Sound Politics: Linda Douglass Said What?

September 02, 2008

Linda Douglass Said What?

I am working with CNN with Wolf Blizter on, and I half-hear longtime news reporter Linda Douglass talking about the Republican Convention. She speaks like a reporter, but the words she's using are like they are coming straight out of the Obama campaign's talking points, saying Obama's experience in the U.S. Senate and with foreign policy is "vast." I was incredulous. So I looked up and I see no caption about her, but I rewind and see under her name: "Obama Campaign Advisor."

Apparently she left the journalism business a few months ago.

Someone actually could have assumed it was a reporter giving these lines as part of a news report, and that's pretty disturbing. I am not saying anyone did anything wrong -- maybe CNN should have kept the caption with her position up for the entire time, or something -- but the line between journalism and campaigns is terribly thin sometimes.

Cross-posted on <pudge/*>.

Posted by pudge at September 02, 2008 04:31 PM | Email This

Comments

1. There is a lot of red meat out there now. In '04 Stefan made a name for himself by focusing on red meat.

You do us all a big favor by not picking on the nimrods and arguing with them. I think they do it on purpose to get your goat. Just post these articles and sit back and post the next one. You maybe noticed that Stefan really doesn't respond to the articles and let's the rest of us hold up the argument. If there isn't a whole lot of interest he just reposts. I hope you do the same.

As far as topic goes, you should have seen CNN last night. And this from Anderson Cooper. When John King came on he had to temper Cooper's nonjournalistic prose, if you can really believe that.

Hopefully, FOX has real reporting on tonight.

Posted by: swatter on September 2, 2008 04:52 PM

2. Yer right. She could have called it what the GOP convention appears to be.

A Funeral....

The lying chimp isn't even going....

Posted by: All Facts Support My Positions on September 2, 2008 05:23 PM

3. In the era of White House produced Video News Releases, in the era of network paid talent being distributed talking points directly and indirectly from party muckamucks, where have you been? The line, it ain't thin, it's translucent. It ain't about journalism, it's about getting paid to read out loud and following the party along.

Posted by: Acid Brain on September 2, 2008 05:28 PM

4. Acid Brain, yeah, I know the Dems have alrady ruined this for us in certain ways many times in the past. But this is a different thing.

Posted by: pudge on September 2, 2008 06:09 PM

5. Swatter,
You crack me up with the line about Fox having real reporting. They better, since they were terrible last week.

Pudge,
It was very common last week with the Democratic Convention for the networks to have the opposing side. Larry King made it a point that his coverage, which was to go on after the convention, would have the Republican counterpoint to the night's topics. I don't have a problem as long as the network plays each convention the same and gives each side their opportunity to get their points across. This was what was so disappointing about Fox News last week. They have been a lot better up to last week (i.e., during the primaries).

Posted by: tc on September 2, 2008 06:09 PM

6. Pudgie:

We're shocked, SHOCKED, that a network would be so biased in their coverage.

If you want to see this bias taken to it's logical extreme, tune in to FOX sometime and catch some of their coverage.

Posted by: Unkl Witz on September 2, 2008 06:13 PM

7. Agreed. There's nothing that shows the two extremes like switching between Fox and MSNBC. Neither even try anymore to seem "fair and balanced".

Posted by: demo kid on September 2, 2008 06:48 PM

8. tc: I never said there was something wrong with it. I was just taken aback at what she said because I thought she was a reporter, because for many years, that's all she's been.

Unkl Witz: I didn't say it was biased.

Posted by: pudge on September 2, 2008 06:50 PM

9. It is CNN, after all. We should probably not expect much from them on these kinds of things. I don't give them the time of day, quite frankly.

Posted by: Michele on September 2, 2008 06:58 PM

10. Be sure to see:

1,200,800 BC: Republicans fight the Demo-saurs

Posted by: John Bailo on September 2, 2008 07:19 PM

11. Wow a troll infestation! Pudge, I'm impressed.

Posted by: Crusader on September 2, 2008 07:54 PM

12. Linda Douglass is just another media pinhead spouting and drinking the progressive kool-aid, where she throws all professionalism out the window in the name of partisan circle jerk politics. YAWN !

Posted by: KS on September 2, 2008 09:26 PM

13. Wow a troll infestation! Pudge, I'm impressed.

Like cockroaches they desperately scurry about when challenged with light of day.

You can all ways tell thigs have upset collectively upset their nest: Unkl Witz shows up.

He's SP's personal barometer of how angst ridden they are at any given time.

Posted by: Ragnar Danneskjold on September 2, 2008 09:49 PM

14. Hey, "All Facts...": I don't know how old you are, but when I was growing up I was taught that you don't don't have to agree with the President, and you don't even have to like him - but the office deserves our respect. That is what distinguishes our constitutional system of government and sets it apart from the rest of the world. Comments like yours reveal a profound lack of understanding about our country, a deficient upbringing, or a total lack of maturity - or perhaps a combination of all three.

If you have an issues argument based on facts and reasoning, make your case. Save the name calling and muckraking for the Daily Kos and its ilk.

Posted by: Patrick on September 2, 2008 10:38 PM

15. MSM Reporter - Obama Campaign Advisor

There's a difference?

Posted by: Jeff B. on September 2, 2008 10:39 PM

16. Jeff B @ 15, only where the paycheck originates from.
Was one state east of here when DalaiBama gave his acceptance speech. It was on no less than 7 channels. I wonder if the same coverage will be on big Mac's acceptance.

Posted by: PC on September 2, 2008 10:53 PM

17. Here we agree,

The video media are in a dreadful state. Fox is horrible but at least they make a serious effort at reporting the politics. MSN and CNN often leave the discussion to Fox .. maning there is only a one sided POV.

Sure, the tuiny percent of us who read political mags and or skim the net, can get real news but few people do that.

FWIW ... herer are a few of the current stories NOT beingt reported by the media:

Chavez buys submarines
Chine building base on Indian Oceean
Oil chaos in Nigeria
Space Station has abandoned almost all scientic experiments

etc.

This really is NOT an issue of the right or the left. Democracy without access to facts will fail.

Posted by: SeattleJew on September 3, 2008 08:40 AM

18. SJ & P, I would even posit that it is the continually sliding deficiencies of video media production and distribution chain that have amplified the kind of overtly biased, uninformed, non-investigative, tabloid driven garbage in the extreme that results in our divisions being held deeper than what we share in common. It's not uniquely a partisan, commercial, or institutional problem, each plays a significant role. It's not isolated to any of the iconic talking heads, whatever one thinks of their positions or talent. For better or worse, citizen journalism is going to challenge the structure's integrity in the coming decade. Hopefully that will do for the televised news what blogging has done for print media. Though news networks will not relinquish their control of influence or become inclusive without extreme pressure. I just hope it doesn't actually speed up the qualitative the race to the bottom.

Posted by: Acid Brain on September 3, 2008 11:45 AM

19. I'll add, as news consumers, the fact that we are expected to accept reality as interpreted through only two competing positions on any topic is a terrible state. Supposedly presenting "both sides" of an issue is limiting the information even when it is presented at its best. A refrigerator has more options.

Posted by: Acid Brain on September 3, 2008 12:08 PM

20. Wow, just got back from 3 weeks in China and I'm watching ABC News and the coverage of the GOP convention.

I think the State Media in China is less biased than the "mainstream media" here in the US. At least in China you read and hear opposing viewpoints rather than just "doubt doubt doubt" and their own biases shoved down your throat.

Posted by: Shanghai Dan on September 3, 2008 06:25 PM