Watching MSNBC’s coverage of the Democratic Convention, one thing is clear — there is way too much down time for the talking heads, who insist on talking and talking and saying nothing. Ugh.
Tag: media
MSNBC gives Rachel her due
Rachel Maddow, who has done a tremendous job both as a guest and guest-host on Keith Countdown with Keith Olbermann, will now follow him on the cable channel with her own show. Great move by MSNBC.
Curve balls
Josh Marshall makes an interesting point about press coverage of John McCain that, I think, could have implications down the road in this race. The press, he says, has been judging him on a “curve”:
On the campaign trail this cycle, McCain frequently forgets key elements of policies, gets countries’ names wrong, forgets things he’s said only hours or days before and is frequently just confused. Any single example is inevitable for someone talking so constantly day in and day out. But the profusion of examples shows a pattern. Some of this is probably a matter of general unseriousness or lack of interest in policy areas like the economy that he doesn’t care much about. But for any other politician who didn’t have the benefit of years of friendship or acquaintance with many of the reporters covering him, this would be a major topic of debate in the campaign. It’s whispered about among reporters. And it’s evidenced in his campaign’s increasing effort to keep him away from the freewheeling conversations with reporters that defined his 2000 candidacy. But it’s verboten as a topic of public discussion.
The other point that again goes almost totally undiscussed is McCain’s two reinventions of himself over the last decade. From a mainline conservative Republican to progressive reform candidate to Bush Republican. The reporters who have been covering him for the last decade know that there is virtually no public policy issue of note which McCain hasn’t made a 180 degree change of position on in the last half dozen years. An ideological shift of that magnitude is far from unprecedented. And such turnabouts or transformations can be a product of searching insights into the changing terrain of American governance. But two such shifts in the course of a decade strongly suggest either instability or opportunism.
Were the press to focus its attention on this with the same energy and resources as its commitment to uncovering the Al Gore “Love Story” lie or John Kerry’s elitism, as evidenced by his windsurfing, then the gap between Barack Obama and McCain would only grow.
Thoughts on Russert
There are a lot of things you can say about Tim Russert as anchor of Meet the Press, both good and bad. He was the consummate Washington insider, a conventional-wisdom sort, but he was never intentionally mean, never shouted, never descended into the kind of nonsense that we have become used to from O’Reilly, Hannity and their ilk.
Russert died today, a shock to everyone who follows politics.
McMahon as the poster boy for housing crisis? Get real
I was watching Good Morning America today when a story on Ed McMahon’s mortgage woes came on. The longtime TV sidekick
is in danger of losing his multimillion-dollar Beverly Hills home to foreclosure. Documents show that McMahon is nearly $644,000 behind in payments on a $4.8 million mortgage loan he got in 2005. Countrywide Home Loans Inc. filed the notice of default on Feb. 28, with the amount owed to “increase until your account becomes current,” according to documents obtained by Celebtv.com.
As of Wednesday afternoon, McMahon’s Mediterranean-styled house was still in the process of foreclosure; the bank hasn’t taken it over yet and no trustee sale date has been set. McMahon and his wife, Pamela, are having “very fruitful discussions” with the lender to resolve the problem, spokesman Howard Bragman said Wednesday.
It’s not a story I normally pay attention to, but the lead-in tease from Diane Sawyer caught my ear:
Further proof of the far reach of the economic downturn — the housing crisis in the tony neighborhood of Beverly Hills? Where a banks is now threatening to foreclose on the mansion of TV veteran Ed McMahon.
A real estate expert quoted by the Associated Press attempts to make the same point:
The former “Star Search” host has found himself in the same situation so many homeowners have recently, said Daren Blomquist, spokesman for RealtyTrac, which follows foreclosure filings. He found that McMahon has taken out several loans on the house over the past few years, including a $300,000 home equity line of credit the same day he took out the $4.8 million loan in November 2005.
“You’re using your house as a piggy bank because there’s so much equity — at least back in 2005 — so you’re able to take money out of it and use that for just spending in any way you see fit,” Blomquist said. “But the problem with that in the long term is that with the housing in this market, you don’t see it continue to go up in property value. Now, you see it going down in many areas … and you still have to pay your mortgage payments. You don’t have the option to take more cash out of the house.”
It certainly is a sad story, but it’s not exactly the same thing as a family in Jamesburg losing a $200,000 Cape Cod because the were conned by some bank into borrowing more than could afford on an adjustable-rate mortgage. McMahon is not likely to end up on the street — in fact, he’s planning to live there as long as he can and is in the process of negotiating a settlement, something that most of those hit by the sub-prime crisis have been unable to do.
Hank Kalet 