Headline Hype
Reported by Nancy - June 30, 2004 -
Fox News Live, June 30, 11:00am-12:00noon ET
Brigitte Quinn & David Asman spent the entire show breathlessly hyping two main stories: the upcoming trial of Saddam Hussein ("it will be the Trial of the Century"), & the sex abuse charges against a 23-year-old Florida teacher for allegedly having sex with a 14-year-old student.
Headlines (6 of 'em) & speculation about Hussein's upcoming trial were sprinkled throughout the show, including a 3-minute opening segment by Steve Harrigan in Baghdad & Bret Baier at the Pentagon, & a 6-minute interview by Quinn of Marc Ginsberg (one of Fox's favorite "commentators") beginning at 11:03am ET, all accompanied by that old photo of Hussein immediately after his "capture", with some old toppling-statue footage thrown in for good measure.
Competing for attention were at least 4 headline mentions of the Florida schoolteacher, with endless video of her walking nowhere, accompanied by breathless voice-over speculation about the case. This culminated in Quinn interviewing Dr Jeffrey Gardere, a clinical psychologist (also one of Fox's favorite "commentators"), beginning at 11:22am ET. Quinn asked Gardere about the teacher, her problems, her personality, & about the student, & Gardere willingly speculated for 5 solid minutes.
In the interest of equal time for all "Trials of the Century", Asman interviewed Craig Mitnick (a defense attorney) & Matthew Mangino (a prosecutor) about the Scott Peterson trial. This 5-minute segment, beginning at 11:42am ET, was a combination of new speculation & re-hash of previous speculation.
Asman introduced a piece by Dan Springer in Seattle (11:37 am ET), which both Springer & Asman characterized as a "government land grab". Turns out it was really about proposed new land-use regulations in Seattle's King County.
Not to be outdone in the trivia-as-news department, Quinn then interviewed (at 11:53am ET) 2 little girls from a small town in West Virginia who have started a petition to bring back one of the 2 ice cream parlors in that town that have been converted to gambling casinos. Quinn was hard-pressed to make this story appear even remotely interesting.
Along the way, the following stories got equal time -- 30-second mentions: there were bombings in Afghanistan, Mary Kate Olsen is being treated for something, Colin Powell was shaking hands in Sudan, there was a shootout in Riyadh, a former star of "The Apprentice" was involved in a brawl in a parking lot, there was a mortar attack on a US military base in Baghdad, Al Sharpton will host a new reality TV show, Vanessa Redgrave toured the wall Israel is building in the West Bank, Paul Bremer is back from Iraq, Tom Ridge is confident about port security, there's a new US$50 bill, "the economic recovery is on solid ground", & Marlon Brando may be broke.
