By The Prowler on 9.26.08 @ 12:08AM
So she's not a governor if Katie refuses to call her that?
CBS New anchor Katie Couric ordered staff to
drop all references to "Governor" or "Gov." from her interview with
Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin. When a staff member
pointed out that in other venues, Couric and CBS News had referred
to Governor Palin's opponent, Joe Biden, using his
title of "Senator" or the abbreviation, Couric, according to a CBS
News editorial aide, sought approval from CBS News management to
drop the "Governor" reference during her broadcast interview with
Palin that began on Wednesday night.
"It's not true," said another CBS News source. "We treat
everyone the same."
But, in fact, that's not the case: as late as September 22, CBS
News and Couric -- even on the CBS website -- used Biden's
honorific. Here is an excerpt from the transcript of a Couric
interview with "Sen." Biden:
Katie Couric: How is it preparing for the debates?
Sen. Joe Biden: Well, it's kind of hard to
prepare because I don't know what she thinks. There's been no -- I
don't know a lot about her, so I have to assume for purposes of the
debate that she agrees with John on everything.
Now compare that the transcript of the "Palin" interview:
Couric: Why do you say that? Why are they waiting for
John McCain and not Barack Obama?
Palin: He's got the track record of the
leadership qualities and the pragmatism that's needed at a crisis
time like this.
In fact, at no point during the broadcast interview does Couric
refer to the GOP vice presidential nominee as "Governor."
Couric is not the only member of the broadcast news corps who
has sought to diminish Palin's professional position, though she
may be the most high profile. Producers and editorial staff at both
NBC and ABC report that fellow staffers have openly ridiculed
Palin, her professional and personal background and her family
during production meetings, in the editing bays during video
editing for nightly news stories, and while covering Palin at
political events.
Ultimately the higher ups at CBS News agreed, saying that
wherever possible, the reference to "Governor" should be struck
from graphics, scripts and published transcripts. In fact, based on
perusal of the CBS website, between video and print, there is only
one reference to Palin as Governor, and that is buried in a subhead
on the splash page of the interview transcript.
-----
Prowler Update (9/26/08; 9:49 a.m.): Check out
"Paulson and
Obama" at AmSpecBlog.
topics:
John McCain, Barack Obama, Joe Biden, Sarah Palin, NATO, Alaska
