Tuesday, July 15, 2008

Chris Wallace: 'MSNBC's coverage went so far over the line'

According to Variety, Chris Wallace, anchor of "Fox News Sunday," differentiated
Fox News' coverage of the '08 election and MSNBC's while speaking to reporters
at the Television Critics Association press tour:

"I think MSNBC's coverage went so far over the line that it lost all
credibility," Wallace told reporters Monday at the Television Critics
Assn. press tour.

Wallace accused MSNBC anchor Keith Olbermann of inappropriately
mixing anchor and opinion-making duties, and said Fox News drew
a distinction between its reporters and opinion-minded hosts.

"There's a reason why Bill O'Reilly and Sean Hannity won't be
anchoring the election night or the conventions," he said during the
sesh at the BevHilton hotel.

That is one reason that I've never bought the argument that O'Reilly and
Hannity are the equivalent to Keith Olbermann and Chris Matthews. Fox
News is not mingling opinion with their political event coverage. The network
does have political commentators on election nights, for example Karl Rove,
but they properly label them as "Republican strategist" or "Democratic
strategist." However, don't expect MSNBC to learn their lesson any time
soon. The network announced earlier this month that Olbermann and
Matthews will be the 'ringmasters' of their coverage of the conventions this
summer.