Patterico's Pontifications

11/12/2008

Couric Took Advice on How to Interview Palin from Obama Supporter Sam Nunn

Filed under: General,Media Bias — Patterico @ 9:40 pm



So it looks like Katie Couric took advice from Sam Nunn in preparing to interview Sarah Palin.

Sam Nunn, who had endorsed Obama in April, was mentioned as a possible Obama VP pick, and now serves on Obama’s transition team. (Via WeaselZippers via Hot Air Headlines.)

I can easily imagine Katie Couric taking advice on how to interview Barack Obama from, oh, Tim Pawlenty. Can’t you?

I’m sure this will generate outrage among journalists, for whom professional ethics trump partisan or personal interests.

I’ll be over here in the corner, holding my breath, waiting for said outrage.

24 Responses to “Couric Took Advice on How to Interview Palin from Obama Supporter Sam Nunn”

  1. Professional ethics?
    From a collection of narcissists?

    Another Drew (5fedf0)

  2. Al Sharpton must have been otherwise occupied.

    JVW (b6009a)

  3. Couric didn’t need any advice from anyone. Palin had better legs than Couric. The task was clear.

    daleyrocks (5d22c0)

  4. The link reads now:

    This Page Could Not Be Found

    This content has expired and is no longer available.

    But here is the cache:

    http://74.125.45.104/search?q=cache:http%3A%2F%2Fwww.portfolio.com%2Fviews%2Fblogs%2Fmixed-media%2F2008%2F11%2F12%2Fkaties-little-helpers-how-couric-prepped-for-palin

    TF (ce52ec)

  5. Why didn’t BO pick Nunn to be VP? I continue to not get that, given Biden’s issues.

    On the other hand, the MSM let Biden act like a crazy uncle that folks ignore at parties, so it might not have mattered.

    Eric Blair (a723e0)

  6. Eric, I think Biden was supposed to be a foil of some kind. He admitted many things that the Obama campaign probably had to get out there, but didn’t want to. With a pariah like Biden, they could shrug their shoulders at him.

    Otherwise, I’m also confused. Hillary probably refused the position (ha, bet she wish she hadn’t), but there are other democrats who made more sense.

    Ah, what the hell do I know? Obama won, so I guess he played his cards right

    Juan (4cdfb7)

  7. So he told her to ask that super stumper about which magazines she had read in her lifetime? Drats!

    paul s (c313be)

  8. So he told her to ask that super stumper about which magazines she had read in her lifetime? Drats!

    Comment by paul s — 11/13/2008 @ 3:25 am

    Yeah, who wouldn’t want to know that?

    Mossberg500 (9fd170)

  9. I thought that was supposed to be a softball question.

    paul s (d99227)

  10. I thought that was supposed to be a softball question.

    Comment by paul s — 11/13/2008 @ 3:54 am

    What,they don’t have Snowmobiling Today in New York?

    Mossberg500 (9fd170)

  11. Yawn~~~ So you’re upset huh? Seen any Fox interviews of Democrats lately? They’re abusive, rude, loud, cut the guest off in the middle of sentences, and down right disrespectful. You act as if Obama sent word to Katie Couric himself. So what if one professional gives advice to another professional and they like one candidate over the other. Its their right. You wouldn’t complain if it were the other way around.

    Bottomline, is doesn’t matter. Palin showed she can’t think under pressure, she can only regurgitate “cram-session talking points” back to a tough reporter. There was nothing of her in that interview, only briefings that were running together. She did dismally and showed her stupidity. Rather than saying, it was just a mis-statement, she tried to defend her statement on Foreign Policy – DUH!!!! That showed that she is too stupid to logically find her way out of a tough situation. Not Presidential Material. A Fifth Grader would do better. She’s an idiot.

    PJACKMACK (a5129b)

  12. I saw most of that interview. It was pretty sad how badly Palin did. But I didn’t think any of the questions were unfair. I don’t imagine that Cheney would have a hard time answering the killer ‘what do you like to read’ question.

    Joe (bec298)

  13. PJACKMACK,

    Yup the Governor’s mansions are filled with idiot Governors.

    Again, missing forrest from the trees. No one argues Fox skews right but it is 1 of 6 that does. On the Newspaper side … ugggg.

    Yet ask a Liberal (Degenerate) like yourself and he swears on a stack of agnostic bibles that CNN/NBC/MSNBC/etc are fair and balanced.

    Just their selection of what to report versus not is clear what they are rooting for.

    Robert Rodriguez (54247e)

  14. Well, yes, Palin did poorly in the Couric interview. That doesn’t make her an “idiot”, it means she was unprepared for such a large stage. Maybe she was smart enough to see that the long knives were out for her, so she clammed up.

    But yes, she did poorly.

    Couric had no business getting advice from a Dem hardliner like Nunn. Why didn’t she ask Fred Thompson? You know, for balance?

    The “what do you read on a daily basis” question dripped with East Coast condescencion.

    But yes, Palin did poorly. So did Couric.

    Viktor Nehring (6c107f)

  15. PJwhatever is gracious enough to comment from his Governers Mansion.

    Also, Sam Nunn would have been a far superior VP pick for the Dems. I wonder why they went with “Joe Biden, Super-Genius”

    Techie (62bc5d)

  16. Plus, it’s a good thing Palin wasn’t running for President.

    Techie (62bc5d)

  17. she tried to defend her statement on Foreign Policy – DUH!!!! That showed that she is too stupid to

    I find your cogent foreign policy views to be quite interesting, and would like to be included on your newsletter’s mailing list.

    Dmac (e30284)

  18. Pretty sad that Katie had to get someone else who isn’t a Journalist to help her do her job. She must have skipped school the day they taught her how to properly prepare yourself for an interview. Oh well, she can just stick to interviewing the Great One and his leftist illuminati cabinet for feel-good stories of empty promises.

    Jeff (3cb047)

  19. “I’ll be over here in the corner, holding my breath, waiting for said outrage.”

    If it’s true, I don’t blame you.

    But it’s still an unnamed source that reveled all of this.

    Reminds me of something that outraged Palin recently………………………………

    Oiram (983921)

  20. PJACKMACK wrote: Seen any Fox interviews of Democrats lately? They’re abusive, rude, loud, cut the guest off in the middle of sentences, and down right disrespectful.

    When Barack Obama was doing damage control after the Reverend Wright videos were revealed, he went on Fox News during Hannity & Colmes, but didn’t speak to either host — he talked to Major Garrett, who covered the Obama beat for FNC. I can guarantee you that Garrett — who is probably the finest FNC reporter that doesn’t work exclusively on Special Report with Brit Hume — didn’t take suggestions from any GOP hacks about how to talk to Obama.

    Obama has also been interviewed on Fox News Sunday at least twice by host Chris Wallace. He had his interview on The O’Reilly Factor, knowing good and well that he wouldn’t be treated any differently than any other pol.

    OTOH, Obama singled out Sean Hannity in an Glamour magazine interview (!) in the midst of criticizing pundits responding to his wife’s often-dismissive remarks about this country. Said The One: “[T]he problem is that rarely do these folks have the guts to say it to your face…” Hannity immediately invited him to be interviewed on any of his shows and promised BHO he would say anything he had said before about him right to his face.

    Obama never showed up.

    Palin showed she can’t think under pressure, she can only regurgitate “cram-session talking points” back to a tough reporter. There was nothing of her in that interview, only briefings that were running together.

    Here’s what Couric related the series of events, according to the source (bold mine):

    Couric shed some light on her preparation for the interviews: Beforehand, she sought advice from former senator Sam Nunn and Council on Foreign Relations president Richard Haas[s]. They told her to draw Palin out on her geopolitical worldview and urged her to let the governor speak at length without interrupting her…

    Think about what you wrote about Palin’s perceived lack of preparedness, P-JACK, and flip it around. Katie Couric is the face of CBS News. She is the franchise player. She’s the superstar. She walks in the footsteps of Edward R. Murrow, Walter Cronkite, and Dan Rather (for those of you who respect him). She’s supposed to be worthy of the throne that is the CBS Evening News anchor chair above all others, male, female, tenured, neophyte.

    In light of those facts, WHY WOULD SHE NEED ADVICE FROM ANYONE in interviewing Palin? Seems that COURIC was the one in need of the “cram-session talking points” just as much as you allege Palin was! And why select among those to seek advice from someone who didn’t want her to be Vice President?

    Thank goodness “The Memory Hole” has a permanent clog in it — the Internet in general, and YouTube in particular. The MSM is going to try to pretend they weren’t in the tank for Baracko Marx. I am dedicated to making sure they don’t get away with it.

    L.N. Smithee (a0b21b)

  21. I was in NY at dinner with some friends and aquaintances a few months back. I go to great lengths not to discuss politics in social settings (esp where alcohol are being served) but the conversation naturally turned that way with the VP debate going on over our shoulders.

    I was really stunned by a comment from one of the members of the table. A bit of paraphrasing but “My friend works for CBS news and he is really smart. For the Palin interview, they brought him into a meeting to help come up with questions that would catch her out and make her look like an idiot and they did it. She looked so dumb and he was really pleased.”

    You can dismiss the story as a complete fabrication by the person who made the comment at dinner or a bit of self promotion from the person who worked at CBS but in the end, its more cirumstantial evidence that there is a serious problem in “main-stream” journalism.

    Tim (3515d0)

  22. I’m an editor and all my good reporters get as much info from any and all sources as they can before an interview. Talking to Sam Nunn before interviewing Palin is Journalism 101. I’d be stunned if Couric didn’t talk to numerous sources on both sides.

    terrence (8fd35a)

  23. Comment by terrence — 11/13/2008 @ 4:34 pm

    Except, she didn’t mention going to anyone else for prep help, did she?
    No mention of someone from the GOP side of the political spectrum, only Democrats!
    Fair & Balanced?

    Another Drew (51839f)

  24. Another Drew wrote:

    Except, she didn’t mention going to anyone else for prep help, did she?
    No mention of someone from the GOP side of the political spectrum, only Democrats!
    Fair & Balanced?

    To be fairer to Couric than she is to Republicans — Richard Haass, the CFR President who is the other person mentioned as having given her pre-interview prep, has only given campaign contributions to Republicans since 1995 (although he has not personally given a dime to either party since 2000, when he gave $500 to the Bush Campaign the day AFTER Bush’s apparent victory).

    OTOH, his status as a supporter of Republicans does NOT address whether or not Haass supported McCain-Palin. In the case of Nunn, we all knew where he stood.

    Terrence wrote: I’m an editor and all my good reporters get as much info from any and all sources as they can before an interview. Talking to Sam Nunn before interviewing Palin is Journalism 101. I’d be stunned if Couric didn’t talk to numerous sources on both sides.

    The only ones Couric cited as a source of questions in the first part of the interviews were emailers. If this is SOP, why be so reluctant to admit it?

    L.N. Smithee (b048eb)


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