Hello Everyone:

Howard Kurtz in my opinion is a fair and credible journalist who did a great job of bringing up and asking the tough questions that definitely needed to be asked about Barack Obama's media scrutiny and Hillary Clinton's come back on his show CNN Reliable Sources last Sunday, March 9!

Here are some of the good questions and key points that Howard Kurtz brought up in this transcript which I was really glad to see openly discussed:

http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0803/09/rs.01.html

CNN RELIABLE SOURCES

Clinton's Comeback Coverage

Aired March 9, 2008 - 10:00 ET

HOWARD KURTZ, HOST (voice over): "Resurrection. As Hillary Clinton confounds the pundits again by winning Ohio and Texas, now Barack Obama is complaining about the media coverage.

Are reporters finally asking Obama tough questions? Is that scrutiny helping to fuel Clinton's comeback? And were journalists shamed into action by the mockery of "Saturday Night Live?"...

KURTZ: I could give you a dozen reasons why Hillary Clinton, who some of my journalistic colleagues said was toast, or at least badly burnt, bounced back this week in Ohio and Texas. It was the phone ringing at 3:00 in the morning ad, it was the trial of Obama fundraiser Tony Rezko, or Obama's fumbling of a controversy about his stance on NAFTA, or maybe Hillary going on "Saturday Night Live." But there is no debate about one thing -- for the first time in this seemingly endless presidential campaign, journalists got aggressive with the Illinois senator, as we saw at this press conference which Obama tried to end early, even as Lynn Sweet of the "Chicago Sun- Times" kept shouting questions.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. BARACK OBAMA (D-IL), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Well, no, Lynn. I'm just saying I don't think it's disputed that I stood there. You were there, Lynn. So was Mike. And I took every question. I was there until everybody had satisfied their questions.

Thank you. Thank you. Wait, wait, guys. Come on. I just answered...

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KURTZ: For months, the Clinton campaign has been complaining about unbalanced media coverage, and this week it was Obama chiding the press.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

OBAMA: I am a little surprised that all the complaining about the reps has actually worked as well as it has for them. You know, this whole spin of just, you know, how the press has just been so tough on them and not tough on us, I didn't expect that you guys would bite on that.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KURTZ: The pundits began debating just what impact the news coverage is having on the Democratic race.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BILL O'REILLY, FOX NEWS: What propelled Hillary to victory was the press and a few small slipups by Barack Obama. The corrupt media had a lot to do with that.

DAN ABRAMS, MSNBC: Yes, the latest storyline peddled by the pundits is that Clinton only won because she played dirty.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KURTZ: So, have journalists started to scrutinize Obama more seriously, and could that affect the rest of this Democratic campaign?

Joining us now, Jake Tapper, senior political correspondent for ABC News; Amy Holmes, CNN political analyst; and Ana Marie Cox, Washington editor for TIME.com and a contributor to the magazine Swampland Blog...

KURTZ: But there was nothing preventing national journalists from reading the Chicago clips and picking up on some of those stories, which occasionally they did. But look, this morning, front page of "The New York Times," the headline -- we can put it up -- "Obama in Senate: Star Power Minor Role." It talks about his lack of influence in the Senate, how he almost immediately began running for president.

That story could have been written six months ago. It could have been written a year ago...

KURTZ: But every campaign I've ever covered, when somebody starts to win, when somebody starts to pull out front, yes, they get positive press in the horse race sense, but then there's always this wave of stories like, well, this person could be president, what do we really know about them? Let's go turn over some rocks...

KURTZ: So are we all just having a few yucks, or has "Saturday Night Live" become a real factor in this presidential campaign?

Joining us now in Austin, Texas, Jeff Jarvis, veteran journalist, former critic for "TV Guide," who blogs at buzzmachine.com. And in New York, Adam Buckman, television editor for "The New York Post."

All right, Jeff Jarvis, "Saturday Night Live" comes back from the writers' strike, and suddenly the clips are all over TV and part of our political conversation.

Why is the late-night comedy show apparently having such an impact on this campaign?

JEFF JARVIS, BUZZMACHINE.COM: Because, Howie, they're finally covering the story that everybody except you has ignored, which is that media's own love affair with Barack Obama is having an impact on this campaign. It's a big part of the story -- the reporters' opinions, the reporters' views, the way they have given him a honeymoon this whole time, has an effect on the campaign, and no one was covering that. So along comes "Saturday Night Live," I think shaming media and media critics everywhere, except you.

KURTZ: And no one was covering it earlier because everybody was so blinded and mesmerized by the dazzling skills of Senator Obama, you would say?

JARVIS: I would say that's part of it, but also because media -- as egotistical as the drama queens in media are, they're not going to cover themselves. They're acting as if they're still objective, when I see manifestly they've failed at that in this campaign.

KURTZ: Well, we'll come back to that...

KURTZ: Even if it is true that the press has been tilted toward the Obama side, perhaps not as quite as blatantly as the "SNL" gang would have us believe, don't you think that started to change in the last couple weeks?

JARVIS: Only a bit. I think my problem is this, Howie -- is that this is a campaign that is in great measure -- well, the Obama campaign is filled with a lot of empty rhetoric -- "Yes, we can. Change we can believe in."

Well, what change? We can do what? I don't think we're hearing the press go after that enough. And so we have this movement forming, but I think it's an empty vessel. And that's part of the problem here, is that you have this kind of emptiness of that rhetoric of not being challenged, and then when Hillary Clinton puts an ad on that does what campaigns do, which is question qualifications, that's called an attack.

And I agree with you that I don't think it's an attack at all. I think it's actually getting down to the brass tacks of a campaign.

KURTZ: But you know...

JARVIS: So it's a very strange kind of tiptoeing around Obama in this campaign..."

Please forward this information on so that more people will know that Obama needs to be getting much more media scrutiny and to show that increased media scrutiny of Obama is probably a factor that will make the primary playing field more level which will help Hillary!

Mitch Dworkin

http://www.securingamerica.com/

http://securingamerica.com/ccn/node/10756
StopIranWar.com: "War is not the answer"
Submitted by Wes Clark on February 21, 2007 - 11:40am.

http://www.securingamerica.com/ccn/node/7191
Listen to Gen. Wes Clark fight for Dems on Sean Hannity's radio program: An excellent example for all of us to follow and what we all need to be doing to help fight back against extreme right wing Neocon smear propaganda!