ABC Conducts Worst Debate, It’s Embarrassing
I got so angry watching the smarmy questions being asked by moderators Charlie Gibson and George Stephanopoulos of both Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama that after listening to just 20 minutes I fired off an email to ABC News. Here is the response and the reason I will make my complaint public at PJNet.org. I want to be sure that someone hears it. First the ABC News response to my email:
As you can imagine, we receive thousands of messages a day from our viewers and while we appreciate you taking the time to provide feedback regarding our programming, we are not able to respond to each one directly.
We encourage you to continue to communicate with us!
IMPORTANT INFORMATION ABOUT CHANGING TO DIGITAL TELEVISION:
Television as we know it is about to change! Are YOU ready? …
No help there for a dissatisfied viewer.
So then I went to the ABC News debate story and found more than 1700 comments, here is the one that speaks my mind:
THIS DEBATE IS A HUGE DISAPPOINTMENT!!! What the heck are you doing?????? So much time on the errors/blunders/past, ya yayaya. Where were all the questions that affect the American people???I think this was shameful!!! You left no room for talking about real issues. And George & Charlie were where all the fault should lie. TERRIBLE, RUDE and IRRELEVANT QUESTIONS !!!!! … You owe PA an apology AND an apology to the candidates.
My wife is in the other room yelling, haven’t they heard how many people died in Iraq today. Ask a question about that. Haven’t they heard how many people are losing their homes today? Ask about that. And so on.
I fully agree with the commenter above and my wife, ABC News you owe the American people an apology. We deserve better.
Update:
Ps: It gets better, or actually worse. I called ABC News to complain at 212-456-7777, got someone who said the line was busy but I could call back later. I asked if I could voice a complaint to him. He said no. I asked if he was at some calling center in another country. His response: You got that right.
So this is ABC News idea of news as a conversation. Ah, I don’t think you have it quite right. Here is the number he gave me: 818 460-7477…alas it was busy.
April 16th, 2008 at 10:16 pm
George S and Charles G should be absolutely ashamed. This is the kind of dishonest, tabloid, gotcha gutter thinking that masquerades as journalism, today. No wonder they lose viewers.
The moment at the end of the program when the crowd began to boo, reminded me of the treatment of Sarah Lacey at SXSW. (see blog http://kadmusarts.com/blog/?p=478)
Talk about elitism and out of touch. Do they really believe these were the questions Americans want to ask?
April 16th, 2008 at 10:22 pm
Amen.
April 16th, 2008 at 10:51 pm
I have never seen or heard such a putrid performance by George or Charles. I thought we would have important questions answered about the things we the people are concerned about. You two are a poor excuse for a moderator. Thank goodness we have the internet!!!
April 16th, 2008 at 10:58 pm
Hi Wonder:
We are not alone, here is what Greg Mitchell says at Editor & Publisher:
April 17th, 2008 at 12:14 am
I don’t care who wears a pin or not. I need to know what will be done about our economy. I’m in the process of lossing my home. The governement will save coorparte america; what about Americans?
April 17th, 2008 at 3:22 am
JUST TERRIBLE. Charles and George, you should get suspended.
April 17th, 2008 at 10:11 am
You’re absolutely right, Len. Horrible debate. I was almost screaming at my computer screen. I heard there were eventually over 7,000 comments on the ABC site before comments were closed.
What’s mystifying is that David Brooks at the NYT said the questions were “excellent.” (shakes head)
April 17th, 2008 at 11:10 am
I can not believe that I waited excitedly all this time for this. I am so dissappointed. Obama got the brunt of it. I think that this may help him. I don’t think that ABC mean for this to help him but to destroy him.
April 17th, 2008 at 2:16 pm
The so called debate, they asked Obama about bitter remark, Wright U.S Marine dose he love America?, And associates , they interrupted him, and said Hillary gets to respond because the length of time Obama took defending himself. It was 43 minutes into it when they finally asked Hillary about Bosnia begrudging, didn’t mention hospital, Peen and her associates, or about pending contrbution fraud case! Then said gun answer of Obama was no answer and continued to interrupt Obama and literally argue with him on tax etc. I will never watch ABC again! I’m for Hillary I believe she is the most experiance, but the non relevent questions from the moderators is sickning!
April 17th, 2008 at 7:09 pm
When ABC teased the program as “Clinton VERSUS Obama” I knew it was a set-up. We Democrats can’t seem to learn from experience. Why wasn’t McCain in the program? Read Gibson’s past news scripts and you’ll find he is a bigger Bush apologist than Tony Snow.
April 17th, 2008 at 11:38 pm
Was the National Enquirer hosting the presidential debate? ABC get serious! This was ridiculous! One of these people may very well become the president of our country. As a result of the moderators (and other media sources) Access Hollywood mindset, people know more about stupid Rev. Wright, Hillary dodging bullets and flag pins which I have never seen any of the candidates wearing, then we do about these candidates views on Russia, China, the Iran and Israel issue and education. These phoney journalists could have discussed what these candidates are going to do about the violence and drug trafficking on our borders, how they would handle an issue with North Korea, if they decided to leave Iraq what would be their plans for Afghanistan. I could go one about the different issue that should have been address last night, but clearly ABC, the moderators were not interested. People?s lives are being impacted by what?s going in the country and Iraq and you want me to decide who I am going to vote based on the garbage that was discussed for 45 minutes on last nights so call debated. There were plenty of other things to discuss other that stupidity that occupied 45 minutes of my life that I can?t get back. These candidates should have been hammered on serious issues and asked to give specific detail on how they plan to resolve these REAL problems.
These issues have been address, discussed, and rehashed. The American people are not deaf, dumb or blind we have heard it already. We will factors these things in our decision. It?s time to move on to real issues! I also want to make my decision on issues of substance. This was a big disappointment. Quality journalism is a thing of the past.
April 18th, 2008 at 12:32 am
How dare you call this a debate. Since when does stupid sensational National Enquirer type questions mascarade as real american issues. George and Charlie are totally “discredited” as so called moderators, they are IMBICILES. I am a 50 year old american who is in desperate need of honest answers on real issues like help with sky high gas prices, my family needs help with health care coverage and I want to know about the candidates positions on the new uptick in killings in Iraq as well as what they would do to make our public schools great like they used to be a long time ago. I wanted them to ask about immigration and what they will do day one on fixing that? WHAT WERE THEY THINKING!!!! ABC WASTED MY TIME AND THE COUNTRYS TIME FOR NOTHING….NO WONDER YOUR’E CONSIDERED A 3RD RATE NETWORK…. You two embarrassed yourselves and your reputations.Wasting the countrys time for almost an hour with nonsense will make your network irrelevant. And I thought Fox News was a joke!
April 18th, 2008 at 2:50 am
Wow. Poor Obama and Clinton. So we finally had a couple of journalists that weren’t falling all over themselves to kiss up to Obama. If these were Republicans that were being questioned none of you would have a problem. If you don’t agree, then go read your previous posts and read what you attack the right about. Who a person associates with speaks to who that person is and what they believe. If your candidates cannot answer a few tough questions I don’t think they are qualified to be the leader of the “USKKKA of America”.
April 28th, 2008 at 4:12 pm
The proof of Charles and George being out of touch of the people of this country and what they want to hear is in their responses after they were criticized for how they conducted the debate. They could not acknowledge that they must have done something wrong as the people’s comments were overwhelmingly disgruntled. If you can’t admit when your faults, you are not as intelligent as you think you are!