Charles Gibson — two headed donkey
Bookworm on Sep 13 2008 at 9:44 am | Filed under: Media matters, Sarah Palin
It turns out that Charles Gibson has two different interview modes. If you’re male, black and a Democrat, it’s very loving. If you’re female, white and a Republican, it’s condescending, aggressive, and dishonest. I know that from all the articles I’ve read about each interview. Now, the Anchoress reprints a compendium of questions (generated at a Hillary forum) from each interview, just to hammer the nail into Gibson’s two-faced coffin. (And yes, that’s a weirdly mixed metaphor):
Obama interview:
How does it feel to break a glass ceiling?
How does it feel to “win”?
How does your family feel about your “winning” breaking a glass ceiling?
Who will be your VP?
Should you choose Hillary Clinton as VP?
Will you accept public finance?
What issues is your campaign about?
Will you visit Iraq?
Will you debate McCain at a town hall?
What did you think of your competitor’s [Clinton] speech?
Palin interview:
Do you have enough qualifications for the job you’re seeking? Specifically have you visited foreign countries and met foreign leaders?
Aren’t you conceited to be seeking this high level job?
Questions about foreign policy
-territorial integrity of Georgia
-allowing Georgia and Ukraine to be members of NATO
-NATO treaty
-Iranian nuclear threat
-what to do if Israel attacks Iran
-Al Qaeda motivations
-the Bush Doctrine
-attacking terrorists harbored by Pakistan
Is America fighting a holy war? [misquoted Palin]
H/T: Mike Devx, who was also kind enough to check to make sure that the list is correct.
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16 Responses to “Charles Gibson — two headed donkey”
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It’s highly useful to watch the video of Gibson’s first interview with Obama.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bzecb7Qe6vo
Especially, notice his attempts to suppress his grin and smile as he attempts to ask Obama about his “hubris” for running for President.
Then – just for kicks! – watch the first interview with Palin again.
Again, especially, note his extreme seriousness and skeptical tone as he asks Palin the hubris question.
But why should I mention his skeptical tone? The whole thing was highly skeptical and challenging, whereas with his buddy Barry, he was jocular and quite accomodating. Perhaps that is because his buddy Barry was running for President and Sarah is running for Vice President, and everyone knows the Vice President job is much more important (and, unlike President, requires experience.)
The mainstream media double standard has never been more obvious. And this is Gibson, one of the more renowned of our mainstream journalists! Sigh…
I just had a flashback, because ABC was widely panned for being pro-Clinton and anti-Obama during the Gibson/Stephanopoulos-moderated debate:
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Critics excoriated ABC on Thursday for its televised Democratic presidential debate, slamming the network for “shoddy, despicable” moderators who they said favored Hillary Clinton over Barack Obama and dwelled on “gossip” instead of issues.
Critics ripped ABC journalists Charlie Gibson and George Stephanopoulos, a former Bill Clinton staffer, for wasting time during Wednesday’s debate on questions like why Obama wasn’t wearing an American flag pin or rehashing old disputes.
“It was another step downward for network news and in particular ABC News … whose usually dependable anchors, Charlie Gibson and George Stephanopoulos, turned in shoddy, despicable performances,” Washington Post critic Tom Shales wrote in a blistering review that got wide Internet play.
http://uk.reuters.com/article/televisionNews/idUKN1740256020080419
I think it was Mark Levin who first said “we will remember 2008 as the year the network news died.” (paraphrasing)
Oz, would you say that you get 51% of your info from Reuters or 49%?
It turns out that Charles Gibson has two different interview modes. If you’re male, black and a Democrat, it’s very loving. If you’re female, white and a Republican, it’s condescending, aggressive, and dishonest. I know that from all the articles I’ve read about each interview.
Of course, people should remember how Oz was trying to badger folks about getting Palin on an interview, while I was holding my cards close to my chest in response.
This is why. You don’t want to go “I’m fully confident Palin should be grilled on interviews cause it’ll convince Oz and follks!”
No, it won’t. Why? Not cause Palin is lacking in competency or knowledge. It is cause the Main Sewer Media cheats.
And when your enemy cheats, you had better not go full balls out and try to get out into the open. You need to watch your back and be cautious. And not take the bait of people who say “Sarah Palin needs more exposure, right now”.
Regardless of who did what to who, I have noticed a definite tendency in media interviews. It’s not about elucidation of thinking, it’s about getting the information out that they want.
I’ve sat on a jury. So, be it the defense attorney or the prosecutor, they both try to get answers to questions favorable to their case. In a court it’s adversarial; the media is supposed to be impartial.
Through a link at Instapundit is this story at Newsbusters.
ABC News Edited Out Key Parts of Sarah Palin Interview
http://tinyurl.com/3nolj7
I understand the reason for the interview is greater exposure for Palin, but one would think that Gibson would have conducted the interview with a little class.
In a court it’s adversarial; the media is supposed to be impartial.
They are the judge: of course they are impartial.
I understand the reason for the interview is greater exposure for Palin, but one would think that Gibson would have conducted the interview with a little class.
Class doesn’t win wars; at least, that is what the Left would tell you.
http://www.bookwormroom.com/2008/03/27/i-believe-them-but/
I think if people read that post again and its comments, they might get a little nostalgia feeling in relation to this topic.
Rule 1. Don’t trust the media.
Rule 2. Get ready to be stabbed in the back.
Rule 3. Attack and obliterate the media before you are attacked.
Rock’s link, is of course, quite damning.
I thought Ozzie raised a valid point, at least on the surface, so I decided to dig a bit. I began with the Reuters link, which turned out to be useful.
The article identifies some of those performing the criticism of ABC:
“It was another step downward for network news and in particular ABC News … whose usually dependable anchors, Charlie Gibson and George Stephanopoulos, turned in shoddy, despicable performances,” Washington Post critic Tom Shales wrote in a blistering review that got wide Internet play.
The Huffington Post, a news and politics Web site, lead its front page with the headline: “ABC’s Gotcha Debate: Ratings Up, Reputation Down.” “The nation has witnessed, first hand, George Stephanopoulos and Charlie Gibson for who they really are: pandering yellow journalists. Carnival barkers …,” blogger Bob Cesca wrote at http://www.huffingtonpost.com.
Nearly 17,000 comments flooded ABC News’ Web site, many of them pouring scorn on the moderators
That’s the extent of the article identifying the critics.
Next I tried to construct the timeline:
- Clinton and Obama debate on 1/30/2008 This is the big pre-Super-Tuesday debate
- Clinton and Obama debate on 2/21/2008 This is the debate before the other big primary day, involving Texas, Ohio, Vermont, Rhode Island
- At this point criticism intensifies over the favorable treatment of Obama compared to Clinton. (Criticism had been building for awhile)
- On 2/23/2008, Saturday Night Live executed its famous skit where the media fawned over Barack Obama, asking if he’d like a pillow, sending vicious questions Clinton’s way
- No further debates for quite some time (seven weeks), especially since the next big primary would not be until late April (Pennsylvania). Or were there other debates? I can’t find a record of them.
- The criticism over this seven week period, and the fame of the SNL skit, ballooned. Consensus grew that Obama had received incredibly preferential treatment compared to Clinton.
- On 4/16/2008 the ABC debate moderated by George Stephanopoulos and Charles Gibson occurred, just prior to the Pennsylvania primary.
- The following day, Obama fans struck back, saying basically that ABC threw Obama to the wolves.
So I am left wondering, does Ozzie have a point?
Well, the critics cited in the Reuters post WERE in fact famously and slavishly (can I say that?) devoted to Obama. HuffPo and Kos are well known far-left blogs that are ardently pro-Obama, and were clearly anti-Clinton. The Washington Post was in the bag for Obama from early on. The fact that they, and 17,000 posters, inundated ABC with criticism is to be expected.
I remember George Stephanopoulos reacting badly to the tsunami of criticism over this debate.
My question is, what did ABC take away from the debate and its aftermath?
Another question is: If ABC was, in fact, pro-Clinton, does it matter? That would make ABC pro-Democrat. After Obama’s victory, they would be expected to promote Obama from then on.
Or is Ozzie claiming that ABC is neutral and does not carry a Democrat bias?
Ozzie doesn’t claim that. As with Dg on other posts I’ve questioned, he doesn’t quite come out and say that. He just says he “had a flashback”. No conclusion…
If you view Gibson’s Obama interview and compare it to the Palin interview, it just gets worse and worse the more you view it.
With Obama, Gibson takes off his glasses at one point and totally becomes empathetic. We later find the glasses far down his nose as he looks over them in a friendly manner. It’s so relaxed and so non-confrontational. Examining the Palin interview, the questions are *so much more pointed and challenging* that it actually is shocking.
Shocking, at least, if you believe that the tone and manner of questioning should have been approximately equal.
My conclusion is that there is no rational explanation for the difference beyond media bias. I can’t explain the exact reason behind the bias in this case. Were George Stephanopoulos and Charles Gibson so seared by the criticism from the far-left Obama supporters that they fell into line into the pro-Obama camp? Or is this simply longstanding anti-Republican bias?
Is this the bias of the establishment elite against “the outsider”, Governor Palin?
There’s an extremely interesting article out right now:
http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/015/552kbtvz.asp
It claims that the bias against Sarah Palin has even more to do with the fact that she is outside the “elite establishment”, that she is simply of the common people, than it is that she is a staunch Republican. Great article, I recommend it highly.
I can’t explain it, but just as with pornography, I know it when I see it: And what I see on display is outrageous media bias.
The link to the Obama Gibson interview, again, is:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bzecb7Qe6vo
My conclusion is that there is no rational explanation for the difference beyond media bias.
It’s not bias. It’s vindictive, cheating, mofos.
That’s not bias. Bias is not inherently dishonorable or bad. We all have it. We all, however, aren’t vindictive, cheating, mofos.
Y, I’m just trying to be kind.
But I’d love to hear a recording of all these journalists, at some Washington D.C. cocktail party where they think no one is listening, where they let their hair down and say what they really think. I suspect your opinion would prove correct.
After all, look at what Senator Obama did in San Francisco when he thought no one outside would here. Those small town America rubes, clinging to their guns, their God, their xenophobia!
Catch them in “private” saying what they really think, and you lose all respect for them.
>>Those small town America rubes, clinging to their guns, their God, their xenophobia!>>
That phrase is right out of the Alinsky playbook, by the way…
More of the same…different source. Unbelievable.
http://directorblue.blogspot.com/2008/09/atlantic-hires-leni-riefenstahl-for.html