Hacking Thru the News
Reported by Nancy - July 27, 2004 -
If this morning's FNL is any indication, Lori Hacking is set to take over Elizabeth Smart as the most obsessively over-reported & trivially pop-analyzed "case" in cable TV news.
When I tuned in at 10:37am (EDT), an interview was in progress with one of Smart's uncles, who was pontificating about what advice he'd give the Hacking family. [Comment: ain't syngery great?] The case was mentioned ad nauseam thruout the show, with multiple teasers for an upcoming "story" about a not-so-mysterious phone call Lori got & plenty of atmospheric video of big scary machines searching a landfill at night. At 11:10am (EDT) Alicia Acuna filed a report about that phone call (which has been previously reported on Fox & elsewhere). At 11:20am (EDT), Brigitte Quinn interviewed Pat Reavy, a reporter for the Deseret Morning News (which Quinn persistently mispronounced as "Desert") about all the non-developments in the case.
All the attention paid to Hacking didn't distract FNL from its usual hijinks. A teaser at 10:46am (EDT) promised an upcoming story about Patti LaBelle entertaining last night at the DNC & was bannered as PARTY GIRL -- but no such story was aired in the next 70 minutes of the show. More on point, at 10:43am (EDT), Quinn interviewed Bill Kristol, allegedly about what John Kerry needs to do to keep his "momentum" going both during & after the DNC. Quinn's questions were often simply statements that allowed Kristol to reinforce the GOP talking points. For example, Quinn said that Bill Clinton had given a pretty good speech on the economy (what this had to do with the alleged topic isn't clear) last night, to which Kristol replied that Clinton couldn't very well talk about the War on Terror because so much had gone wrong during his administration.
At 10:56am (EDT), Quinn interviewed Andrea Peyser, a columnist for the New York Post -- without mentioning that the Post is also owned by Murdoch's Newscorp. Peyser gave an abbreviated version of her column in today's edition of the Post, claiming that the Clintons behaved weirdly at a party last night. (Comment: that seems to be her "professional" assessment, based on the fact that they arrived separately & weren't glued to each other all the time).
At 10:59am (EDT), FNL went to live coverage of a Kerry speech in Norfolk, VA. Kerry said there are 3 things we need to do in response to the 9/11 Comission report. He got as far as #2, when at 11:00am (EDT) Fox cut back to the studio so they could announce that the next hour of the show was about to start.
At 11:01am (EDT), Steve Brown filed a report from Boston about the DNC that noted that Bill Clinton got standing ovations last night. Brown gave an abbreviated list of tonight's scheduled speakers, mentioning Howard Dean, Barack Obama & Teresa Heinz Kerry (he referred to her as "the would-be first lady"). Brown didn't mention either Dick Gephardt or Ron Reagan, also scheduled to speak tonight. [Comment: it must absolutely *kill* GOPs that Ron Reagan is so not in line with their agenda.]
At 11:04am (EDT) Quinn interviewed Senator Norm Coleman (R-MN), a member of the "Truth Squad" the GOPs have sent to Boston to "rebut" the DNC. [Comment: this was merely another convenient way to reinforce GOP talking points -- the economy's good, tax cuts are working.]
At 11:08am (EDT), James Rosen filed a report from Crawford, TX, where Bush is on vacation -- but Rosen's report emphasized how Bush is "studying" the 9/11 Commission's report, Condoleeza Rice has flown down to meet with Bush & Bush had a teleconference about how to "fast-track" implementation of the report's recommendations. [Comment: no surprise that Rosen didn't mention that all of this "action" was the usual had-to-be-dragged-kicking-&-screaming routine; or that GOP Congressional "leaders" were insisting on going on their usual August vacations until they were faced with a revolt from within their own ranks if immediate action wasn't taken.]
At 11:30am (EDT), Molly Heneberg filed a brief report about Kerry in VA. Curiously, FNL showed the same video that they had shown live a half-hour earlier, & again cut it off before Kerry could state point #3 of 3.
At 11:33am (EDT), Greg Jarrett joined Quinn. His behavior was so abominable I'm making a separate entry just for him.
At 11:40am (EDT), Brenda Buttner gave a 2-minute glowing market report that included a free plug for Neil Cavuto's program later today, which Buttner called "Fair & Balanced".
