CNN and MSNBC give full coverage to Kennedy - Fox has Jack Ingram singing "Barefoot and Crazy"

[sabra]

http://tunedin.blogs.time.com/2009/08/26/fox-news-on-kennedy-short-shrift-or-right-coverage-for-wrong-reasons/?xid=rss-topstories

When news of Sen. Edward Kennedy's death broke this morning, cable news kicked into full coverage mode. CNN brought on Paul Begala and others to remember the Senator's political career. MSNBC's Morning Joe had public and personal reminiscences of the politician and his legacy. And Fox & Friends had... a Law & Order: SVU fan who helped cops foil a crime, plus hit country recording artist Jack Ingram singing "Barefoot and Crazy"!

Now, a couple points in the interest of fairness (and, um, balance). Fox News did devote considerable time to Kennedy's death earlier in its morning show. And while the SVU segment was insipid, insipid is what Fox & Friends generally does. It's not as though the show was making itself stupider to spite the Democratic leader. (How could it, really?)

...

Now let's not kid ourselves: Kennedy was a liberal Democratic icon, and Fox News, as becomes plainer every day, knows its right-leaning audience well and gives them what they want. Considering the channel's apparent determination this summer to give a full airing to every anti-Obama remark screamed at a healthcare townhall, it's reasonable to wonder if Kennedy's politics affected the play the story got. I will go out on a limb and guess that if Kennedy were a Republican of similar stature, he would have gotten a smidge more Fox air. (Though hypotheticals are the easiest kind of argument to make.)

And as for the other news segments Fox ran: well, it's obvious where the channel was coming from on them too. The 9 a.m. healthcare segment featured, no surprise, another town hall, with Sen. John McCain taking a question from a distraught woman who said she feared "for (her) freedom." The deficit story was about "three scary things" that "the mainstream media isn't telling you" about Obama's deficit projections; it cited a Wall Street Journal editorial as backup. The torture story focused mainly on the reputed danger of any investigation to covert agents and terrorism-fighting in general. In the 10 a.m. hour, it added in a report on the shortcomings of the Canadian healthcare system. Because it's Fox News, and Fox News exists to protect us from Canada.

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Beyond the Kennedy-to-other-news ratio, the cable networks mainly reverted to form. CNN's coverage, bringing in the likes of former Clintonites Paul Begala and James Carville (as well as journalist analysts), focused on Kennedy's political style, family history and legacy. MSNBC's subject was much the same, but the tone was more personal, with the likes of Chris Matthews and Mike Barnicle offering what was more like a private, inside-the-Beltway remembrance of the Washington legend. Fox's tone, meanwhile, definitely seemed perfunctory and forced, though anchor Megan Kelly responded to a viewer e-mail asking why the channel wasn't talking more about Chappaquiddick by saying that the infamous car crash "was part of his legacy. But the major part of his legacy is the service he provided to his country."

[Mike Daniels]

1. I found MSNBC's morning coverage pretty even-handed

For the most part is was personal rememberances from people who knew or worked with Kennedy and even Pat Buchanan focused on the positive elements of Kennedy's life.

As for the 2 plus hours I watched I only heard one mention about the car accident and it just a side-bar that Buchanan used to lead into a recollection of a meeting between Kennedy and Nixon shortly after the incident had occurred.