CBS Caves Again, Will No Longer Air Edited Interviews After Noem Whined About Cuts To Hers
from the perpetual-extortion-guaranteed dept
CBS has decided it likes being in an abusive relationship. A few months ago, it laid the groundwork for perpetual extortion by settling a lawsuit with Donald Trump over allegedly deceptive editing of an interview with then-presidential candidate Kamala Harris. Trump claimed this was election interference and sued, despite winning the election, re-taking power, and using that power to get even with every person or entity he feels has wronged him.
The motivation for CBS wasn’t the money. It only agreed to donate $16 million to the Trump library, which should be more than enough to cover the costs of erecting a physical tribute to Trump’s artifice. Sure, someone may put a few books in there, but it’s pretty much guaranteed Trump will not have read any of them. The real motivation was greasing the wheels for administration approval of its $8 billion merger with Skydance.
CBS shouldn’t have bothered. All this did was open the door to more direct federal government interference with its day-to-day business, which has since seen CBS dump Stephen Colbert for being too critical of Trump, as well as agreeing to be a propaganda outlet for the Trump administration with the impending installation of an FCC-appointed “bias monitor” to ensure future programming treats Trump as a demigod, rather than the mere politician he actually is.
But too much is never enough for Trump and the GOP. Kristi Noem recently took to X to complain that some of her baseless smears of Kilmar Abrego Garcia — the highly visible face of the administration’s risible “eject all the brown people” deportation program — had been removed from the broadcast version of her interview on “Face the Nation.”
That Noem bellied up to the Nazi Bar to bitch about stuff most people realize is the reality of taped interviews (things get cut for time/clarity/etc. all the time) after CBS had already published a full transcript of the interview as well as the uncut recording didn’t matter to Noem, Trump, or any of their always ready-to-be-roused rabble.
And it apparently didn’t matter much to CBS, either. Rather than defending its perfectly normal editing techniques or pointing out that the things said in the cut portion were mostly baseless criminal accusations that weren’t backed by criminal convictions (much less filed criminal charges), CBS has given Trump and his buddies things they haven’t even asked for, ensuring this cycle of abuse will continue for as long as the GOP remains in power.
Days after complaints over the handling of an interview with Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem on “Face the Nation,” CBS News said Friday it would no longer allow editing of its guests’ words on the Sunday morning public affairs show.
[…]
Going forward, CBS said it would only broadcast live or live-to-tape interviews on the show, meaning guests’ statements could not be edited, subject to legal or national security restrictions. CBS said the change was made “in response to audience feedback.”
This wasn’t “audience feedback.” This was a powerful administration getting mad about stuff that happens to pretty much everyone who’s ever recorded a taped interview ever. And if there was any “audience feedback,” it came from people who truly seem to desire nothing but pro-Trump propaganda spewing from their TV sets, rather than have to endure things like facts, pointed questions, and journalists refusing to be government stenographers.
Even worse, CBS’s official explanation caters to exactly the wrong sort of people: bullies with executive-level power in the government and the be-hatted asshats that adore the velvety touch of a boot heel applied to their tongue/neck:
In its announcement, CBS News said the policy will allow for “greater transparency” in interviews.
Yeah, I mean… I guess. But CBS had already engaged in “greater transparency” by posting the entire Noem interview and transcript before Noem even started to complain about it. CBS already did the “transparency” thing. Allowing government officials to utilize CBS as a bullhorn for baseless claims and outright lies doesn’t serve the public interest.
But this administration doesn’t serve the public interest either. And it doesn’t want anyone getting in the way of its disservice. With this capitulation, CBS shows that even one of the largest corporations in the United States is unable to stand up to bullies, even though it has all of the law on its side. That’s extremely disheartening, especially when it appears even the system of checks and balances appears to be, for the most part, willing to be steamrolled into submission, if not actively engaged in supporting the rise of Republic authoritarianism.
Filed Under: bullshit, dhs, ice, kilmar abrego garcia, kristi noem, trump administration
Companies: cbs, cbs news, paramount
Comments on “CBS Caves Again, Will No Longer Air Edited Interviews After Noem Whined About Cuts To Hers”
OK, Yapping Authoritarian Jackass, we’ll have to stop here, we’re out of time for today. This has been CBS News.
Hey, CBS, you’re getting sued for not letting us yammer on forever.
Due to Audience Feedback, our news programs are now open-ended. Please disregard scheduling, any programming slot after the news may be edited for time.
[Local CBS affiliate cuts news short so Wheel of Fortune or whatever runs uninterrupted.]
Hey!
Fox News 2.0
CBS is really working overtime to ensure that only fools and/or the deluded will ever think that they’re a credible source of news going forward…
With this capitulation, CBS shows that even one of the largest corporations in the United States is unable to stand up to bullies, even though it has all of the law on its side
Call it what it is, don’t give them credit that they don’t deserve. They aren’t unable to stand up to the regime, they are unwilling to stand up to the regime.
The first implies a lack of capability, and wouldn’t be their fault. The latter implies a lack of desire, and absolutely is their fault.
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They Got Caught Again
Not Kamala Harris! She’s forever grateful that CBS chopped up her infamous word salad interview, to cut out the nonsensical parts and deceptive-edit it to make it sound better. Only Republicans have to take along their own film crews to an interview as an insurance policy.
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Did anyone understand that word salad? Can’t someone please edit it down so it maybe becomes understandable?
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The TLD;DR is that he doesn’t understand what editing is, and thinks that the edits to the Kamala interview last year were beneficial to her, while the edits to Noem’s weren’t.
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So, CBS made the same cut for Kamala and Noem, but it was positive for Kamala and turned Noem into a drama queen, and now CBS needs to make apologies for the latter.
Is it normal to you, Koby?
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Yes. Kamala wanted the edit, because the original made her look bad. Noem didn’t want the edit, because she hit a homerun with the original. CBS is rightful to apologize for bias. Creating policy to stop with the edits is an attempt to return to normal.
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You’re so fucking bad at lying, Koby. This all came out during the case: CBS released the full transcript and what they did was (1) not at the behest of Kamala Harris and (2) they did show basically the entirety of the response, though they showed two different versions of it. Both were cut for time AS REGULARLY HAPPENS, including with Donald Trump. Nothing in the edit was done to make Harris look better. Again, the full aspects of the quote was used, just two different versions of it that were cut differently for time.
Why do you always lie in the most obvious of ways?
And you FUCKING KNOW that if Biden had demanded Fox News change its editorial policies you would be SCREAMING from the rooftops about how it was a First Amendment violation.
You’re so transparently pathetic.
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Get back to me when they start releasing unedited versions of Trump’s interviews.
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I don’t know if I’ll able to stomach that, full length versions of Trump’s ramblings full of narcissistic and self gratulatory statements to bolsters his insecurity.
No thanks.
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Yes, of course. As we all know, President Harris won the election because they deceptively edited her footage because it was the only media coverage of the entire election and so many of her voters insisted after the fact that they wouldn’t have voted for her if the footage was raw, even though they wouldn’t have watched it all anyway. And now the Harris Regime is systematically bringing undue pressure against media companies and threatening to pull licenses and prevent mergers and sue outlets if they don’t publish more flattering reports about how she has the biggliest best presidency ever. So brave of you to speak out without fear that her stormtroopers will be knocking down your door at any moment and insisting that any criticism is evidence of communist indoctrination and Un-American activities!
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Hey, so when are we going to get the piss tapes?
Or what about every single trump interview uneditted?
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I never thought I’d live to see it. Admitting to yourself and everyone here that republicans need their own camera and editing crews to get past fact-checking(and reality for that matter) is a step in the right direction!
Add another complicit ‘legacy’ media platform to the ever growing list. History doesn’t look very kindly upon them, and the devil is in the details of how they were complicit.
Re: I seem to be in quotations mode these days...
… but damn if it hasn’t already all been said before:
Re: Re: I seem to be in quotations mode these days...
But honestly, you’d think that the people in the business of informing the general public would know (and understand) this — and how it applies to their own actions.
Proof, I guess, that wealth, power, even cleverness and profession, have very little to do with actual intelligence let alone wisdom.
Oh, well I’m sure that’ll work and nobody in the Trump Administration will get mad and blame CBS for looking bad in an interview again.
This would be a great time for any Dem on CBS to ask what Trump is hiding in the Epstein files. Just saying.
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“Why is Donald Trump trying to cover up a pedophile’s criminal acts?” should be a question every Democrat asks of every reporter from every network and news outlet every day.
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The Epstein victims are putting together a client list, so…
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Sadly, too many of the ‘Old Guard/Bribed’ Democrats (aka Vichycrat’s) in office are too comfortable in their ivory towers, the ones at the ground level of this mess are getting ignored if their voters or ‘reassigned to Antarctica’ if they’re in office.
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edit: they’re
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Absolutely, though somehow I expect that clip would be edited out before it was aired, ‘new policy’ be damned…
Idiocracy...
CBS turns into C-Span to please Trump…
cbs is now a propaganda farm. If you continue to work there I hope every horrible thing you support happens to your families.
In no universe does this not blow up in their face, either by an unedited interview of some MAGA shill making them look like a lunatic, or when they get caught editing a interview of some prominent Trump critic, despite their pledge not to.
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At least until they decide a government censor gets to have final editorial discretion over all political interviews. “Hey, that’s unconstitutional!” “Sure, so is much of what Trump’s getting away with.”
Re: Re: Just stop the obsession with Trump
Trump is a single person, and there are checks and balances and courts and separation of powers and ultimately the voting populace for reining a single person in.
The U.S., as a constitutional republic governed and controlled by and for its populace through the mechanisms and beliefs controlled by its constitution, has chosen to stop being a country abiding by that constitution.
Trump was just the person stepping into that void that the modern U.S. society created for itself.
He may be too old to witness in person the ultimate result of such a change that history tells us is “crash and burn”. In some respect, that is a pity.
I’m going to play the devils advocate and say this is actually a good thing. Why?
This way, when people like Noem go off on a racist Nazi rant, the whole world will see it, rather than have it buried in a printed transcript.
On the other hand, Trump supporters will then complain that CBS should have edited out racist rant since it wasn’t relevant.
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Yes. Kristi Noem is apparently in too deep to understand that the edit she’s so upset about was actually CBS doing* her a favor.
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The misconception you seem to be operating under is that anyone watching doesn’t already know exactly what sort of people the regime is filled with. They didn’t keep anyone in the dark as to what kind of person she is with the edit, and no-one will be surprised by more of the same going forward under the ‘no edits unless the regime wants them’ policy.
Only thing edited
Will be Anything trumpet says, Held over SO trump can get it Done INHOUSE.
Then rel4ease it.
And I agree that TYhey should have Unedited, No time limit debates with themselves ON live TV..
IF they will let you do it LIVE..
(THEY WONT)
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hmmm…editing to make someone look good or bad…sounds like censorship to me
Continuously flagging every right leaning comment-even those without profanity or name calling-while letting the left wingers thru is a bad look.
stay classy, Techdirt
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You MAGA folks always give the game away immediately. You just admitted that editorial discretion, a core 1st Amendment right, is something you consider censorship.
Of course, you don’t complain about how Fox News or the NY Post do much worst in using edits to mislead viewers/readers.
You don’t think editorial is censorship. You’re just a MAGA hack.
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Except editing is a normal practice since there’s limited time on a television program. It’s fine to say the full footage should be released online (and it was), but your assumption that it was done to make someone look good or bad…sounds like a confession about conservatives like Project Veritas that specifically edit footage for that purpose.
The flagging is a community thing. It is funny that you think profanity or name-calling are the reasons why right wing trolls get flagged though. It couldn’t possibly be due to the inhumane, bigoted, sociopathic sycophantic authoritarian beliefs they espouse. “It’s okay to be an authoritarian cheerleader as long as you don’t swear!”
So there should be no cuts to Dems’ interviews, either, meaning not everything is going to go Noem’s way.
Re: In theory yes. In practice...
The difference is that dems are much less likely to be spouting the kind of stuff that would have been cut, and not likely at all to take advantage of this new ‘opportunity’.
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Proving they said and did nothing that should have been cut, instantly giving them increased credibility over the Republiturds.