The Baumgarten Report

Sarah Palin is back in Alaska, telling anyone with a microphone who will listen that the John McCain campaign staffers who are leaking information about how she was a rock around the neck of the campaign “jerks.”

And she implored the very news media she attacked as being unfriendly toward her during the campaign to do its job and out those who are making the statements.

Two conflicting observations about all this.

First, she has a point. Anonymous sources are difficult to respond to, and should only be used sparingly and when all else fails. It’s not particularly fair to confront Palin with the accusations without giving her opportunity to confront the source. Perhaps there are mitigating circumstances surrounding the character of the source or his or her relationship with Palin that might color her response.

On the other hand, it’s disconcerting to me that these stories of Palin not knowing that the United States, Canada and Mexico make up NAFTA and that she didn’t know that Africa was a continent and incorrectly thought South Africa was a part of the “country” of Africa (like South Carolina or the south of France?) were not reported until after the election.

The Fox News Channel, which has been on the forefront of breaking this story, acknowledged in its reporting that they knew of these allegations before the election, but that the still unnamed sources swore them to secrecy until it was over.

Reporters on this one should have been more aggressive in verifying the allegations and getting them out to their readers, listeners and viewers before the election was held. The failure to do so makes them appear to be tools of the McCain campaign.

During Friday’s News Talk Online on Paltalk.com with guests Mary Walter from Fox News Talk and WACK News Director Rus Jeffrey there was mention by the latter of a study which showed that MSNBC’s news coverage is biased against John McCain.

The report by the Pew Research Center’s Project For Excellence In Journalism is linked HERE. It’s an important study, and helps us sort whether it’s a question of viewer bias clouding perception or reality.

The findings clearly are an indictment of MSNBC’s coverage. But, interestingly, they find no such political leanings by the cable network’s sister network NBC. In fact, the study finds that at NBC, ABC and CBS, reporting tends to be “more neutral.”

CNN, it found, was “somewhere in the middle of the cable spectrum” but “generally more negative (toward McCain) than the press overall.”

While many viewers find that unsurprising, equally expected were the findings with regard to Fox, which the Pew report concludes has been “more negative than the norm” toward Barack Obama.

Tomorrow’s News Talk Online on Paltalk.com will focus on how well the news media are covering the presidential election campaign.

Is the coverage biased? Or is the perceived bias in the eye of the beholder, not the news organization?

And how many of us are turning from the old mainstream media in favor of getting our information from the new media?

Joining us to discuss the coverage of the campaigns will be Fox News Talk’s Mary Walter and WACK News Director Rus Jeffrey.

Prior to joining Fox News Talk, Walter spent over 15 years in talk radio. The majority of that time was spent hosting “The Passion Phones” on NJ 101.5 (WKXW-FM) out of Trenton, NJ. The show was a combination of relationship based talk topics and relationship advice and was the first show in its time slot to simultaneously rank in the NY and Philadelphia markets.

A graduate of Villanova University, Walter also spent four years hosting a politically based, morning drive, talk show at WCTC-AM where she became the New Jersey’s first female morning drive host.

Now at Fox News Talk, Walter regularly fills in for Brian Kilmeade, Judge Andrew Napolitano, Spencer Hughes and John Gibson. She has also appeared on The Alan Colmes Show. Fox News Talk can be heard throughout North America on both Sirius and XM. Walter also has filled in for Steve Malzberg on WOR and been a guest commentator on The Man Show with Geoff Pinkus on 560 WIND in Chicago, which also appears on Paltalk.

You can also find Walter on The Fox News Channel as a guest commentator on their weekend segment, “America’s Voices” and also as a guest commentator on “America’s Newsroom.”

Jeffrey is a frequent contributor to News Talk Online. He has over a decade of radio experience in both small and medium radio markets.

Before moving to the United States, Dr. Rus held positions at several Canadian radio stations including CKPT in Peterborough, CJBQ in Belleville, and CJSS in Cornwall.

In addition to his duties as news director at WACK AM, Jeffrey is senior pastor at Fresh-Wind Ministries.

To talk to Walter and Jeffrey on News Talk Online on Paltalk.com at 5 PM New York time Friday October 31 CLICK HERE. There is no charge.

Paltalk is the largest multimedia interactive program on the Internet with more than 4 million unique users.

News Talk Online is also syndicated by CRN Digital Talk Radio to an additional 12 million households.

Tonight brings the much-anticipated debate between Republican vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin and her Democratic opponent Joe Biden. And, once again, in an interview with CBS’ Katie Couric, Palin has stumbled.

In precursor interviews with both candidates, Couric ask each to cite one decision the U.S. Supreme Court has made, other than Roe v. Wade, that they disagreed with.

Biden immediately cited the Violence Against Women’s Act, which he introduced, which would allow women who were victimized by crimes to sue their attackers. The Supreme Court overturned portions of that law.

Palin couldn’t think of one solitary high court decision, other than Roe v. Wade, that she disagreed with. Not a single one in the history of the United States.

As she has prepared for tonight’s debate, Palin has been calling conservative radio talk shows to attack the mainstream media. Saying that she’s looking forward to addressing the American people tonight without being “filtered” by the mainstream news media.

But if her past performances in interviews with Couric are any indication, Palin won’t then have an excuse for not knowing the issues. She has to ace this debate. Or she will be a heavy rock around John McCain’s neck. Pulling him under the political waters. Sinking his run for the presidency.

The upcoming vice-presidential debate will be one of the issues discussed at 5 PM New York time today on News Talk Online on Paltalk.com. CLICK HERE to join in the conversation.

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