Friday, November 7, 2008

Friday Video: Special Liberal Media Edition - Gore Vidal vs. David Dimbleby





DD - "What kind of an eruption are you talking about?"

GV - "Well... may I talk the facts of life to you? The BBC audience I know very well, and they like the facts of life..."


From the BBC election coverage on Tuesday night, I think shortly after the overall result was officially called by the networks - they didn't show a clock on screen, just like a Las Vegas casino. David Dimbleby is a well-known television presenter for the BBC, while Gore Vidal is a somewhat longer-established cultural landmark of US literature. So it's quite funny when Vidal says "well, I don't know anything about you", and also with everything else he says. But there's plenty of serious talk in it too.

This was the best election coverage available to me (the competition being RTE, which was quite good, and Sky News and CNN, which were not so much). Not sure if there's anything good on YouTube of Simon Schama vs. John Bolton, or John Bolton vs. the BBC reporter in Phoenix (you display "a fundamental ignorance of the Republican Party" - Bolton said that, not her).

After they pack it in with Gore Vidal here in this clip there's a minute or so of analysis with one of the pundits - the one with the moustache - who's name I've forgotten, but earlier in the coverage he described a historic bias in exit polls, in favour of Democrats, as due to Republicans "being more suspicious of the news media". Sad - and scary - if true. Because it can really be rather entertaining.


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