GOP Killing Patient Rights; NBC: Sports Bra = Title IX Success
1) Network coverage of the
"patient's bill of rights" has stressed how Republicans are
killing all the wonderful "rights" Democrats want to provide.
CBS attributed the GOP position to insurance money but ignored how trial
lawyers will reward Democrats.
2) Bushwacked. MSNBC jumped on
a George W. Bush "slip-up" but couldn't find it. CNN
highlighted the racial covenant in his deed.
3) Those paying more in taxes
would get a bigger tax cut than those paying less, complained CNN's
Brooks Jackson in compliantly relaying numbers from an unlabeled Citizens
for Tax Justice.
4) On Today Jonathan Alter
credited Title IX for the sports bra and Katie Couric marveled: "The
importance of the sports bra to American women really cannot be
overestimated can it?" Washington Post: "The sports bra is the
cloth symbol of Title IX's success."
5) FNC the first network to
report how William Kennedy's ex-wife alleged that he "brought FBI
files to their home and spent hours entering information onto a laptop
computer."
6) FNC's Carl Cameron among
the guests Thursday night when MRC Chairman Brent Bozell hosts Mike
Reagan's national talk show.
>>>
"Another Gore Tobacco Gaffe, Up in Smoke: Few Reports Touch on Gore's
New Tobacco-Paid Consultant Carter Eskew, And Fewer Find Hypocrisy."
The latest Media Reality Check fax report by Tim Graham is now online. It
begins: "On August 28, 1996, Al Gore shared with the Democratic
convention and the nation the tragic story of his sister's 1984 death from
smoking. He tremulously pledged: 'Until I draw my last breath, I will
pour my heart and soul into the cause of protecting our children from the
dangers of smoking.' So what would Gore say when his campaign hired
Carter Eskew, a consultant who created ads against Sen. John McCain's
$1.10-a-pack cigarette tax? Ads Bill Clinton claimed could be 'fatal to
young children who continue to be seduced and sold illegally cigarettes
that will shorten their lives'? He didn't have to say anything. It's
another Gore tobacco gaffe the media have barely touched."
To read the report or to view a complete video
clip, in RealPlayer format, of Gore's emotional talk at the 1996
Democratic convention about his supposed turn against tobacco, go to: http://www.mediaresearch.org/news/reality/1999/fax19990714.html
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1
It would help if Republicans were pushing a true conservative,
individually-empowering, market-based alternative to the liberal
"patient's bill of rights" instead of the "yes, but"
approach they are taking -- a strategy to show they too care which
certainly isn't earning them any media credit for caring.
Network coverage
Tuesday and Wednesday night stressed how Republicans are killing all the
wonderful "rights" and "protections" Democrats want to
provide. CBS's Bob Schieffer attributed the GOP position to crass
fundraising concerns: "Pushed by the big insurance companies, the
Republican majority stuck together as expected and killed the Democrat's
HMO reform plan plank by plank." Without a counter-comment Schieffer
highlighted how the AMA denounced those who voted no, claiming for them
"insurance company profits come first and patients come last."
NBC's Gwen Ifill relayed a complaint from an HMO victim without giving
equal time to a business perspective.
Check out how
Republicans are on the downside of this spin from Dan Rather in a
24-second item on the July 13 CBS Evening News:
"In the U.S. Senate the first key vote on
the so-called and bitterly fought over patient's bill of rights. It's
supposed to help patients challenge decisions by their HMOs. Late today
Republicans defeated proposals that would have protected women from being
forced to leave the hospital just hours after breast cancer surgery. Also
defeated: a proposal to let women choose gynecologists as their primary
care doctor."
FNC and CNN aired
full stories Tuesday night with CNN presenting separate pieces on HMO
victims and the burden the Democratic plan will impose on small
businesses. That night ABC and NBC skipped the subject, but they caught up
on Wednesday night as did CBS with a full report which castigated a
Republican leader for getting "personal" in ridiculing Ted
Kennedy. Here's how the broadcast networks handled the Senate votes on
Wednesday night, July 14:
-- CBS Evening
News. Bob Schieffer began: "The Democrat's plan to overhaul HMOs
with that patient's bill of rights is dying a slow, but certain death in
one of the most partisan debates ever."
Ted Kennedy shouting: "We're glad to have
protections for our children, and we refuse to provide it for the other
children."
Schieffer: "Senate debates often get this
loud, seldom do they turn this personal."
Don Nickles: "I'm glad my colleague is
settling down. I was getting ready to call Doctor Frist again. I was
afraid we might need him, might have a heart attack on the floor."
Schieffer: "In fact, the hoo-ha really
didn't matter. Pushed by the big insurance companies, the Republican
majority stuck together as expected and killed the Democrat's HMO reform
plan plank by plank. On near party line votes Republicans killed the
Democratic proposal to give doctors, not insurance companies, the final
say on treatment. Too costly, Republicans said, and by the same logic
killed plans to let women designate gynecologists as their primary
doctors, guarantee access to emergency rooms and allow HMO patients access
to experimental treatment. The new President of the American Medical
Association, the group that speaks for doctors, was furious."
Dr. Thomas Reardon, President AMA: "The
Senate has now said that insurance company profits come first and patients
come last. This is a real setback to patients."
Schieffer: "Republicans did push through
proposals requiring HMOs to pay for hospital stays after mastectomies and
allowing the self-employed to deduct the cost of health insurance from
their tax bills. And they will offer additional reforms tomorrow, but
since the President has promised to veto all the Republican proposals,
this is ending as many predicted: Both sides will have an issue to take
into next year's campaign. But as for HMOs, not much is going to
change."
Nice balance from
Schieffer: Two pro-Democratic plan soundbites versus one soundbite from
someone against the plan, but only to demonstrate his personal tone, so
really 2-to-0. While Schieffer attributed the Republican position to
getting insurance money he failed to suggest that maybe Democrats are
salivating over pleasing trial lawyers by pushing a provision to allow
more lawsuits against HMOs.
-- ABC's World
News Tonight. Linda Douglass presented a less biased piece than Schieffer
but one which still stressed what Republicans opposed:
"For the second day Republicans closed ranks
to defeat one of the Democrat's most sweeping proposals, to apply HMO
reforms to all insured Americans. Frustrated Democrats cried foul."
After a bite from Kennedy about how Republicans
are bought and paid for by the insurance industry, Douglass continued:
"Republicans argued most Americans are
covered by at least some state insurance protections."
Rick Santorum noted the arrogance of assuming
bureaucrats in Washington have the solution, before Douglass ran through
the OB-GYN and emergency room provisions that were defeated. She then got
to the Democrat-lite plan forwarded by Republicans: "But Republicans
scrambled to deflect criticism that they are insensitive to consumer
complaints, especially complaints from women. They approved a measure to
permit longer hospital stays for mastectomy and they are also pushing
their own plan to offer greater access to OB-GYN care, but it would not
apply to everyone."
Barbara Boxer got to emphasize that point before
Douglass concluded by noting Republicans plan to pass their plan on
Thursday.
-- NBC Nightly
News. Tom Brokaw opened the broadcast:
"If you're not happy with your HMO
you're not alone, but stayed tuned. Changes are coming. The U.S. Senate
is in the closing stages of a pitched debate on a patient's bill of
rights. The Democrats are losing their battle to institute a massive
overhaul which Republicans claim would be too expensive. The Republican
version does include some change but not enough to satisfy President
Clinton who already is talking veto."
Gwen Ifill went
through the amendments defeated by Republicans and ran competing
soundbites from Kennedy and Nickles before concluding with an HMO
victim's tale:
"Beth Gross, a nurse from Virginia, brought
her own story to the Capitol, saying her HMO denied her son access to a
needed specialist."
Gross: "I cannot believe that I lived in a
country that allowed an insurance company to be so ruthless with a
child."
Without a counter soundbite or emotional anecdote
from a businessman, Ifill concluded with the White House spin: "But
government fixes, Republicans maintain, are not the solution. Democrats
are prepared to lose tomorrow's final vote and White House officials,
who call the Republican bill an absolute sham, are already predicting a
presidential veto."
2
George W. Bush has remained largely unscathed by the media, but some are
trying to nail him with stories that are quite a stretch. Last Thursday
night MSNBC's Brian Williams highlighted how "one of the first
slip-ups might have been committed by Bush." But there was no
slip-up, something Williams conceded minutes later. On Tuesday night
CNN's The World Today highlighted how Bush once bought a house with a
restrictive covenant.
-- July 8 News
with Brian Williams on MSNBC. Williams intoned:
"Now, to politics in this country. And today
in Seattle, Washington one of the first slip-ups might have been committed
on the campaign trail by Texas Governor George W. Bush."
The error? By phone Newsweek's Howard Fineman
urgently reported, as transcribed by MRC analyst Mark Drake:
"Well, Brian, this was the first unscripted
moment of the campaign. I love it because so far it has had all the
excitement of watching paint dry. I'm here at a big convention of minority
journalists, 6,000 African Americans, Hispanics, Asians, American Indians
all here to talk about race and politics and so forth. Al Gore was long
scheduled in here. Bill Bradley was here today, also long scheduled to
appear but Governor George Bush of Texas was in town to fund-raise but
wasn't going to come to the convention but at last minute this morning, he
decided the better part of wisdom was to make a stop at the convention
center here in Seattle to stop by and talk to the journalists here. And it
was quite a scene because he came in pretty much unannounced and was
immediately surrounded by a group of college journalists who began asking
him all kinds of questions about affirmative action so on. He gave his
standard answers that he's for affirmative access, not for quotas and so
forth.
"But it was really quite a scene and I think
it was the first moment when George W. Bush had to decide something on the
spur of the moment and he decided he couldn't be in the great Pacific
Northwest without stopping by this meeting. Meanwhile, having heard that
George W. Bush was going to come one of his rivals for the Republican
nomination, John McCain, said hey, I can do one better than that. I'll
come and hold a full scale press conference. So not long after George W.
Bush had departed, John McCain showed up and held a big conference
outside. Meanwhile, Bill Bradley gave an hour long detailing his history
of involvement with the race and his support of affirmative action. And Al
Gore will be here too tomorrow. So all and all, it's been quite an event
and probably a little more news than the people at the Unity Conference
were expecting."
Wow. But where's
the "slip-up"? Williams conceded: "Howard Fineman on the
road in Seattle with the Bradley campaign. And while perhaps not a slip-up
by George W., a hungry press corps is given something at that gathering
today."
-- CNN's The World Today on July 13 allocated
about a minute to an item narrated by anchor Jim Moret:
"Today's campaign 2000 news includes
information about a frontrunner's real estate past. CNN has obtained
copies of the deed for a Dallas home once owned by GOP presidential
candidate George W. Bush. It includes a covenant allowing white residents
only. Bush bought the house in 1988. He sold it in 1995 five days after
being sworn in as Governor of Texas. Bush was asked tonight about the
clause at a multimillion dollar fundraiser in New Jersey."
Viewers then saw
and heard some back and forth between Bush and a reporter, but MRC analyst
Paul Smith found it hard to make out all the words over the crowd noise:
Bush: "You understand those covenants are
against the law.... It's against the law. They're non binding."
Reporter: "But still, it is a
covenant."
Bush: "I didn't know it was a covenant
because it is not the law. Listen, the neighborhoods are mixed
neighborhoods so obviously it is not the law. It is non-binding.
Reporter: "Are you concerned about that at
all though as being legal at one time?"
Bush: "Yeah, I don't like those kinds of
covenants at all. That's why they struck them down."
Moret added: "Texas outlawed racial
covenants in 1984."
Earlier in the day
Inside Politics spent several minutes on the topic. Bill Schneider pointed
out that Democrats such as Dianne Feinstein and John Kennedy owned homes
with a racial covenant. Anchor Bernard Shaw asked Dallas Morning News
editorial writer Lee Cullum: "Is this a case of journalists making
too much about something that's not really that significant?"
She said yes but,
nonetheless, CNN went with it a few hours later in prime time.
3
People who earn more and pay more in taxes will get a bigger tax reduction
dollar-wise than those who pay less in taxes. Sounds logical, but to
CNN's Brooks Jackson, who is usually above passing along shoddy
rhetorical arguments, it shows how the Republican tax cut plan unfairly
benefits the rich.
Reviewing the
House GOP proposal on the July 13 The World Today, Jackson asserted:
"The top capital gains tax rate would drop
five percentage points to 15 percent, but that's not worth much to most
taxpayers. Those making roughly $38,000 to $63,000 a year would get an
average cut of $17. Those making more than $300,000 a year would get a cut
of more than $8,300, according to a study by Citizens for Tax
Justice."
He didn't label
the group as liberal before continuing: "There would be help for many
working couples." After a bite of Bill Archer explaining how the plan
would eliminate the marriage penalty," Jackson complained:
"Couples would get a larger standard
deduction, but that's no help to the working couples who itemize
deductions. The 55 percent tax on big estates would be phased out,
repealed entirely by the year 2009. But only the richest two percent of
estates are taxed now, so 98 percent would see no benefit."
Amongst those two
percent, a group Jackson did not mention: Thousands of small businesses
passed along every year to heirs at an owner's death. But with an
onerous 55 percent rate on the value of the business's property and
equipment often exceeding the revenue flow of the business, heirs are
forced to sell just to pay the huge tax on a paper gain.
4
A bra world on Today. Tuesday morning Jonathan Alter used soccer player
Brandi Chastain's display of her Nike sports bra as an excuse to curve
an argument about how women have moved from burning their bras as a
"sign of defiance" in the 1960s to showing their bras in the
1990s as "the most visible sign of achievement." Alter credited
Title IX with making the sports bra possible. Afterward, Katie Couric
marveled: "The importance of the sports bra to American women really
cannot be overestimated can it?"
In a piece carried
on the July 12 News with Brian Williams on MSNBC and then again on the
July 13 Today, Newsweek's Jonathan Alter asserted, as transcribed by the
MRC's Mark Drake:
"Women' liberation in the early 1970s: The
most visible sign of defiance against male oppression was burning your
bra. Women's liberation in the late 1990s: The most visible sign of
achievement is showing your bra, well your sports bra anyway..."
"Many American are learning this week that
the triumph of women's team sports is the result of something called Title
IX. That was an obscure provision in an education bill signed into law by
Richard Nixon in 1972 that said women should have the same access to
educational resources, including high school and college sports budgets,
as men. Sometimes the fine print in Washington bills, widely discounted as
boring or irrelevant to our lives, turns out to be central to social
change. Title IX made women's team sports, indirectly producing everything
from the WNBA to World Cup champions to the sports bras that helped them
play. Women's undergarments are still often about selling sex. That's
Victoria's Secret. But for now on, thanks to Brandi Chastain's little
gesture, they also represent strength, success and a new comfortable place
for the women's movement, one of the great social movements of the 20th
century."
Immediately after
Alter's taped piece Katie Couric asked guest Lucy Danziger of Women's
Sports & Fitness magazine: "When I got this assignment I thought
whoa, slow news day. But the importance of the sports bra to American
women really cannot be overestimated can it?"
Washington Post
reporter Ann Gerhart also saw the sports bra as a symbol of Title IX's
success. In a July 14 Style section article titled "Cashing In on the
World Cups," Gerhart wrote than Chastain's jersey removal "has
brought instant attention to a piece of clothing that is humble and
practical -- not a traditional bra of shine and lace and cleavage, but a
sturdy compression garment. The sports bra is the cloth symbol of Title
IX's success."
5
Wednesday night FNC became the first network to pick up on fresh evidence
that former White House Associate Counsel William Kennedy took FBI files
home to enter data from them into his portable computer and that a judge
may soon order Hillary Clinton to be deposed. As noted in the July 9
CyberAlert, a July 8 column by Bob Novak suggested Filegate "might
yet be broken open with political implications for Hillary Rodham
Clinton" as Judicial Watch revealed what Kennedy's former wife said
she witnessed. To read more, go to the July 9 CyberAlert: http://www.mediaresearch.org/news/cyberalert/1999/cyb19990709.html#4
In a piece run on
the July 14 Special Report with Brit Hume and Fox Report, David Shuster
put on screen text from an affidavit recently filed by Hillary Clinton:
"I have never obtained or ordered nor requested anyone to...to obtain
any FBI file, FBI background investigation summary...of any former
government employee employed by either the Bush or Reagan
administration."
Shuster noted that
the affidavit "still leaves open other allegations that the First
Lady somehow benefitted. 'I have never seen the FBI investigative
summary' of Republicans. The conservative group Judicial Watch says the
word 'seen' is the key."
Larry Klayman, Judicial Watch: "Did she have
this information provided to her orally? Did she see it on her laptop
computer and therefore she didn't see the original but she saw a
recordation. Did she have the information summarized and given to her in
other forms?"
Shuster: "Klayman is convinced the courts
will soon grant his request to question Mrs. Clinton face to face. A
lawsuit has been building for nearly three years and Klayman recently
obtained potentially explosive testimony about the man with the moustache
[video of Kennedy walking with another man], William Kennedy, a key figure
in the case. Kennedy is a former law partner of Mrs. Clinton and worked
briefly as a White House aide. His ex-wife has now alleged that on several
occasions Kennedy brought FBI files to their home and spent hours entering
information onto a laptop computer."
Shuster concluded
by passing along how "legal observers" think a federal judge
will order the First Lady to testify.
6
Hear from and talk to Fox's Carl Cameron, the leading television
reporter on the Chinese espionage beat. He's scheduled to be amongst MRC
Chairman L. Brent Bozell's guests Thursday night when he hosts the Mike
Reagan talk show on the Premiere Radio Network. Plus, Steve Forbes, Tony
Snow and Jackie Mason. To see a partial list of the many Chinagate scoops
delivered by Cameron on FNC check out the MRC's Special Report:
"The Cox Report versus The Iran-Contra Report." Go to: http://www.mediaresearch.org/specialreports/news/sr19990706.html
Or, for a condensed version, go to: http://www.mediaresearch.org/news/reality/1999/FAX19990624.html
The Reagan show is
distributed live from 6 to 10pm ET, 5 to 9pm CT, 4 to 8pm MT and 3 to 7pm
PT, but many stations carry it on a delayed basis. To see a list of the
cities, dial positions and times 180 stations carry the Mike Reagan Show,
listed by state, go to: http://www.webforums.com/forums/t-read/msa21.261.html
To listen live
during the above listed hours via either RealAudio or Windows Media
Player, go to Broadcast.com's site: http://www.broadcast.com/shows/reagan/
Among the stations
in larger markets or with strong signals that cover a wide area (all times
local):
Montgomery, Alabama: WACV 1170-AM, 6-8pm
Los Angeles: KIEV 870-AM, 8pm-12am
San Diego: KSDO 1130-AM, 7-10pm
San Francisco: KSFO 560-AM, 3-6am
Ft. Myers: WINK 1240-AM, 8pm-12am
Des Moines: WHO 1040-AM, 9pm-1am
Boise: KBOI 670-AM, 6-9pm
Ft. Wayne: WOWO 1190-AM, 8pm-12am
Kansas City: KCMO 810-AM, 6-9pm
Las Vegas: KDWN 720-AM, 3-6pm
Reno: KKOH 780-AM, 7-10pm
Houston: KPRC 950-AM, 10pm-1am
San Antonio: KTSA 550-AM, 8pm-12am
Salt Lake City: KALL 910-AM, 6-9pm
Norfolk: WNIS 850-AM, 8pm-12am
Spokane: KGA 1510-AM, 6-9pm
Milwaukee: WISN 1130-AM, 12-3am
Washington, DC: WMAL 630-AM, 3-5am
As you can see,
many stations do not carry the full four hours, so you may not be able to
hear all the guests, but Bozell's assistant/producer, Deborah Bilyeu,
passed along this planned guest schedule to lure you in:
First hour: Steve Forbes and possibly Paul Weyrich
Second hour: Steve Allen
Third hour: Carl Cameron
Fourth hour: Jackie Mason and Tony Snow
Jackie Mason and Tony Snow back-to-back. You
can't say conservatives don't believe in diversity.
--
Brent Baker
3
>>>
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