H
Harry Hope
Guest
From The Los Angeles Times, 11/30/07:
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationw...,1,6572347.story?track=rss&ctrack=1&cset=true
The right views YouTube questioners, cries foul
Democratic partisans were allowed to put Republican hopefuls on the
spot by CNN, Internet talkers say.
By James Rainey, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
Conservative Internet commentators were buzzing Thursday with
accusations that producers had skewed the CNN-YouTube presidential
debate by allowing Democratic partisans to pose tough questions to the
Republican contenders.
Several bloggers said CNN had betrayed a liberal bias by selecting
questions designed to put the eight presidential candidates on the
defensive.
But executives at the cable-TV network said they were proud of
Wednesday night's debate and had simply chosen 33 questions -- from
nearly 5,000 submitted by videotape -- that would prompt a spirited
and substantive discussion.
A review by the Los Angeles Times of the debate sponsored by CNN and
YouTube four months ago found that the Democratic presidential
candidates also faced queries that seemed to come from the
conservative perspective.
At least two of the citizen-interrogators had clear GOP leanings.
"We were looking for people who were interested enough in the process
to ask a question," Sam Feist, CNN's political director, said
Thursday.
"We didn't inquire about people's ideological beliefs, and that wasn't
relevant. . . . We were looking for questions that would make for an
interesting debate."
Feist said that the high number of viewers who watched the two-hour
session was proof that the network and the video- sharing service
YouTube had achieved that goal.
Nearly 5 million people tuned in, a record audience for cable
television coverage of a primary debate, CNN said.
Controversy over the content of video questions began almost as soon
as the broadcast ended, when Republican former Education Secretary
William J. Bennett said on CNN that one of the questioners had ties to
the presidential campaign of Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.).
Retired Brig. Gen. Keith Kerr, who is gay, had asked the candidates
why gays and lesbians shouldn't be allowed to serve openly in the
military.
Kerr is a member of a steering committee for Clinton on gay and
lesbian issues.
Although the retired military man and Clinton's camp said the
Democratic candidate had nothing to do with the question, CNN
apologized.
David Bohrman, executive producer of the debate, said the network
wanted to avoid "gotcha" questions from clear Democratic partisans and
would not have allowed the query if it had known of Kerr's ties to the
Clinton campaign.
But several Internet commentators said the cable-TV network should
have screened out Democratic partisans, who they said "hijacked" the
Republican forum.
In postings that popped up throughout the day Thursday, they said
that:
A Texas woman identified only as "Journey," who asked if women should
be punished for having abortions, had appeared in another YouTube
video wearing a "John Edwards '08" T-shirt; a man asking a question
during the debate about gay rights had also appeared on a social
networking site as a supporter of Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.), and a
Manhattan Beach man -- while tasting an ear of corn and asking a tough
question about farm subsidies -- had once worked as a summer intern
for Rep. Jane Harman (D-Venice).
Jay Tea was one of several to complain, writing at the blog Wizbang:
"Those were good, solid questions. But CNN, by playing by completely
contradictory standards for its questioners at debates, betrays its
bias: the Democrats get to stack their questions to make their
candidates look good; the Republicans find themselves having to squirm
and evade, or give concrete answers that won't make some people very
happy."
But, CNN's Feist said, conservative commentators did not complain when
questioners who shared their political ideology had videos aired
during the Democratic forum in July.
During that session, one video questioner asked the candidates to
choose between raising taxes or cutting benefits in order to save
Social Security.
Another demanded to know whether taxes would rise "like usually they
do when a Democrat comes in office."
A third featured a gun-toting Michigan man, who in an interview
Thursday said he had voted twice for President Bush, who wanted to
know if the Democrats would protect his "baby" -- an assault rifle he
cradled in his arms.
Another questioner from that forum who seemed to have clear
conservative credentials was John McAlpin, a sailor who asked Clinton:
"How do you think you would be taken seriously" by Arab and Muslim
nations that treat women as "second-class citizens"?
McAlpin's MySpace page features pictures of Rudolph W. Giuliani, the
former New York mayor and Republican presidential candidate.
It depicts Fox commentator Bill O'Reilly as a friend, while offering a
caricature of a bearded, turban-wearing "Borat Hussein Obama" -- a
derogatory reference to Obama, the Democratic candidate who as a youth
attended a Muslim school.
CNN officials said that in the Democratic debate, as in Wednesday's
Republican encounter, they had not attempted to determine the party or
ideology of the questioners.
______________________________________________
WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
Harry
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationw...,1,6572347.story?track=rss&ctrack=1&cset=true
The right views YouTube questioners, cries foul
Democratic partisans were allowed to put Republican hopefuls on the
spot by CNN, Internet talkers say.
By James Rainey, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
Conservative Internet commentators were buzzing Thursday with
accusations that producers had skewed the CNN-YouTube presidential
debate by allowing Democratic partisans to pose tough questions to the
Republican contenders.
Several bloggers said CNN had betrayed a liberal bias by selecting
questions designed to put the eight presidential candidates on the
defensive.
But executives at the cable-TV network said they were proud of
Wednesday night's debate and had simply chosen 33 questions -- from
nearly 5,000 submitted by videotape -- that would prompt a spirited
and substantive discussion.
A review by the Los Angeles Times of the debate sponsored by CNN and
YouTube four months ago found that the Democratic presidential
candidates also faced queries that seemed to come from the
conservative perspective.
At least two of the citizen-interrogators had clear GOP leanings.
"We were looking for people who were interested enough in the process
to ask a question," Sam Feist, CNN's political director, said
Thursday.
"We didn't inquire about people's ideological beliefs, and that wasn't
relevant. . . . We were looking for questions that would make for an
interesting debate."
Feist said that the high number of viewers who watched the two-hour
session was proof that the network and the video- sharing service
YouTube had achieved that goal.
Nearly 5 million people tuned in, a record audience for cable
television coverage of a primary debate, CNN said.
Controversy over the content of video questions began almost as soon
as the broadcast ended, when Republican former Education Secretary
William J. Bennett said on CNN that one of the questioners had ties to
the presidential campaign of Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.).
Retired Brig. Gen. Keith Kerr, who is gay, had asked the candidates
why gays and lesbians shouldn't be allowed to serve openly in the
military.
Kerr is a member of a steering committee for Clinton on gay and
lesbian issues.
Although the retired military man and Clinton's camp said the
Democratic candidate had nothing to do with the question, CNN
apologized.
David Bohrman, executive producer of the debate, said the network
wanted to avoid "gotcha" questions from clear Democratic partisans and
would not have allowed the query if it had known of Kerr's ties to the
Clinton campaign.
But several Internet commentators said the cable-TV network should
have screened out Democratic partisans, who they said "hijacked" the
Republican forum.
In postings that popped up throughout the day Thursday, they said
that:
A Texas woman identified only as "Journey," who asked if women should
be punished for having abortions, had appeared in another YouTube
video wearing a "John Edwards '08" T-shirt; a man asking a question
during the debate about gay rights had also appeared on a social
networking site as a supporter of Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.), and a
Manhattan Beach man -- while tasting an ear of corn and asking a tough
question about farm subsidies -- had once worked as a summer intern
for Rep. Jane Harman (D-Venice).
Jay Tea was one of several to complain, writing at the blog Wizbang:
"Those were good, solid questions. But CNN, by playing by completely
contradictory standards for its questioners at debates, betrays its
bias: the Democrats get to stack their questions to make their
candidates look good; the Republicans find themselves having to squirm
and evade, or give concrete answers that won't make some people very
happy."
But, CNN's Feist said, conservative commentators did not complain when
questioners who shared their political ideology had videos aired
during the Democratic forum in July.
During that session, one video questioner asked the candidates to
choose between raising taxes or cutting benefits in order to save
Social Security.
Another demanded to know whether taxes would rise "like usually they
do when a Democrat comes in office."
A third featured a gun-toting Michigan man, who in an interview
Thursday said he had voted twice for President Bush, who wanted to
know if the Democrats would protect his "baby" -- an assault rifle he
cradled in his arms.
Another questioner from that forum who seemed to have clear
conservative credentials was John McAlpin, a sailor who asked Clinton:
"How do you think you would be taken seriously" by Arab and Muslim
nations that treat women as "second-class citizens"?
McAlpin's MySpace page features pictures of Rudolph W. Giuliani, the
former New York mayor and Republican presidential candidate.
It depicts Fox commentator Bill O'Reilly as a friend, while offering a
caricature of a bearded, turban-wearing "Borat Hussein Obama" -- a
derogatory reference to Obama, the Democratic candidate who as a youth
attended a Muslim school.
CNN officials said that in the Democratic debate, as in Wednesday's
Republican encounter, they had not attempted to determine the party or
ideology of the questioners.
______________________________________________
WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
Harry
