Only ABC Hits Obama on Lack of Substantial Cuts in New Budget, NBC, CBS Downplay per MRC

We are not surprised that Jack Tapper, ABC's White House reporter, went after the Obama budget for Obama not taking an aggressive lead on cutting the budget.  We would have been shocked if he had not reported the facts.  Tapper is probably one of the best reporters in the White House Press Corps for telling it like it is and letting the chips fall wherever. He has never been a kneepadder for anyone which we find refreshing and wish we could say the same for all members of the White House Press Corps.

Why is it that women reporters more than men have a hard time telling the truth about this President? Even George Stephanopoulos on Good Morning America challenged Obama's Budget Director Jacob Lew. He wouldn't let him off the hook as he continued to press for answers. We never thought we would said it but Stephanopoulos has gotten much better over the years and doesn't shrink from going after someone to get the truth.

We thank the MRC for covering television for the rest of us. Their reports are always non-biased and right down the center when discussing what is happening around the television channels from the alphabet network news to cable news networks to the history channel and more. It is a service that is greatly appreciated because watching the nightly news could be pretty depressing especially as you watch the spin on CBS and NBC.  Note:  We have promised to also start checking out Media Matters to see what they have to say which should be interesting.

We sure hope the merger of NBC and Comcast provides a better news product then they have today at NBC and especially MSNBC. It would be great to see competition for Fox News and CNN, but as it stands, MSNBC is so far left that it would have to almost start over. CNN could gain shares of the audience if they would lose some of their long time people and bring in more people who are unbiased reporters that report the facts not the spin. CNN has improved over the last year but have a long way to go. They are #1 for breaking news but after that Blitzer's personal agenda creeps in like on Egypt. CBS is a joke -- gave up on them a long time ago.

Fox's Meghan Kelly and Brett Baier who replaced Brit Hume are right up there with Jake Tapper from ABC in reporting news not spin. After watching Brett Baier, it goes downhill rapidly with Shepherd Smith for his second program of the day. The 'sky is falling' Beck comes on right before Brett Baier. At least Brett Baier has always been a very calm reporter and after Beck that is needed on Fox. Does Fox News think having a screaming person seeing conspiracies everywhere is going to get them viewers? It certainly doesn't get them advertisers many who have canceled on Beck.

Beck has gotten worse not better in his conspiracy theories as news since joining Fox. Thought he was much better on CNN.  When you learn that Beck while at CNN said the American healthcare was horrible and then goes to Fox News and it becomes the best in the world, you start to wonder about his reporting. How did it change because he went from CNN to Fox?

Once again ABC has gone to the forefront with their unbiased coverage of the White House on the President's budget.

There is a major problem when it comes to news when you can actually pick out a few people who report the news not spin. It should be every last reporter that upholds the ethics they were taught when they went into Journalism. How some of these people pass for a journalist is beyond me. If they don't know what is expected of them as a reporter, then they had better reread ethics courses that are taught in journalism colleges or follow the Society of Professional Journalists Code of Ethics to right the ship of the journalism profession. Some of these so-called journalist are an insult to people's intelligence.

If a person cannot keep out their bias when reporting, then they need to find a new line of work. The American people deserve better!

Only ABC Hits Obama on Lack of Substantial Cuts in New Budget, NBC, CBS Downplay
February 14, 2011

Of the three morning shows on Monday, only ABC's Good Morning America aggressively pushed the Obama administration on a lack of substantial cuts in the 2012 budget. NBC's Today and CBS's Early Show either downplayed the issue or didn't fully explain the President's new spending.

ABC's Jake Tapper declared that Obama's plan "shows that the President will not take the lead in any aggressive measures to reduce the debt." He also pointed out, "President Obama's budget projects at least $1 trillion in deficit reduction over ten years, but it still creates $7.2 trillion in new debt, pitting the President on a collision course with Republicans who are already saying this budget does not take the deficit seriously enough and deeper cuts are needed."

NBC's Chuck Todd ignored the new spending in the budget and instead asserted that the White House is "join[ing] the battle" with its new plan. Todd blandly repeated Obama's talking points on the cuts.

GMA co-host George Stephanopoulos actually challenged Barack Obama's budget director, Jacob Lew, wondering, "As you know, many Republicans are saying, already, that it doesn't go nearly far enough. And they countered with a budget that actually cuts, according to them, more than $60 billion this year out of federal programs. Why can't the President go that far?"

On the Early Show, reporter Bill Plante didn't highlight the new spending. Instead, he simply noted that Republicans believe the cuts aren't enough.

Finally, at the close of his report, he allowed, "But overall, all of these cuts, which Democrats and Republicans will argue over, affect only one tenth of the budget. And the only way, as the President's budget reduction commission said, to get complete, total spending cuts, is to go in to the spending in the entitlement programs like Social Security and Medicare. Not on the table."

A transcript of George Stephanopoulos' interview, which aired at 7:10am EST on April (Feb) 14 can be found at MRC