EMail to MSNBC and Norah O'Donnell

Regarding this travesty of reporting. (Contact info here.)

Dear MSNBC

What an appalling performance by Norah O'Donnell with Sen. Leahy. Is the job of your Chief Washington Correspondent to parrot the White House's press secretary? O'Donnell said, and I quote: "Tony Snow said today that 'you guys want the truth, and in this interview you're going to get the truth from Karl Rove.' What's wrong with that?"

That is shocking. As a viewer I can only take from this that O'Donnell agrees with Tony Snow. While that's obviously her right as a person, as a reporter isn't it her job to give viewers unbiased information? I can picture her saying, "Tony Snow said today that 'you guys want the truth, and in this interview you're going to get the truth from Karl Rove.' How do you respond to that?" Then we get the White House's side and Leahy's side. That's fair reporting. For O'Donnell to inject herself into the story - I don't know what to say. It's just shocking. Aside from all the reasons that many of us viewers might not believe that we're "going to get the truth from Karl Rove" under the White House's proposal - it's just awful reporting.

A short time later O'Donnell said: "...and Tony Snow said today 'I thought this was a fact-finding mission, not a ratings-finding mission' - that you're trying to create a courtroom atmosphere."

That's just unbelievable. Again, aside from parroting - in a tone and in the wording of agreement - the WH press secretary, which you have to admit is just flatly wrong for a reporter to do, O'Donnell here does worse. A reporter could and should with Snow's statement point out the glaringly obvious without a bit of bias: that a "courtroom atmosphere" is, when you think about it for about a millisecond, a pretty darn good place for a "fact-finding mission." What exactly about speaking under oath goes against finding facts? Doesn't it actually improve the chances that you're going to get the truth? It of course does.

Again: appalling. Terrible, and appaling. [Note to self: That's "appalling," dumbass]

Video of the clip here.