Fair is fair -- and Couric strove to be just that
07/23/08 09:15 AM
By ED BARK
Barack Obama's Middle East odyssey, with the three major broadcast news anchors in tow, has irked John McCain to the point where his campaign is firing back with a video titled "Obama Love."
More on that later. But first let's look at CBS Evening News anchor Katie Couric's effort to balance the scales with her "exclusive" interviews of both Obama and McCain.
She sat down with the presumptive Democratic nominee in Amman, Jordan before talking to his Republican counterpart in New Hampshire on Tuesday's Evening News. And whatever her ratings or remaining time with the broadcast, let's credit Couric with both stirring the pot and beating NBC's Brian Williams and ABC's Charles Gibson to this one-two punch.
She first pressed Obama on his disinclination to support the U.S. troop "surge" in Iraq despite its apparent short-term success at least.
"People may be scratching their heads and saying 'Why?' " she told him.
Obama said the U.S. had erred in shifting away from "the central front of terrorism" in Afghanistan. But he also pledged to "always listen to the commanders on the ground. And I will make an assessment based on the facts at that time."
Couric tried again: "But microcosmically speaking, did the surge . . . help the situation in Iraq?"
"Katie, there is no doubt that our troops helped to reduce violence," Obama replied before emphasizing that the money would have been better spent in Afghanistan and on improving a faltering U.S. economy.
Couric made a third run at him, with a slightly vexed Obama rejoining, "Katie, I have no idea what would have happened had we applied my approach (instead of the troop surge) . . . So this is all hypothetical."
On to McCain, who eagerly dug in.
Obama has "indicated by his failure to acknowledge the success of the surge that he would rather lose a war than lose a campaign," he said in what likely will be a resonating sound bite.
Succeeding in Iraq means that "obviously we will be freeing up troops to go to Afghanistan," McCain said, claiming Obama "doesn't understand that it's not just troops. It's an overall strategy" for winning the war on terrorism.
"Senator McCain, you sound very frustrated with Senator Obama's perspective," Couric then told him.
"No, I'm not at all," he answered. But Obama "just has been wrong and is wrong."
Couric's concluding assessment of the surge likely pleased McCain more than Obama.
"The numbers do indicate that Iraq became much safer after the surge," she told viewers, citing statistics showing far fewer deaths and casualties.
Earlier in the day, though, the McCain campaign put up a video depicting various reporters kissing up to Obama to the tune of The Four Seasons' "Can't Take My Eyes Off of You."
It included a three-peat of MSNBC's Chris Matthews saying of Obama, "He's sort of a gift from the world to us in so many ways."
All of this has a way of at least temporarily correcting any imbalances. Couric's course correction was Tuesday's Exhibit A. Here's the "Obama Love" video that may have provided the impetus:
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