Nets devote more coverage to Wilson's outburst than to Obama's speech
During their September 10 editions, the three evening network news programs cumulatively devoted more coverage to Rep. Joe Wilson's outburst during President Obama's September 9 joint address to Congress on health reform -- in which Wilson claimed President Obama lied when he said "our reform efforts" would not "insure illegal immigrants" -- than they allotted to the speech itself. Moreover, while ABC's Jake Tapper explicitly stated that "the president's reforms" would not "apply to illegal immigrants" and NBC's Kelly O'Donnell said that "the bill, as it's written now, is explicit saying that illegal immigrants will not get any health care benefits in reform," the CBS Evening News did not attempt to fact-check Wilson's interjection.
NBC, CBS provide more coverage of Wilson's outburst than the speech itself
NBC featured nearly twice as much coverage of Wilson as Obama. NBC's Nightly News provided 3 minutes and 2 seconds of coverage of Obama's September 9 joint address to Congress, compared to almost twice as much coverage -- 5 minutes and 47 seconds -- of Wilson's outburst during that address. CBS Evening News similarly provided more coverage of Wilson's remark than the President's speech: 3 minutes and 21 seconds for Wilson's outburst compared to 2 minutes and 50 seconds for the speech itself. By contrast, ABC's World News provided more than twice as much coverage of Obama's address than they gave to Wilson's remark. World News featured 5 minutes and 17 seconds on Obama's address compared to 2 minutes and 18 seconds on Wilson's comment.
Cumulatively, nets gave Wilson more coverage than Obama. Taken together, the three nightly news programs aired September 10 on NBC, CBS, and ABC provided more coverage of Wilson's outburst than Obama's address to Congress itself. Cumulatively, Obama's speech received 11 minutes and 9 seconds of coverage, while Wilson's remark commanded 11 minutes and 26 seconds of attention.
Despite reporting Wilson's outburst, CBS fails to fact-check it
CBS's Cordes: Wilson "stands by what he said, but regrets where he said it." In CBS Evening News' lead story about Wilson's outburst, which included several repetitions of his claim that Obama "lie[d]" about whether or not health reform would cover illegal immigrants, correspondent Nancy Cordes did not question whether or not Wilson's claim was accurate. Moreover, Cordes reported that Wilson "stands by what he said." And neither anchor Katie Couric nor other correspondents reporting about health care fact-checked Wilson's claim:
CORDES: The former military attorney stands by what he said, but regrets where he said it. Constituents in his conservative district agree.
UNIDENTIFIED CONSTITUENT: It's completely out of line.
CORDES: Mr. Obama accepted Wilson's apology. [CBS Evening News, 9/10/09, accessed from the Nexis database]
ABC's Tapper: "Would the president's reforms apply to illegal immigrants? The answer is no." On World News, Tapper offered the following fact-check of the issue:
TAPPER: The president tried to do a fact check of his own.
OBAMA: The reforms I am proposing would not apply to those who are here illegally.
TAPPER: Would the president's reforms apply to illegal immigrants? The answer is no. House and Senate bills explicitly say any new government subsidies to purchase health insurance would only apply to legal citizens. But the issue is more complicated than that. When illegal immigrants go to emergency rooms, the charges are often paid for by emergency Medicaid, which at least one Democratic bill may expand. Though, today, the White House reiterated the president's point.
ROBERT GIBBS (White House press secretary): The legislation that the President will sign won't cover illegal immigrants. [ABC's World News, 9/10/09, accessed from the Nexis database]
O'Donnell: "[T]he bill, as it's written now, is explicit saying that illegal immigrants will not get any health care benefits in reform." On Nightly News, O'Donnell offered the following fact-check of "Wilson's complaint":
O'DONNELL: Wilson's complaint, however rude it was, reflects a view Republican leaders stood by today. While the president insists health care reform will not cover illegal immigrants, Republicans argue there is a loophole because the House bill fails to require proof of citizenship.
SEN. JON KYL (R-AZ): And so if there is no verification of eligibility required, it is quite likely--indeed, I would say probable--that a lot of people who are not eligible, including illegal immigrants, will be--will end up receiving the benefits of the legislation.
O'DONNELL: And, Brian, this is complicated because the bill, as it's written now, is explicit saying that illegal immigrants will not get any health care benefits in reform. But Republicans say they're concerned about cracks in the system, and examples of times when illegal immigrants have managed to get benefits like Medicaid. Now, this has caused such a fuss that, tonight, Senate Democrats concede there is confusion, and the last committee that's working on legislation says it will try to do more to be specific about requiring proof of citizenship. [NBC's Nightly News, 9/10/09, accessed from the Nexis database]
PolitiFact: "We rate Wilson's statement False." PolitiFact.com concluded that Wilson's accusation that Obama lied about health care reform applying to undocumented immigrants is "false" and stated that "it's worth pointing out that illegal immigrants participating in the exchange would be paying for their insurance like everyone else. That's similar to the current system."
But it's worth pointing out that illegal immigrants participating in the exchange would be paying for their insurance like everyone else. That's similar to the current system -- we're not aware of any particular restrictions that stop illegal immigrants from buying private insurance now. Under health care reform, illegal immigrants would be able to buy private insurance or the public option.
When we look at all of this evidence, it seems that health reform leaves in place the status quo on illegal immigration, and certainly does not provide any new benefits particularly for illegal immigrants. [PolitiFact, 9/09/09]
Methodology
Media Matters for America reviewed digital video of the September 10 editions of NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams, CBS Evening News with Katie Couric, and ABC's World News with Charles Gibson.
Media Matters counted the minutes and seconds of programming devoted to Obama's joint address to Congress and, separately, to coverage of Wilson's remark. Programming about the president's address, or that referenced his speech, was counted as coverage of Obama's speech. Similarly, programming about Wilson's outburst was coded as such. The tease provided by the anchor at the top of the program was not counted.
But they never can seem bothered to mention that, huh? I bet they would if he were a democrat... OK, so maybe they wouldn't say "LIE" but they'd probably inform people that he was (at least) WRONG. That would be nice here. No such luck, so yeah: We're doomed.
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Come to my blog to debate Health Care!
http://eddiecabot.blogspot.com/
Something always pops up to distract those who should be reporting the issues. Instead they focus on the clown in the cage grinning with a live chicken's neck in his mouth.
This seems to be a pattern, in which the media will for the most part talk about anything, ANYTHING, other than health coverage reform ideas our President is proposing. Like death panels, or death books, or death to granny. They seem fixated on death, and on predicting it is the American people who will suffer it. They ignore that this is already the outcome for thousands of us who are uninsured on an annual basis. They ignore the fact that they are repeating right wing health insurance lobbyist talking points.
Here's my observation - it's an editorial decision designed to retain an audience through to the next commercial break. It has nothing to do with informing the audience about life and death issues.
I had to tune to BBC America to see any of Obama's eloquent overview of liberalism and the role of government. Wilson's stupidity, however, was there for all to see on every channel.
Our distasteful choices are to resort to political theater (I'm old enough to remember the Yippies); hire Frank Luntz to create mindless bumper stickers; or acknowledge that we can't motivate Americans to do good, we can only scare the bejebus out of them to do what we want. (The smoking gun...mushroom cloud...be afraid...)
There are some lessons in John Adams' presidency when similar forces demonized each other, but if we don't want to live through a McCarthy era we need to find methods to stop this now. Having a few uninformed people in a nation of 300 million is not the problem. Having sedition funded by billionaires promoted with national media and naively reinforced with corporate advertising is the problem.
Although it infringes on the freedom of speech, it would be somewhat nice to have the Sedition Acts back in place, which made it illegal to publish "false, scandalous, and malicious writing" against the government and officials... then maybe Americans can get some real news instead of this garbage.
It's better to chase the new story then analyze the old one (even though it was never truly analyzed).
He also receives FREE healthcare under a single-payer government run system called TRICARE. This is the national program that covers veterans, and yet, he has voted against veterans health benefits 11 times in 8 years! WOW, what a hypocrite. But isn’t that the Republican norm?
Nothing needs to be debated. They won't be covered in the proposed bill. It's a non-starter. But anything that mentions illegal immigrants is enough to get the racist teabaggers' all riled up.
Or do you think that because you look and sound like an American, you won't have to provide proof?
It's the biggest non-starter ever. We're not going to issue ID cards to our citizens and illegal immigrants will not be participating in any of the plans proposed in the different bills under consideration.
Those hung up on this have other problems that have little to do with immigration.
Many come here because they know they can beat the system. And the system the federal government runs are the easiest to beat.
Proof of citizenship is required *in order to get an insurance card!* Obviously. Do you think the government is just going to subsidize illegal aliens? It doesn't happen under Medicare, and doesn't happen under any other program. The right is just stoking anti-immigration hysteria in an attempt to defeat Obama.
I need to point out that the AP, CNN, factcheck, and polifact have all declared Wilson's statement false.
Yes it does. They are racists. How did I come to this conclusion?
Because nobody can tell me what these teabaggers are protesting. You may claim it's spending, but Obama's been in office FOR 9 MONTHS and any spending he's done was to avert a full-blown economic depression. What has he done that's so wrong?
That's right. NOTHING. These racists just can't stand the black man spending the white man's money.
The final confirmation came when the racist parents/school administrators/hate radio hosts were up in arms about Obama addressing school children. "I'm not going to let my child listen to the evil black man!!"
"I want my country back" (from the black man)
"This isn't the country I remember" (due to the black man occupying the White House.
Let's ask Mr/Mrs Racist Parent:
"I don't want the president talking to my child" (due to the president being black)
Let's see what's on a 9/12 teabagger's sign:
"Monkey see, monkey spend"
Grandstanding? More pressing needs? By taking a few minutes to address school children about working hard and setting goals? Fail.
are you telling me you would have no problem with the same equation with your child and a President Bush?
No, I wouldn't. In case you missed it, the president, even the black president, is everybody's president. Let's ask former president John F. Kennedy about this:
"Ask not what you're country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country".
Also I highly doubt that you were singing Bush's praises whilst he was in the WH....but if you say you wouldn't have a problem with some teacher asking your child how he had inspired them, so be it.... the teachers aid suggestions were the main problem, not the presidents address, and that is where the left is blowing things out of proportion.
BTW, it has been a long time since most people have put anything before themselves in this country, so using JFK's quote is a little out place in this forum....
This is arrant nonsense. Bush 1 actually *did* ask students how they can help him achieve his goals (one of the objections of the right), and no one accused him of being a socialist or a Nazi. The left blew things out of proportion? What planet do you live on? The right wing accused Obama of indoctrinating their children--not the other way around!
Tax cuts. Not exactly as helpful to the students as studying hard, setting goals, and staying in school; you know, the political stuff.
They're really benign questions. The kids could have said "he doesn't inspire me" and "I don't want to help the president". Frankly, I think everyone should be inspired by him because of his story regardless if you agree with him or not.
Obama, on the other hand, was asking kids to write an note to themselves about how they were going to help the President achieve the goals he was going to set in the talk to the school kids.
It was the rightwing knee-jerk reaction that assumed that the goals being discussed with different than what they actually were. Obama's goals were for kids to stay in school and work hard while they are there. And kids were supposed to write about how they were going to personally help reach those goals.
Projection rears its ugly head yet again.
Also, a lot of the parents who took their kids out of school wouldn't have a problem with religion being brought into the classroom to indoctrinate school children.
It's a rightwing tactic to behave that way. And so they assume everyone acts that way.
Bigotry, ignorance, and jealousy rear their ugly heads yet again.
Later in that same post I said "Obama's goals were for kids to stay in school and work hard while they are there. And kids were supposed to write about how they were going to personally help reach those goals."
Please forgive me.
None of the bills change anything about medicare. These seniors are screaming about their fellow citizens being provided with the same kind of coverage they have.
Don't these seniors have grandchildren who are in danger of losing their health insurance when a parent gets laid off? Don't you think they should be grateful that they have insurance for themselves and that the congress and president are trying to assure their kids and grandkids remain on the insurance rolls?
Anyone in the crowd who has a job could lose their job tomorrow and be uninsured. Any of them could be diagnosed with an illness that would disqualify them from getting any other insurance.
They're all thinking that it couldn't happen to them, but believe me it can. It happened to my family.
Try putting yourself in someone else's shoes sometime.
You people lie as easily as you breathe. The major objection has been that Obama proposed it, and that it goes against market fundamentalism. Illegal aliens can't get medicare right now; as factcheck points out, there is no reason to believe they would get any help under Obama's proposal, for obvious reasons.
Because if his words could be twisted in any way that seemed offensive it would be all over the place on TV, News Papers, and AM talk radio. I saw the speech and the most controversial thing said by far was Rep. Wilsons out burst so I guess Obama did such a good job it required no further coverage.
The reality is that he did give a good a reasonable response to the questions and lies to the health care bill and that is why it has little coverage. I saw it and hope you did to I even saw the response by the republicans while I was not impressed by it; but at least he didn’t pull a bobby jindal and talk down to us like Mr. Rogers talking to 4 year olds. By the way same old same old except for the not mentioning the right wings desire to burn down Medicaid and Medicare it was nothing new tax cuts tax cuts and did I mention tort reform making insurance and medical companies immune to law suits even when they are blatantly responsible for the suffering of the person suing.
They take a critical look at the issues concerning illegal aliens...abortion...deficit neutral spending...insurance competition...and the public option.
As usual, the findings show the president to be less than honest or factual.
We fact-check the president's address to Congress and the nation.
September 10, 2009
Summary
President Obama’s prime-time address to Congress and the nation on health care prompted a Republican congressman to shout “you lie!” Did he? Here’s what we’ve found:
Obama was correct when he said his plan wouldn’t insure illegal immigrants; the House bill expressly forbids giving subsidies to those who are in the country illegally. Conservative critics complain that the bill lacks an enforcement mechanism, but that hardly makes the president a liar.
Your point was, with regards to this thread?
Personal request: could you provide a link so that I could measure Reagan's and Bush 43's truthiness? Thanks.
The point? Coverage of Pres.Obama's speech...which was lacking according to mmfa.
I guess Wilson wasn't lying after all. But don't let facts stand in the way of your outrage.