CNN's Carol Costello Thinks Waving Your Arms is Good Excercise

My general sense is that our media is failing us. 

http://lastmenandovermen.blogspot.com/2016/09/the-beltway-media-not-donald-trump-is.html

But I wanted to check out some morning stuff today to get a closer look. 

Thought I'd start with Costello at 9 AM. Wow. She starts out talking about an interview Hillary did with Don Lemon. 

Lemon asked her about Colin Powell's hacked emails being released. Of course Lemon right away wanted to get Hillary's response to Powell calling her arrogant. 

Hillary doesn't take the bait. She takes the high road and said she feels sympathy for Powell's private emails being put out for public consumption. She then moved on. 

Lemon came in to chat with Costello. Right way Carol Costello thinks it's outrageous that Hillary 'punted' on the specific thing Powell said about her being arrogant. Costello claimed everyone sees her this way and it's a problem that she didn't respond. 

Lemon agreed-of course-that she needs to answer this. Costello then went into the most absurd case of dime store sociology that Hillary was afraid to criticize Powell because of his great standing in the black community. It was interesting looking at Lemon who, of course is black, having no expression whatsoever when she said this. 

Yes, she's afraid she's going to lose black voters by criticizing Donald Trump. Proving yet again that: Carol Costello, like most of her white fellow Beltway journalists: don't know anything about black voters. 

Note also that Costello mentioned nothing about what Powell's emails say about Donald Trump. That, Ms. Costello didn't consider newsworthy. 

Then she pivots on to Donald Trump's absurd 'medical report' on Dr. Oz. 

She let us watch a couple of minutes of Trump answering questions from Oz. Note that Oz is considered to be a fraud by many other physicians. 

http://www.latimes.com/science/sciencenow/la-sci-sn-dr-oz-claims-fact-check-bmj-20141219-story.html

At the end. Costello said 'Well, so he said good things, is that reassuring?'

Lynn Sweet, the Washington Bureau Chief of the Chicago Sun-Times was first up. To her credit her answer was a flat no. She talked for two minutes about how this tells us nothing. She went on to talk about the absurdity that Trump says he gets a lot of exercise by 'waving his arms.'

Ms. Costello responds by not responding at all. She changes the subject to the issue of Hillary's stumble on Sunday. This raises questions Costello said 'That isn't going to stop is it?'

Paul Singer from USA Today obliged with a 'No, narratives get hardened and are tough to change htis late.'

Classic Beltway move. Don't deal in facts deal in narratives and optics. Because narratives aren optics are purely subjective standards. 

Singer then went on to say that her health will be the first question. 

At this point the media-not Donald Trump is her main opponent.

This is what journalism is in 2016. Carol Costello in he next segment went onto to claim that new polls showing Trump building a lead in key battleground states. This is also false. It's true a few polls showed him leading in Ohio; a few others show her still leading. CBS actually showed her up by 7 points. 

The Real Clear Politics average does have him up in Ohio by six tenths of a point. This is hardly 'building a lead.'

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2016/president/oh/ohio_trump_vs_clinton-5634.html

P.S. At the end of the first segment about Colin Powell and Dr. Oz, Don Lemon did slip in that, yes, Powell also criticized Trump very pointedly as treating black people of fools. Yet the media narrative has it that Hillary is the one who has insulted voters. 

You know, calling blacks losers in the ghetto, who are duped into staying on Dem plantation isn't in any way insulting to voters. You know, because black voters don't count, just racist white voters. 

Lemon also pointed out that Trump's visit to Dr. Oz was pure tv and contained no new information. If he wanted to be transparent about his medical records that was the total wrong way to do it. 

Without question, Trump is making a mockery over transparency norms, while Costello and her colleagues claim Hillary has the trust issue. 

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/donald-trump-dr-oz-media_us_57d9b7e8e4b08cb140938acc?0wyjgmg3gtf8yqfr

http://mediamatters.org/blog/2016/09/14/press-keeps-punishing-clinton-over-disclosures-while-trump-makes-none/213065

But while you might say that the truth was allowed to peak in a little in this segment, it was totally at the end. Lemon sort of slipped it in. But Costello didn't really say anything when he was done but 'Ok, so we got to go to a break now.'

So it sort of has the value of the fine print at the bottom of the page. Few will read that much less absorb it.

P.S.S. The topic that didn't make any appearance in this segment: Kurt Eichenwald's big Newsweek piece about just how huge and unprecedented the conflict of interest is with the Trump Organization.

http://www.newsweek.com/2016/09/23/donald-trump-foreign-business-deals-national-security-498081.html

This garnered no attention from Costello.