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CNN Talkback Live

Did Osama Bin Laden Get a Face Lift?

Aired December 19, 2001 - 15:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: All the networks know that. I know that. Many of the people in the media know that. Millions and millions of people who are watching us right now know that.

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TUCKER CARLSON, HOST: Meet the media insider whose expose leaves network execs fuming.

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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They routinely call people out there in America -- out there in the audience -- white trash.

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CARLSON: Are you fuming yet? Also, the changing face of Osama Bin Laden on the run. Did he shave his beard, get a nose job? Botox? Think of the possibilities.

Welcome to TALKBACK LIVE: AMERICA SPEAKS OUT. I'm Tucker Carlson.

There's a lot of talk today about Osama Bin Laden's new look, not that anyone has seen it. Just a lot of speculation that he has undergone some sort of makeover to avoid capture. We will talk about that a lot later in the show.

We have "Atlanta Journal-Constitution" editorial cartoonist Mike Luckovich, winner of the Pulitzer Prize. He's going to work on Bin Laden's image and see what he thinks might make a good disguise. We'll be checking with him throughout the hour.

But first, let's talk about slanting the news. Which way do you think it leans? What about reporters, editors anchors. and other journalists? Are any of them objective?

Meet Bernie Goldberg, a former CBS correspondent and currently something of a persona non grata at the networks. His new book, "Bias: a CBS Insider Exposes How the Media Distort the News" has managed to make more than a few network execs squirm. Also with us, Hal Bruno, the former political director with ABC News. Now Mr. Goldberg, first to you. All the network and anchors have denied explicitly, again and again, being biased in any way. What is your evidence that they are?

BERNARD GOLDBERG, FORMER CBS CORRESPONDENT: Well, the fact that they deny it means nothing, obviously. The evidence is that -- the way they see the world, the way they -- you know, I'm hearing -- I'm sorry, I'm hearing myself coming back in this. I'm going to have to turn this down.

The evidence is the way they see the world. They see conservatives very clearly, but they don't see liberals. They identify conservatives as right-wing Republicans, as right-wing Christians, as right-wing radio talk show hosts, right-wing Miami Cubans.

But the only time you ever hear the term left wing out of these peoples' mouths is if they're talking about a part of a airplane. It's how they see the big issues of our time, whether it's feminism, whether it's gay rights, whether it's race, whether it's even homelessness. That's -- that's where the liberal bias comes in.

CARLSON: Now, Hal Bruno, in Mr. Goldberg's book he makes an interesting point. Study after study after study shows that the majority of the news media -- particularly at the networks -- vote Democratic. Mr. Goldberg says, look, if the majority of the media were Midwestern Republicans, would it affect the coverage? Maybe on the margins it would. Yes, it probably would. Is that -- I mean...

HAL BRUNO, FORMER POLITICAL DIRECTOR, ABC NEWS: Not really. It wouldn't affect it in the slightest. First of all, we are professional journalists. Most of my colleagues that I worked with in 50 years in journalism, including 20 years at ABC News, weren't anything. They were mostly middle of the road. Whatever they were, they left it at home when they came to work.

I worked 15 years with Peter Jennings, every single day on all programs that had anything to do with political coverage. Never once did I have any problems at all with any kind of political bias. It just wasn't there.

GOLDBERG: Well...

CARLSON: Peter Goldberg, what are the orthodoxies? What are the things that are taken for granted?

Well, let me -- let me just answer Hal for a second. With all due respect, Hal, during the impeachment hearing all the senators went up in the Senate to sign an oath book to swear that they would be fair and impartial.

Peter Jennings was doing a live play-by-play. He identified every conservative who went up to sign that oath book as a conservative. He said there is Senator Santora, a conservative from Pennsylvania. There is Senator Smith, a conservative from New Hampshire. Every conservative who went up there, Peter Jennings identified and rightly so. Because the audience needed to know that these conservatives had an axe to grind.

They were conservative. And during impeachment, that was going to matter. But then when every liberal went up, Senator Boxer was simply Senator Boxer from California. When -- when Senator Schumer went up, Senator Schumer was simply Senator Schumer from New York. When Senator Daschle went up he was simply Senator Daschle from South Dakota.

Now, Hal, did you miss that or do you not think that's an example of liberal bias?

BRUNO: Well, I don't think it's an example of liberal bias. And I -- I do not recall such a thing happening.

GOLDBERG: Well, it happened.

BRUNO: But if you say it happened I -- I won't argue with you. But I know that over a period of all these years in -- you know, I can only speak for ABC News. I cannot talk about the internal workings of other networks because I don't know.

But I know from the very top all the way on down at ABC, not only was there not a bias, but we constantly were on the alert to make sure that no bias creeped into our coverage.

And I was directly in charge of the political coverage. We always had a saying in my political unit when the campaign started, we don't care who wins or loses. All we want to do is get it right.

GOLDBERG: Hal, I'm not saying there's a conspiracy. I'm not saying that people go out and -- and try to get conservatives. That they walk in in the morning, they go into a dark room, they pull out a piece of paper with their liberal agenda on it and say, "how can we screw conservatives today?"

I'm not saying that at all. But I just gave you a pretty example, Hal, and you're saying, "Well, I don't know anything about it." That's not much of an answer. Your successor, by the way, Mark Halprin -- your successor Mark Halprin says flat out, on the record, there is liberal bias at ABC News. Now, you could all sit around...

BRUNO: Well, I don't agree with my successor.

GOLDBERG: I understand that. You could all sit around and make believe that it isn't the case. It doesn't matter whether I think it's the case. What matters is what your audience thinks is the case. And you're losing audience by the truckload. Twenty years ago...

BRUNO: I don't think that's the reason that the networks.

GOLDBERG: That's one of the reasons.

BRUNO: I think so much of it is in the eye of the beholder, which I realize is a cliche. Let me give you an example. In 1988 we had a presidential campaign in which Michael Dukakis, the Democrat, ran a very bad campaign and he lost. George bush, the Republican, ran a very smart campaign. It was his personal best as a campaigner.

When the election ended, there were all kind of stories and panels and postmortems being done on how biased the media was in favor of Bush against Dukakis.

Four years later, the media bias was supposed to be in favor of Clinton. He ran a smart campaign. Bush lost, ran a dumb campaign this time. And again, this time the media bias shifted the other way. The truth is our coverage reflects the campaign that's there and our coverage reflects the story that we're covering.

GOLDBERG: My guess is -- and tell me if I'm wrong -- but my guess is you haven't read the book at all. You haven't opened a page of the book. Because I make the point...

BRUNO: I have read excerpts of the book.

GOLDBERG: Right. You've read excerpts from newspapers, probably. I make the point that this is not about politics. You see, you live in a political world. And Peter Jennings and Tom Brokaw and Dan Rather live in political words. And frankly you think the world revolves around politics, as do many journalists in Washington. It doesn't.

BRUNO: But I don't live in that world.

CARLSON: We're going to -- we're going to have to go to a quick commercial. We will be back in just a minute with you, Mr. Goldberg and you, Mr. Bruno. But first, before we go, let's take a look at what Mike Luckovich has decided Osama Bin Laden might look like right now. We will be right back.

ANNOUNCER: If you are in the Atlanta area and you would like free tickets to the show call: 1-800-410-4CNN.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CARLSON: Welcome back to TALKBACK LIVE. We are talking about media bias today with two long-time veterans of the network news.

Bernie Goldberg, we -- we have a sort of interesting e-mail here that says -- and it's addressed to you -- that says "Saying that the press is biased is certainly true, but saying it's all biased to the left is a misstatement."

Since September 11, this writer sees a bias to a right. Do you, and do you think it's a problem?

GOLDBERG: No, I think -- by the way, I do think the media did a wonderful job on September 11th. They gave us the news straight. They gave us the facts. They gave it to us without the attitude. And it's -- it's too bad that it took a national tragedy of such monumental proportions to get them to be empathetic and give us the news straight.

But when it comes to the big social issues, when it comes to recognizing conservatives but not recognizing liberals -- which, amazingly -- amazingly -- Hal Bruno doesn't think is an example of liberal bias. Well, that's the problem.

CARLSON: Well, Hal Bruno, let ask me you this. And honestly, what percentage of -- of the news media -- the network news media -- how about just ABC News -- is pro-choice? It's got to be above 80, don't you think?

BRUNO: Well, we have a tremendous number of women that have come into journalism in the last 20 years...

CARLSON: But not all women...

BRUNO: ...and most women tend to be pro-choice. So I would have to say -- obviously, I'd say a majority of the people who work in the news -- not just at ABC, but who work in the news -- are pro-choice. But I think the majority of the country probably is pro-choice too.

CARLSON: Well, actually, I mean...

BRUNO: But we still...

CARLSON: Hold on. And you don't think, first of all, that 80 -- the percentage of pro-choice people at ABC is greater than that in the country and B, that it -- you don't think that would affect coverage of abortion at all?

BRUNO: No. And I'll tell you why. Because I was in charge of our coverage at the time the abortion issue came back to life in the late 1980s. And we were very, very conscious of what the dangers might be in covering this story. We had to make sure that both sides got the same kind of treatment. And we went to great lengths to make sure that that happened. And it did happen. On all of our programs.

I always took great pride in the fact that people who worked for me and myself, as well, and most of the people at ABC, had the respect of people on all sides. That the right-to-life people, the pro-choice people knew that when they were in touch with us, they were going to be treated fairly.

The same thing is true in our dealing with the people in politics, whether they were conservative or liberal, Republican or Democrat. They knew that when they talked to us, and when they came to ABC, they were going to be treated fairly.

CARLSON: Do you buy that, Bernie Goldberg?

GOLDBERG: Well, I say this with -- I want to make clear -- I say this with all due respect. I'm sure Hal -- I don't know him personally -- but I'm sure he's a wonderful guy. I know he's very competent. I'm sure he loves his family and gives money to charity. But he is delusional. He is absolutely delusional. Hal Bruno is part of the problem, not part of the solution. When -- and I -- here is why I say it.

BRUNO: Well, he is an ideolologue and he accuses everybody else has to be the same as him. The rest of us are not ideologues. He's the ideologue.

GOLDBERG: What ideology would I have, Hal?

BRUNO: Well, apparently you must be a conservative. Are you?

GOLDBERG: Oh, you see, that interesting.

CARLSON: Did you vote for Ronald Reagan?

GOLDBERG: That's interesting. Because Hal didn't read the book, I'll just help him out. I'm pro-choice. I'm pro-gay rights. I'm very liberal on many, many issues.

I grew up in a solidly Democratic family in the South Bronx. My father worked in a factory. I never went to -- to private school one single day in my whole life. I -- I don't think I've ever been to a country club even as an adult.

So there's nothing in my background that would indicate that. But this is what happens when you talk about liberal bias. You must be an ideologue. You must -- well, why? Why am I an ideologue? Because I'm criticizing liberal bias. Hal, maybe you're the ideologue from the left. Did you ever think of that?

BRUNO: Well, you know, you're the one that said that I -- that we associated a world only of our own people. And that's nonsense. Away from work I was a volunteer firefighter for 40 years. My best friends were the people I served with on the fire department. I'm retired now from journalism. I'm chairman of the National Fallen Firefighters Foundation.

GOLDBERG: Do you think...

BRUNO: We are embroiled in things that affect everybody's life every single day. So when you spin off a silly thing like I'm delusional or that I don't know what the other rest of the world is like because I only associate with liberal journalists, that's nonsense.

GOLDBERG: Do you think those firefighters think there's a liberal bias?

BRUNO: Beg your pardon?

GOLDBERG: Do you think some of those firefighters -- many of them think there is a liberal bias?

BRUNO: I think some do. Certainly.

(CROSSTALK)

BRUNO: And a certain number of people do believe that.

GOLDBERG: And do you think it's because they are ideologues?

BRUNO: Yes. Well, I -- no. I don't think it's because of that reason. But I think everybody has their viewpoint and they tend to view the media in the viewpoint that they are coming from.

GOLDBERG: Well, why did you say I'm an ideologue, then?

BRUNO: I always used to have a saying -- for many years I had to cover the Middle East. And no matter what you the wrote, you got angry letters from one side or the other. There was no way that -- that people wouldn't think were you biased.

And on the same story, you would get -- you would get, you know, angry letters from both sides. And I came to believe if everybody was mad at you, you're probably doing something right.

CARLSON: OK. Well, on that note about anger, we're going to take a quick break here on TALKBACK LIVE. We'll return in just a moment to answer the question: is the press biased? We'll be back in just a minute.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CARLSON: Welcome back to TALKBACK LIVE. We're talking about media bias. But first we want to talk about Osama Bin Laden. Reports filtering back to the United States in the last couple of days suggest he may have undergone plastic surgery.

We wondered what would it look like if we did. So we asked Mike Luckovich, the editorial cartoonist of the "Atlanta Journal- Constitution" to come in and give us his conception of what Osama might look like.

MIKE LUCKOVICH, EDITORIAL CARTOONIST: All right. Well, I've drawn Osama here fairly naturally. And I -- I derive great pleasure from ridiculing this turd. So -- so this is a lot of fun for me.

And I was imagining how he's going to look and I drew this composites. What I'm going to need you to do, Tucker, is after the show I'm going to need you to bring these to Pakistan to the forces on ground so that they'll be able to pick him out of a crowd.

CARLSON: I'll write to Tora Bora.

LUCKOVICH: Now, the first one we see Tom Cruise and Penelope Cruz together, but with a wig on and -- and a nice dress. I'm just wondering if -- if Osama could actually be Penelope. Is he duping Tom Cruise?

CARLSON: Very -- they'd make it in the Oscars. Very clever.

LUCKOVICH: You know, that's something to think about. Now, they've said that plastics -- plastic surgeons may have come across the border and actually operated on -- on Osama in -- in the caves. So if they just moved his rather long nose out front they could do something like this. Maybe do a little something with his hair, and then you have Osama "Big Bird" Laden. So they need to be looking out for -- for him.

And now finally -- finally, what I'm thinking that he may have done is got an al Qaeda operative to sit on his shoulders. And then they both wear a big sheet, and Osama pokes his head out of it. And you see a plate here and a -- a border guard is saying, "Let this man pass. He's got Osama's head on a platter." The old costume trick. It's the oldest al Qaeda trick in the book.

CARLSON: The old two-headed horse. Well, that that is fantastic. I hope you didn't give him any ideas. Mike Luckovich, thank you very much.

LUCKOVICH: Thank you, Tucker.

CARLSON: OK. We are back to the question of media bias with Hal Bruno and Bernie Goldberg. Mr. Goldburg, there was a fascinating section in your book where you suggested -- I don't know how much length you went into on it -- but you talked about conflicts arising out of corporate ownership of the networks.

You gave example where earlier this January the "Wall Street Journal" printed a piece about GE aircraft engines that had had problems, and you pointed out that that story was not reported on the NBC nightly news, which is of course owned by GE. Can you offer other examples? Is this a widespread problem, do you think?

GOLDBERG: No. That was really a minor, minor point. The point I was making is Tom Brokaw went on the air to criticize me, saying, "you shouldn't attack your own company."

And I just wondered when I wrote -- when I started to write this, I just wondered would Tom Brokaw attack -- attack I'm putting in quotation marks -- his own company if, let's say, GE made faulty engines. Of course, by accident made faulty engines.

Well, it turns out after I wrote that that there was a page one "Wall Street Journal" piece that was picked up by at least a dozen newspapers around the country where GE -- there were cracks in GE engines that are on wide-body airplanes and tens of thousands of people are getting on these airplanes after day.

And I did some checking and Tom Brokaw didn't report it. So I said, you know, he -- he thought I was attacking my company by writing about liberal bias and he didn't attack his own GE company by reporting the news about airplane engines that affect so many Americans.

CARLSON: Hal?

BRUNO: I'm very concerned about corporate ownership of networks and news organizations, period. And that's been a trend in the last ten years. And what I'm concerned about is, I liked it better in the days when the ownership of newspapers, of magazines, of networks, was in the hands of people whose prime concern was journalism.

My concern with journalism today is not what Bernie is talking about, bias. My concern is a lack of leadership, a lack of training, a lack of discipline. We have had an influx of people into journalism whose first commitment is perhaps not journalism and who have not had the training...

CARLSON: Well, but wait a second. Hal Bruno...

BRUNO: ...appreciation, the love of journalism that's necessary to carry out this wonderful profession.

CARLSON: But -- if I could just point out -- weren't -- there were a number of early television anchors who were also cigarette pitch men. And also...

BRUNO: Beg pardon? I couldn't hear that.

CARLSON: I said there a number of early television anchors who also pitched products on the air.

BRUNO: Yes, and that was a bad practice.

CARLSON: So but I mean, in some sense hasn't it improved, I guess, since the 1950s?

BRUNO: Well, that's -- that's one aspect, perhaps, that has improved. But journalism today, I think, is suffering from a lack of -- a lack of discipline and a lack of training.

One refreshing thing -- and it's terrible that a tragedy had to bring it about. I have been very impressed with the job that these young reporters -- men and women -- are doing from Afghanistan. I think they're doing a superb job of reporting. As a person who at one time covered the war and revolution beat, I have great admiration for what they're doing under very difficult circumstances.

CARLSON: Mr. Goldberg, really quickly, I'm wondering if your book doesn't overstate the influence of the three big television networks. I mean, since 1996, when you wrote your first piece for the "Wall Street Journal" essentially attacking CBS, the world has changed. There are so many more outlets for people to get news. And I'm wondering if the networks are less important than they were.

GOLDBERG: That's a very good point. The networks are less important than they were, given that Fox is around, for instance, and that there is the Internet that's around. But when Hal says, you know, I'm worried about other things. I'm not worried about this issue of liberal bias, that is one of reasons the networks are less important. They are far less relevant today than they were ten years ago...

CARLSON: I'm afraid we have interrupt you both. Mr. Bruno, Mr. Goldberg, thank you both. We have go now to Daryn Kagan here in Atlanta, who will take us to the Pentagon briefing, thanks -- Daryn.

(INTERRUPTED FOR CNN COVERAGE OF A LIVE EVENT)

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