarks:

"What happened today?" is replaced with "Who won today?" The public debate cheapens. The public trust falters. We fail to understand our world or one another as well as we should -- and that has real consequences in our own lives and in the life of our nation. We seem stuck with a choice between what cuts to our bottom line and what harms us as a society. Which price is higher to pay? Which cost is harder to bear?

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The simple values Walter Cronkite set out in pursuit of -- to seek the truth, to keep us honest, to explore our world the best he could -- they are as vital today as they ever were.

Our American story continues. It needs to be told. And if we choose to live up to Walter's example, if we realize that the kind of journalism he embodied will not simply rekindle itself as part of a natural cycle, but will come alive only if we stand up and demand it and resolve to value it once again, then I'm convinced that the choice between profit and progress is a false one -- and that the golden days of journalism still lie ahead.

---------

We are grateful to him for altering and illuminating our time, and for the opportunity he gave to us to say that, yes, we, too, were there.

I invite you to watch President Obama's complete remarks at the memorial, below. His comments about how better standards in journalism are needed start at about the six and one half minute mark.

To those who deeply desire that Congress be where real legislating takes place -- and where all Senators and Representatives have the opportunity to leave significant legislative legacies -- I urge you to consider these two speeches as, essentially, two halves of what it will take to have that happen.

We cannot have a Congress that really works, if our elected representatives do not seek to embody the best we Americans have to offer: the best of our national character.

But at the same time, we cannot have a Congress that really works (and an Executive branch as well), if "we, the people" are not accurately told "the way it is" by America's major news organizations. The American people need accurate information, so they can support their representatives in living up to those standards of character that the American people, themselves, hold to in their daily lives.

Given the constant efforts by special interests to control what Congress does, it's easy to understand how our representatives can wind up representing special interest over the interests of the nation as a whole.

However, "we, the people" bring a counter-balancing force to the actions of the special interests: our votes on election day and the freedom we have to champion our interests by writing letters and other forms of civic action.

But -- with the vast majority of journalistic efforts currently focusing on "Who won?" rather than "What happened?" -- we, the people, are left uninformed and ill-prepared to hold our representatives accountable for doing the right thing. How can we, if we don't know what the "right things" are ourselves?

In fact, it's worse than that. Without a profession -- one that might otherwise be considered The Most Trusted Profession In America -- providing high quality journalism that would earn it our trust, we, the people, are left to be victimized by agents of the special interests, agents who use any number of methods to convince us (essentially) that "up is down" and "backward is forward."

This is how a majority of us wound up believing that Saddam Hussein was responsible for the 9/11 attack, and is how a significant number of us believe right now that President Obama is not an American and that his health care plans include an organized effort to put old people to their death.

This is also how America's election system is coming close to being privatized, rather than being under government/civil service control.

As President Obama said, without journalism of the kind Walter Cronkite practiced.

The public debate cheapens. The public trust falters. We fail to understand our world or one another as well as we should.

The time has come for journalists -- and the corporate leaders for whom they work -- to once again commit to helping the American people...

...to seek the truth, to keep us honest, to explore our world...

(By "keep us honest" I'm not sure if President Obama meant "us politicians" or "us Americans.")

... illuminating our time... (so we could) say that, yes, we, too, were there.

Journalism that gives the American people a complete and honest picture of their world. That illuminates all that is going on, so we can know enough to tell our leaders what we want them to do without accidentally saying some variation of "up is down." This is what we need.

But there's one more aspect to illuminating what's going on in addition to right/wrong truth telling. It's the aspect having to do with what "complete picture" means.

"Complete picture" means reporting on humanity's accomplishments as well as humanity's failures. The best we are doing and the worst.

The "unvarnished truth" about we humans is that we do both. Great things as well as terrible. But the strange thing about America's major news organizations is that they almost always report the terrible things. They only rarely report the great!

Walter Cronkite knew both existed. And -- while he didn't shy away from reporting the negative activities of our world -- he absolutely celebrated the positive ones, especially the space program. The story of humanity doing what had previously been considered to be "impossible" thrilled him to no end!

In the official CBS News report of his death, below, you can watch Walter talk about the importance of reporting on this greatest of human achievement.

Space exploration may not seem like such a great achievement these days. And perhaps, given how little has happened since man first landed on the Moon, it is a great achievement gone to waste. We'll see what plans develop in the next few years.

But there are projects under way today that deserve the regular coverage the space program received in its infancy. And that's because these project have the potential to usher in a new world just as the space program did. These projects have the potential to take human society where it has never been before.

The energy efficiency and "next, nature-friendly industrial revolution" work of the Rocky Mountain Institute and McDonough-Braungart Design Chemistry are two examples.

Others are the initiatives -- such as Business for Social Responsibility, the UN Global Compact, and the World Business Council for Sustainable Development -- that are working to transform the business world from one focused on profits alone to one focused on producing sustainable products and services.

As President Obama said, the journalism industry could profit in the future from delivering a higher quality product to it customers.

And isn't that how other industries thrive? By offering the highest quality products and services possible? Why should journalism think it can survive by appealing only to the lowest emotional and intellectual aspects of its customers? To offering fighting rather than learning?

On Wednesday night, when speaking to Congress, President Obama concluded by saying:

... when any government measure, no matter how carefully crafted or beneficial, is subject to scorn; when any efforts to help people in need are attacked as un-American; when facts and reason are thrown overboard and only timidity passes for wisdom, and we can no longer even engage in a civil conversation with each other over the things that truly matter -- then at that point we don't merely lose our capacity to solve big challenges. We lose something essential about ourselves...

President Obama didn't mention journalism as he ended his day before Congress, but I'm going to end by connecting those two dots now.

If we don't want to lose our capacity to solve big challenges, we need the highest quality journalism possible here in America. We need journalism that helps the American people, rather than holding them back or sending them off on irrelevant or dangerous tangents.

We need high quality journalism that replaces "fair and balanced" with "truthful and complete".

Rather than giving lies equal time with facts, we need journalism that's willing to push lies away from us, not shovel them towards us. And we need journalism that's willing to regularly report on the initiatives that have the potential to give us the solutions we are looking for, initiatives that are capable of making the impossible possible.

Because if we don't know these initiatives exist, then "we, the people" won't be able to demand that our representatives give those initiatives their support.

Imagine a business world that puts "doing the right thing" ahead of "more profit no matter who gets hurt." Imagine a carpet manufacturing process so clean that the water leaving the factory is cleaner than the water entering the factory.

I already know these things are possible, because I'm involved in the corporate social responsibility movement. Now maybe you will start learning they are possible too. And then maybe so will your representative in Congress.

And we'll be on our way to the healthy and prosperous America (and world) we are truly capable of having!

-------------

This essay is based in part on the dialogue I had on Saturday September 12th with participants in the Newshare workshop organized by Bill Densmore of the Media Giraffe Project at the UMass - Amherst School of Journalism. I am a huge fan of Bill's efforts to help the journalism profession find a path to a sustainable future, both financially and ethically / morally, and want to thank him publicly for allowing me to discuss my ideas for a movement for quality journalism with the others who were there.

Brian Williams: "We Won't Ever See A Man Like Walter [Cronkite] Again"

2009-09-09T17:19:14Z

There is a lesson in the way he lived his life, and in how he did his job. We won't ever see a man like Walter again. We won't ever see another anchorman like him. The best we can do is to try to live up to his example.

Richard Valeriani: Sept. 7, 2009, News Update

2009-09-07T18:07:34Z

SEPT. 7, 2009, NEWS UPDATE

President Obama resumes interrupted vacation at Camp David. Lot cheaper than Martha's Vineyard.

President gives speech on education. For all those children left behind.

Unemployment reaches 9.7%. The only good news is that it includes George W. Bush.

Fraud alleged in Afghan election. Who could have seen that coming? But give Afghan government credit...It came up with novel means of corruption. Set up fake polling places which recorded thousands of votes for President Karzai. Not even Chicago pols thought of that.

Obama to give speech outlining views on health care reform. How about a speech on why we're still in Afghanistan?

Former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barack indicted on corruption charges. His former finance minister serving time for embezzlement. Another former aide charged with illegal wiretapping and fraud. Israel's former President being tried on rape and sexual harassment charges. Who does Israel think it is, Afghanistan?

Israeli government approves construction of hundreds of new homes in occupied West Bank. How do you say, "Up yours, Obama " in Hebrew?

Former Sen. Bob Dole urges Obama to present own health care reform plan. What difference does it make? Republicans will oppose cure for cancer if offered by Obama.

David Letterman offers top 10 list giving top 10 ways to irritate Dick Cheney. How come he didn't get Cheney to deliver it?

Trial balloon floated suggesting Cheney might be candidate for President in 2012. Floated by Cheney? Or by Democrats? Would he run on pro-torture platform?

Manson killer Susan Atkins, terminally ill with brain cancer, denied parole. Too bad for her she's not imprisoned in Scotland.

British official admits "oil and trade" involved in decision to release Libyan terrorist jailed for Lockerbie bombing. So it wasn't "compassion" after all-unless you consider compassion for British oil companies. And enough of the "I told you so" from the cynics.

Female Sudanese journalist jailed for wearing pants. Guess it doesn't take much to make Sudanese men feel threatened.

Oliver Stone movie about Hugo Chavez screened in Venice. Bet you didn't know Chavez is illegitimate son of Fidel Castro.

South African sprinter Caster Semenya to undergo gender test after setting record in women's race. Would this happen if he/she didn't have "semen" in her name? Consulting Pat to see if Saturday Night Live gig possible.

Diane Sawyer to replace Charlie Gibson as anchor on ABC's "World News Tonight." From White House flunkie to TV top. You've come a long way, baby.

Who was it who said, one female anchor, breakthrough, two female anchors, cat fight? Some sexist, no doubt. Lone male anchor Brian Williams salivating.

Woman kidnapped at 11 by convicted sex offender finally discovered after 18 years. Local authorities and police must have had same training as SEC officials who ignored warnings about Bernie Madoff.

Levi Johnston disses never-became mother-in-law Sarah Palin in Vanity Fair. In Vanity Fair? Barbarians at the gate indeed.

Rachel Sklar: What to Expect From - And For - Diane Sawyer

2009-09-03T10:34:49Z

Remember when an anchor stepping down was a huge deal? Tom Brokaw. Dan Rather. Peter Jennings. These names were huge pillars of the news ecosystem, and their departures were big stories — as well as the fraught issue of who had the gravitas, the experience, the journalistic, anchor-ly heft to step into their enormous shoes.

The last transition was just a few years ago, but oh how things have changed. The news that Charlie Gibson is leaving ABC's World News after only a few years in the top spot is definitely news, but is shaking no foundations. It's also not at all surprising who is replacing him: Diane Sawyer.

And why should it? Sawyer's got a track record a mile long. She's an accomplished journalist, well-known to ABC viewers over the years, a longtime partner of Gibson and equal to him in stature at the network, as well as in the upper echelons of that news ecosystem.

Well, for one thing, Sawyer's a woman.

A woman!

Remember when that was a big deal? Cast your mind back to 2006. Katie Couric had just been announced as the successor to Dan Rather (or, really, Bob Schieffer), and the entire media community was in a tizzy. What would she wear? Would her hairstyle change? Would we still get to see those famous legs? I'm serious; this was the subject of legitimate debate in legitimate news outlets. The coverage of Couric's ascension to the top spot at CBS, at its core, was about how viewers would react to a pretty, perky woman delivering their nightly half-hour news round-up.

Over at ABC, Sawyer was not impervious to that trend. The spring of 2005 had seen a spate of Katie-vs.-Diane stories over the GMA/Today Show ratings, and after Bob Woodruff's terrible accident in Iraq ended the pairing of he and Elizabeth Vargas leading the broadcast in early 2006, both Gibson and Sawyer quietly started maneuvering for the anchor position.

According to Howard Kurtz in Reality Show, his book chronicling the anchor wars, Sawyer and Gibson were in contact about the ascension possibilities, as partners on GMA for eight years prior, but there were definite backroom goings-on as well. There was more: Sawyer also felt the added weight of the Couric treatment, very much aware of how the media would treat them as competitors:

It would be like every movie that featured two women battling it out. Women made great copy, that was the way the popular culture worked ... She did not want her evening news tenure to be viewed through that prism. If she went to Darfur, the stories would be all about how she was trying to demonstrate that she was more interested in the plight of refugees than Couric was. She would be cast in a catfight.

We all know what happened: Gibson took over the ABC anchor chair. Couric took over at CBS. Sawyer remained at GMA, ever valuable to the network. Come January, she'll finally be making that switch from morning to evening, to one of the hallowed Big Three anchor chairs.

Why bring all this up now? Things seem so different now, don't they? Katie Couric has been on the job for three years now, and when it comes to waving scalps, Sarah Palin's is a pretty decent one to have claimed. Gibson's depature from the chair is news, certainly, but as previously mentioned it won't rate the kind of wall-to-wall coverage of the Brokaw-Williams handover, so carefully brokered and so seamlessly managed back in December 2004. New media upstarts enjoy dancing on the grave of the nightly news almost as much as they do that of newspapers. Though the Big Three claim 20+ million viewers each night, there's no doubt that the timeslot is not the big dog it once was.

Things are different — but that's why it's worth noting. Katie Couric's been leading the CBS Evening News for three years and it's still on the air (albeit with diminished ratings share). Charlie Gibson, for all his XY-chromosome-ness, never did manage to permanently unseat Brian Williams from that top spot. And in truth, there could not be a more perfect replacement for Gibson at ABC than Diane Sawyer, whose reporting chops, professionalism, longevity and on-air authority make her the ideal for a seamless transition.

But — looking ahead, there will be stories about how it's BriWi vs. The Girls, and real data there, too, about whether or not viewers are switching over. There will be catfight stories, especially if ABC and CBS start getting close in the ratings or double-dealing for big-time exclusives. There will be assessments of Sawyer's wardrobe choices and hairstyle, comparisons with the choices Couric makes and has made (here's a potential headline: Will Diane Sawyer Cut Her Hair? Katie Did!). Looking ahead is made somewhat easier by looking back, and the fact that those articles about Couric's wardrobe may have been in 2006, but chatter about Hillary Clinton's pantsuits and Sarah Palin's Naughty Monkey pumps are decidedly more recent.

Looking ahead, those will be the stories — but so, too, will be the story of how a longtime ABC stalwart with an award-winning career took over one of the most important posts, still, in news — and the whole thing didn't fall apart. That's the thing about progress. It just sort of happens.

This post was originally published at Mediaite.com.

Brian Williams: Charlie Gibson "A Pro," Diane Sawyer "Legendary"

2009-09-02T14:22:17Z

"NBC Nightly News" anchor Brian Williams, who stands firmly atop the evening news ratings race, released a statement on the news that Diane Sawyer will be replacing Charlie Gibson when Gibson retires later this year.

Williams praised both Gibson and Sawyer and said, "the competition has never been more robust among the three network evenings newscasts."

His full statement:

"I would love to say that ABC's loss is NBC's gain, but then they went and appointed Diane Sawyer to replace Charlie Gibson. That doesn't lessen the competition one bit.

Charlie is a pro, and he's been the most able competition anyone could ask for. Diane is no different -- a legendary name in our business for decades -- and now we'll have to work every bit as hard every day to put on the best newscast possible. This is more evidence that the competition has never been more robust among the three network evening newscasts, and it keeps us all sharp, aggressive and on our toes. Congratulations to Charlie, congratulations to Diane, and Katie and I will continue to work hard every day. "

READ KATIE COURIC'S STATEMENT HERE

Eric Boehlert: Media: Angry Right-Wingers Are Important; Angry Libs Are Annoying

2009-08-25T10:04:33Z

Suddenly this summer, as right-wing mini-mobs turn health care forums into free-for-alls, as unhinged political rage flows in the streets, and as the Nazi and Hitler rhetoric flies, anger is in. Suddenly anger is good. It's authentic. It's newsworthy. Reading and watching the mini-mob news coverage, the media message seems clear: Angry speaks to the masses.

Instead of being turned off by the displays of passion the way the press had been when liberal protesters took to the streets prior to the Iraq war, media elites have been touting the mini-mob trend as a "phenomenon" (USA Today) staffed by a "citizen army" (Bloomberg News).

And make no mistake, the health care mini-mobs have been showered with a massive amount of media coverage. During the week of August 10-16, the topic of health care, and specifically the politics and the protests of health care, accounted for a staggering 62 percent of all cable news coverage, according to the Pew Research Center's weekly survey. My guess is that you would be hard-pressed to find a single week during the run-up to the Iraq war when liberal anti-war protests accounted for just 6 percent of the cable news coverage.

Why the gaping disparity? How come liberal anti-war protesters were shunned by the press, but the mini-mobs are showered with incessant coverage? It's because apparently when angry -- and overwhelmingly white -- conservatives protest, they come attached with a direct line to the American psyche. Liberals, though, most certainly do not.

Bottom line: Liberal protesters don't tell us anything about the mood of America. But angry right-wingers do, according to the press.

Read the entire Media Matters column here.

Brian Williams Reacts To Losing To "Daily Show" In Softball

2009-08-12T11:48:53Z

They said it couldn't be done, but The Daily Show has beaten NBC Nightly News in the ratings, and by "ratings" I mean a softball game. Monday night, Jon Stewart led his team to a 12 share over Brian Williams and the NBC Nightly News gang, who only nabbed a 2 share in the coveted runs demographic. Here's Brian Williams making excuses.

Brian Williams: I Start The Day With "A Bit Of Methamphetamine" (VIDEO)

2009-07-30T12:52:41Z

Brian Williams made a loopy, entertaining appearance on "Way Too Early with Willie Geist" Thursday morning, detailing his morning routine in depth and congratulating the "Morning Joe" co-host on his new solo show.

Williams claimed that each morning begins with members of his presumably-fictional "valet staff... repeating the stories of the day in a low voice as I kind of come to."

"I step into clothing that is held out for me," Williams continued. "I select from a wide array of shirts and ties and jacket combinations."

When Geist suggested that Williams' morning routine seemed to include "a couple of drinks," the "Nightly News" anchor did Geist one better, joking that "normally they'll prepare for me just a bit of methamphetamine if it's going to be a tough morning."

Williams also congratulated Geist on his new 5:30AM show, lauding him for claiming one of the "last shards of television that no one really cared about."

As Williams' deadpan appearance came to an end, a chuckling Geist admitted, "I don't know what just happened."

WATCH:

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

Norman Horowitz: As Our Kids Were Dying In Wars, Michael Jackson Died In Encino

2009-07-26T23:46:03Z

To avoid service in the Army or Marine Corps during the Korean War, I volunteered for four years of service in the United States Air Force. Other than being in a bar fight from time to time, I was never in -- or even close to being in -- harms way. None of this really matters other than to say that I wondered then why our government took a four year chunk out of my life, and it is over fifty years later, that I still wonder.

The "Coalition of the Willing" (how about that for a name?), along with our service men and women, are other peoples' sons and daughters. They volunteered to protect and defend our country and our constitution. Is that what they have been doing? And, the war in Afghanistan has cost the coalition almost 1300 dead, and counting, and counting... Were we ever threatened by the country of Afghanistan?

It is sad that we still find ourselves in Afghanistan for most of this decade with no end in sight.

As a whining media person I have noted in the past that it is important to report on all of the events having anything to do with the life, times, and death of a popular singer, yet not report in any detail whatsoever on what our soldiers are trying to do in Iraq and Afghanistan.

There was an opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal entitled: "The Tragedy of Michael Jackson." I jest that this was a very important story for the Journal to cover. I continue to admire them for their journalistic courage in these matters. The self-proclaimed King of Pop was nobody's victim. He was solely responsible for his life as well as his death.

Almost all of the radio and television outlets have dedicated countless hours to the unfolding of the Jackson story, his life, his career, his family, and of course the circumstances surrounding his death.

While I hope we are coming to the end of our national mourning for this entertainer I would like to comment about a minor issue that has affected our country for nearly eight years: the death of so many and the destruction of so much.

General Stanley McChrystal, is currently in the middle of a 60-day assessment of how to turn the Afghan war around. We are near the end of eight years of war and we are "assessing?" The Taliban and its allies are obviously growing stronger, and they have killed 35 U.S. troops in the first three weeks of July.

"We've seen the security for the Afghan people deteriorate over the last three years," Admiral Mike Mullen, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told troops during a visit to southern Afghanistan on July 17. "We have to start to turn that tide over the next 12 to 18 months." Even as Mullen was hoping for a year and a half to turn things around, Defense Secretary Robert Gates acknowledged on that same day that the U.S. public is war-weary and that progress must come quickly. "After the Iraq experience, nobody is prepared to have a long slog where it is not apparent we are making headway."

What follows is to and for those people who work at the broadcast networks and purport to be "journalists."

You guys did a great job incessantly covering the demise of Michael Jackson. He will still be dead as our boys and girls continue to be killed in our two horrid wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. There was/is more coverage on how Jackson died than the how and why our kids are dying in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Many ask why I incessantly write about our wars and our television coverage, and I have no reasonable answer other than what is going on makes me nuts.

These wars continue to need to be reported on. Every single day. Tonight on the CBS Network news they reported on such hard news stories such as: Sarah Palin, Hillary Clinton, Wall Street, health insurance, a car crash, a bicycle race, a high school, baseball hall of fame, and a technology story. A war? What war? Didn't anyone tell them that we are actually involved in two wars with our kids in harms way? If not, why not?

Broadcasters are required to serve in the public interest, convenience, and necessity. Is there anyone out there who thinks they are doing that?

Wanna see real journalism, at least most of the time? Read the New York Times, The Washington Post, and the Chicago Tribune.

Sadly, Howard Beale lives on US Cable and Broadcast Networks, but he is presently using names like Lou Dobbs, Katie Couric, Chris Matthews, Brian Williams, Bill O'Reilly, Larry King, and Others.

Bet each and every one of them considers themselves a journalist. Perhaps they are, but to me they are primarily entertainers pretending to be journalists.

Our President, and our Congress will sleep soundly in their beds tonight knowing that the managements of GE, Disney, CBS, Time Warner, and News Corp are sleeping soundly in theirs.

If only our kids who are in harms way could be sleeping soundly in theirs.

Norman Horowitz
Insomniac

Michael Russnow: Obama Backtracks Calling Police Action Stupid: Was It Moderation or Is Obama Becoming the First Wimp?

2009-07-25T06:29:58Z

While watching the president's rambling press conference Wednesday, I was jolted out of a near snooze when he made a sharp comment, saying the Cambridge, Massachusetts police had behaved stupidly. I was excited, because Barack Obama usually plays to the middle ground. Not because he's a political centrist -- he's not -- but because it often appears he believes the best chance for achieving success is to offend the least many people possible.

That's why he wasn't my first choice last year in the primaries -- he was actually my fourth. I viewed him as the sort of guy who becomes frat president -- not so much to get the girls, but to be everyone's pal. A glad hander with an even temperament, a winning smile, soft-spoken, articulate and smart. A great trait to become president of the Harvard Law Review, but not the leader of the free world.

And so, because Obama measures his words about almost everything, I was intrigued when he finally said something direct and from his heart after someone asked him at the end of the press conference what he thought about the case of Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates, who'd been arrested in his home.

I liked the way Obama laid it out carefully, saying the initial stages seemed fine to him, when someone saw Gates in the dark from a distance trying to jimmy open the door of his Cambridge home. He said he didn't mind at all that the police were called to investigate and found Gates, who was already inside his home.

But at that point he said it should have ended, as the professor showed the officer his ID, indicating he actually lived there, and Obama earned a big hurray from me when he said that the police department acted "stupidly" when they arrested Gates.

He was right. The policeman, Sgt. James Crowley, was wrong. Yet, though Gates was released without being charged after four hours of what must have been a humiliating experience for a distinguished professor -- or any decent American -- mug shots, fingerprinting and the like -- Sgt. Crowley said he had done nothing for which to apologize, though the mayor of Cambridge did just that.

When the case became controversial -- lead stories by Brian Williams on NBC, Katie Couric on CBS, Charlie Gibson on ABC and reports on CNN, Fox News and MSNBC -- not to mention the inevitable replays on YouTube -- Obama suddenly softened his tone. It was as if he said, "Oh, my God, it doesn't matter that I was right, but this will take media space away from my health care issue, and I don't want to make people think I was playing favorites with people tied to my race."

Then, when the tweets on Twitter became deafening he almost completely backtracked during a surprise appearance before the White House Press Corps. He said he was wrong for what he'd said about the Cambridge Police department and Sgt. Crowley, insisted that Crowley was an "outstanding police officer" and blamed himself for ratcheting up the incident by his comment. He further told the press he'd called Gates and Crowley and invited them both to the White House to have a beer for a kumbaya moment. Instead of this mealy-mouthed reversal, why couldn't the president man up and say, "You know, I don't have to explain myself. I said what I meant and I stand by what I said."

Even though the facts of this case are still as mysterious as the Michael Jackson toxicological reports, it's clear that had Professor Gates done anything truly illegal the police would have been champing at the bit to get the info to us. If Professor Gates had pulled out a gun or brandished a cane or slugged Sgt. Crowley in the mouth it would have been assault and grounds for arrest. No such charge has been made.

So since it is just conjecture as to what happened, I'll explore the most vile possibility. Perhaps Professor Gates is a hothead and quick tempered. Perhaps he was so repulsed by the thought that he was being questioned in an accusatory manner -- after having given the officer proof that he lived in the house -- that he -- hold onto your hats -- said something nasty. Maybe it was more than nasty -- a vulgar epithet -- maybe even used the "F" word or combined it with the word honkie.

When I was a kid I was taught, "Sticks and stones can break your bones, but names can never harm you." Was Sgt. Crowley never taught that? Not even in training for the Cambridge police force? How gutless of our president in his zeal to be neutral and not make waves to say that both Sgt. Crowley and Professor Gates overreacted. It doesn't matter whether Professor Gates overreacted. Such an overreaction is within his legal rights. It is not within Sgt. Crowley's legal rights to take advantage of the situation.

There was no reason for Professor Gates to be led off in handcuffs, whatever unpleasant thing he might have said to irritate Sgt. Crowley. The officer should have taken a deep breath and walked away. His powers as a policeman, which include being armed with a gun and a stick to beat someone back, do not entitle him to use the threat of physical force under color of authority when someone is exercising freedom of speech in his own home.

Even Sgt. Leon Lashley, an African American Cambridge police department colleague of Sgt. Crowley's, admitted that, while he supported Crowley's action (big surprise), it probably would have played out differently had he been the officer to arrive on the scene. When CNN's Anderson Cooper pressed Lashley as to why Gates was taken in -- whatever he'd said, it was in his house -- Lashley lamely responded that they were able to do so because Gates had walked outside the house. Cooper pressed further, saying Gates was on his porch and it was still his property. Lashley insisted that once out of the house, a hot exchange of words could then be viewed as disturbing the peace. That's a big stretch.

There is nothing about this case that doesn't smell phony, and the fact that our president won't stand behind his words when they become controversial makes me quite concerned about his future. It's still too early in his administration to point the finger of failure as partisan Republicans have done. But whether it's the timetable on our involvement in Iraq on which he's waffled, his health care deadline, on which he caved in to congressional forces wanting a delay or his still unfulfilled promise to gay Americans that he will eliminate the preposterous "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy -- that even many distinguished members of our military have lobbied against -- Obama just doesn't have the cojones to follow through unless he has a clear consensus. He is so afraid to offend and risk losing support that he refuses in fact to lead by setting the proper example.

The president says he has to be careful about what he says, because when he says something it gets a sizable reaction, and that's true. But in this case it deserved the media attention and exposed an outrageous happenstance that shouldn't be pooh-poohed and dispensed with over a couple of Miller Lites. The president shouldn't be so concerned about offending conservative elements of our society that he somehow compared Gates and Crowley's behavior as a simple case of two men overreacting. Even CNN's David Gergen said he was distressed about Obama's conclusion giving equal status to the men's wrongdoing.

I'll say it again. Gates has a right to scream at a policeman and tell him to get out of his house. You might not like it if he called Crowley a pig (and I'm not saying he did), but even if he had it's covered under the First Amendment. Crowley's "overreaction" went a lot farther than harmless name calling, forcibly taking Gates from his house like a common criminal. His deed was a helluva lot more consequential and an overreaching of the public trust invested in him as a police officer.

So, if this is another sizable sign of how our president is more concerned about his television "Q" rating than making meaningful change for the American people, Obama may well be a one-term president. My only hope is that if Obama can't get his act together by next year there will be a strong Democrat standing in the wings to go head to head with him in the 2012 primaries rather than the party giving him token support and in the process handing the country back to the Republicans.

In case you can't tell, I'm thoroughly disgusted with his actions today.

Michael Russnow's website is www.ramproductionsinternational.com

Chris Weigant: Friday Talking Points [87] -- A Tale Of Two Houses

2009-07-24T20:35:19Z

Before I begin with the serious stuff, I'd like to indulge in a little gratuitous media-bashing first. If that sort of thing isn't your cup of tea, just skip to the next section now. You have been warned.

A few weeks ago, because of firing Dan Froomkin and selling access to their reporters and in general for their op-ed priorities, I wrote that the Washington Post had reduced itself, in terms of being a trustworthy outlet for news, to a cartoon (Tom Toles' editorial cartoons, to be exact -- about the only thing left worth reading on their op-ed pages). But now it's looking like this is a deeper trend than just one seriously annoyed blogger. Because, with Walter Cronkite's passing, the title of "most trusted newsman in America" now passes to... Jon Stewart? The glaring problem with this is that Jon Stewart is not a journalist! He's a comedian. He readily admits that what he does is "fake news." And yet, even with this admission, he is trusted more than the big three network news anchors to deliver facts to America. That is a sad, sad, state of affairs, people.

Nothing against Jon Stewart, of course. His brand of political satire can be hilarious at times, and such satire on television is just as important as cartoons are on the newspaper op-ed pages. So I do not belittle what Stewart does, or what he has accomplished. But there's a reason why the Time magazine poll shows (with a handy map) that Stewart beat (or, in two cases, tied) Katie Couric, Brian Williams, and Charlie Gibson in thirty-eight states in this country on who America's most trusted newscaster is. Because the quality of not just the anchors, but network news in general, is so incredibly low that a comedian gets more respect from the public in more than three-quarters of the United States.

In support of this argument, I offer up Exhibit A -- Chuck Todd. Now, I probably could have randomly chosen just about any other network reporter or anchor and made the same point, just in case you think I'm singling Todd out here. I offer him up not as the worst example, but as a representative example, in other words. I used to have a lot more respect for Todd back during the campaign when he was the "polls and numbers" guy for NBC. He stood in front of the cool computerized maps of the electoral numbers by state back then. But since, he has been promoted to Chief White House Correspondent for NBC. Meaning his beat is the White House now. Which also means he is the guy in the audience who gets to ask a question for the National Broadcasting Company during presidential press conferences, such as the one we had Wednesday night.

A big part of Chuck's job definition -- what NBC assumably pays him a lot of money for, in other words -- is to competently ask questions to the President of the United States. Now, to be fair, sometimes such questions can be hasty and ad hoc, when asked on the run. But this is a formal press conference, where Todd has had days and days to formulate a question, endless hours in which to practice saying his question in front of a mirror (so he'd get it right on national television) and -- importantly -- he knows he will be called on (unlike a lot of the people in that room).

Here is Chuck Todd's question for President Obama, which I personally transcribed from the audio. [To be polite, interjections such as "um" have been removed (as is usually done when presenting the spoken word as written text), and non-standard elisions such as "gonna" have been changed to "going to" -- both standard editing practice. But I have not edited his words beyond that.] This is what he gets paid the big bucks for:

Thank you, sir. We're just talking in that question about... about reducing health care inflation, reducing cost. Can you explain how you're going to expand coverage... is it fair to say... is this bill going to cover all 47 million Americans that are uninsured, or is this going to be something... is it going to take a mandate... or is this something that isn't... your bill is probably not going to get it all the way there, and if it's not going to get all the way there, can you say how far is enough... you know... "OK, 20 million more, I can sign that, 10 million more, I can't"?

Now, how many Americans think that, if given the same exact chance -- and knowing he would be called upon -- Jon Stewart couldn't have asked the exact same question a little bit better?

But maybe that's a cheap shot. It's a stylistic thing, after all. Maybe Chuck Todd was just nervous. Trustworthiness is based upon more than style, after all. It's about getting the facts straight, and telling the American public what they are. Here are Brian Williams and Chuck Todd chatting, after the presser finished. Notice that BriWi starts out with an introduction which pats television journalism on the back, NBC on the back, and reminds everyone once again of the incredibly high opinion television journalists have of themselves (which, as the Time poll so painfully shows, is just not warranted).

BRIAN WILLIAMS: Chuck Todd, our man in the arena, in the front row, first of the television correspondents called out. Chuck, what stood out to you?

CHUCK TODD: I would say there's [sic] two headlines. If you're following the health care debate because you're wondering about the future of health care, you heard him [Obama] promise 97 percent coverage, and you heard him promise that only if you make a million dollars are you going to get taxed, that that's how this thing is going to get paid for, and I think that those were details that hadn't been clear before tonight. I think if you're following the politics of this debate, you learned that the August deadline is very flexible, as he sort of started to... use language that said, "I want a bill that's right, and I won't necessarily sign a bill just because it gets to my desk very quickly," so, he's showing flexibility on that... timeline... but... and we did learn about who's going to pay for this thing.

That sounds like some pretty good journalistic tea-leaf reading, huh? Except that most of it is flat-out wrong. President Obama did not come remotely close to "promising" either of the things Chuck Todd said he did. Maybe this is why the headlines Todd predicted for the next morning just did not appear. Don't believe me? Read the full transcript of the press conference for yourself, and see if you agree that Obama "promised" anything of the sort, in either case.

Obama said that taxing millionaires did "meet his principle" that the middle class wouldn't have to pay for the bill. But it was couched by lots of soft language such as: "they've got a number of ideas... we haven't seen a final draft... I haven't seen the final versions... what I want to do is to see what emerges from these committees...." Believe me, I wish Obama had made that promise, which I wrote about this week in pretty strong terms. And I wish Obama had promised a few other things here and there, which I also wrote about in pretty strong terms, just before the press conference started.

But he just didn't. On the 97 percent question, Obama agreed with Chuck Todd (in response to his mangled question) that it would be a good goal to shoot for, but that likely wouldn't be met: "I want to cover everybody. Now, the truth is that, unless you have a -- what's called a single-payer system, in which everybody is automatically covered, then you're probably not going to reach every single individual." Obama then went on to generalize a bit, but in no way did he ever even approach "promising" that 97 percent of Americans would be covered. So Chuck Todd, who was sitting in the same room listening to the President of the United States answer a direction question from his own lips, apparently just did not listen to the answer. And then he rushed to the cameras after Obama left the room to report what he thought he had heard, even though it was incorrect.

Todd went on to indict pretty much the entire mainstream media for focusing on a story which didn't even exist and express astonishment that what was being fought over in newspapers and on cable television was not reality. Astonishment, that is, that anyone would think that there was a different reality than what the inside-the-Beltway crowd had decided upon for that particular week.

BRIAN WILLIAMS: And Chuck, how would you characterize the president tonight? If it wasn't a new urgency he came out with tonight, it was hardly resignation either, though as you noted, the can's been kicked down the road in terms of deadlines, a bit?

CHUCK TODD: He did. You know, I thought he seemed... he didn't seem like he'd been beaten up politically the way, frankly, if you read the newspapers or watch cable on this health care debate, you would think he had been taking a brutal beating. He seemed a lot more confident that he is going to get something. The fact is, we do know he met with some key... he talked with a key senator, Max Baucus... he talked about that tonight... the finance committee. He must have liked what he heard, because there did seem to be a confidence in him about getting this done. I just also found... he enjoyed the lighthearted moments there a little bit... talking about... his own doctor and how great that health care is, and then joking about what it would be like breaking into his own house.

Which brought it back to the new story the mainstream media had latched upon as the Most Important Issue of the day. Average Americans are much more concerned, you see, with some cop in Massachusetts than they are with whether they'll go bankrupt over healthcare bills.

Sheesh.

Oh, the other story which the talking heads completely missed this week? The Dow Jones Industrial Average hit 9,000 points, after a rally that has lasted a few months, and has gained back everything lost since Obama took office. Remember all the media fulminating a few months ago that "as goes the Dow, so goes the economy," and "Obama's obviously a failure on the economy, just look at the Dow"? Remember? Well, that storyline has gone down the Memory Hole now that the Dow's back up again. I heard Brian Williams himself introduce a story about the Dow's climb by taking great pains to explain how the Dow was and should be seen as totally and completely separate from the state of the economy.

It is no wonder more people trust a comedian poking fun at politicians and the media, because he makes his living exposing and highlighting these idiocies to America on a daily basis. And there's certainly no shortage of material there -- nor will there be in the foreseeable future, sad to say.

In conclusion, let me congratulate Jon Stewart for achieving "Most Trusted Newscaster Even Though I'm A Comedian And Never Said I'm A Journalist" status. And for putting all the people who should have been in the running for that title to shame.

Which leads me to our own awards quite nicely (easy transition this week...).

This week's awards for Most Impressive Democrat Of The Week and Most Disappointing Democrat Of The Week could be titled: "A Tale Of Two Houses." Now, I'm not normally a big Dickens fan, but I simply could not have put it better myself:

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of light, it was the season of darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to heaven, we were all going direct the other way -- in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only.

Which leads us to the Speaker of the House and the Senate Majority Leader. Anyone want to bet on which house will produce a bill first? I'll take the House, you can have the Senate. No takers? No? Nobody?

Imagine my surprise. To be honest, I didn't think anyone would take that bet right now. Because, no matter what the outcome, the differences between Pelosi's leadership in the House and Reid's "leadership" in the Senate is, without doubt, "in the superlative degree of comparison only."

Pelosi is knocking heads and taking names over in the House. She is threatening their five-week vacation (an idea I've been pushing for a while), threatening the Blue Dogs in Henry Waxman's committee that she's just going to bypass them and move a bill to the floor, and she's threatening (or "whipping" in the parlance of Washington) all her House Democrats to stand together and hold firm.

And she has appeared confident to both wavering party members and the press that she has the votes to get it through. She may indeed have them, or she may be bluffing. But the bluff (if it is one) has certainly made her opponents think twice about opposing her. It's a show of strength, in other words. It could work, it could fail. The jury's still out on that.

But simply for acting like a leader this week, Speaker Pelosi wins the Most Impressive Democrat Of The Week award hands-down. Pelosi is often dismissed by her critics because she represents the district of San Francisco in the House, but people forget that she learned politics in Baltimore, at her Daddy's knee. And Baltimore is closer, in this respect, to the bare-knuckled politics of Chicago than it is to San Francisco. People forget Pelosi's past at their own peril, in other words. Pelosi knows how to lead. She knows how to double-dare her opponents in a way that makes everyone wonder if she is stronger than she appears, or merely bluffing -- which winds up raising the stakes and risks for such opposition. This is good psychology, and good hardball politics.

Congressional leaders have all sorts of tools at their disposal to goad their fellow party members into action. Sometimes it takes drastic goads. Sometimes these efforts fail. But it is indeed refreshing to see someone like Pelosi actually use these tools the way they are meant to be used. Whether she gets a House floor vote on healthcare reform legislation before the end of August or not, Pelosi wins the MIDOTW award this week just for showing us all how it should be done.

[Congratulate Speaker Nancy Pelosi on her Speaker contact page to let her know you appreciate her efforts.]

Which, sadly, brings us to the foolishness for the ages, and the season of darkness over in the Senate. Harry Reid has been so disappointing on so many levels for so long, that I think I will start referring to him as "Senate Majority Designated Milquetoast Harry Reid." Because I just can't bring myself to type the word "leader" -- especially not in a title, and capitalized "Leader" -- to refer to Senator Reid any more.

Speaker Pelosi began healthcare legislation in the House by getting the three committee chairs whose committees would have to deal with the bill together -- so they could present one bill that could make it through all three committees without intra-house squabbling. She has not succeeded in this, but she did get the same bill through two of those three before hitting the Blue Dog snag. Reid did not follow this example, and let the two Senate committees work separately. Due to the absence of Senator Ted Kennedy (who chairs one of these committees, but has been sidelined due to health reasons), Max Baucus has been hogging the spotlight since the beginning of this process. Kennedy's committee passed a bill, but Baucus has been stalling by telling everyone he wants a "bipartisan" bill -- even though he knows full well that no Republicans are going to vote for any such bill in his committee, even if it were labeled the "Republicans Save Health Care, Democrats Are Evil And Should Be Rounded Up, And Obama Wasn't Born In Hawai'i Act of 2009." It just ain't gonna happen, but that hasn't stopped Baucus from wasting everyone's time chasing this moonbeam.

Reid's job, in such a case, is to knock some heads behind the scenes, and break up the logjam. Reid's job, like Pelosi's, is to cajole and (yes) threaten recalcitrant "Democrats" to get something done. Reid's job is to threaten every senator's five-week summer vacation, if it becomes necessary.

Imagine if Harry Reid had stood up this week and said the following:

"The senators on Senator Baucus' committee have said they need more time to get a bill out. Fine. The Senate will not adjourn for August until they are done. Because if they truly do need just a bit of time to get this done -- and are not merely trying to kill the effort through endless delays because it's easier politically than taking a public stand -- then we have five long weeks, and nothing on the calendar for those five weeks. Now, I know that most senators would prefer to go on summer recess, so I direct all their comments to Senator Baucus and their fellow senators on Baucus' committee. Let him know the urgency of finishing their work. If this work takes a little more time, then we will all sit here in Washington in August until the work is done. If they truly are trying to kill healthcare, then they can publicly say so, and we can all go home for the summer, and I can report to the president and the American people that because Max Baucus does not think healthcare reform can be done this year, then it isn't going to get done."

Just imagine...

Of course, what Harry Reid did come out and say was "Gosh, Senator Baucus says he needs some more time. Well, we'll just have to give it to him. So we can all go on our five-week vacation, and then come back and -- maybe in September, I don't know... or maybe by Hallowe'en, does that work for everyone? No? Thanksgiving? OK, well, maybe we'll just start all over again next year, can we all agree on that?"

Or words to that effect. Sorry, but I was unable to transcribe Reid's recent remarks completely accurately, because my keyboard kept throwing up in disgust. Ahem.

Which is why, for the record-breaking eleventh time, Harry Reid is hereby awarded the Most Disappointing Democrat Of The Week award. Perhaps after Pelosi is done over in the House, she could put a pair of steel-toed boots on and go over and kick some spinal integrity into Senator Milquetoast Reid. Just a suggestion.

[Contact Senate Majority Designated Milquetoast Harry Reid on his Senate contact page to let him know what you think of his actions.]

Volume 87 (7/24/09)

With that out of the way, we look forward to the Dog Days of August, when the Blue Dogs are feeling pretty doggone good about themselves, for their doggéd efforts to bird-dog healthcare legislation in the whole dogfight with their own party's leader and "top dog," Barack Obama.

OK, sorry, you're probably dog tired of this by now, right? So we'll stop, and just... (I simply can't help it)... let sleeping dogs lie.

[Editor's note: We have cancelled the author's five-week August vacation for writing the previous two paragraphs. We apologize, and promise it won't happen again.]

Grrr... snarl...

Seriously, though, why is everyone afraid of August? Except, of course, Nancy Pelosi, who was quoted this week saying "I'm not afraid of August. It's a month." The conventional wisdom being bandied about Washington, echoed by the news media, is now: "August equals doom and defeat for Obama's healthcare legislation this year." August equals death, in other words, because it will give healthcare reform opponents all month long to attack the plan. I've heard people on the left and the right say almost exactly the same thing, as if it is a foregone conclusion.

But, I have to ask, doesn't that mean that healthcare supporters also have a whole month to make their case? Are they just going to ignore the opportunity, and not fight back?

To put it another way -- Congressmen all go home during this period. They talk to their constituents at town hall meetings and the like. They make themselves available in local offices for local feedback. But if the American people really do want healthcare reform, and are going to be really upset if it doesn't happen... doesn't that mean the Congresscritters are going to get an earful on the issue? Especially Democrats who are seen as standing in the way of actual reform? And especially Democrats who are standing in the way of reform who have taken truckloads of money from the healthcare industry?

Isn't the healthcare reform a winning argument, in other words? So why would five weeks of making this argument mean support will wither away?

To be fair, the term "Swift Boat" is being thrown around. Senator John Kerry took August off during his campaign, ignored a vicious attack ad, and it may have cost him the presidency. But Kerry didn't know it was coming and didn't react fast enough. Everyone should be ready for this August's fight -- people for healthcare reform included. So there's no real reason to think it's going to play out the same way.

Of course, it might. But then again, it might not.

Democrats, right up to President Obama, need to start channeling some of Speaker Pelosi's feistiness on the issue this August. Ads should be teed up and ready to go. Talking points should be memorized. There's going to be a fight, but please, Democratic Party, don't follow Harry Reid's example this time ("the way to win the battle is to start by surrendering"), follow Nancy Pelosi's.

Here are a few pointers for the summer, for all Democrats to consider. Most of them were written with Obama in mind, but they can be easily adapted by others just as usefully.

Lead with the sob story

I simply cannot say this enough. Every Democratic politician, every time they are interviewed, every single time, should begin with some heart-wrenching story about what is wrong with the system we have today. This is the core of the debate for Democrats, and they have been almost COMPLETELY SILENT about it so far. This is insane. Don't you guys care whether you are driving the public debate or not?

Obama showed (although it was kind of weakly done) how to do this in his recent press conference. In one way or another, some version of the following has to be used within the first answer you give on television:

"Well, I'm glad you asked me that, Chas Blowdry, but before I get to the answer I'd like to share with your viewers this letter I got last week. It's from a constituent of mine in (insert name of podunk town here). She went to the hospital because she was hit by the limo of the CEO of a health insurance company. She needed a bandage, but the hospital demanded the deed to her house before they'd give it to her. She also needed an aspirin, and they took her car before they'd give her that. When she pointed out the guy who hit her owned the hospital, she was sued and forced into bankruptcy."

We know where you live

OK, that was a bit over the top, I'll admit, and designed to get a laugh. But there are millions and millions of real stories of people's lives destroyed financially by getting sick, which are not funny in any way, shape or form. They are also not rare, sadly. That is the whole point.

Now this one was written for Obama to use as a blunt weapon, but it could also be adapted by just about any advocacy group that wished to run a dandy television ad in the home district of (for instance) some Blue Dog Democrat who is gumming up the works in Congress.

"I'd like to read a letter from a constituent of Representative Roadblock's, if I may. This woman has lost her house and lost her job and lost just about everything she had in life because her daughter got leukemia. She lives in (insert podunk town name here), which is one of the towns represented by Congressman Roadblock. So I'd just like to ask the congressman, 'Why do you want to continue the system which caused this to happen? Why are you standing in the way of us helping millions of people like her, both people who vote for you and people who do not? What would you say to her, what would you tell her you're doing for her?' Because that is what this whole debate is about."

We know who pays you

This one is a continuation of the previous item.

Every single Democrat standing in the way of reform should be put on a list. And then next to their names, there should be a dollar amount showing exactly how much these people have gotten in "campaign donations" from the healthcare industry, the lobbyists, the drug companies, hospitals, and the like. This list should be circulated to every single Democrat who appears anywhere in public this August. To make it even more useful, put the Republican leadership in Congress on the list too, and see how much they've sucked off the teat of the healthcare lobby. Then whip this handy list out as it becomes necessary.

"In response to the quote you just ran from Senator Boughtnpaidfor, I would just like to point out that he has taken 2.6 million dollars over the years from the very industry we are trying to reform. This might put the senator's remarks to the effect that healthcare reform causes cancer into some needed perspective. Don't you think the people who gave him those millions might have some influence over what he says about it? It's sad when the people we elect to Congress put the big-money special interests in front of the needs of their constituents, that's all I have to say."

They want to scare you, so nothing gets done

This is a wonderful way to take command of the conversation. All the sniping recently is about details. So don't sweat the small stuff. And remember, it's all small stuff. Keep your eyes on the horizon -- which in this case, means always moving the debate back to one hard, cold reality -- the baby that's going to be thrown out with the bathwater if nothing passes this year.

This needs to be bluntly pointed out, so we are devoting the next three talking points to show various ways to raise the level of the debate to: "We want to fix it -- they don't."

"You know what this whole debate is about, to me? It's about whether we, as a country, have a system where 62 percent of all personal bankruptcies are filed due to health costs -- up from eight percent in the 1980s. Is that the direction this country should be heading in? I think not. We have produced a bill which will largely solve this problem. Our opponents want to kill this bill at any cost. They will say anything about it in an attempt to demonize it and scare just enough of the American public to just the right level of fear so that nothing gets done this year. But what they are really fighting for is more medical bankruptcies. They were in charge of Congress for a decade. They had majorities, and a chance to solve this problem. They did not. We are now going to. They are standing in the way of this happening, because they want to keep the status quo. We think the status quo is unacceptable. They do not. That is the real issue here, and I wish that fact wouldn't keep getting swept under the media's rug."

End the evil of "pre-existing conditions"

Once again, focus the debate on the problem you are trying to solve, in language everyone is aware of.

"One of the most positive things this legislation will accomplish is to banish forever the term 'pre-existing condition' from the insurance industry's vocabulary. We think it is barbaric for the law to allow insurance companies to get away with this in a moral society. This is one of the things our opponents never like to talk about, because they are responsible for inaction in changing this barbarism in America. We are taking a stand with our legislation that this practice must be made illegal. And we simply cannot understand how anyone could be politically against this. You know what? We all have pre-existing conditions. We're all going to die one day. That is the nature of life, and we are committed to ending this discriminatory practice."

Getting sick is why you have health insurance

This is a variation on the same theme as the last one.

"Let me just add one more thing. We think the practice of 'rescission' is abominable. This is when your health insurance company discovers that you are sick and actually want to use your insurance, and they manufacture some reason why they don't have to pay for it. We are going to outlaw this practice once and for all with our healthcare reform. It's astonishing, but again, the same people have allowed this to go on for years who are now opposing reform, and these politicians have taken a lot of money from the insurance companies over the years. I believe this is a moral failing of our healthcare system, and say that it has to end. The reason you have health insurance in the first place is to take care of you when you get sick. If we have to pass a law to force these companies to do so, I can't understand why anyone could be against that, myself."

We are not going to let you relax in August

This is a message that, again, would be most effective coming from President Obama, but could easily be used by advocacy groups for healthcare reform as well. Because this is the sort of hardball language politicians understand. And, it's obvious, the time to refrain from using such measures will be over if Congress goes on vacation without producing anything.

"Some in Congress think that if they just delay, delay, delay... then nothing will get done on healthcare, and they won't be held responsible the way they would be if they actually had to vote on it. I am here today to tell you they couldn't be more wrong. They are about to take a luxurious vacation on the taxpayer's dime for five weeks, and some of them are quite happy that they've managed to block anything from getting done in Congress. I call on all constituents of these obstructionists -- no matter which party they belong to -- to make their voices loud and clear during August. They want fun in the sun? Why not instead turn up the heat on them? They want to relax? We will be holding town halls and running ads in their home states and districts. They want to get re-elected? We pledge to do everything possible to see that that does not happen if they block healthcare reform from passing. America put Barack Obama in the White House to get something done on this issue, and if a handful of people in Congress are standing in his way, then we are going to make sure every single one of his or her voters is aware of that by the time they get back in September. Count on it."

Chris Weigant blogs at: ChrisWeigant.com

Full archives of FTP columns: FridayTalkingPoints.com

Cross-posted at: Democratic Underground

Iowa Is Curious Outlier On All Time Magazine Polls

2009-07-24T13:12:19Z

The other day, I put up the results of a funny Time Magazine online poll that declared the Daily Show's Jon Stewart America's Most Trusted Newsman, probably because the poll was designed to elicit that response. I learned two interesting things from that post. First, apparently there are a ton of very earnest people who did not get my joke about Stewart winning Time Magazine's Person of the Year award in 2006, which everybody won. That joke usually kills, but clearly, it needs to go back to the workshop, for tweaking.

The other thing I learned is that Iowa seems to have a tortured relationship with Time Magazine polls! In the Trusted Newsman poll, Iowa results favored Katie Couric, by a wide margin. But the overall results placed Couric in last place. Over at BuzzFlash, Matt Stopera took a look at previous polls and noted that "Iowa always seems to be on the opposite side of things."

It's quite curious. These polls would have you believe that Iowa is a redoubt of countering opinions. According to these polls, unlike the rest of the U.S., Iowa thinks that the U.S. should take a "stronger stance on the Iranian electoral crisis," that going to the moon wasn't "worth it," that North Korea should not go back on the the terrorist list, that Sarah Palin aided her electoral chances by quitting her job, and that Congress should not pass a resolution honoring Michael Jackson.

I'm not at all sure why Iowa is so consistently anomalous. And obviously, I don't want to put myself in danger by getting TOO CLOSE TO THE TERRIBLE TRUTH! But it seems to me there are three possibilities, here.

1. There is one very committed guy in Iowa who's dedicated himself to ruining Time Magazine polls.

2. Rick Stengel hates Iowa, and is miscounting their votes in an attempt to make them look stupid.

3. The ethanol lobby has their finger in every pot, and people refuse to pander to them at their peril.

[Would you like to follow me on Twitter? Because why not? Also, please send tips to tv@huffingtonpost.com -- learn more about our media monitoring project here.]

NBC Nightly News Analyzes Obama 'Birthers' Movement: "Becoming A Staple Of Blogs And Conservative Talk Radio" (VIDEO)

2009-07-23T08:22:16Z

Anchor Brian Williams addressed the already-disproved claim that President Obama is not an American citizen last night in his Nightly News broadcast. The issue has become resurgent after a tape of a woman angrily questioning a GOP Congressman about the issue at a town hall spread like wildfire across the internet.

Williams called it "the question that won't seem to go away for President Obama even though it's been answered," and noted that it's become "a kind of conspiracy theory."

NBC's legal correspondent Pete Williams reported that despite being debunked, the conspiracy theory is "becoming a staple of blogs and conservative talk radio."

WATCH:

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

Send us tips! Write us at tv@huffingtonpost.com if you see any newsworthy or notable TV moments. Read more about our media monitoring project here and click here to join the Media Monitors team.

Online Poll: Jon Stewart Is America's Most Trusted Newsman

2009-07-22T14:10:53Z

Well, in a result that he will probably accept as downright apocalyptic for America, The Daily Show's Jon Stewart has been selected, in an online poll conducted by Time Magazine, as America's Most Trusted Newscaster, post-Cronkite. Matched up against Brian Williams, Katie Couric and Charlie Gibson, Stewart prevailed with 44 percent of the vote. Now, if we're being honest, he probably managed to prevail as the winner precisely because he was the odd man out in a field of network news anchors. Nevertheless, I think Jim Cramer should feel free to SNACK ON THAT.

Brian Williams drew the second largest percentage of votes, with 29 percent. Gibson and Couric finished third and fourth, respectively, with 19 and 7 percent of the vote.

Time has helpfully broken out the results, state-by-state, so if you want to muse on some anomalous results, feel free. Brian Williams won Arizona, Wyoming, Nebraska, North Dakota, Florida, South Carolina, Indiana, Delaware and Vermont, and tied in Kentucky and Alaska. Charlie Gibson was big in Tennessee and Montana. Katie Couric pulled off the Mondalian feat of winning one state: Iowa.

Stewart finished no lower than second place in all states, except, curiously, Vermont.

To view the results, click here.

[Would you like to follow me on Twitter? Because why not? Also, please send tips to tv@huffingtonpost.com -- learn more about our media monitoring project here.]

Jon Stewart, Brian Williams Assess Media's Desperate Seduction Of Sanford (VIDEO)

2009-07-21T10:09:03Z

Jon Stewart hosted NBC Nightly News anchor and managing editor Brian Williams last night for the newsman's fourteenth appearance on The Daily Show. Their ensuing discussion, which touched on the passing of Walter Cronkite and the overtures made via email to Mark Sanford by various figures in the media, alternated between the cordial and the cordially biting. Let's focus on the latter part, obviously!

Dovetailing off his opening segment, which blasted the various media figures who pitched their own variety of Argentinian woo to get Mark Sanford on their shows, with the promise of an easy ride floated as an enticement, Stewart asked Williams what he does to "seduce" a public figure like Sanford. Williams parried the shot, saying, "You'll have to ask the individuals whose names are on these emails, Jon." Stewart was quick to point out that his colleague, David Gregory, was one of those names:

STEWART: How do you seduce a subject? How do they? What is his name, David Gregory, for your organization, NBC. He sends one that says come on my show, you can frame the conversation the way you want to?

WILLIAMS: Free to frame it, but David can then knock the house down.

And that's the incredibly true story of how Brian Williams told the funniest joke on The Daily Show last night!

Though Stewart got in some goodies, as well, especially after Williams awkwardly segued to a discussion of Walter Cronkite.

WILLIAMS: We lost a great man last Friday night, Jon.

STEWART: That cannot be your segue. Is that your segue?

WILLIAMS: I thought that might educate our segment.

STEWART: Are you talking about Billy Mays?

WILLIAMS: We've had a tortured relationship.

STEWART: We have had a tortured relationship. You're right. Walter Cronkite is a giant in the industry. Is that a man who you looked up to?

WILLIAMS: The guy I wanted to be when I was a kid.

STEWART: Really?

WILLIAMS: It was like Carrot Top to you.

STEWART: So how does it feel to fall so short?

[Arm wrestling ensues.]

WILLIAMS: I think that ended up about even.

STEWART: It always does, doesn't it?

[WATCH]

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart

Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c

Brian Williams

www.thedailyshow.com

Daily Show
Full Episodes

Political Humor

Joke of the Day

Also explored last night, how does frenzied animal coitus compare to the media's courtship of Mark Sanford? Pretty favorably, actually!

[WATCH]

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart

Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c

To Sir, With Love

www.thedailyshow.com

Daily Show
Full Episodes

Political Humor

Joke of the Day

[Would you like to follow me on Twitter? Because why not? Also, please send tips to tv@huffingtonpost.com -- learn more about our media monitoring project here.]

Walter Cronkite PHOTOS: The Legendary Newsman Out In NY

2009-07-20T09:54:18Z

Legendary newsman, Walter Cronkite, passed away this Friday. The former CBS anchorman was a staple in the New York media world. Photographer Patrick McMullan recorded many of Cronkite's nights out in recent years.

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