Why media denigrated Trump convention

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Why media denigrated Trump convention

Press largely pans president's speech.

This is a rush transcript from "Media Buzz," August 30, 2020. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.

HOWARD KURTZ, FOX NEWS ANCHOR: This is “Media Buzz.” I'm Howard Kurtz. We have got a packed line-up today, including Trump campaign Press Secretary Hogan Gidley, pollster Frank Luntz, and Congresswoman Debbie Dingell. If you needed one phrase to contrast the media coverage of the Republican and Democratic conventions, it would be this, night and day.

That was especially true after President Trump delivered his acceptance speech to very mixed media reviews, including the staging at the White House.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Biden is not a savior of America's soul. He is the destroyer of America's jobs. And if given the chance, he will be the destroyer of American greatness. Your vote will decide whether we protect law abiding Americans or whether we give free rein to violent anarchists and agitators and criminals.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What we saw tonight was a disservice to the American people. It was a cheapening and a devaluing of the people's house.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It was such a stark contradiction between the carefully scripted message of this campaign to reach out to those remaining undecideds and independents, and then what Donald Trump delivered, which is fear mongering.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It was an incredible and an electric speech by the president. Some saying it was a little too long. But this was his moment. And he connected with this audience here and across the country.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: All the big arguments were there, the main messages is -- the biggest of all I think was this basic positioning of the election choice, which is that the Republicans are pro-America and the Democrats are anti-America.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's Joe Biden's fault for the American carnage that has spread across the United States of America, despite the fact that Mr. Biden has not been in the White House for four years and he has.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KURTZ: The overall tone of the coverage was sharply negative, beginning when the president gave his speech in North Carolina the first day.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What we have just heard from the president was a grievance-filled informal acceptance speech that was filled with so many made up problems about mail-in voting that if we were to air just the truthful parts, we probably could only air maybe a sentence, if that much.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It was a night of revisionist history here at the Republican national convention, filled with an alternative reality.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KURTZ: Joining us now to analyze the coverage in Seattle, Emily Compagno, host of the Fox Nation show, Crimes that Changed America, and here in D.C., Susan Ferrechio, chief congressional correspondent for the Washington Examiner, and Philippe Reines, a former State Department official under Hillary Clinton. Emily, many pundits are casting President Trump's attacks on Biden as way over the top.

Such as you won't be safe in Joe Biden's America, by saying, well, he's been president for nearly four years, and this is happening in Donald Trump's America, fair point?

EMILY COMPAGNO, FOX NEWS CONTRIBUTOR: Right, fair point. That's exactly what the coverage is doing. And I note as well that there are different viewpoints on what to be optimistic about. So in his attacks on Joe Biden, they said he was the one that was part of the government when there was relative peace and prosperity, quote, "and eight years of economic growth."

When they say that now, President Trump, quote, "defiant and dark as ever," are levying Joe Biden as the source of the problems.

KURTZ: Yeah. Philippe, what's lost in the media outrage at the Republicans and their rhetoric -- because there were a lot of apocalyptic attacks at the Democratic convention last week. Joe Biden and others saying that President Trump's re-election would threaten American democracy. So with so much vitriol on each side, each guy saying the other would take the country into a hell-scape, is there any chance that this cancels each other out?

PHILIPPE REINES, FORMER HILLARY CLINTON ADVISER: Well, you know, polling this morning released by ABC does not bear that out. It does seem that Joe Biden did himself more good than Donald Trump did. His favorability rating basically improved a little bit, he being Vice President Biden. Donald Trump stayed, even or to some extent, lowered.

So it really depends what they're trying to do. I would take note, though, that what's very interesting about the conventions is how much it sidelined the media. So while we're discussing the media's role in it, you know, the clips you just ran, whether they were from Fox or CNN or MSNBC, they all ran at 11:30, midnight, or 6:00 in the morning.

From, you know, I guess, 7:00 or 8:00 p.m. until 11:30 p.m. Both parties had a stretch of time, really almost without interruption, where, you know, you can't buy that kind of time. That's like buying, you know, 1,000 30- second commercials in a row. So to some extent --

(CROSSTALK)

KURTZ: We call them info in infomercials.

(CROSSTALK)

REINES: Yeah, well, exactly. And that's the best -- you only get that once a year.

KURTZ: There was some exceptions -- I'll come back to that later. But Susan, a major media criticism, as you know, was the gathering at the White House of more than 1,500 people, shoulder to shoulder, mostly not wearing masks and the use of the White House as a political backdrop, valid issues. But was there too much coverage of those issues?

SUSAN FERRECHIO, WASHINGTON EXAMINER: Well, I think it's important to cover it. It would have been absolutely negligent if the media didn't talk about this unprecedented move to use the White House. But the covert (ph) clearly in terms of whether or not it does violates any laws and who might be subjected to that prosecution. I think that's all fair game for us to cover.

And it's also fair game to talk about people sitting in close quarters, out on the White House lawn during a pandemic, a lot of them weren't wearing masks. All fair game. But I think you also have to have some context and perspective that I thought was missing here, which is that, you know, there have been an awful lot of protests and marches, including one that took place just this weekend in Washington, D.C., where there are lots of crowds and people not wearing masks. And again, the media is not really talking about that.

(CROSSTALK)

KURTZ: That hardly gets mentioned. That's a very astute point. Emily, we heard the president, Vice President Pence and others say that Joe Biden is a Trojan horse. That was a favorite phrase. Also, that was talked about with other speeches -- Don Jr. Coverage again basically has been that Biden is just going to be a tool or vehicle for Bernie Sanders, AOC, and others in the left wing Democratic Party.

Despite the fact that he doesn't hold many of the same positions on, for example, Medicare for all or de-funding the police, your thoughts?

COMPAGNO: Well, I think that's exactly the point, that the Biden that we used to know in the eight years that he was holding the vice presidency. He held different positions than he had started to further now. And so the argument is that he has in fact become, yes, a catalyst, a mouthpiece for that far left portion of the party.

And that's why he's considered a Trojan horse for the same now. Were he to hold the office of the presidency, then he would in fact further the most radical position of the party, which he used to occupy a more centrist role. And it's clear by the policies that he's put forth that he has changed. This isn't just him supporting.

This is actually him putting forth policies that were far left prior to him taking that position as the vice president.

KURTZ: Well, Philippe, I mean, Biden has moved somewhat to the left. But he got hammered by a lot of the press during the primaries for not being liberal enough and taking -- and resisting some of this. But I think there is a general tendency in the media to defend him almost instinctively against these GOP attacks.

REINES: Well, I think the problem are the nature of the GOP attacks. You know, for these things to work, there has to be some kind of underlying foundation, even if it's only a kernel of reality that they can then blow up. If people don't see Joe Biden as a liberal, as a lefty, certainly not to the extent that they, you know, might see Bernie Sanders or Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.

Then this is a waste of time. I mean, the larger point seems to be that the president and his campaign of the GOP are throwing spaghetti at the wall. First, it was China. Now, it continues to be his health, his mental acuity. And it's this liberal attack, and it doesn't seem to be taking hold. And that's because there's just no there-there.

The most recent thing someone's going to think about Joe Biden is that he was not for de-funding America.

KURTZ: De-funding the police.

REINES: I'm sorry, de-funding the police.

(CROSSTALK)

KURTZ: Susan, theres' strikingly a little talk, at least according to the media to give mention about COVID-19. Melania Trump did talk about it. Larry Kudlow talked about it in the past tense. The president said there will be a vaccine by the end of the year. With 180,000 Americans dead, the media reaction is how can the pandemic not have gotten more attention?

FERRECHIO: Well, I think he did. The president talked about ways that the country's going to move forward from the pandemic. This is a political convention. This was about what Trump wants to do in his next four years. This is about the president getting re-elected. It's kind of odd that the media would expect the president to take -- use the convention with sort of a gloom and doom. We're in a pandemic. Everybody's suffering.

The president has always taken an optimistic view that we're going to survive this. It's going to eventually go away. The economy's going to bounce back. And he gets so much criticism for that. But that's just been the way he's governed. And I think it makes perfect sense that that's the way the convention operated. Just keep it as something looking forward, something positive.

Here's how we can come up with a vaccine and treatments. And they did that during the convention.

KURTZ: All right. All right, lightning round here because we're short on time. Now, by the last two nights, MSNBC was putting on a counter convention. Rachel Maddow and company breaking in half dozen times a night, not just for fact-checks, but to denigrate some of the speakers -- bring on somebody like former Obama official, Ben Rhodes. Here's what happened after the speech by former Ambassador Rick Grenell.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He is spinning plates with really some of the wackiest conspiracy theories that have been pedalled. Ben, this falls under the category of false, misleading, and pretty dangerous.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yeah, Nicolle. I'm not even sure where to start.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KURTZ: Emily, how does a network justify that when it ran the DNC virtually without interruption?

COMPAGNO: Well, that goes back to Philippe's point about the media sort of elbowing their way in to ensure that they are grabbing some of that time, that it is not an uninterrupted infomercial for the GOP. And secondly, I think this is not a new debate. And there really isn't an argument that, yes, fact-checking skews toward GOP.

But really, the key is the amplification of such, both in media and also on social media. I mean, it goes -- remember 2013 with Michele Bachmann. The fact-checkers argued, well, it's not our fault there's great material. So I think this is not a new aspect.

KURTZ: Philippe, I'm all for aggressive fact-checking when speakers stray from the truth. But it seems to me the standards should be the same. CNN also did a lot of fact-checking with a journalist-led panel. Fox News came on at 10:00 Eastern with Bret Baier and Martha MacCallum leading the coverage. My question to you is, is there any question that the Democratic convention got far more sympathetic treatment overall from the media than the Republicans did?

REINES: It's a huge question, because this is very simple. The approach to both parties by all three major networks and every media outlet should be fair and equal. Meaning, there should be the same criteria, that if you maul a fact that you correct a fact. That is their responsibility. If the Republicans, and particularly Donald Trump, maul and trample over many, many, many, many more facts and tells outright lies than Joe Biden and the Democratic convention.

Then you can't compare the volume as the litmus test for fairness. It's the approach that's important. And to go back to something Susan said earlier, noting about the masks in the audience --

(CROSSTALK)

KURTZ: -- very briefly.

REINES: I was going to say that, you know, it's such a -- Donald Trump is such a visually-oriented person. There were American flags everywhere. It's so well staged. And he knows he has a problem even with his own party about pandemic management. It's so self defeating to not have masks in the audience. Like, I understand why he doesn't want to wear a mask --

(CROSSTALK)

KURTZ: I have got to get a break. I have got to get a break here. By the way, the Democrats did draw more on the TV ratings than Republicans. But both were way down from four years ago. Ahead, the Trump campaign's Hogan Gidley will be here, when we come back, the coverage of the GOP convention and the riots in Kenosha.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KURTZ: One person wearing a patriot prayer hat was shot and killed in Portland last night as pro-Trump demonstrators rally in the city and clash with counter protesters. This happened days after the police shooting of Jacob Blake in Kenosha, Wisconsin, and that -- and the subsequent riots that followed have become such a major issue you that Vice President Pence added it to his convention speech.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

VICE PRESIDENT MIKE PENCE: Last week, Joe Biden didn't say one word about the violence and chaos engulfing cities across this country. So let me be clear. The violence must stop, whether in Minneapolis, Portland, or Kenosha.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KURTZ: Biden did address Blake being shot in the back. There's a lot we don't know about that. And the 17-year-old charged with murdering two people during the riots in a video and with MSNBC's Andrew Mitchell and CNN's Anderson Cooper.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOE BIDEN, DEMOCRATIC PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: By the way, I condemned violence in any form, whether it's looting or whatever it is. These guys are rooting for violence. That's what it is all about. To prove that you shouldn't be scared with Joe Biden they're pointing out what's happening in Donald Trump's America.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I thought that Mike Pence might have something having to say about the shooting of that young man in Kenosha, but instead, again, his focus was on the notion of violence.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Apparently, the chief suspect, a 17-year-old, is a supporter of President Trump, which is why I find it kind of surprising that the continued language about mobs in the street has been used.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I am shocked that the Democrats only now seem to be waking up to the fact that violence is a problem.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The Democrats have dropped the ball on this. They didn't bring it up during the DNC. And they thought, well, its President Trump's America and the unrest is going to be pinned on him.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KURTZ: Emily, perfectly fair for Trump and Pence to bring up the Kenosha violence, fair to say that Joe Biden and the Democrats didn't discuss the earlier riots at their convention. But some journalist criticizing the Republicans -- and Ben Carson was the one exception, for not talking about the Jacob Blake shooting at their convention.

COMPAGNO: Those are fair points. I will say that in -- to take a step back from the media's coverage, I think what is so difficult for reasonable, normal people to swallow is that kind of cherry-picking and really utilization for political points, the entire coverage. I just spent the last week in Portland and outside of it.

And everyone there just the normal, reasonable people were sort of begging for just a reasonable coverage, where it's OK to discuss inequities in America and what needs to be done about it, while also decrying violence of all forms and requesting peace on the streets without having the, quote, "phrase, law and order" be construed as a racially-tinged euphemism.

So I think that's where the media right there is failing in terms of that cherry-picking and really staccato machine gunning of all of those points for their benefit.

KURTZ: Right. We see cherry-picking on both sides, of course. Philippe, many journalists are saying Joe Biden left himself vulnerable by having a four-day convention where there was no talk at all about the riots that have consumed the country's attention and so much media coverage, but focusing only on racial injustice.

REINES: Yeah. Well, I think the start is important to note that the timelines, the Democrats went a week earlier. So to whatever extent that this has taken on momentum and gotten larger or gotten more intense, that's something the Democrats couldn't foresee. But I think what's important to note here is exactly what Emily said. There's something here for everyone.

And to the polls that I referenced this morning, after the George Floyd killing, you had 74 percent of Americans, which included a very high percentage of Republicans, who were not supportive of the president's handling of the incident. And in general, were noting that how racial justice in America is handled as unequal.

After the Republican convention and after Jacob Blake, you have a situation where those numbers have gone way down. You have now, I think, 62 percent of Republicans and whites, whites across all ideological bends, believing it. So unfortunately, to whatever extent, there's a Republican strategy to stress law and order by pressing

-- even though it's law and under a land that, as earlier noted, under President Trump, to whatever extent that's their key or one of their keys, one of their buttons they're going to push, it is working marginally. And that's unfortunate because it's a difficult situation --

(CROSSTALK)

KURTZ: -- New York Times columnist, Nick Kristof, tweeting today that Trump has incited violence and clashes from Kenosha to Portland. CNN analyst Ron Brownstein, this -- talking about Portland, this is Trump -- what Trump not only unleashes but promotes, vigilante violence. Are those criticisms fair?

FERRECHIO: You know, I think the public can see with their own eyes what's going on. And to Philippe's point, about why the polls have changed, I think the polls have changed on this. And they have dramatically, because of the evolution of this thing, from the time George Floyd was killed until now, the spreading violence, the increasing violence, the persistent violence.

The lack of leadership of these local Democratic governments in getting law and order, getting things under control, has driven home the very message that the Republicans and the president put forward, which is that the Democrats are not getting control of this. And that if you elect Joe Biden, there's going to be still no control over these riots and violence in the streets.

And a great counter message by Democrats is to say, no, this is President Trump's fault. He's inciting all of this. The problem is, people can turn the TV on and look at their phones and look at videos and see with their own of eyes what's happening in the streets. And that is what's driving the message. And that's why the polls are creeping in the direction of the president.

And it's hurting against Biden. That's why you're seeing him coming out with a stronger message against this violence.

KURTZ: I understand. Emily, I've got half a minute. The -- what's comp -- you're the crime expert. What's complicating the coverage of the Jacob Blake shooting is, you know, these other of things like he had a knife in the car. He had been charged with sexual assault last month in a domestic abuse case. The police officer tries to tase him. But that doesn't mean he deserved to be repeatedly shot in the back and paralyzed.

COMPAGNO: No. I would say that what complicates the issue is when we have video footage of a horrific scene, no matter what all of those complicating factors occur in, and that it enables people to make a conclusion, draw a conclusion, and have those emotions immediately, what is clearly a tragic death. And then when everything else starts kind of filling in the tracks, and it enables to round out.

But that's why people say let's hold on -- let's wait for an investigation to come to that legal or conclusion or the criminal conclusion, people have already drawn that conclusion with their own eyes because of the video.

KURTZ: It's already been in the court of media opinion. All right, Emily, Philippe, Susan, thanks very much. Good to see you. Up next, what was the main Republican message during the virtual convention? We'll ask long-time GOP pollster, Frank Luntz. That's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KURTZ: And joining us now is Frank Luntz, the veteran pollster and long- time Republican message man. And Frank, you told Politico's Tim Albert a couple days ago when he asked you what Republicans believe. There's no consistent philosophy. You can't say it's about making America great again during at a time of COVID and economic distress and social unrest.

It's just not credible. He asked you a couple more times. And you said I don't have the answer. Why is this question so difficult to answer?

FRANK LUNTZ, POLLSTER: Because it's very easy to define what the Republicans are against. And you can say that they're for freedom, for personal responsibility, for accountability. But that's not specifics. In the Democratic convention, Joe Biden did not at all talk about policy. At the Republican convention, they talked about policy, but only about the last four years.

They didn't talk about what's going forward. The Republicans did an excellent job at prosecuting Joe Biden for being too left wing. But they did not do an effective job at explaining what Donald Trump is going to do if he's rewarded the election. The Democrats did an excellent job in prosecuting Donald Trump as a person.

And so I think this election is going to be Trump, the person, versus Biden's policies. And I don't know who is going to win.

KURTZ: Well, you were among the invited White House guests. Let's put up a picture for the president's speech on Thursday night. Two part question, does that mean you're now a Trump supporter? And secondly, so you don't think the president's speech, a 70-minute speech, answered the question of what he's for, at least for the next four years?

LUNTZ: It answered the question what he's -- first off, no. I -- the great thing about having a stroke, Howie, is that there's nothing that anyone can do to me now that I've been through hell. So they can't make my life any worse if they don't like what I say to you. So no, I support no one. My job as a pollster is to be accurate, is to be precise, is to explain what's going on.

And I don't think that they made the case for the next four years. I think they made the case for what had been happening in America up through the first of March. But just as they did not address COVID, the Democrats did not address the violence in the streets. And quite frankly, I think it's wise for Donald Trump to go to Wisconsin.

Because if a president doesn't go to where there's a crisis happening, then what kind of president are they? That Joe Biden has to get out onto the campaign trail that Donald Trump should be there. And if they protest even more, well, that just shows you that the country is having a problem right now.

KURTZ: All right. Let me jump in. Is it that the Republican Party, which didn't even bother with a platform at this convention, now believes what President Trump believes? And are you reluctant to say that when you talk about policy? LUNTZ: No. As I said, I'm not reluctant to say anything that there's been a prosecution. And it's been effective that this is not your parents' Democratic Party. That the programs that they propose are government-controlled and that they're going to raise your taxes a lot. And Donald Trump's not going to do that.

But in terms of the specifics, other than education, other than parental choice and education, which Trump did talk about, that there's not enough focus on the future.

KURTZ: Well, it's not unusual for an incumbent to try to disqualify the challenger in politics. I've got less than a minute. Do you think, as somebody who studied this for decades, that we will know who won this election on election night?

LUNTZ: So I'm glad you asked that. And I actually will lean in on this, because I want people to pay attention. The Republicans are telling people to vote at the ballot box. And so I'm expecting Donald Trump to be leading on election night. The Democrats are telling people to vote by mail. And so we may not know on election night who the winner is.

And in fact, you can have a situation where Donald Trump wins on election night, but because of all the things that happened in days that follow that Joe Biden is declared the winner.

I am scared, deathly scared of what is going to happen to our democracy if we have one president on Tuesday evening and a different president Thursday or Friday.

We already saw what we went through in the year 2000 when it was too close to call.

KURTZ: Yup.

LUNTZ: We are much angrier now, much more divided now. God help us if that's the situation.

KURTZ: All right. Well, all the more reason for the media not to jump the gun on November 3rd or November 4th.

Frank Luntz, it is good to see you. Thanks very much for coming by.

LUNTZ: Thank you.

KURTZ: And coming up, the Trump campaign's top spokesman on the media, the president, and the convention. Hogan Gidley is up next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(HOGAN GIDLEY INTERVIEW)

KURTZ: After the break, Democratic Congresswoman Debbie Dingell on the coverage of the convention and the Trump-Pence attacks on Joe Biden.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KURTZ: Joining us now from Dearborn, Michigan with an opposing point of view is Democratic Congresswoman Debbie Dingell. Welcome. And my first question, the media mostly panned President Trump's speech with very, very sharp attacks on what was called Joe Biden's America, but as a political person, I ask you, was it an effective speech?

REP. DEBBIE DINGELL, D-MI: You know, it was a long speech. I think there are some things in it the people listen to. But as Democrats, we got to take these next 65, 64 days very seriously, work hard in every single one of them, and we cannot take this race for granted one single day.

KURTZ: Well, it did take several days for Joe Biden after the violence broke out in Kenosha following the shooting of Jacob Blake to make a video and then do interviews on MSNBC and CNN which he also I condemn the violence.

The question is: How much of that got out? Biden spoke to the Blake family. He said he was considering going to Wisconsin. But now, President Trump is announcing he will go Kenosha on Tuesday.

So doesn't this reinforce the media's characterization of the Biden campaign as being kind of slow and ultra-cautious?

DINGELL: You know, Howie, I'm going to be very strong on this. I'm not going to let President Trump define who we are as Democrats. I identified this issue two months ago. Joe Biden has been very clear that he does not support defund the police.

We need right now, as far as I'm concerned, a leader that is not afraid to have uncomfortable conversations. And Kenosha, Wisconsin has reaffirmed again, a black man and a white man were treated differently. We've got to identify it.

We've got to have a leader who will have that conversation, not put kerosene on the fight. I think President Trump continues to put kerosene on the fire.

I know many Democrats, I do not know a Democrat that supports anarchy, rioting, looting. We all need to condemn it, Republicans and Democrats. I see the Black Lives Matter event yesterday again working with the police.

My police chiefs -- I've done 20 of these kind of events, community vigils, marches -- my police chiefs have met with these kids, have met with the leaders of the group, they walked with them in many instances. It's not either/or.

We need a leader, which Joe Biden is, that is going to bring people together and not be afraid of tough conversations and support those in the community that keep us safe.

KURTZ: Well, if Biden doesn't want to let the president dominate this issue, which is an important issue, he not only needs to get out there, he does say he is setting the road this week, he needs to talk to more journalists and do more interviews.

You warned of overconfidence four years ago when Hillary was way ahead in the polls. Could Democrats be facing the same situation now, overconfidence, overconfidence even in a state like yours, Michigan?

DINGELL: Well, (INAUDIBLE) says, stop calling me Debbie Downer and call me Debbie realist. I said two months ago, I didn't believe the polls when it showed him 16 points up. It was total -- I won't use the word on television.

We have to take this seriously. I think this is going to be a competitive race. I think it is going to be competitive until Election Day. I think what Frank said could be real.

What we have to do, Jim Clyburn said this to us right after John Lewis died, we have to turn out votes in massive numbers, as many people as we can, get them to vote early so that no one can question the integrity of this election or not have confidence in the election results.

KURTZ: I raised this with Hogan Gidley. Conservative media folks often push the line that the president has made a big issue of, that Joe Biden will just be a tool for the radical left of the party, Bernie, AOC, the Squad, and so forth.

He gets accused of identifying positions, for example, abolishing private health insurance that he never supported in the primaries and doesn't support now.

But I ask you this because you are someone who I think has been concerned about your party moving too far left.

DINGELL: You know, what I'm concerned about is recognizing that we're a party of diversity. We have frontliners, we have moderates, and we have progressives. You find the common ground.

But he is -- I found the language to be offensive and not true. I know people of all different viewpoints that care about the people. They have the same values. They have different perspectives. Joe Biden is not being moved to the left. He's always had the same values.

But, you know what? We all believe that every American has got a right to health care. How are we going to get there? My father-in-law was the first person that introduced the universal health care. We do need to worry about the environment.

This administration has rolled back more than 100 environmental regulations. I don't call that socialist. I call that protecting the world that we live in. Having clean drinking water is what every person should have.

I'm just simply not going to let this administration or the Republicans frame us with untruths. That is a lie and not true.

KURTZ: All right. Congresswoman Dingell, it is very good to see you. Thanks very much for joining us this Sunday.

DINGELL: Good to see you. Thank you.

KURTZ: Still to come, why Melania Trump's speech got such mixed media reviews and throw basketball and baseball players, forcing the cancellation of lots of games over the Kenosha shooting.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KURTZ: Melania Trump drew mixed media reviews at the GOP convention with a compassionate speech that led off with the coronavirus.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MELANIA TRUMP, FIRST LADY: I want to acknowledge the fact that since March, our lives have changed drastically. My deepest sympathy goes out to everyone who has lost a loved one and my prayers are with those who are ill or suffering. I don't want to use this precious time attacking the other side.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KURTZ: Joining us now in New York, Kat Timpf of "The Greg Gutfeld Show" and host of Fox Nation's "Sincerely, Kat."

Melania did manage to win over some liberal pundits with that compassionate speech, but others slammed her message, even her accent and what she was wearing. What did you make of that?

KAT TIMPF, FOX NEWS CONTRIBUTOR: Yeah, well, I thought it was interesting that pretty much everything I saw written about it agreed with she did have this compassionate tone, she did say a lot of the right things, and some of them stock without (ph) praise.

There was a piece in Politico that said she had a conciliatory tone that the other speakers had lacked. But then there were other pieces, multiple pieces, like one in the Washington Post, saying, yes, her tone was great but she doesn't get to do that because she had entertained questions about Obama's birth certificate, et cetera.

There was one in The Atlantic that said her being nice and saying nice things actually amounted to her lying because basically her husband doesn't do these things and call for unity in that writer's mind.

So, it was mixed reviews based on the exact same thing. Everyone said compassionate --

KURTZ: Yeah.

TIMPF: -- tone but it was whether or not that was fair, essentially whether or not she can do anything right, depending on who is writing it.

KURTZ: Right. Well, because they don't like who she is married to.

TIMPF: Right.

KURTZ: Look, you want to draw a contrast between the president's Twitter taunts and her call for civility, fine. But you had Bette Midler tweeting get that illegal alien off the stage. Oh, god, she still can't speak English.

Former New York Times reporter Kurt Eichenwald apologized. He didn't like her Rose Garden redesign. He blasted her as (INAUDIBLE) American citizen. What explains this sort of vile?

TIMPF: It's -- I was glad to see Better Midler's tweet was pretty across the board condemned. However, it's obvious that if that had been a liberal woman who was from another country out there speaking with an accent and a Republican had said something about it, I mean, they never would have said something about it, right?

This is not the first time we have seen Melania being attacked for her accent and people make this kind of comments. It is absurd. She apologized. I am the type of person where you apologized, I forgive you, because that is what I want to be shown that grace if I was in that situation.

KURTZ: Yeah.

TIMPF: I don't think I would be probably but I would want to be shown that grace.

KURTZ: Right.

TIMPF: But it is truly an insane thing. If you don't agree with her politics, hey, fine, attack her on that. But to attack her on the --

KURTZ: Right.

TIMPF: -- accent when -- how many languages do you speak, Bette Midler? Truly, it's not fair and it's such a low blow. It was really disgusting.

KURTZ: Low blow, indeed. Less than a minute, professional sports leagues shutting down now to protest the Kenosha riots led by the NBA and starting with the players, some baseball teams, soccer, and other sports.

I think a lot of conservatives out there might be saying they're not happy seeing the sports shut down because of the political views of these players.

TIMPF: Yeah, I certainly think that a lot of people aren't happy, with the NBA, in particular, though. The activism isn't a new thing. That goes all the way back to the civil rights era. So this isn't something that's becoming political. This has been angering the NBA for a while.

You talk with the MLB, there have been examples, of course, like Curt Flood and Jackie Robinson. But in general, they have been a little quieter about social issues.

KURTZ: Right.

TIMPF: So when they started doing the protest thing, form of protesting, you know, not playing games, walking out of games, it was something a little bit newer and it was a little bit messier.

KURTZ: Yup.

TIMPF: But I saw a piece in ESPN, actually, Jeff Passan said, that's what made it beautiful.

KURTZ: We got to go.

TIMPF: It never happens from the top down.

KURTZ: We got to go. They are entitled to their opinions about Playboy (ph).

TIMPF: Yes.

KURTZ: That's it for this edition of “Media Buzz.” I'm Howard Kurtz. I hope you like our Facebook page. Check it out. Check us out on Twitter. I would love for you to listen to my podcast, "Media Buzzmeter." You can subscribe at Apple iTunes, get it on your Amazon device, or other places that convey podcasts.

Thanks for watching. We'll see you back here next Sunday with the latest buzz.

END

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