Couric failed to question Matalin on earlier statements absolving Cheney of blame in shooting; echoed Matalin's account of shooting's disclosure
SUMMARY: NBC Today host Katie Couric failed to question Republican strategist Mary Matalin regarding remarks she and other surrogates of Vice President Dick Cheney previously made absolving him of blame in the accidental shooting of his hunting companion, despite Cheney's admission that he was solely to blame for the accident.
In interviewing Republican political strategist Mary Matalin regarding Vice President Dick Cheney's public relations disclosures following his accidental shooting of a hunting partner in Texas on February 11, NBC Today host Katie Couric failed to question Matalin regarding remarks she and other Cheney surrogates previously made absolving Cheney of blame in the shooting. Couric did not ask Matalin why she told the press on February 12 that Cheney was blameless in the accident. Nor did Couric ask Matalin why, given Cheney's February 15 admission that he was solely to blame for the accident, Cheney allowed his defenders to blame the accident on the victim, Harry Whittington. Couric also uncritically repeated Matalin's assertion that Katharine Armstrong -- the host of the hunting expedition during which the shooting occurred -- disclosed the accident to the press at Cheney's behest. This explanation is contradicted by statements Armstrong reportedly made to both CNN and National Review that she decided to notify the press independently of the vice president.
Couric failed to question Matalin regarding her assertion -- reported in the February 13 Washington Post -- that in the shooting incident, Cheney "was not careless or incautious or violate any of the [rules]. He didn't do anything he wasn't supposed to do." Moreover, Armstrong and White House press secretary Scott McClellan both faulted Whittington instead of Cheney. The New York Times reported February 13 that Armstrong blamed Whittington because he "did not announce" that he had returned to the hunting party after leaving it. From the Times article:
Mr. Whittington, she [Armstrong] said, "did not announce -- which would be protocol -- 'Hey, it's me, I'm coming up,' " she said.
"He didn't do what he was supposed to do," she added, referring to Mr. Whittington. "So when a bird flushed and the vice president swung in to shoot it, Harry was where the bird was."
McClellan referred reporters to Armstrong's statement blaming Whittington in a February 13 White House press briefing, stating: "I think Mrs. Armstrong spoke publicly about how this incident occurred. And if I recall, she pointed out that the protocol was not followed by Mr. Whittington, when it came to notifying the others that he was there."
But in a February 15 interview with Fox News host Brit Hume, Cheney took responsibility for the incident, stating: "It was not Harry's fault. You can't blame anybody else. I'm the guy who pulled the trigger and shot my friend." Although NBC News White House correspondent Kelly O'Donnell had already noted this fact in an earlier Today segment, stating, "The vice president used his TV appearance to try to undo an assertion first made by the first person he authorized to talk about it: witness and ranch owner Katharine Armstrong, who along with the White House suggested Whittington's own actions contributed to the accident," Couric did not ask Matalin why Cheney allowed his defenders to fault Whittington for days without correcting them.
From the February 16 broadcast of NBC's Today:
O'DONNELL: The vice president accepted responsibility for two major aspects of what happened: the hunting accident itself, and decisions made about how to tell the public he had shot a man.
[...]
O'DONNELL: The vice president used his TV appearance to try to undo an assertion first made by the first person he authorized to talk about it: witness and ranch owner Katharine Armstrong, who along with the White House suggested Whittington's own actions contributed to the accident.
McCLELLAN [video clip]: The protocol was not followed by Mr. Whittington, when it came to notifying the others that he was there.
O'DONNELL: But Cheney took full blame.
CHENEY [video clip]: It was not Harry's fault. You can't blame anybody else. I'm the guy who pulled the trigger and shot my friend.
Couric also echoed Matalin's assertion that Armstrong contacted the Corpus Christi Caller-Times to notify the paper of the shooting -- at Cheney's behest. The Caller-Times was the first news outlet to report the shooting, prompted by Armstrong's notification.
As Media Matters for America previously noted, National Review White House correspondent Byron York reported February 13 that "Armstrong said she did not coordinate with the vice president's office before calling the Corpus Christi paper." And during the February 13 White House press briefing, CNN White House correspondent Suzanne Malveaux asked McClellan to explain the discrepancy between Armstrong's reported statement "that she did not believe the Vice President's Office was aware that she was going to go to the local press" and McClellan's earlier statement -- at the briefing -- that "[t]he vice president spoke with Mrs. Katharine Armstrong, and they agreed that she should make that information [regarding the shooting] public." A later statement by Armstrong to the Associated Press contradicted her earlier reported statements to York and CNN. From a February 15 AP article:
"I said, Mr. Vice President, this is going to be public, and I'm comfortable going to the hometown newspaper," she told The Associated Press in a telephone interview. "And he said you go ahead and do whatever you are comfortable doing."
But rather than challenging Matalin on her disputed account of how Armstrong decided to notify the press of the accident, Couric echoed Matalin. Matalin then reasserted that Armstrong had contacted the Caller-Times at Cheney's behest. From the interview:
COURIC: I know that the vice president said he felt comfortable with the way the story itself -- or the release of the story -- was handled. But in hindsight, do you believe he should have notified the media in a more timely way?
MATALIN: No. And in fact, if you look at the facts of the case, Katharine Armstrong, who was an eyewitness and is a hunter who was there, was on the phone trying to reach the media as early as 8 Sunday morning. The objective was to get the story out. Not get it out fast, but get it out right. Sometimes accuracy -- and the vice president believes this, and I believe he's correct -- accuracy and completeness should take priority over quickness. We saw in the coverage of Katrina, the first stories out of there were so horrific they impeded the rescue effort.
COURIC: Right. But to get the owner, I guess -- to get the owner of the ranch to call the local paper, does it strike you as odd in any way that, say the vice president's office or the --
[crosstalk]
MATALIN: She's -- Katie, she's not the owner -- she was not just the owner of the ranch. She was an eyewitness to the event. By the time I spoke with the vice president Sunday morning, I had gotten four different accounts of what happened. So I know from personal experience in dealing with Cheney press that just putting out a statement does not make any story just be humdrum. Any routine -- anything of the vice president's requires complete, fulsome, accurate, conveyance of information. We've seen this repeatedly every time he goes to the hospital for a routine test. So the effort there was to get not just the ranch owner -- she -- Katharine is a hunter, she is an expert on gaming down there in Texas official [sic] in such regard. She did own the ranch, and mostly importantly [sic], she was an eyewitness to the account. The vice president only knew what he did. He saw Harry leave. He didn't see Harry come back. Katharine saw the whole thing. I think that he was correct in trying to put out the most complete and accurate rendition. How he got it out, where she got it out, and our expectation that getting it out and getting it on the wire in the most expeditious way she could accomplish without any staff down there was the right decision.
and it quotes mrs. armstrong as saying that when she saw cheney's secret service detail running, that she thought he had a heart problem. a very interesting statement because if she was an "eyewitness", then she already knew why they were running.
Yes, let's put an unchallenged Cheney defender/former employee to spin the RNC Talking Point.
Katie, throw some softballs Mary Matalin's way will ya? Show her we're on her side.
We can't have a GE business trying to embarrass the Vice President now can we? We've invested too much money in this administration.
The Today Show, a sappy sickening show as it is, ALWAYS has time between Al Roker fat losing segments for Repub apologists. Katie can't read her lines fast enough.
*sigh*
Maybe Katie should limit herself to interviewing celebrities about dating. Every venture she takes into something serious, whether politics or current events gives one more clear indication that she is in way over her head.
I guess there is no NBC staff that could help her prepare for this interview. It's sad, but typical.
It's done on purpose. Dog and pony show. Let's stop being surprised at the MSM.
Couric is NOT a newsperson, but rather a morning show ornament.
What gets me is her arrogant and indignant stance to someone like Howard Dean (who, in all likelihood, is telling the TRUTH) and her acquiescence to the Republican Matalin (who is further clouding the issue)...
Katharine Armstrong was not an eyewitness to the shooting. She admitted later that she was sitting in the car and didn't even see what happened. In fact, when she saw all the excitement she thought maybe Cheney had had a heart attack. She made up details or took them second-hand from witnesses in talking to the local news, re: where Whittington was and how seriously (not very, according to her; Cheney admitted later that he was bleeding profusely) he was hurt. She had no business giving out those details as though she were an eyewitness.
The current pack of newscasters and reporters have become a laughing stock. Cable news is for partisans...viewers choose their outlet based on their political agenda. The networks are all puff and provide little hard news.
The following story by Irish author C.S. Lewis illustrates the media's futility.
- His father was traveling in an old-fashioned train of the kind which had no corridor, so that the passengers were imprisoned in their compartments as long as the train was moving. He was not alone in the compartment. He found himself opposite a respectable-looking farmer in a tweed suit whose agitated manner was to be explained by the demands of nature. When the train had rattled on for a further few miles, and showed no signs of stopping at a station where a lavatory might be available, the gentleman pulled down his trousers, squatted on the floor of the railway carriage and defecated. When this operation was complete, and the gentleman, fully clothed, was once more seated opposite Albert Lewis, the smell in the compartment was so powerful as to be almost nauseating. To vary, if not to drown the odour, Albert Lewis got a pipe from his pocket and began to light it. But at that point another passenger, who had not spoken one word during the entire episode, leaned forward and censoriously tapped a sign on the window which read NO SMOKING."
Today, the media is vigorously tapping on the no smoking sign while the real story, right before their eyes, goes unreported or spun to promote a particular agenda...sad but true.
There have been a number of inconsistent statements made (about being an eye witness, about alcohol consumption, about whether or not a proper hunting license had been obtained), but VP Cheney taking ultimate responsibility for pulling the trigger is not really one of them, in my opinion.
By the way, does anyone know exactly what Ms. Matalin's job was when she worked for the VP? (And was she working for him when the Plame/Wilson CIA leak happened?)