U. S. Senate candidate Andy Martin criticizes the hiring of outside “franchise” writers to provide content to NBC without any vetting, accountability or standards by NBC. Martin says NBC is becoming an increasingly left-wing news organization, perhaps shadowed by MSNBC’s Keith Olbermann and other agents of the hard left. Andy also says NBC’s own internal Chicago “political experts” Carol Marin and Mary Ann Ahern “eat what they are fed by Mark Kirk.”
ANDY MARTIN
Republican for U. S. Senator/2010
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November 5, 2009
Mr. Frank Whittaker
Vice President
WMAQ-TV
Chicago, IL 60611
via fax (312) 527-2470
Dear Mr. Whittaker:
What is happening to NBC News?
A couple of weeks ago, Carol Marin stole one of my stories and allocated it to my opponent. I guess that’s the definition of chutzpah. It sure ain’t the definition of “news.”
Then over the weekend Mary Ann Ahern said I didn't exist.
Guess what: I am the only candidate for United States Senator in the Republican party who has run statewide before (Mark Kirk hasn’t). I carried or nearly carried (close) 45 counties, and received almost a quarter of a million votes. Last year. Mary Ann Ahern is either corrupt or incompetent in ignoring my existence. Which is it?
The latest insult to the traditions of NBC News surfaced today. I was reading an entry on your web site “Mark Kirk Goes Rogue,”
http://www.nbcchicago.com/news/politics/Mark-Kirk-Goes-Rogue-69273997.html
and I was stunned to find at the end of the story it was posted by someone called Steve Rhodes who runs some sort of web site, The Beachwood Reporter. http://www.beachwoodreporter.com/
“Beachwood” is receiving money from outside sources to fund its operations. So NBC is using on its own web site “news” generated by someone who is being funded by third parties and reportage is by Steve Rhodes, whose journalistic credentials are nowhere to be found.
Who vets Mr. Rhodes’ views, credentials or qualifications? You are the VP of “News.” Do you know what Rhodes' credentials are? Do you know all of his funding sources? You are receiving “content” from an outside franchise without any apparent oversight from NBC management in Chicago. At least when we point the finger at Marin and Ahern we have some idea who signs their paychecks. Who signs Rhodes’ paycheck?
What’s left of NBC news? The more you hollow out the organization and “franchise” news to liberal local web sites, the less people will turn to you. At least when they read my Internet newspaper and blogs, www.ContrarianCommentary.com, they know who is writing and what our point of view is.
I am not in the business of defending Mark Kirk, “the Kirkster” as we call him, but when Kirk is attacked by someone who is obviously a typical liberal (Rhodes) then I am concerned by the increasingly left-wing slant of NBC News. Moreover, no one knows Rhodes’ credentials to be a political commentator, and nowhere are they stated either on your web site or his.
What if you were carrying my comments from http://www.contrariancommentary.com/, without any disclosure or attribution as a conservative? Would that be fair? I don’t think so. But then real conservatives have ethics and integrity; liberals don’t.
Rhodes claims to know Kirk has “internal polls,” which no one has previously stated Kirk has, and Rhodes then trashes Kirk’s opponents by claiming they are not “credible.”
The only genuine ”news" story Kirk has generated recently, ignored by the Marin/Ahern combo, was that the Kirkster issued a bogus "poll" listing all of his primary opponents except me.
I wonder if he left my name out because I am the only Republican who has run statewide before? Or maybe I was in the "internal poll" but not in the publicly released "poll?" A case of news management? 100% Would your political bloodhounds Marin and Ahern be interested in Kirk’s lacuna? Not at all. They are a press release service for Kirk. These dogs not only don't hunt, they eat what they are fed by Kirk and nothing else.
I have a more credible statewide voting record than Kirk, because I have run statewide and he hasn’t. When are you going to report the facts instead of merely parroting Kirk’s propaganda?
More and more people trust the media less and less. The Rhodes/Beachwood example is Class A evidence why so-called “mainstream” media are dying. You hire liberals to attack Republicans, and demand that Kirk remain a liberal or face criticism from Rhodes & Co. Rhodes in turn has his own political agenda, which is not balanced by any conservative voices. WMAQ-TV has become a one-sided liberal megaphone for the left.
I was hired by NBC News in 1967 and seriously considered accepting the offer. But the NBC News of 1967 no longer exists. People like Bill Corley are no longer welcome at NBC. NBC wants bubbleheads that steal stories and manifest total ignorance of politics as “political” commentators.
What you have today at NBC news is a dying franchise being operated by outside contractors. It’s sad.
Sincerely yours,
ANDY MARTIN
AM:sp
P. S. I personally wrote this letter, not some outside contractor.
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