MediaWatch: June 1993
Table of Contents:
- MediaWatch: June 1993
- National Public Radio Anchor's Liberal Year at Weekend Today
- NewsBites: Tax Revolt?
- Revolving Door: Whiplash
- Clinton's "Serious" Deficit Cuts
- Hubbell's "Perception" Problem
- Myers on Euro-Pork
- Post's Ideological Double Standard
- Janet Cooke Award: Hard News Hillary's Pliant Press
Myers on Euro-Pork
NBC's Lisa Myers has again rooted out Congress' servings of pork. On the May 4 Nightly News, she exposed extravagant waste at the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, funded by U.S. tax dollars: "In the last three years, thanks to Congress, the bank has received $200 million of your tax dollars. That money was supposed to provide loans and investments to help Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union...So far the bank...has spent $300 million on its own operations, and only $240 million on loans." She cited the $80 million dollars spent to outfit its headquarters, and noted: "The marble in the lobby wasn't good enough, so it was ripped out and replaced with the world's finest. The cost, more than a million dollars."
Closer to home, Myers examined the U.S Department of Agriculture, where "bureaucrats with nothing to do find ingenious ways to justify their existence." Questioning the need for a USDA office in one of America's wealthiest suburbs she found the office had given $3,500 to a "ritzy hunt club, where taxpayer money went to build a loading dock, for horse manure."
Engberg's Clinton Check
After a fall attacking George Bush's ads and mostly ignoring Bill Clinton's, CBS reporter Eric Engberg's "Reality Check" has turned to the new incumbent. On the April 17 Evening News, Engberg reported the Clinton campaign paid many of its young workers as "independent contractors," paying no Social Security taxes on them, a la Zoe Baird. The other networks and the news magazines ignored the scoop.
On May 24, Engberg suggested that Vice President Gore's government waste review start with his five offices, including a Carthage, Tennessee office with a paid staff of three. On May 28, Engberg took viewers inside the Clinton tax deal to see what legislators received in exchange for their yes votes, including a tougher Haiti policy and a new tariff on peanuts. Little tidbits like these gave viewers a better grasp of the details lost in the big picture.
