I'm someone who has been known to yell at the TV during sports events. A bad play or a bad call and I'm as vocal as any beer guzzling fan in the cheap seats. I've even been known to let the F-word fly. And fly. And fly.
Lately, I've found my loudest and most passionate outbursts coming not during a football game on Sunday, but while watching live political interviews on TV - like the one I just watched on MSNBC between David Shuster and McCain Campaign Spokesman Ben Porritt.
Basically Shuster just let this guy get away with the saying that McCain doesn't have any lobbyists working for his campaign. To Schuster's credit - and it is very minor credit - Shuster did bring up Charlie Black - but Porritt simply denied there were a lobbyists, attacked Obama's questionable connections, fillibustered till the end of the segement at which time Schuster thanked him for coming on. End of interview.
WTF?! Why can't these interviewers call a lie a lie? Why do they give these spokespeople wide berth to repeat their lies and then not correct the factually incorrect impression that they leave viewers with.
It's not like the idea of lobbyists on the McCain campaign is so obscure that Schuster wouldn't know that the claim was patently false, he should have had a LIST of names of lobbyists on McCain's campaign - he interviews some of the McCain lobbyists on a regular basis.
But this is Shuster's modus operendi in these live interviews he'll often make one attempt to be forceful or aggressive or call a lie a lie and then he'll give the liar the floor to lie some more making no other attempt to correct the record or call the liar on the lie.
Shuster is not alone over the past weeks I've cursed out everyone from Andrea Mitchell to Tom Brokaw to David Gregory to George Stephanopolous to Anderson Cooper. Some are worse than others, (I'm talking to you Andrea Mitchell) but they're all guilty of malpractice.
What is wrong with these people? Are they afraid if they hold the interviewees feet to the fire (like Campbell Brown did with Tucker Bounds a few weeks ago) they'll lose access? Why should they care? People who come on your show and lie to your face repeatedly are not aiding you in your supposed mission which is to report news.
Note to the media: Lies are not factually accurate and hence should not be reported to begin with.
Are they ill prepared and so uninformed that they don't catch the lies? If so they should do pre interview legwork - research on the topic they're discussing and the person they're asking rather than just reading questions off a teleprompter.
Sometimes I think they're so focused on the next question on their list or that one answer they have a prepared rejoinder for that they don't really listen to what the interviewees say.
Sometimes I think they have an agenda that has nothing to do with reporting the truth or informing their audience of the facts.
I say that if an interviewee lies you call them on it and you say it's a lie each and every time they tell one. I say that if during a live interview someone repeatedly refuses to answer the question they were asked - you end the interview. Why reward them with a platform for their talking points.
Back to Campbell - she got a lot of kudos for her Tucker Bounds interview (from me as well as many others) when she pushed him to answer her question. but when I look back on the interview, I realize that all she did was what any reporter should do when their questions aren't being answered.
What she did was her job. David, Andrea,George, et. al. are all getting paid a hell of a lot of money, it's about time they started doing their job as well.
UPDATE here's the link to interview. It's even more pathetic on the second viewing. Shame on David.