I really hadn't wanted to write anything about the Salahis, the couple who apparently gate-crashed last week's White House dinner, because who would want to give such camera hogs even more attention? But alas here I am, writing about them.
Or more precisely, about NBC "News".
Michaele Salahi apparently harbors aspirations of "starring" on the Bravo cable channel's reality show, Real Housewives of D.C., and while she and her husband were entering the White House, they were followed by a Bravo camera crew.
Monday morning, the Today show, which, while generally fluffy infotainment, is a part of the news division, had the Salahis as guests. At no point in the interview -- or in the next day's followup -- did Matt Lauer mention that Bravo and NBC are corporate siblings, both part of NBC Universal. In fact, both are based in New York's Rockefeller Center.
As reported by Brian Stelter in today's New York Times, "Both NBC and the couple say that they received no money for appearing on the 'Today Show.' An NBC staff member suggested Wednesday that the couple selected Mr. Lauer in a good-will gesture to NBC and, by extension, Bravo."
According to Stelter, NBC's Nightly News, when reporting on the issue Tuesday, "did note the corporate connection".
Did the corporate connection affect the questions that Mr. Lauer posed? Probably not. But wouldn't you feel more confident about it if you had known the connection ahead of time rather than after the fact?
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
.jpg)
No comments:
Post a Comment