PBS NewsHour wins Walter Cronkite Award

[alp227]

This week the PBS Newshour was awarded the prestigious Walter Cronkite Award for political television coverage. Gwen Ifill accepted the award in Los Angeles as PBS’s cable news counterparts hosted “birther” conspiracy theorists and sent hundreds of reporters each to London to cover the royal wedding, many more than they sent to Japan to cover the natural and nuclear disasters last month and many more than they have stationed in the powder keg Middle East.

The Cronkite prize panel of judges selected the Newshour for its “thorough and balanced” coverage of key midterm electoral races. The judges praised PBS newspeople Ifill and Judy Woodruff for “focusing on the issues, talking with real voters and letting the candidates explain themselves.”

“At this point in my career, I’ve worked for newspapers, at a commercial network and now at Public Broadcasting, where like clockwork, we are accused by those on the right and those on the left of bias,” said Ifill. “Too many of these critics don’t actually watch or listen to what we do.” She added that PBS more than earns its pay, partly for seeding the news industry with a baseline of reliable material to work from.

Full story: http://washingtonindependent.com/108773/gop-targeted-pbs-earns-walter-cronkite-award

[librechik]

1. Congrats, they do a lot of good--and yet, in the coverage of Obama revealing his BC

Jim Lehrer and Dan Balz from the Post discussed the issue for 10 minutes with not a single utterance of the word or concept of racism. What, are they blind?

Oh, and over time, 75% of the faces they book are white, male and republican. They have a liberal voice on about twice a year, literally.

Your public television at work.

[elleng]

2. 75%? Really? You've studied this?

[librechik]

4. Yes, it was a FAIR five year study. n/t

Heres' one of the 6 month segments (they do ongoing studies of content on the NewsHour)
http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=2971

[alp227]

6. i think FAIR has done studies on the Newshour

for example in 2006 the study found most guests on NewsHour were of the corporate/Washington/academia elite and public interest advocates are generally neglected. Meanwhile, the NewsHour has a black woman reporter (Gwen Ifill) and Hispanic reporter (Ray Suarez). While yes I'll acknowledge the narrow range as a flaw I prefer the NewsHour over the infotainment evening news shows on the networks any day. Today I expect PBS to focus on relevant issues while the networks obsess over the royal wedding.

[robinlynne]

8. Actually jim Lehrer is SO obsessed with being impartial that he does not vote.

(which if ind absurd), but the point is, I'm sure he took every precaution to have an equal number of Dem's and repugs. unfortunately, in our country, half Dem's and half repugs not only does not reflect our nation , it does not reflect the two sides of national views.....

[librechik]

11. right--also, they think a center right opinion balances a Far right opinion

and as I said, they almost NEVER have a real liberal on. Sometimes Paul Krugman, but that's about all.

[librechik]

15. also, if he is so impartial, why no mention of the obvious racism in the BC issue?

Jim protects his DC friends. His friends in this case were the (WaPo and others) meida who kept the controversy going and allowed the birthers --and their own fascist editors--to give the story continuing life. He was covering up for them.

[elleng]

17. They don't editorialize, they report;

[librechik]

19. yes, they striaght-facedly report what a giant liar says and what a humble truth teller says

as if they were both equal points of view, and not a clue to the viewers about which is correct.

[elleng]

21. That's so the viewers, the electorate, can decide for themselves.

'Correct?' Thanks, but I'll decide that one.

[librechik]

23. thats the ideal--

but there is a racial memory of being told the truth by Cronkite, not "he said she said." And i for one will never stop missing Uncle Walter.

[librechik]

10. Yes, definitely. They are essential. But they need to do much better

also, they are the most influential outlet for the disgusting he said she said style of journalism which poisons our discourse. The NEVER take a stand on a fact which isn;'t countered by some other opinion.

[elleng]

18. 'Disgusting' REAL fair and balanced.

They don't 'take a stand' because they are not paid to do so; they report the news.

[elleng]

16. 2006, a while ago, eh?

They've got correspondents Kwame Holman and Hari Shreenavasin (SP?), Margaret Warner, Fred de sam Lazaro, and Marcia Coyle, among others, and guests range widely, as relevant.

[alp227]

20. Hari Sreenavasan, added as part of the NewsHour revamp

I've watched the show regularly since 2008 or 2009 and have seen even Randi Weingarten the leader of the American Federation of Teachers on the program in addition to a Libyan human rights activist who's also an academic.

[robinlynne]

3. and they took the show off the air this year.....

[librechik]

5. no, the show is still on PBS every night around six.

[robinlynne]

7. not here in los angeles. used to watch it every day. the replacement shows are interesting,

al jazeera, NHK news, and bbc news and french news.

[elleng]

9. That is sick! NOT alj etc, but taking it off air in L.A???

[alp227]

12. PBS still exists in LA, but on a different channel

it's KOCE 50 not KCET 28. Weeknights at 6. KQED in San Francisco even shows the NewsHour live at 3!

[robinlynne]

22. cool. thanks. i'll see if we get that channel.

[librechik]

13. right--I know why that happened, and it's not a pretty story

For many years the newshour had a partnership going with KCET, sharing studios and correspondents and crews. But a couple of years ago, the NewsHour just about died (financially). They had to let go all of the non-washington station correspondents, and consquently the partnership with KCET. They were not very gracefuyl the way they did it, either. KCET got pissed and dropped the NewsHour. Now they have no LA outlet.

[alp227]

14. actually KOCE shows all the PBS shows in LA including Newshour n/t

[elleng]

24. For the naysayers here, Mark Shields just said the birther stuff is/was racist.

He's paid for his opinion, and he gave it.