Media Curmudgeon

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May 16, 2007

Fox News Debate

On Wednesday evening, May 15, 2007, the Fox News channel broadcast the third debate, featuring Republican candidates for president. To my surprise, Fox News did a much better job of producing the debates than MSNBC did on the first two debates, especially the second debate.

I find it ironic that the Democratic candidates declined to appear on Rupert Murdoch’s Fox News cable channel because of their perception that Fox News is biased in favor of the Bush administration and conservative ideologies, when in actuality Fox News was less biased than MSNBC on the second debate coverage. Brian Williams, the NBC “Nightly News” anchor, was the moderator for the first debate among the Democrats broadcast on MSNBC and he did a workmanlike job, displaying an appropriate gravitas and expertise—his questions were good.

(An aside here—I called Brian Williams an “anchor,” a term I don’t like. I prefer “presenter,” which the British use. The BBC calls the people who read its news, news presenters, which makes sense. One meaning for anchor is something heavy that weighs you down, which might be appropriate for Katie Couric, but not for Brian Williams.)

However, the second MSNBC debate featuring the Republican candidates from the conservative hallowed ground of the Ronald Regan Presidential Library, was a train wreck, as Neil Derrough indicated in a Media Curmudgeon blog dated May 6, 2007. The hosts for that debate were conservative interrupter Chris Matthews, who dominated an uncharacteristically meek Keith Olbermann, the liberal counterbalance, who looked like a deer caught in headlights. Some of their questions were relevant, but others were silly, like Matthews asking the candidates to raise their hands if they agreed with several issues, which had nothing to do with debating—it made the candidates look like they were in a classroom raising their hands when asked if they had to go to the bathroom. It was about Matthews trying to be cute, not about debating the issues.

In contrast, Fox News had serious, experienced journalists asking intelligent, relevant, informed questions. Sad sack Brit Hume, Fox News’ managing editor, did a good job of keeping everyone on time and Chris Wallace and Wendall Goler asked excellent questions. Chris Wallace, the host of “Fox News Sunday,” is the son of CBS correspondent Mike Wallace and worked at CBS’s WBBM-TV as a reporter in the 1970s when blog poster Neil Derrough was the V.P., general manager of the station—a minor bit of trivia that adds to both Derrough’s and Wallace’s credibility. Wendall Goler is Fox News’ White House correspondent and the only black person to ask questions in any of the debates. Good for the conservative Fox News to be the only network to show a commitment to diversity—imagine that. And shame on MSNBC for being all-white and male.

It will be interesting to see how CNN handles the next debate among Democratic candidates and if moderator Wolf Blitzer can do as good and as an impartial a job as the usually partial Brit Hume did. We’ll see if the CNN questioners reflect diversity and can ask intelligent questions that are more about the issues than the questioners themselves, something the confrontational Blitzer has not shown a propensity for in the past.

Posted by Charles Warner at May 16, 2007 02:22 PM

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Bruce Braun at May 17, 2007 01:29 PM writes:

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