Terry Gross Appreciation: Here's to the "surgical" providance

[blondeatlast]

of a NEW ONE!

Damn, she's always been good, but today, she was downright masterful.

Just enough rope . . .

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

1. Terry, I hope you read DU!

You were wonderful when you interviewed O'Reilly. You were polite, even though there were times I'm sure he was getting to you. And you DID call down Al Franken on that bogus letter and chastity survey he made. You did NOTHING to make O'Reilly paranoid-I'm curious at what in the People review bothered him, and will try and go find it now. If anything, you bent over backwards to be polite to him, and he showed how sick he is.

[cprise]

2. I have to disagree

She didn't defend herself well at all when Bill questioned her motives, and made a comparison with her Franken interview. She could have done it, but she was unprepared.

Bill got good ammo from this interview.

Terry is a Weimar liberal. She is facile and needs that attitude in return. A yen for novelty is not even close to having the ability to put 'journalists' with a persecution complex in their place. She has no idea what all of the proto-Bills running around have in store for her.

[Cat Atomic]

3. I'd have to agree with you.

I was waiting for her to say, "Al Franken is a comedian, sir- you claim to be a journalist", or "do you interview Democrats the same way you interview Schwarzeneggar?", or even "I'm conducting the interview, Mr. O'Reilly- not you". I thought she got trampled all over there at the end.

I love Fresh Air- and Terry Gross is an excellent interviewer. But I don't think she was prepared for the sort of Springer-esque attacks that O'Reilly launched.

[blondeatlast]

4. We must have heard different interviews, then

He hung up on her, fer cod's sake. She didn't toss him softballs, she held out the string and let him hang himself. At least that's the interview I heard.

[toddzilla]

5. overall it was great, but i'd have to agree on the franken interview thing

she could have came back a little better, but overall he came across as a blustering, idiotic, pompous ass that he is.

[jokerman93]

7. I have to say

I thought Bill controled that interview from start to finish. Also, I was surprised to hear he holds a few very progressive views. Definitely a lively interview, but if we're keeping score, I'd give that one to O'Rielly.

Mick

[newyawker99]

9. Hi jokerman2004!!

Welcome to DU!! :toast:

[dpbrown]

6. In this case, I think she was better off not being caustic

She lobbed him softballs, and he still couldn't take it.

It was like listening to someone who couldn't distinguish between the voices in his head and the voices of the person he was talking to. You could almost hear the astonishment in Terry Gross's voice as she realized that O'Reilly was talking himself into her as his enemy, attacking him, slandering him, being part of the great unwashed leftists who hate him. But she wasn't doing any of that. She was asking him questions about his background, his upbringing, his politics - all softball, easy questions for someone who's not lying.

But O'Reilly was lying. He was lying about the Peabody Award, he was lying about registering as a Republican, and he was just pathetic when he was bragging about having beat up his dad when he was 17. I found myself thinking, "Yeah, right. Probably a bedwetter."

The guy is seriously unbalanced. I think Terry Gross handled it much better by going softball that by getting in his face. And O'Reilly still went ballistic on her on his show, taunting her (when she couldn't answer back) to his gullible and ignorant fans.

Precious. Simply precious.

Dan Brown
Saint Paul, Minnesota

[indigo32]

8. It's not her job to put anyone into their place

that is simply not what she does. She did let him make a total ass out of himself though.

[Maddy McCall]

10. Exactly...by not entering the interview with an agenda she gains

credibility.

Do other posters think she was supposed to use O'Reilly tactics against O'Reilly?

I think the dismay you could hear in her voice said plenty. Her lack of words gave O'Reilly plenty of time to demonstrate just what a pompous, paranoid fool he is.

[cprise]

11. She was browbeaten into saying she gave Franken an easier interview...

and even then she could have given a short, perfectly acceptable reason why:

* Franken is a comedian, you are a journalist

* or, people are writing about you and you should expect a chance to answer their charges (by contrast, not many best-selling authors are devoting chapters to Al Franken)

OK, that second one wasn't short. If Terry is so good, can't she anticipate this stuff? (I say no, and she can't even stomach going to the Fox website to read Bill's full transcript.)

Feh. This kind of thing continually puts me off NPR. I used to like them until I realized I was being LIED to. ("Oooh, aren't we hip... Here is some novelty-news to sugar-coat those nasty LIES we're feeding you. Next stay tuned for some delusion on MARKETPLACE.") The only reason NPR listeners were less gullible about the invasion of Iraq was that most affiliates also carried BBC World and people were inhaling it like fresh air (or perhaps the only air left).