What would happen if we put an X on CNN?

CNN did indeed flash an X over Cheney’s face during a speech. CNN **may ** have fired a switchboard operator who interjected political comments into a call with someone complaining about the X, although I can’t find any mention of this story on a mainstream new site, only rightwing blogs, which makes it somewhat suspect.

However, even if the switchboard operator does exist and did say the things he said, that doesn’t lend any credence to the right-wing claim that CNN purposefully projected an X on the Vice President’s face. CNN is a big corporation. The people handing calls from the public aren’t sitting in the newsroom. They’re not privy to special secret insider info. They only know what they’re told is fit for public consumption. So either everybody at CNN is part of a grand conspiracy to smear Cheney, or one rogue operator unprofessionally interjected his personal opinion into a call and got fired for it. Assuming, of course, that the call isn’t a hoax.

CNN claims the X was a technical glitch. This is corraborated by the text that appeared beneath the X: “Transition begins after 5 frames of black.” According to CNN the X was a placeholder used to time transitions between different shots.

I realize that this story is currently a hot item in wingnutland, but come on! If CNN really wanted to make the VP look bad there are many things that would be far more subtle and effective than flashing an X over his face. This is just one more paranoid right-wing persecution fantasy.

Also, if we put an “X” in CNN it would be CNXN. The only thing a station with those call letters could do would be to play tapes of Nixon all day long (well, except for 18 minutes) and nobody wants to see Nixon 24/7.

Hey, it was funny in my head.

This sounds like something that will wind up on Snopes in the not-too-distant future.

“Likewise, the international marketing consulting firm Team Hollywood Inc., responsible for a database of over 11 million Americans, both Democrats and Republicans from across the country, was consumed with the calls. “The volume of calls to our company became an issue that could not be ignored,” stated Joan Friedman of Team Hollywood. “We needed a statement on behalf of the Internet community callers and their newsworthy Blogs, so we made the call.””

What the hell is “Team Hollywood” and how did it become the representative of Outraged Americans?

The whole thing sounds like a combination of blogosphere hysteria and some obscure company’s publicity stunt.

For instance just keep replaying his requests to retain torture as a tool.

Jim

Oh, this was a technical glitch all right. Nothing sinister about it, perfectly logical explanation, and I have absolutely no problem with it.

However, CNN doesn’t have that fair degree of journalistic credibility that you mention, IMHO. There have been some incidents over the years that call into serious question their methods and their biases, so a healthy amount of oversight of their stories by an informed public is a very good thing.

When something like this happens, CNN and others should be held to account. Reasonable people will be satisfied with a reasonable explanation, as I certainly was.

It’s the Franklin Mint Mark of the Beast: You get the X now, with the remaining numerals sent on approval once every approximately 90 days. Should you decide to join the legions of Satan, simply do nothing and you will be billed for each numeral in three equal installments of 39.95 each, plus shipping and handling.

That sounds like a pretty plausible scenario. I wonder if another explantion might also be that the call center person was just ignorant, and stupidly assumed it was intentional. Or maybe he thought the caller was speaking of an editorial show which might very well have intentionally made such a graphic. No doubt even obviously editorial shows get responses like the caller’s, and he might have jumped to a conclusion.

Drudge is also saying CNN’s Laurie Goldberg has issued a press release acknowledging the firing.

Excuse me, but what does this mean? “Held to account”? Do you mean that people should pay attention to what they are watching, and (as the telephone operator reportedly said) “if you don’t like it, don’t watch”?

A phrase like “held to account” makes it sound as if a news medium should be accountable to some external body, other than the consumers of the news. I hope this is not what you meant.

I certainly agree that constant scrutiny of all of our news sources is quite healthy. As far as bias goes, I think it’s hard for any of us to measure. I would wager that CNN’s bias, if any, would be to the left of you and the right of me and that I might see a conservative bias and you might see a liberal bias. But what is the objective measure that we judge bias by? It’s hard to determine the gold standard for truth when all the information you get is filtered in some way by the bearers of the information. The mere process of selecting what to report involves some bias as does our decision about what to read or watch. So in the end, how do you measure it?

Wow. An X on his face you say? For a fraction of a second? No wonder you sense a conspiracy.

If this is how the liberally biased American media intend to bring down the President and his cohorts, I predict another 100 years of Dubya.

And I nominate the OP for this week’s crazy person award.

Agreed. To that end, I recommend that people visit Media Matters, or their CNN specific search results, here.

They really must be held to account.

and

That’s what it’s reporting.

The wording on that alleged release, however, is exactly the same as the wording that the author of the DailyPundit was allegedly given over the telephone by the CNN representative. Is it not possible that Drudge just picked up the DailyPundit’s alleged conversation and ran with it?

If CNN has issued such a statement, in a press release, why is it not on any regular news outlets like wire services etc.? And why is there nothing about this on CNN itself? After all, if true, the story of the fired employee reflects well on the company, and you would think they would be keen to dissociate themselves from any hint that the X was placed onscreen intentionally.

I’m not alleging some conspiracy of silence here. Nor am i stating unequivocally that the CNN statement as reported by Drudge doesn’t exist. It’s just curious that no regular news sources have reported this, and that CNN itself doesn’t confirm the story on its own website (as least, not that i can find).

Purely a technical glitch. Glad to see Moto and Bricker making sense. Makes me warm and fuzzy!

Well, they were busted allowing military PsyOps folks to “sit in” or be “interns” or whatever. If CNN is biased, it ain’t liberal, that’s for sure, unless you’re a card-carrying John Birch Society type or something.

But go ahead, attack them. I welcome the not-conservative-enough purges. Expose that flank. You don’t need centrists, anyway.

Well, sometimes bias is easy to measure, and a gold standard for truth can become a little clearer when someone falls far short of it.

I think it is pretty indisputable that the reports out of CNN’s Baghdad bureau prior to Saddam Hussein’s defeat were biased more in favor of him than objective truth would allow. CNN’s Eason Jordan lobbied the Iraqi government extensively to keep that bureau open, as a symbol of the network’s international prestige, and the network deliberately quashed stories about the brutality of the regime to ensure continued access.

That cannot be supported by any reasonable person, and when it came out CNN was roundly condemned for this practice.

An X. An X? An X??!!

Holy crap some people really need a life.
I’m supposed to believe that an evil Ted Turner sits high atop CNN tower somewhere like Dr. Evil with a band of evil minions and the best they can come up with is “I’ve got it! Let’s flash an X on Cheyney’s head for a split second! If everything goes as planned he will stop lying. Muwahahaha!” pu-lease :rolleyes:

Maybe if they put “liar” on his forehead, or “666”, or a cross-hair, or drew a mustache. But an “X”?

And I could see the operator rolling his eyes over the phone at the persistant caller who wouldn’t take “technical glitch” as an explanation, demanded it was a conspiracy, wanted to operator to admit it, wouldn’t hang up till they got Ted on the line, so the operator responded “All right, all right, you busted us, it was deliberate, it was to get him to stop lying. Now can you leave me alone, it’s time for my lunch break.”

Since the OP has been pretty well debunked, can I just comment on this from the OP link:

“Kevin Finn said, “The Vice-President is a symbol of the United States, much like the American flag. For CNN to desecrate the image of the Vice President is the same as the Iranians burning the U.S. flag at a rally staged for the whole world via television. It is a slap in the face to all those who serve and have served in the armed forces”.”
:rolleyes: Honestly. While this wasn’t in fact a “desecration” of anything (and it would have been inapprproriate for CNN as an organisation to do so) the “desecration” of public officials (objecting to, ridiculing, not treating as sacred) is one of the things the flag stands for.

Although I would be happy to run Mr. Cheney up a flag poll if it would make Mr. Finn feel better.

Clearly, we are having a positive influence.

Obviously, CNN was trying to point out Mr. Cheney’s overwhelming influence in, & sympathy for, the African-American community.

Cheney X. Got a ring to it, doncha think?

:smiley: