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KURTZ: And a great Secret Service story for two or three days. And for two weeks it was all about them and their sort of checkered history. |
PRESS: But I'll tell you -- but here's another problem, is you had the White House cover-up. They wouldn't send Desiree Rogers up to testify. And they were saying case closed. The Secret Service is going to fall on their sword. As always, I think the cover-up kept the story alive. STIREWALT: Well, and you also have at ... |
KURTZ: A celebrity president in the sense that he goes on Leno, that he goes on ESPN and talks about college hoops. |
STIREWALT: Instead of just being a political figure, he's a transcendent celebrity figure who is friends with Oprah and who is part of a celebrity society in America. |
KURTZ: OK. So he's famous. I mean, all presidents are famous. He's really famous. |
KURTZ: What about Richard Heene, the balloon boy's father, or Octomom? I mean, the media just seems magnetically drawn to these freak shows. |
STIREWALT: Where are the child abuse charges? This is the one thing I still can't figure out, is, seriously, with the octoparents, with the balloon guy. |
KURTZ: They threw up on two morning shows, "Good Morning America" and "Today." |
ASHBURN: Two morning shows. |
STIREWALT: Yes, this is child endangerment, that people are subjecting their kids to this. And I wonder where the prosecutions really are. |
PRESS: These are cases of our covering stories that really are not worth the time of day, as far as I'm concerned. Maybe a quick mention and then move on. ASHBURN: OK. Come on. My 6-year- old daughter said, "Mom, did you know there was somebody who had eight babies?" I mean, Octomom became just something that swept thr... |
PRESS: Because we did it. I'm sorry. |
ASHBURN: Bill, how can you say that a woman who has eight babies is not worthy of coverage? That's my point. |
YELLIN: I also think more than at any other time, it's not media minds who drive what we cover. It's what people are following on Twitter, what they're Googling, what they're looking for on the Internet that creates some sort of feedback loop that... |
KURTZ: I actually think that's a good thing, that we are no longer the sole gatekeepers and people can file online on their Facebook -- but it now seems that we have totally abdicated our leadership and we just follow whatever's hot. |
ASHBURN: Well, there's no context either. I mean, just what you were saying, is that it's part of this society, a bubble within a bubble. Nobody is putting these things in context. And then all of a sudden, the story is done and, boom, it drops off this ledge and you don't hear from them again. |
KURTZ: And something else comes along, the next hurricane. |
But don't we -- this maybe goes to your point about filling up all the hours. Don't we try to dress up these stories as having some kind of cultural significance? In other words, it's not about the fact that she had eight babies and she's got 14 kids. It's that this is really about the taxpayers having to foot the bill... |
PRESS: Of course we do, to justify covering it. |
YELLIN: Is that what we're doing right now? I mean, come on. This is an excuse to talk about Octomom. |
PRESS: But it's crazy, to me, Octomom. And also the balloon boy. |
I mean, I thought it was pretty clear from the beginning that this couple was totally phony. And it took like two days to say that, to finally get around to it. |
ASHBURN: No. But in the very beginning, I was sitting at my computer and my friends and other journalists and everybody were saying, "Did you see this? Did you see this? Did you see this?" It came at me from six different sides of my life, and... |
KURTZ: It was a very dramatic moment at the time, when we didn't know whether a child was in danger. I had no problem with that point. |
PRESS: For a while, right. |
YELLIN: It's the follow-up coverage, right. |
PRESS: Once we knew the kid was not there, boom. |
STIREWALT: And then it's complicated. Then it has to be something complicated and nuanced and, what's this all about, as opposed to saying, OK, this happened, these people are prostituting their family for celebrity. And boom, we're done, we're moving on. |
PRESS: I'm here to say right now this is not going to change. I mean, I'm telling you. |
KURTZ: I was going to say, so it seems like what we've lost here is our ability to move on. |
ASHBURN: OK. Let's talk about health care. |
PRESS: And to make distinctions. |
KURTZ: We're out of time. |
KURTZ: We'll have to leave it there. Jeez -- sorry about that. |
Jessica Yellin, Lauren Ashburn, Bill Press, Christ Stirewalt, thanks very much for joining me. |
PRESS: There you go. We tried. |
KURTZ: Out of time. |
Well, up next, a reliably good year. Some of the biggest names in journalism paid a visit to this program in 2009. We'll take a look back in a moment. |
KURTZ: We have relished the opportunity over this past year to sit down with some of the leading journalists and most provocative commentators around. So this seems like a good time to look back at these RELIABLE SOURCES moments. |
Some of my favorite interviews took place when network stars got to reveal a bit more of themselves. |
Here is CBS' Byron Pitts talking about how he grew up unable to read and about the father who abandoned the family. |
BYRON PITTS, CBS NEWS: I often think, there but for the grace of God go I, because I was also angry when I felt abandoned by my father. We've reconciled to some degree in recent years as we speak now as men. |
KURTZ: But now you're a successful network star. And now, when he met you, at least for the first time in a long time, he wanted something from you, didn't he? |
PITTS: Sure. |
KURTZ: What did he want? |
PITTS: Oh, he wanted money. |
KURTZ: And what did you say to him? PITTS: I said no. In fact, I used some choice words that I won't use on television. But it was my way to sort of pay him back for I thought ignoring me all these years. |
Now, one of the things I learned -- learning in my own life and a point I make in the book is there's real power in forgiveness. That as long as I was angry with my father, it actually did me more disservice because he went on with his life. |
KURTZ: Right. |
PITTS: But when I told him I forgave him, that not only, some may say, let him off the hook, but it freed me. KURTZ (voice- over): It was a touching moment when ABC's Robin Roberts, a breast cancer survivor, talked about why she was especially happy to go to L.A. for the Oscars. |
ROBIN ROBERTS, "GOOD MORNING AMERICA": And this is part of the reason why I also accepted this. Because this time last year, completely bald, just finished chemotherapy. I was home on my couch. I couldn't be here, at the Oscars. I couldn't be anywhere, I couldn't travel. |
So, I like the fact that folks know that, they see me here this year. If they're going through something similar, they know this, too, shall pass. And that will hopefully make them feel like whatever they're going through, that they can indeed get through it. |
So, it's not something that I have wanted to do, be so open in public about it. But I am -- it's gratifying knowing that it's helping so many people. So that makes it more than worth it, Howie. More than worth it. |
KURTZ: Lara Logan, back from Afghanistan, accused the U.S. military of lying about the war and talked about her decision to go back months after giving birth. |
(on camera): If we were lied to, why didn't the American media make more of that? |
LARA LOGAN, CBS NEWS CORRESPONDENT: Well, I mean, I know a lot of journalists who tried. I mean, it's very hard to prove a lie. |
When commanders are telling you we have enough troops, you know they don't have enough troops, but no one will tell you that on camera or on the record. How do you prove that that's a lie? When commanders are telling you it's not that the Taliban's stronger, it's that we're more successful, all you can do is to try and... |
KURTZ: You have an 8-month-old baby. I just saw him. He looks very cute. |
Did you hesitate to go back into a war zone? |
LOGAN: I didn't hesitate. But it is very hard. It is. I mean, everything has changed and I think about not coming home. I think about that child growing up without a mother. And that's definitely the hardest thing I've ever done. |
KURTZ (voice-over): We've had our share of lighter moments, such as when I took the program to Los Angeles and chatted with Mariel Hemingway outside her home in the mountains about her addiction to Twitter. |
(on camera): You are very candid on Twitter and also on your blog. I mean, you have written about difficulties growing up, your sister Margo's suicide, your divorce. MARIEL HEMINGWAY, ACTRESS: Yes. |
HEMINGWAY: You know what I do? Is because, actually, I believe there's not a problem that anybody hasn't had. |
I mean, I believe that we all have the same problems. They just have different wrapping paper. |
So, for me, it's saying, you know what? I know I'm in the public eye. Guess what? This is what I come from. This is what I deal with. |
KURTZ (voice-over): And who better to ask about the changing world of gossip than Liz Smith, who, at the age of 86, has just been dumped by "The New York Post"? |
(on camera): The paper was paying you $125,000 a year. Rupert Murdoch apparently signed off on this. It wasn't his idea. |
Does this mean you were no longer in the "in" crowd as far as "The New York Post" was concerned? |
LIZ SMITH, GOSSIP COLUMNIST: I don't think I was ever in the "in" crowd as far as their editor was concerned. I really wasn't his cup of tea, Howard. |
I was too, you know, maybe laid back. He thought I was too friendly with my sources and I just wasn't -- I didn't have that killer instinct that they love on "The New York Post." |
Also, I love New York, and I care about New York. And I don't think these Australians understand or love New York. |
KURTZ: Now, I've heard that before about you, about, well, Liz Smith, she's just too nice to the people she writes about. Has gossip become meaner these days and maybe you're a little out of step with the new culture? |
SMITH: It's become more obvious. I mean, more vulgar. |
You can say more things. You know, you can say things you weren't able to say. I remember back when "The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas" was a big hit. I wasn't allowed to say that on the air. I had to say "Whohouse," and that was only about 10 years ago. |
KURTZ: I don't think we'll bleep that. |
(voice-over): It was a treat for me to sit down with David Frost about his famous series of interviews with the 37th president, what would now be branded checkbook journalism. |
(on camera): A lot of people wanted to interview Nixon. You got the interview. You paid the former president $600,000. That would be more than $2 million today. |
I think if you did that today, if the circumstances were today, you'd be criticized far more intensively than you were at the time. |
SIR DAVID FROST, JOURNALIST: I don't think so, because there's a curious point from what I can remember. In terms of the Nixon interviews, I mean, NBC News were offering $400,000 or whatever. And questions about checkbook journalism happened during the 18 months between when we signed and when we didn't, and I would an... |
But they really sort of came to an end when the first interview went out and everybody said this is history. |
KURTZ: You mean, that you were not rolling over for Nixon? |
FROST: Yes, exactly. And this is history and this is valuable. And so that controversy sorted of faded away. |
KURTZ (voice-over): Fox's Bernard Goldberg and I went at it over his book accusing the media of conducting a slobbering love affair with Barack Obama. |
(on camera): All right. There are generalizations in this book. Here's one: "Mainstream media writers hate O'Reilly and think MSNBC is just wonderful." |
Well, I'm a mainstream media writer. I don't hate Bill O'Reilly. In fact, I was on his radio show last week. And I've repeatedly taken on MSNBC for lurching to the left. |
BERNARD GOLDBERG, AUTHOR, "A SLOBBERING LOVE AFFAIR": Right. Obviously, I don't mean every single reporter. And I don't even mean every single reporter was in the tank for Barack Obama. I'm making a statement about the mainstream media as a whole. |
KURTZ: But if you, as a critic, are upset about, for example, MSNBC's pro-Obama bias, Chris Matthews "thrill up the leg" and all of that, what about all the softball interviews that Sean Hannity did with John McCain and Sarah Palin? In other words, are you applying the same standards to somebody where you also a contri... |
GOLDBERG: By the way, the fact that I'm a contributor, if you know anything about me, Howie, I'll blast Fox News in a second if I think they deserve it. I don't care. |
KURTZ: Here's your opportunity. |
GOLDBERG: Well, no, this is not a good opportunity because I don't agree with the premise of the question. |
KURTZ: All right. |
(voice-over): My biggest news-making interview of the year was with Anita Dunn, then the White House communications director. That video went viral when she unloaded on Rupert Murdoch's cable network. |
ANITA DUNN, FMR. WHITE HOUSE COMMUNICATION DIRECTOR: I mean, the reality of it is that Fox News operates almost as either the research arm or the communications arm of the Republican Party. What I think is fair to say about Fox, and certainly the way we view it, is that it really is more a wing of the Republican Party. |
KURTZ: Is that the reason that the president did not go on Fox News Sunday, a few weeks back, when he did all the other Sunday shows? And will President Obama appear on Fox News again, let's say, this year? |
DUNN: Well, you know, Howie, President Obama appeared on -- he did "The Factor," he did O'Reilly... |
KURTZ: Yes. That was very interesting entertainment (ph). |
DUNN: ... in the campaign last year, as president earlier this year when he met with news anchors, met Chris Wallace. |
KURTZ: OK. But my question is, ,will he appear on Fox in the next couple of months? |
DUNN: No, you had a two-part question. The first was, is this why he did not appear? And the answer is yes. |
Obviously, he'll go on Fox because he engages with ideological opponents, and he has done that before. He will do it again. |
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