Wednesday, July 23, 2008

CBS Defends Defenseless McCain Interview

By now, I know that when John McCain does an interview, he is bound to lie about something that he purports to take a stand on. He will also lie when Barack Obama's position makes him look like a weak and ineffective leader. What I'd like to see from the press is that they call him on his deception, not for them to actively help McCain sound better by editing his answers. Once the blogosphere, Keith Olbermann and eventually other outlets caught on that CBS screwed around with the interview, they came back not with an apology, but this piece of crap.

From The Politico:


"As all news organizations do with extended interviews, last night’s Obama and McCain interviews were edited to fit the available time and to give viewers a fair expression of the candidates' major differences," CBS spokeswoman Jennifer Farley emailed. "The full transcript and video were and still are available at cbsnews.com."

That is one trick the traditional media excels in. Claiming that it is online is great for the percentage of people that look up their news on the web, but as anyone knows, the news has a much deeper impact when it is televised. If CBS was really short of time, they should have edited out whole questions and their subsequent answers, not mish-mash answers to different questions.

Also, CBS and Couric should take less questions so that you can follow up on important matters. Couric failed on that by not pointing out that the Anbar Awakening started happening before the surge was a twinkle in Bush's eye. It is the job of the press to get to the bottom of things, not simply to bend over and let the candidate shove their bullshit wholesale to the public.

What a disgrace! Jeers to CBS and Couric for that shameless interview....and equally horrendous defense of the matter.