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Is PBS Newshour Anti-Conservative?

Fox’s “Hannity and Colmes” show on May 21 featured Melanie Morgan, chair of Move America Forward, an organization that supports the Bush administration’s war policy in Iraq.

HANNITY: And welcome back to “Hannity & Colmes”. I’m Sean Hannity.

In an action that reeks of censorship, PBS’ signature broadcast, “The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer”, has effectively banned conservative radio host Melanie Morgan from any future appearances.

Now, citing Morgan’s on-screen demeanor, the executive producer of the left-leaning news forum released the following statement. It said, “The NewsHour style is to ask pointed questions politely; we expect our guests to subscribe to the same rules. Since the program is produced live, we can’t do much to eliminate rude guests from your television screen once the segment has begun. What we can do is guarantee you will never see that person on our program again.”

Joining us now, radio talk show host, KSFO, San Francisco, Melanie Morgan.

First of all, Melanie, I would say this is a badge of honor for you on the one hand. But on the other hand, they are only silencing you. And there was an interruptive liberal guest on the program. Why were you — why were you separated in that way?

MELANIE MORGAN, RADIO TALK SHOW HOST: First of all let me just say that I thought it was a joke when I heard about this. I had been out of town visiting relatives in Kansas City, Missouri, which is my home town.

When I heard about it from my relatives and said, “That can’t be true.” And then I went to the blogosphere. And ohm my goodness, there was such a riot over some of the filthiest language I’ve ever seen in delight.

Let me tell you this. Linda Winslow, who’s the executive producer of “The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer” is either badly misinformed or outright lying. Because these are the facts.

I was accused of being rude and interruptive. The guest who was on opposite me, who was with Votevets.org, one of the funded organizations by George Soros actually interrupted me for the very first time.

I did a word count on this. We were interrupting four — we were interrupted four times equal on each side. And he was given 55 percent of the air time or 56 percent of the air time to my 44 percent.

You can watch the segment or read the transcript here. You can read listener responses to the PBS Ombudsman here.

Like Hannity, I too read the transcript, and found both had their irritating moments, with Solz repeating “We are the troops,” and basically called the president a coward for not serving in Vietnam, and Morgan throwing out that chest-thumping cliche that people who don’t support Bush’s war efforts are anti-American. She also depicts Solz’s organization as purely political, as just a creature of big liberal money (Soros) and presents herself as the true populist vote. I’m sure both have big and small backers.

I did a word count, too, and Solz did get 1,040 words in compared to Morgan’s 811.

I also watched the segment. Both interrupt each other and Woodruff. Both are clearly passionate about their positions, and angry with each other. I learned about their organizations’ ideologies; I didn’t learn much about the range of grassroots politicking that’s going on in response to the war in Iraq (the ostensible topic of this news segment).

Though this won’t make much of a difference to folks who already think poorly of PBS, there wasn’t a PBS ban on Morgan. The Newshour producer implies in a response to complaints that Morgan won’t be invited again: “Since the program is produced live, we can’t do much to eliminate rude guests from your television screen once the segment has begun; what we can do is guarantee you will never see that person on our program again.” We’ll have to see.

My answer to the this posting’s question is no. I think it’s possible to be liberal without being anti-conservative, and I believe this is really about the Newshour style. My guess is that the Newshour does not want to do segments that sound like Fox’s Hannity and Colmes or the thankfully dead Crossfire on CNN–shows that set up debates that are either false, or are destined to go nowhere.

Written by Ayschlay

8 Responses to “Is PBS Newshour Anti-Conservative?”

  1. ~J~ Says:

    June 22nd, 2007 at 6:17 am
    Visit ~J~

    I watched the segment and I agree with the following response to the ombudsman:

    The May 8 “debate” between Jon Soltz of VoteVets.org and Melanie Morgan of Move America Forward was one of the worst such segments I’ve seen on NewsHour in awhile. I turn to NewsHour to escape the shouting heads pervasive on the 24-hour news networks. Between Soltz’s offensive insistence that he represents “the troops” (when in fact, many of the troops vehemently disagree with his views), and Morgan’s insistence that the Democrats don’t want victory (merely because they want to fund it only six months at a time), and their nasty and disrespectful attitudes toward each other and the viewers, I was sickened by the whole display. If I wanted red herrings, straw men, ad hominems, and other such nonsense I wouldn’t be watching NewsHour.

    Chris Nandor, Arlington, WA

    Both of them interrupted the other and they were both obnoxious. What I don’t understand is the comment by the producer:

    Last night the NewsHour attempted to help our viewers understand why the members of Congress are having so much difficulty arriving at a decision regarding the way forward in Iraq. We believe the intensity of the pressure being exerted on Democrats and Republicans by the “wings” of their respective parties is having an impact on those who are looking for some sort of compromise position. We decided to let representatives of those wings explain their positions, hoping they would participate in a dialogue with us and each other. As our guests demonstrated, however, that was a forlorn hope and the result was a lot of heat, but very little light.

    Since neither guest was in the studio with Judy Woodruff, there wasn’t much she could do to prevent them from interrupting one another, short of saying — as she did at least three times — “please let him/her finish his/her point”. The NewsHour style is to ask pointed questions politely; we expect our guests to subscribe to the same rules. Since the program is produced live, we can’t do much to eliminate rude guests from your television screen once the segment has begun; what we can do is guarantee you will never see that person on our program again.

    Linda Winslow
    Executive Producer
    The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer

    Does this mean both will not be allowed back due to their lack of manners or just one; the one who didn’t get all the face time?

    They should have interviewed one and then the other for rebuttal and a final word from the first one with the microphones turned off while the other was speaking.

  2. david Says:

    June 22nd, 2007 at 7:21 am
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    As a general response–not limited to this program–I totally avoid talk radio and seldom watch any news analysis programs because of the rudeness of the hosts and the guests. I think it goes back to my childhood–weren’t we all taught it was rude to interrupt another? I simply can’t stand listening to a program when the “winner” is the person who yells the loudest. I don’t care whether it’s liberal or conservative, I really don’t need a pundit to suggest my political viewpoint. As for talk radio–it’s rude, vulgar and useless. Unless I need a traffic report, I’ll put an Aretha cd in the player instead. I’m a happier American after listening to Aretha sing than the pundits talk. Talk radio rots your brain.

  3. ~J~ Says:

    June 22nd, 2007 at 8:39 am
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    David,
    I listen to gospel music and it soothes my soul.

  4. Big Mo Says:

    June 22nd, 2007 at 8:47 am
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    Ayschlay - may I ask a personal question? Are you still in college or recently graduatd? Because your analytical skills/critical reasoning skills are excellent.

    Great job breaking this down. You do a credit to this site, and, if your professional work is similar, to your work.

  5. solacegirl Says:

    June 22nd, 2007 at 2:02 pm
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    I’ve heard a couple of “progressive” talk shows that are criticizing shows like The News Hour for becoming too conservative. They also criticize PBS for no longer being run as a public station, but rather being over run by right-wing conservatives newly elected to the PBS board of directors. Any thoughts?

  6. Ayschlay Says:

    June 22nd, 2007 at 6:41 pm
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    Big Mo,

    I appreciate the comment. I’m a grandfather (yeesh, still not used to that). For now I’ll just say that I teach, research, and write for a living.

  7. Ayschlay Says:

    June 22nd, 2007 at 8:59 pm
    Visit Ayschlay

    When I lived in New York City, my companions thought me as, at best, a moderate. In the heartland, some have considered me a wild-eyed communist feminazi (and I am, as I rub my hands together in maniacal glee).

    Political labels are relative to the person assigning them. For some, PBS can’t be liberal enough, and others think its too liberal.

    One problem here is the liberal-conservative spectrum is too simple to capture our political complexions. The other is that since people have different definitions of liberal and conservative in their heads, we need to spend more time spelling out our definitions.

  8. Big Mo Says:

    June 22nd, 2007 at 9:48 pm
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    Ayschlay thanks! (And DOH! on my part. When you said the other day you used Lexus-Nexus, I assumed student and didn’t think to think anything else.)

    And I agree on the labels. The day after the 2006 elections, I told a MoveOn friend of mine that the best way to describe me was something like “a Bible-believing environmental Truman Democrat Reagan conservative.”