"The Five" on Fox News Channel didn't cover more than a few seconds of President Obama's petulant Rose Garden attack on conservatives making Wednesday "a shameful day for Washington." The other networks, which define "news" as anything their Heroic President chooses to utter, including his March Madness picks, were shocked and appalled.
In Thursday's New York Times, Phil Griffin, the president of MSNBC, noted that ABC, CBS and NBC had broadcast special reports because they deemed the president’s remarks important. Griffin denounced Fox’s decision to skip it as “a disgrace.” At TV Newser, Fox broke out its smackdown machine:
Fox News, which rarely lets a competitive swipe get by, responds, "Phil's network of partisan pundits have to rely on the talents of Brian Williams and NBC News to cover basic news events. So him calling anything a disgrace in regards to news coverage is ironic considering he oversees one daily."
"The Five" host Greg Gutfeld seemed to protest the brevity of their White House snippet. At the end of the program, Gutfeld apologized: “I want to apologize for cutting out of the Obama presser. I think it should have been handled better.”
Fox executive Michael Clemente explained "Yesterday’s decision not carry the president’s statement live was made when we received the following from the White House press office: ‘The president delivers a statement on common sense measures to reduce gun violence.’ We’ve carried and reported on numerous presidential speeches and ideas for reducing gun violence, as well as those from influentials on the other side of the issue.”
It could be added that Fox News played a substantial amount of Thursday's interfaith memorial event in Boston, including the president's remarks. When President Bush was in charge, the broadcast networks certainly denied him the chance to break in for live speeches. People like Griffin should know instinctively that they didn't grant Bush large chunks of MSNBC air time at the risk of "disgracefully" covering something else.
