Judy Woodruff gazing into the abyss

I've noticed that a lot of people on DU despise Ms. Woodruff, which is ironic because she's the most shamelessly and transparently partisan Democrat of any TV journalist (as opposed to consultant, commentator, etc..) and she has been for her whole career. She's married to Al Hunt, for gosh sakes! (During the primaries some DUers might have assumed she was a Republican because she was openly contemptuous of John Kerry and Wes Clark, but that was due entirely to her embarrassing school-girl crush on John Edwards.)

Anyway, this afternoon we got to see her gaze into the American abyss and it was damn funny whether you like her or hate her. (People who hate her probably enjoyed it more) The CNN Poll today was whether our boys in Iraq and Afghanistan will be remembered as the next "Greatest Generation." At the end of the show Judy read the results off her script as 93% NO and as soon as she said it she realized that can't be right. So she looked at the monitor and saw the results on screen as 93% YES and 7% NO. Hooray for the Global Warriors on Terror!

But then she gets word in her ear-piece that she was right the first time and that the actual poll was, in fact, 93% saying today's terror warriors will not be remembered as the next great generation. After that sank in she said, "I'm sure that doesn't mean any disrespect for our current men in the military... blah, blah." She was really rattled! It's a kind of rattled we've seen a lot lately on the faces of TV Democrats who have been so busy going through caniptions trying to look "fair" that they didn't notice that Joe and Jane Six-pack have quietly outflanked them on the left.

It is a shocking result. Of course only a gibbering idiot would compare WWII with the current fiasco on any level, but the gibbering idiot vote has, until recently, been a lot bigger than 7%.

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Woodruff is quite nearly THE most despicable shill for the Repuglicans -- at least IMO she's among the worst. I literally cannot stand her anorexic self.

I'm also having trouble believing she's married to Al Hunt. Anyone else confirm that?

The two are considered a prominent Beltway power couple. Every year they run a major event to raise funds for spina-bifida.

--IMM

I believe. I support many charities, also. I didn't need to "whore" myself for "mega funding" in my community. Maybe the needs they have with their own child swayed their journalistic endeavors. Who knows.

Mort Kondrachki also has a "disabled child." It costs ALOT to get top notch care for a disabled child.

One must make "compromises." :-( Maybe I would have "whored for my child" too.

Or maybe they just honestly believe what they believe. That Bush's cuts in funding are "leaving EVERY Child Behind" so it's more money for their child...or they are on the dole. :shrug:

There's rules you know!


Edit for clarity: There's the "I'm taking a hit" hit and there's the "I'm taking another hit and pretending it's still my first hit" hit.

that kind of reaction next election night. And the early reports from New York...

when Florida was called for Gore

I was watching returns at a friend's house, and tv was tuned to Fox.

And the look on Brit Hume and the Fox woman's faces was priceless.

It was as if they'd just been told their favorite child had just failed out of college, or worse.

It was a wonderful moment.

Did you conclude Judy Woodruff is a Democrat based on her spouse?

Do you apply that to James Carville and Mary Matalin?

and hollered obscenities at Al Hunt in a Washington restaurant in front of Hunt's small child? You do all realize that was Woodruff's child, right? She's a ruthless Bush hater from way back.

(Spending my whole life in DC has left me out of touch with America but very much in touch with the politics of our local luminaries.)

Jesus... ask Bob Novak who he considers the biggest Democratic shill on TV. He and Woodruff can barely be in the same studio anymore, and it's quite mutual.

This whole reaction puzzles me. Everyone here realizes that TV journalists don't take sodium pentathol before every show and just say whatever is on their minds, right? TV journalism is always a mannered and self-conscious performance.

There's a phenomenon in play that perhaps not everyone considers. Black people would rather get pulled over by two white cops or two black cops than a mixed race team because the black cop in a mixed pairing will often show out for the white cop (to quote noted social scientists NWA), being extra harsh... bending over backward to show no favoritism because he knows the white cop expects him to be soft.

I hear fairly overt Democrats on TV say appalling things all the time because they feel obliged to... really rah-rah pro-American horseshit of a type Republicans don't always feel a need to say.

One shouldn't be so literal... A cumulative study of the words spoken by people on TV would suggest that Republicans are really good on civil rights. Think of how many times you've seen Republicans on TV say "of course racial discrimination is wrong..." and "slavery was a terrible thing." Democrats feel no pressure to say slavery is bad.

By the same token, Democrats probably spout more patriotic hogwash on TV. Paul Begala can't make it through an episode of CROSSFIRE without jabbing his finger at someone and barking "I love this country!" It's a PR thing.

nt

You obviously have a computer and your hands seem to work... Jesus!

Novak...

:eyes::eyes::eyes::eyes::eyes::eyes:
:eyes::eyes::eyes::eyes::eyes::eyes:

RL

Judy Woodruff a Dem? She sure fooled me. Every time she shills for the Repukes and Bush.

Yes, she's married to Al Hunt. And James Carville is married to Mary Matalin.

We know all about an inebriated Bush foul-mouthing hubby Al Hunt in a DC restaurant. But whore Judy has converted. Money talks. Integrity walks.

Nice try. You created a fair amount of bandwidth and got us to respond. So I guess you win.

as Matlin is because she's married to Carville.

Judy Woodruff is a horrible whore who sides with the most powerful.

She has been a hapless shill for BushCo and Al Hunt is as much a Dem partisan as Alan Colmes; totally irrelevant against the right-wing juggernaut.

....they had such a stupid poll!

of Democratic bias shown by Woodruff on air.

Or search NewsMax.com or Free Republic for her name. The wingnuts truly *despise* her. Compendiums of supposed liberal bias on TV news are crawling with her highlights.

I swear... you guy are just being funny, right? If you polled the entire Washington Media and PR community on who on TV is a big liberal Woodruff would be in the top five.

The Daily Howler uses her often to provide examples of Republican propaganda, but not because she's a Republican. The Daily Howler is interested in making the point that the range of views on TV has shifted so far rightward that it's absurd to talk about liberal bias. The penchant for using Woodruff is because she has a lifelong reputation as the poster-woman for rampant lefty bias... you don't disprove liberal bias by quoting Rush Limbaugh; you argue that TV news has slanted rightward across the spectrum by proving that even the most reliable lefties spout Republican-friendly nonsense.

The overall spectrum on TV is right-leaning and quite compressed. That said, Woodruff is on the left-most edge of that compressed spectrum.


(Younger viewers may be confused by the fact that she really dislikes John Kerry, but that's not a partisan thing. She just really dislikes John Kerry.)

That's a source of information? They hate anyone to the left of Hitler. To them everyone is liberal.
Woodruff is no liberal. I doubt she is a democrat.

as to what people say on Newsmax or Freeperville. It's one of those a=a deals.

RIGHT. Judy doesn't need a "card." She's an old pro fighting for the Right...Actually she and her hubby "Love POWER" and their "Inside the Beltway" status.

Didn't you realize? They are "ABOVE US" mere mortals who don't thrash it out in the "news" trenches of Washington?

You don't get on the "A" Party list like Al and Judy unless you "shill" and "whore." :puke: on Woodruff.

nt

Are you a "tutor?"

Freepers call anyone not to the right of Atilla the Hun liberal. Do you ever listen to Woodruff? Still waiting for pro-dem verbage.

"The overall spectrum on TV is right-leaning and quite compressed. That said, Woodruff is on the left-most edge of that compressed spectrum."

Almost. Not Quite. The whoremedia, except for CBS, does not LEAN Right. It IS Right.

Woodruff is a dem? Yeah right. She has been one of the most partisan republicans on the tube. She is a crabby shrew.

I think she's as close to objective as they get. One classy dame.

mediawhore traitors when the enormity of the bush crimes become evident.

I am ALL FOR IT, as long as we do it by rule of law, and operate withing the electoral, legislative, and judicial institutions. I am sure am glad I am not the only one who wants to see a bunch of politicians and Washington insiders dangling from ropes for the war crimes and economic treasons they have perpetrated for years, even for decades.
Why should our poor servicemen be the only ones to give up their lives in the line of public duty? Our elected and appointed leaders also do "public service." But they never seem to have to pay for their mistakes.

Let The Hanging Movement begin here and now! And we shall proceed by Rule of Law!

like to see your list. Or, is she the only one who strikes your fancy?

They are there to mix it up with their interviewees. Of course they will (or should) appear to oppose whomever they are up against.

Asking tough questions gives their subjects a chance to show their stuff.

A boxer's sparring partner does him no favors by lying down.

Let's get some perspective.

--IMM

trying to be "fair and balanced" and trying to "mix it up with their interviewees" to accomplish this.

It's so hard competing with the Corporate money and inside Washington Bush/PNAC/Heritage Foundation/AEI/CATO/ and other Think Tanks that just trying to "CHOOSE" amongst all these worthwhile foundations just makes one's mind boggle in trying to be FAIR. :crazy:

--IMM

I've always thought that she had a clear anti-Democrat bias. Its not that visible--she strives to maintain a balanced appearance, but deep down I cannot help but feel that she really hates Kerry.

This thread is a shocker though. I've always seen her as one of the worst on CNN, if thats possible.

I don't pursue this because of a special interest in Judy. I've never liked her, myself. But this is, to me at least, a weirder instance of fantastical group think than MIHOP.

I accept the sincerity of everyone's perceptions but I'm hard pressed to imagine a set of experiences that would cause such perceptions...

All I can figure is that if someone started watching INSIDE POLITICS when the Democratic primary season started getting hot they would be amazed how much this crabby old lady obviously hates Kerry (which she does), but that doesn't make a person right wing. Many people at DU hate Kerry and for many of the same reasons. She strikes me as a dinosaur 60's bleeding heart who tends to dislike the more technocratic DLC type Democrats.

Aside from that there's no explanation.

I am not suggesting the things she says are objectively liberal taken for themselves because TV is very right-wing and even the most liberal utterances on TV are at best centrist. But within that narrow range of opinion she's been on the left edge of it for 20 years.

from? Some of us are critical of Kerrys "Strategy." Thank God we've not been subjected on the Dem side to "Repug Group Think."

I have no idea why you would post this and then say there are Kerry haters here.

Do you spend much time reading DU? You sound rather "clueless."

hmmmm....

in a certain way. There is a particular country that feels it must conquer a region of the world and the rest of the world is trying to figure out what to do about it.

It was a stupid poll question anyway. How could ANYONE try to draw a comparison between this debacle in Iraq and WWII?

for examples.

Woodruff is a shameless partisan democrat but she doesn't LIKE the dem nominee? Reminds me of the journalists (using the term loosely here) who have come out since the 2000 selection and admitted that their coverage of Gore was unfair...b/c they didn't LIKE him! And of course * is just so darned LIKABLE! (I guess we'll have to take their word for it, all I see on the telly is a drooling nitwit).

The job of a journalist is often to play devil's advocate and take the opposing side of an issue in order to draw out the stance of an interviewee or to shed light on an issue. This bashing of Judy Woodruff is typical of much shallow analysis that sadly permeates the left as much as the right.

I've been turned off by her during the primary season, but didn't realize she had a thing for JE.

when she nodded and smiled and made sympathetic noises as Eliot Abrams spewed one obvious lie after another on the McNeill-Lehrer Report.

He lied in ways that I caught right away (and later confirmed with a bit of research), and this woman who spends every day of her life keeping up with the news just let him keep on telling these outrageous whoppers.

When I wrote in to the show to complain, nothing happened until four months (yes, four months later) when I got a preprinted postcard from the show saying, "We're sorry that you think our show is biased. We endeavor to be fair." Period.

That is funny. I don't care if she's married to Al Hunt. Judy is NOT a Democrat. She has proved that over and over and over on her "Inside Politics" show and during the debates.

MY personal SNARKY comment from the REPUB Judy Woodruff....(paraphrased)She was talking about Wes Clark and his comment about being poor and raised by his mom. He grew up in a poor environment and didn't have a nice house. Her SNARKY comment? "Oh, I've seen Wes Clark's house and neighborhood. I bet if you ask his neighbors they wouldn't think they live in a poor neighborhood." Damn wench. If she's a Democrat, I'm a Repub....She's a WH shill.

I've asked the author of this thread for an example several times. Oops...I guess your example proves the opposite. Oh well, still waiting....

curious. I remember reading about Bush being drunk and going up to Judy, her husband and their son (he was 4? years old at the time) while they were eating in a restaurant and threatening them because of an article Al had written about the chimp. I always wondered why she wouldn't use her CNN pulpit to get back at him. She never does. She has always favored the repubs. She has to be a republican. She has the platform and a very good reason to go after this administration and chooses not to. :shrug:

Woodruff shamelessly Dem partisan?

<snarf> Good one!!

Julie