Ted Koppel, Anchor Provocateur - WPost

[Cassandra]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A50994-2003Dec9_3.html

" From the start, the ABC team knew they would be hamstrung by the crowd onstage. "How did Dennis Kucinich and Al Sharpton and Carol Moseley Braun get into this thing?" Koppel asked. "Nobody seems to know. Some candidates who are perceived as serious are gasping for air, and what little oxygen there is on the stage will be taken up by one-third of the people who do not have a snowball's chance in hell of winning the nomination."
<snip>
Koppel then voiced his apparent disdain for Kucinich, Sharpton and Braun, asking whether they would eventually "drop out" or continue a "vanity candidacy."

Again, Kucinich punched back. "I want the American people to see where the media takes politics in this country," he declared to loud applause. Koppel had become one of the debaters, and he had just taken a hard right to the jaw. The candidates, many of them, were in open revolt against the moderator. "

Koppel's opinion and Kucinich's response. I'm a Dean supporter with an ABB point of view, but I find it arrogant of Koppel (and Washington, in general) to decide for the people who's a serious candidate and who isn't. The rush to crown someone is part of what gave Nader space in which to rush in last time. As inconvenient as it is to have so many in this debate, those who disagree with the front-runner need time to have their views aired and hopefully adopted by the eventual candidate. Regardless of how likely their candidacies are (and I do not forget how Dean was looked at as hopeless, early on), ALL the candidates have made a positive contribution to the debate on the issues and until our candidate has been chosen by voters, I wouldn't mute any of them (except for the nasty attacks).

[grannylib]

1. Exactly right, and that is why I objected also to Gore's timing...

we need to hear them all, it's still relatively early, and things can change rapidly at this stage of the game.

[pistoff democrat]

3. Oh, don't get me started!

Gore's timing made me ill. I understand that Lieberman is way too far to the right, but, if Gore actually had any class, he would have talked to him first. Lieberman looked sad and he actually got applause to Dean's chagrin when it was brought up. My first instinct was to go to Clinton's office and tell him to endorse his long-time friend, Clark.

...bad taste in the mouth...

[Cassandra]

10. He wanted to talk to Joe but

was afraid that it would have gotten out to the media even sooner than it did. Also, Lieberman was considered by Gore to have run a lackluster campaign. As for his timing, he had said in an earlier speech that he would endorse someone before the primaries.

[pistoff democrat]

2. Yes, I thought Koppel was so

inappropriate and he didn't cover well for himself at the end either. Recall the sycophantic...oh you all do so much better when you're challenged...crap?

It was a cheap shot and, although you don't mention this, he also turned to Edwards to punch him that way, too!

:wtf:

[mikehiggins]

4. Correct

And I don't care about any of the endorsements. Kudos to Howie for snaring a big one.

The high point of this debate (24?) was Dennis going after Koppel like a cat on a canary.

I thought Dean took a good shot at expanding the point later on, but he gave Koppel a chance to undermine him when Dean exaggerated the time spent on polls, etc. I can understand how Dean felt, though. It seemed like that discussion dragged on forever.

Leave it to Al to drop the bomb on Ted, though.

SNL has better ratings than Nightline, and probably a damn sight better rating than this latest debate. Time to shut these things down, folks. There should be one more debate, a week before Iowa.

[SquireJons]

5. I agree

The endless attacks on Democrats by Democrats has to stop, or we'll get creamed in November.

[eissa]

6. I always thought highly of Ted

but not last night. I thought this was the worst debate so far. Ironically, I thought ALL of the candidates performed superbly. I don't know if Ted is responsible for that -- he did his best to pit one against the other and I was really proud that all of them avoided that bait.

[Nazgul35]

7. Ahmen....

I was fuming at the stupid ass questions Kopel was asking! And he was asking all the candidates questions about Dean....which was just not cricket...this put them in a position of offering up dismissive responses and made them all look petty...

Consider the "who thinks Dean can beat Bush" question....I was disappointed on two counts with that one....

First, disappointed in all the candidates for not raising their hands...as they should have done for anyone of the Dem candidates....

Second, for providing the repugs with a commercial that will hit Dean hard should he become the nominee....

I was actually looking forward to the professional level of this debate and was more disappointed than any of the other debates....including the two fox debates!!!

[Cassandra]

9. They could all have raised their hands...

and very gracefully, and truthfully, said that any one of them would be a better President than Bush. I wish they had done that; it would have removed the sour grapes stuff.

[DianeK]

8. i agree..

i also support dean but i think koppel did a dreadful job! he really wanted to make it all about dean and actually set it up to put everyone on the offense against dean..i am sure it would have probably gone that way very well without his 'help'..i resent also that he tried to marginalize the other candidates...the people will make that decision, thank you very much. i remember a debate in the last general election where both buchanan and nader were excluded..there was not a snowball's chance in hell that i was going to support either one of them, but i resented the fact that someone else made the decision about who's views i got to hear..it was unfair to them and it was unfair to the people

[no name no slogan]

11. Leave it to Kucinich to TELL THE TRUTH

People like Koppel and the rest of media (and their horse-race mentality) is the reason why only half the eligible population votes anymore.

They spend their time poll-watching and avoiding any sort of substantive debate about issues, but instead report on how "handsome" a candidate looks or how much money he's siphoned from supporters wallets.

Since when has it EVER been right to base an election on how much money is spent? Shrub outspent Gore by $60 MILLION in 2000-- does that make him RIGHT? Wellstone got outspent 10-to-1 in 1990-- does that mean he SHOULDN'T have been elected?

Kucinich exposed once again how the media does ALL of us a disservice in its coverage of the campaigns by NOT focusing on the issues but on the esoterics of who endorsed who, how much money do the candidates have, and why certain candidates are "unelectable" and others aren't, thereby setting the boundaries for what issues are "important" and what issues are effectively off-limits for discussion.

It should be no suprise that Dennis Kucinich isn't afraid to address these issues. He's spent his whole political career standing up for what's right vs. "not making waves" so he wouldn't be perceived as "unpopular". From saving Muni Light from a corporate predator in the 1970s to publishing Diebold's BBV files on his congressional website last month, Kucinich has shown courage on the issues that our lazy and useless mass-media would rather ignore.