CBS News was once one of the defining news outlets in the world. Whether it was Edward R. Murrow reporting live from London during the Blitz in World War II or Walter Cronkite’s coverage of the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, generations of Americans turned to CBS for fair, accurate reporting on the most important issues of the day.
No longer.
CBS News now stands accused of deliberately distorting its news coverage for nakedly political purposes, to prop up Kamala Harris’ flailing presidential campaign by attempting to hide her inability to answer even simple questions about her policy positions and how she would act if elected president.
How badly skewed was CBS’s coverage of its interview with Harris, broadcast to the world on “Face the Nation” and “60 Minutes?” Well, last week, the nonprofit group Center for American Rights (CAR) filed a complaint with the Federal Communications Commission alleging deliberate news distortion, a violation of FCC regulations and a half-century of precedent.
In this complaint, CAR lawyer Daniel Suhr contends that the evidence of illegal news distortion by CBS could not be clearer: In two different news programs, CBS broadcast the same question, followed by two very different answers from Harris, resulting in a situation where “the general public no longer has any confidence as to what the Vice President actually said in response to the query.” This goes well beyond mere editorial oversight of an interview — picking what to include and what not to include — and
