Kerry Sanders--Baseball Fan

Can someone please buy Kerry Sanders a baseball almanac? On Sunday's Nightly News story about survivors of Saturday's tornado in Mississippi, Sanders told us that one woman who survived is the mother of Houston Astros pitcher "Ray" Oswalt. Actually, his name is Roy Oswalt.

And on Monday's story about the rapidly increasing murder rate in Chicago, Kevin Tibbles told us that, "Two-year-old Cynia Cole (was) killed in the crossfire while sitting in the back seat of a car." A moment later, Cynia Cole's grandmother, Cynthia Lyons, was identified by a Nightly News graphic as "Cynia Lyons' Grandmother". It is appalling and disrespectful that Nightly News cannot even manage to correctly identify this poor little girl who was tragically murdered. The Nightly News producers owe her family an apology.

Does anyone at Nightly News bother to fact check? Does anyone there even care anymore?

Et Tu, Lester?

From Lester Holt's April 25 Daily Nightly blog: "There is also news from the destroyed oil rig off the coast of Louisiana. After first hoping they had dodged a major environmental disaster, officials are facing a steady leak of oil into the ocean. Our environmental affairs correspondent Ann Thompson is in the region tonight to tell us what happens now."

Actually, her name is Anne Thompson.

Little Rock, Alaska

During Tuesday's Nightly News story about how European air travel has been disrupted by the volcanic ash cloud, a large on-screen graphic proclaimed "63,000 Flights Cancelled". The very next night, a similar story included a graphic that announced "100,000 Flights Canceled". So were the flights cancelled or canceled? It's hard to believe that a supposedly professional news broadcast cannot manage to spell a word the same way two nights in a row.

On Friday's broadcast, a story about severe weather featured The Weather Channel's Mike Seidel. At the beginning and end of the segment, a caption under Seidel informed us that he was reporting from "Little Rock, AK". No. The state abbreviation for Arkansas is AR. AK is the abbreviation for Alaska. How is it possible that the producers and editors could make a mistake like this? Is anyone at Nightly News paying attention to what goes on the air? Does anyone care? This is not OK (that's Oklahoma, by the way).

Buddy The Hero Dog

When Brian Williams ended Friday's Nightly News broadcast by announcing that Buddy the hero dog from Alaska would be appearing on Saturday's Today Show, I must admit I was concerned. Will Lester Holt and Amy Robach ask Buddy the tough questions, or will they do a superficial, ingratiating interview? Will they ask Buddy what newspapers he reads (or at least what newspapers he was paper trained on)? Will they question his controversial statement that he can see a Russian Wolfhound from his doghouse? Will they ask about his exorbitant wardrobe expenses, like his $5,000 flea collar? Why does Buddy dislike Bo so much? Is one of Buddy's puppies pregnant and unmarried? Is it true that Buddy chases cars--especially Ford Mavericks? Since Buddy is a German Shepherd, does he have a birth certificate to prove that he was born in the U.S.? Why did Buddy quit halfway through his first term as Alaska's state mascot? Did Buddy ever take steroids when he raced in the Iditarod (and should steroid use be expected in a race whose name ends with "A-Rod")? These are the kind of questions to which viewers demand answers. I hope Lester and Amy won't disappoint.

Brian's White Board

From Brian Williams's April 21 Daily Nightly blog: "So we have this white board in our conference room...The white board is a place for story ideas—not the big stuff to which we have correspondents assigned (volcanoes, presidents, and the like) but the smaller, more optional items—that many nights are my favorite elements of the broadcast, and certainly the most fun to write and deliver."

I get it. White board stories are stories that have absolutely no news value and don't belong on a news broadcast but are put on the air in order to pander to viewers by offering them warm and fuzzy items--stuff that's fun to watch and easy to digest (like "America's Funniest Home Videos"). So the viewers keep tuning in night after night to see skateboarding bulldogs, pink dolphins and clips from Leno's monologue. That way, more people watch the broadcast, the ratings go up and ultimately you get to charge higher ad rates. White board stories. I totally get it.

Jeff Rossen Gets An "F" In Math

Can someone please buy Jeff Rossen a calculator? On Saturday's Nightly News, Rossen told us that the year-to-date murder rate in Chicago had risen from 81 last year to 97 this year, a 16.5% increase. Wrong. That actually represents a 19.75% increase. Here's a tutorial for Rossen and his producers: Let's say the murder rate in Metropolis increased from 100 in year 1 to 150 in year 2. Common sense and logic tell us that that represents an increase of 50%. The way we get that mathematically is to take the difference in murders from year 1 to year 2 (50) and divide that by the number of murders in year 1 (100). 50 divided by 100 is .5, so that means the murder rate increased by 50%. Now let's apply that formula to Rossen's Chicago figures. The difference in murders from year 1 to year 2 is 16. We divide that by the number of murders in year 1 (81). 16 divided by 81 is .1975, so the murder rate went up by 19.75%, not 16.5%. This isn't rocket science. It's junior high school algebra. If Rossen and his producers can't calculate a simple increase in a murder rate, how can we trust them with the really difficult stuff?

Cheerleader Brian Williams

Great news for NBC! According to an article in Saturday's New York Times, the Peacock Network only lost $223 million on the Vancouver Olympics, which is less than the estimated $250 million they thought they were going to lose. Of course, you won't see that story on Nightly News. That's because when it comes to reporting on NBC and its parent company GE, Brian Williams is a cheerleader, not a reporter. On Feb. 13, Brian could barely contain himself when he announced that the previous night's Olympic Opening Ceremony had attracted 68 million viewers (Nielsen put the rating at 32.6 million--less than half of what Brian claimed). On March 1, Brian bragged that the previous day's USA-Canada gold medal hockey game was "one of the most-watched sporting events in television history...." (a claim that is dubious at best). And of course, we all remember March 4, 2009, when Brian spent more than two minutes with CNBC's David Faber desperately trying to prop up GE's falling stock price by talking about what a great and solid company GE is.

I think that whenever Brian reads a story about NBC or GE, he should pick up a pair of pompoms. After all, that's what cheerleaders do.