I was knockin' around Get Donkey earlier when I came across this post:

UggaBugga's Quiddity Quack describes how ABC News doctored some footage of a fumbling Bush to make him sound better. Very Interesting, but unfortunately not surprising.

So I headed over to Quack's place to see what the fuss is about:

What actually happened was shown on CBS:
In a report by Bill Plante:

BUSH: ... when I say I'm a patient man, I mean I'm a patient man. And that we will look at all options and we will consider - uh, .. uh, .. uh, .. uh - all technologies available to us and diplomacy and intelligence.
The four seconds where Bush was trying come up with the items he was going to consider were unflattering to the President. He looked hesitant and not focused on the issues.

However, a different George Bush was seen on ABC:
In a report by Terry Moran:

BUSH: ... when I say I'm a patient man, I mean I'm a patient man. And that we will look at all options and we will consider - uh, ? all technologies available to us and diplomacy and intelligence.
How did ABC do that? Instead of a continuous shot, which would have shown a "jump", the viewer saw Bush at the podium up until the words "we will consider", and then the image was switched (?) to a side view - the four-second fumbling excised - where "all technologies available" was heard as if he spoke whole thing seamlessly.


There is a noticeable difference when comparing two video clips, but it still carries some punch in an audio version which is available as a 250k .wav file here. The first part is CBS / Bill Plante, the second part is ABC / Terry Moran. (The .wav file is as small as possible: 8bit, mono, 8khz sampling.)

Who says the media doesn't polish Bush's image?

Okay, if Bush had said "... and we will consider - uh... nuking the hell out of everyone with all the technologices available to us and diplomacy and intelligence" and the part in italics was cut out, that would be trying to polish Bush's image. Taking out superfluous "uh"s does not qualify. I'm sorry. The idea that the press is trying to "cover up" Bush's inarticulateness is just plain goofy. It's well documented. People have come to expect it and knew about it during the election. To detractors of the president, it's proof that he's an idiot. To the rest of us, it's merely proof that he is not articulate. Many of us aren't. Because I don't get a kick out of watching Bush squirm (and most don't), I have no need or care to see every "uh" and fumble.

So, am I just saying that because I am a Bush supporter? Actually, no. I am not a very big fan of Houston Mayor Lee Brown. During Tropical Storm Alison, he was on television a lot. For those of you who are not familiar with Brown, he is not a very articulate person. He doesn't unload Bushisms, but he does say "uh" a lot. I remember watching him on the news at the Firehouse in the middle of the storm as he stumbled his way through explaining that he was asking for federal assistence. After the umpteenth uh, I noticed that it wasn't a live broadcast and wondered why they felt obligated to leave the footage unedited and waste our time. (I was a bit short-tempered about it; we were in the middle of a tropical storm, after all)

Of course, Brown stumbled for what have been fifteen seconds. Bush's edit was only four seconds.

That's the point, though. Four seconds. Not exactly Kurtz-worthy material.