Though the Republicans had, arguably, little to celebrate last night, they certainly went overboard with the festivities. Which meant unintended victims in this, the "political equivalent of a Chucky Cheese."
CONTINUED »
JOSSIP REPORTS — With Keith Olbermann back in New York and supposedly making up with Chris Matthews, and Joe Scarborough insisting everyone at the network is going to have Thanksgiving together, everything should be hunky-dorey at NBC News, yes?
No.
Joe Scarborough is still taking shots at Olbermann on the air (excellent video here). Oh, and then there's this little matter of Chuck Todd, David Gregory, and Brian Williams — and Meet The Press. It's a clusterfuck, and these are the details: CONTINUED »
JOSSIP REPORTS — With budgets already stretched thin — do you know how much Keith Olbermann costs? — cable networks like MSNBC find themselves covering one of the most expensive presidential election cycles ever. Those primaries went on for eternity, and the DNC and RNC will demand a few million more bucks. And then there's the damn presidential debates still coming!
All those costs explain why network head Phil Griffin has handed down travel restrictions — namely, the number of producers heading to Denver and St. Paul is nothing like it was just four years ago, we're told. Well-placed informants tell us many producers who went to the conventions in '04 aren't going to either the DNC or RNC this year, while the producers who did make the cut will have to pull double or triple duty, handling multiple talent at the same time.
Sounds pretty crappy, but cutbacks are the reality, right?
Well, it's the reality for everyone — except a one Andrea Mitchell. CONTINUED »
McCain's camp was all whine-whine-whine to NBC News president Steve Capus over some comments Andrea Mitchell made on Meet the Press. On the subject of Saturday night's faith forum, Mitchell relayed Team Obama sentiments that there was foul play involved in the event — "that McCain may not have been in the Cone of Silence and may have had some ability to overhear what the questions were to Obama. He seemed so well prepared." Someone call someone a cheater?
McCain campaign manager Rick Davis sent a very strongly worded letter to NBC, which so often receives this sort of thing, chiding them for "abandoning non-partisan coverage of the presidential race."
This, even though Mitchell was doing that thing that journalists do — reporting — on what had already been stated by the Democrats, and gave full context to the quote. Except, whoops, now it looks like McCain wasn't in that Cone of Silence after all. Their bad, yo. So what is this magical cone that McCain was not in? CONTINUED »
As we've noted before, Andrea Mitchell sometimes does mean things and is generally a terrible interviewer, and it was a mistake for MSNBC to give her an hour of daytime programming to host.
That said, Mitchell is the one news personality we've been enjoying of late.
Unlike the other talking heads we have to listen to, Mitchell is calling it like is. If somebody is lying — ahem, John McCain's campaign — she says so plainly. If somebody is trying to mislead the public — ahem, Barack Obama's campaign — she let's us know.
And when somebody is trying to bullshit the American public, like McCain's campaign manager Rick Davis did last night? Yep — she calls him out on it. Not the next day. Not in a blog post published later. But while she's conducting the interview. This is important because this is what a journalist is supposed to do. (It'd be even better if she didn't let her guests talk over her.) CONTINUED »
What's this? A news anchor actually using the word "lie" to describe a politician's actions? That alone is news, since the media is all too willing to write around blatant lies with words like "misrepresentation," "stretch," and "misleading."
But here's MSNBC's Andrea Mitchell, known for pushing colleagues out of the way, doing it to describe John McCain's new ad about Barack Obama's decision not to visit troops in the hospital during his trip overseas, and how it was motivated by Obama's inability to turn the event into a press opportunity (since cameras wouldn't be allowed).
Funny, then, that Mitchell herself may have played a role in Obama's canceling of the hospital visit. CONTINUED »
"Citizen of the world" Barack Obama is leading the press corps through a tour of Europe and the Middle East right about now. It's not about him wanting to present himself as the de facto future U.S. president, of course, but just his chance to hang out with 200,000 of his closest German friends. And he would have loved to have been able to keep his scheduled dates with American troops in Landstuhl and Ramstein, except he had to cancel. How come? Because, according to the campaign, it wouldn't be right to visit the military facilities on a campaign-funded portion of his trip.
Or maybe it's because the media's camera crews wouldn't be allowed. And Obama is tired of getting ripped on for making stops that the press isn't allowed to take part in. Yes, blame Andrea Mitchell. CONTINUED »
Chris Matthews did a fine job infuriating the Hillary Clinton campaign. Now colleague Andrea Mitchell is doing her part to stink things up with Barack Obama. Not that there's anything wrong with a reporter actually, um, reporting.
Mitchell, who booted Lee Cowan out of the way to trail Obama to the Middle East and Europe this week, made a satellite stop by Hardball last night — and in soundbite-able brevity, slammed Obama for engaging in reporter-free public relations stunts as he makes his way through Iraq and Afghanistan. (And then Matthews had to ask about black people.) CONTINUED »
Like David Gregory before her, Andrea Mitchell is being accused by insiders of big footing a colleague to serve her own agenda.
Mitchell is said to have lobbied NBC Nightly News executive producer Alexandra Wallace to let her cover Barack Obama's overseas trip next week to Europe, Iraq, and Afghanistan, despite the fact that Lee Cowan — yes, that Lee Cowan — has been covering Obama's campaign since he began running for president. It's a classic Mitchell "big foot," we're told by one NBC source who's provided accurate information in the past, and has angered folks at NBC's political desk, news desk, and elsewhere. CONTINUED »
As tasteless as it may seem, the rush to find out what to do with Sunday's Meet The Press, following Tim Russert's sudden death at NBC's D.C. studio this afternoon, is on. We're told Steve Capus & Co. are already plotting out what to do, and it's likely Andrea Mitchell will be asked to chair the show, though David Gregory is also a candidate. It's very possible Sunday's show will be used, at least in part, to air a video memorial of Russert, with Tom Brokaw being asked to join the panel, along with Chuck Todd, and others. It's unclear what the role of Brian Williams, who is anchoring NBC Nightly News from Afghanistan, will be, says, a source.
At least one blog post makes the case in fingering MSNBC's Andrea Mitchell for this line about Barack Obama's Virgina visit: "Interesting images today. Barack Obama, Mark Warner, in Southwest Virginia. This is real [chuckle] redneck … sort of … uhm … bordering on Appalachia … country. This is not the Northern Virginia … uh … you know … high-tech corridor. And these are voters that he would not logically … be … you know, gravitating to. This is the beginning of a pivot." Evidence of prejudice, or just bad newscasting?
Andrea Mitchell treated the entire NBC Newsroom in D.C. to a meltdown today, relays an spy. Her 1pm MSNBC show had camera problems upstairs, which meant Andrea was forced to go to the downstairs studio. Horror! We're told a furious Mitchell went "absolutely nuts" and began screaming at several staffers. Some witnesses to the event imagine she'll be reprimanded from above. Luckily, she goes home to a shoulder rub from husband Alan Greenspan.
Andrea Mitchell has her detractors. And her supporters.
Last week we relayed some sentiments from inside MSNBC, where the NBC News correspondent is hosting an hour slot at 1pm. So far, we haven't been terribly impressed with the daytime go from the otherwise remarkable Mitchell (Contessa Brewer and Alex Witt remain our daytime favorites), and neither have her colleagues. Now, her defenders are weighing in.
Chimes one veteran MSNBC operative, who failed to volunteer a prior close working relationship with Mitchell: "I wouldn't jump to any conclusions just yet (not that you've said she's getting canceled, which would be PATENTLY UNTRUE). While you say 'nobody’s impressed' all anyone can talk about is how strong she's been with her show. Wait for her team to flesh things out. By summer you'll be surprised how good things are. Her access and reputation are her greatest strengths and while her delivery could use some work, she'll get there, she just needs to adjust." (For the record, the idea that "nobody's impressed" were not our words.)
And one anonymous tipster, claiming to be a senior staffer at the network, says: "Your scathing comments are based on nothing. Everybody loves what she's doing, from [Phil] Griffin on down. Ratings speak for themself."
Watching Andrea Mitchell's hour-long 1pm show on MNSBC, we can see why her critics, from inside 30 Rock, are bickering.
Mitchell, who we've always loved on the NBC Nightly News and her daytime MSNBC appearances, doesn't appear confident in her anchor chair. Introducing guests, and saying goodbyes, takes extraordinarily long. And the conversation is nothing less than stilted.
More than one MSNBC insider has relayed the gossipmongering going on inside MSNBC, which ranges from "nobody's impressed" to "she should go back to being a full-time correspondent."
That Hillary Clinton didn't really have to flee sniper fire on her trip to Bosnia didn't surprise most in the press corps. After all, more than a few of them accompanied her, and Sinbad and Sheryl Crow, on that 1996 trip when she was First Lady, and themselves witnessed the gunfire-free arrival and photo taking that must have slipped Hillary's mind. And even if they didn't, there were plenty of newspaper reports they could've Lexis'd.
But then there are folks like NBC's Andrea Mitchell, now wo-manning an afternoon MSNBC show, who claims to remember a different version of events … but never brought it up before, even though Clinton has been telling this story for months.
Even when the specific trip was topical – as it was on a March 13 Nightly News segment, where Mitchell mentioned Sinbad and Crow on that trip but not Clinton's reshaping of history – Mitchell didn't bring it up. On Monday night, however, she did say "those of us on that trip recall it differently."
How convenient, how that everyone has seen the video now? CONTINUED »
Editorial Director
