While within the power-friendly environs of the corporate-funded Newseum, congressmembers John D. Rockefeller IV, Tim Pawlenty and Mary L. Landrieu probably felt pretty good about their ability to field such softballs from ABC's George Stephanopoulos as "What's the problem with the public health option?"

But upon leaving corporate TV's criticism-free zone, where such lies as Rockefeller's statement that "Medicare is gonna start going broke in 2017, which is like the day after tomorrow," pass completely unchallenged, they each were questioned by real-life journalist Sam Husseini of WashingtonStakeout.com (9/15/09).

Compare the treatment described above with Husseini's calm but determined questioning of the pols:

Sam Husseini: Health insurance mandates--don't they end up being a subsidy for the insurance companies, because you're mandating that people go out and buy their product?

Mary Landrieu: ...I'm not carrying water for the insurance companies....

SH: You say you're not carrying water, but your No. 1 contributor is JP Morgan Chase, PACs and individuals associated.... And you've precluded the Medicare-for-all type option. Why shouldn't somebody conclude that you are doing the bidding of the financial industry?

And to Rockefeller's platitude, "Don't worry about the insurance companies. Believe me, we're going to take care of them," Husseini responds in a most un-Stephanopoulos manner:

You say not to worry about the insurance companies, but even though you obviously come from a very wealthy family, you've raised money for your campaigns--the No. 1 sector, according to Open Secrets, is finance and insurance. Why shouldn't it be seen that a lot of people in Congress are in effect doing the bidding of the insurance companies?

The big news in the health reform debate is that the White House seems to be willing to give up on the "public option," a government insurance program that would compete with private insurers. Everyone sees this as a big story, but there's something revealing about the way the Washington Post's Ceci Conolly led her piece:

Racing to regain control of the health-care debate, two top administration officials signaled Sunday that the White House may be willing to jettison a controversial government-run insurance plan favored by liberals.

In Beltay mediaspeak, "regain control" must mean doing something that right-wing Democrats and Republicans want. The Post's Dan Balz already made this recommendation about the public option, writing on August 12, "Some of his staunchest allies believe that course would be prudent and might change the dynamic of the debate in the administration's favor." And on the roundtable segment on ABC's This Week on August 9, host George Stephanopoulos wondered if Obama would accept a watered-down bill in order to break with the "Howard Dean wing of the party." This notion was seconded by panelist Cokie Roberts, with right-wing columnist Peggy Noonan chiming in to say, "Maybe it would be good for the President if the left got absolutely furious about something."

So the health reform debate has shifted even further to the right--exactly where the corporate media wanted it.

Images of the U.S. media's longtime foe, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, with Obama at last weekend's Summit of the Americas in Trinidad prompted some corporate reporters to take the unusual step of questioning the political motivations behind an official photo-op.  On ABC's World News, Jake Tapper referred to Chavez's gift of The Open Veins of Latin America to Obama as a "stunt" (video available here).

George Stephanopoulos questioned whether Chavez was not just posing with Obama in order to take advantage of Obama's popularity. "You have to wonder who would win a popular vote between Obama and Chavez in Venezuela these days," Stephanopoulos stated in an early Sunday morning ABC News broadcast.

Yet, as even Miami Herald columnist Andres Oppenheimer--a Chavez critic--acknowledges in his latest column, "there are no recent polls on Obama's popularity in Venezuela." So just where does Stephanopoulos get the idea that Obama polls so favorably in Venezuela? Why, likely from Obama's own adviser on Latin America!

In an interview with Tapper broadcast on ABC, Jeffrey Davidow--a senior adviser to Obama on Latin American affairs and director of the Summit of the Americas, who is also president of the Institute of the Americas think tank, stated that Chavez

rushed photos of his handshake with president Obama on to his government's website, along with his express desire to be friends. That was for a reason.

There's a sizable population in Venezueala, probably the very, very vast majority of Venezuela Venezuelans, who have a more favorable attitude to president Obama than to him.

Tapper: You're saying president Obama is more popular in Venezuela than Chavez is?

Davidow: Yeah.

What better authority on what "probably the very, very vast majority of Venezuela Venezuelans" want than a White House senior advisor?

The pundit panel from Sunday's broadcast of ABC's This Week, introduced by the host:

GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS : And I am here for The Roundtable with George Will as always, Tom Friedman of the New York Times, former Speaker Newt Gingrich and Peggy Noonan of the Wall Street Journal.

The New York Times splashed the Barack Obama-Bill Ayers "connection" story on the front page of Saturday's paper. Obama's practically non-existent ties to former Weather Underground figure William Ayers have been the subject of endless speculation among folks like right-wing yakker Sean Hannity, who suggested to ABC's George Stephanopoulos that he should ask about Obama about Ayers in a debate (which Stephanopoulos subsequently did). So with a little more than a month left before the election, the Times grants 2,100 words to explaining... well, that "the two men do not appear to have been close." So why write the story in the first place? The Times offers one clue: "Their relationship has become a touchstone for opponents of Mr. Obama.... Conservative critics who accuse Mr. Obama of a stealth radical agenda have asserted that he has misleadingly minimized his relationship with Mr. Ayers."

In other words, the far right has deemed it newsworthy.

For bonus irony, we are treated to this from John McCain:

In a televised interview last spring, Senator John McCain, Mr. Obama’s Republican rival, asked, "How can you countenance someone who was engaged in bombings that could have or did kill innocent people?"