I hadn’t heard of Fox Business News anchor Melissa Francis before she devoted a segment to the Obamacare spike she experienced while working for CNBC during the Obamacare debates of 2009-2010. She reports that she was ordered by CNBC management to avoid criticism of the mystical math of Obamacare in deference to respect for the president. The video below excerpts her introductory personal account from the larger segment.
Could Francis’s report possibly be true? Circumstantial evidence certainly supports it. The networks’ coverage of Obamacare comports with Francis’s report of the spike. (Whether or not such a spike was necessary elsewhere is another question. I doubt it.) This is a point that Francis makes glancingly herself in the segment with reference to the veil of silence that shrouds the networks’ exploration of the Grubergate videos.
In the course of the segment Francis refers to CNBC’s response. CNBC’s response to Francis is reported by the New York Post’s Page Six reporter Emily Smith, and the response falls into the category of a Watergate-style nonresponse response. Smith quotes the CNBC spokesman: “That’s laughable, but we take notice, because as the fastest-growing network in prime time, we’re always on the lookout for high quality comedy writers and actresses.” Translation: Guilty, guilty, guilty.
Howard Kurtz devoted a segment to Francis’s report on his Fox News Media Buzz show yesterday. The segment is accessible here. He also discussed the veil of silence that has covers the Grubergate videos here.
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