Wildfires ... Roberts ... Roberts ... Wildfires ...
Reported by Nancy - September 29, 2005 -
That headline pretty much sums up the noon hour today (9/29) on FNL. In fact, FNL was so enamored of those wildfires that they used a split-screen during most of the program to display the wildfires on the larger 2/3 of the screen even while guests were being interviewed on the topics of Roberts & SCOTUS. Not until nearly the end of the hour was any other story even mentioned.
Bill Hemmer anchored the noon hour & did a passable job with the material he was given. The only segments that didn't involve either Roberts/SCOTUS or wildfires were:
12:36pm (EDT) - Uma Pemmaraju read headlines:: 5 US soldiers killeld by a roadside bomb in Iraq; Gen Casey testifying to Congress; Nagin allowing some stores in NOLA to reopen "despite warnings from" the health dept; Amtrak train derailed in MO; Muppet stamps
12:46pm - Molly Henneberg reported on what Hemmer called "fallout" from Rep Tom DeLay's (R-TX) indictment; she repeated DeLay's claim that it's a "political witchhunt" by a "rogue" DA & showed a long clip of DeLay followed by a shorter clip of former Rep Chris Bell (D-TX).
12:53pm - Phil Keating in NOLA reported on what Hemmer called "finger-pointing" between Mayor Ray Nagin & former Chief of Police Ed Compass.
Comments: Between the eye candy of the wildfires & the endless bloviating about who the next SCOTUS nominee might be, FNL managed to squeeze in quite a bit of blather about Roberts, but other than the segments noted above, the rest of the country & the rest of the world simply doesn't exist for FNL & its viewers.
NOTE TO READERS: Please stay on topic (FNL's coverage of Roberts/wildfires, & how that coverage allows them to ignore other news). O/T comments will be deleted. Thanks.
