MediaWatch: December 1995
Table of Contents:
- MediaWatch: December 1995
- Budget News Without Basic Numbers
- NewsBites: A Wee Bit Off
- Revolving Door: Crossing Into Crossfire
- Deck the Cuts with Gusts of Folly
- TV Ignores Travelgate Acquittal
- "Al Capone of Apple Juice"
- Media Mourn Moderates' Decline Pennsylvania's Problem
- Janet Cooke Award: DeParle's Drama of Destruction
Revolving Door: Crossing Into Crossfire
Michael Kinsley's decision to leave the liberal chair on CNN's Crossfire has created a much coveted opening. The Washington Post reported November 10 that 30 people had contacted the network. While Robert Novak, a columnist, and John Sununu, a former presidential aide, alternate weeks on the conservative side, a reporter may get the liberal slot.
Two of the four people being "personally recruited" by CNN President Tom Johnson, a revolver who toiled as a top aide to President Johnson, are journalists: long-time Los Angeles Times Washington Bureau Chief Jack Nelson and Time columnist Margaret Carlson, a Special Assistant to the Chairman of the Consumer Product Safety Commission during the Carter years.
Carlson, a former Time Deputy Washington Bureau Chief, took the liberal chair for two nights. At the conclusion of the show, normally one host says "From the left, I'm" and gives their name, followed by the other saying, "From the right..." Not Carlson. On November 13 and 14 she signed off "From Washington, I'm Margaret Carlson. Good night for Crossfire," baffling Novak: "I'm, ah, from the right, you almost confused me, I'm Robert Novak."
This after Carlson spent the previous half hour hitting U.S. Rep. David Dreier (R-Calif.) with points right out of the House Democratic talking points on the budget: "Medicare can be discussed when we get to the merits of the budget, not when you're trying to shove a revolution down the President's throat....The capital gains tax benefit goes dramatically to the top ten percent of income earners," and "Wouldn't it look fairer if you were proposing these spending cuts without the tax cut? The spending cuts wouldn't need to be so savage."
Writing Left
Two Capitol Hill liberals have tapped print media veterans to head their press operations, Roll Call reported November 30. Dan Holly, who covered city hall for Knight Ridder's Detroit Free Press for the past two and a half years, is the new Press Secretary for U.S. Rep. Joe Kennedy (D-Mass.). Earlier, he worked for the Newark Star-Ledger and Miami Herald....Senator Carol Moseley-Braun has hired Read Scott-Martin as her Communications Director. Roll Call reported that he "was a United Press International reporter in both Washington and St. Louis until 1991." He joined UPI's D.C. bureau in 1990, covering PAC finances "and working on the foreign desk during the Persian Gulf War." In 1988 he was a press aide in Democrat Richard Gephardt's presidential effort, in 1992 he worked for Senator Bob Kerrey's presidential run, and in 1994 he directed research for Pennsylvania's unsuccessful Democratic gubernatorial candidate, Mark Singel.
New to McHugh
Congressman John McHugh, a New York Republican, has brought aboard ABC News veteran Robin Wolfgang as his Press Secretary. After helping produce video news releases for the Bush-Quayle campaign, in late 1992 she joined ABC's Washington bureau, putting in a brief stint as a production assistant for Good Morning America. A few months later, she told MediaWatch, she began handling production for Political Director Hal Bruno's weekly radio show before taking a production associate slot with the now-defunct TV show Day One.
