Edwards' staff tussles with UNC journalism school

Source: Charlotte News & Observer

By Ryan Teague Beckwith, Staff Writer

A UNC-Chapel Hill journalism professor said John Edwards' presidential campaign tried to kill a student's video story about his campaign headquarters.

Associate Professor C.A. Tuggle said two top staffers for the former North Carolina senator demanded that the school drop the segment from the student-run television program "Carolina Week." They also asked to have the video removed from the YouTube Web site.

Tuggle said they threatened to cut off access to Edwards for UNC student reporters and other student groups if the piece aired.

"My gosh, what are they thinking?" Tuggle said. "They're spending this much time and effort on a student newscast that has about 2,000 viewers? They're turning a molehill into a mountain."

Read more: http://www.newsobserver.com/politics/politicians/edwards/story/750356.html

Here's link to what Edwards doesn't want you to see:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lb8r0XIZs7Y

the "two americas" to know.

about 1:40 in to the YouTube clip. Could that be what's got John so hot and bothered?

Oh, and I think it'll reach more than "about 2,000 viewers". The reporter signed off, "Carla Babb, MTV News"!

Now that's the story. And it's a story with a lot more legs than that vapid video.

He sure doesn't get much press otherwise.

zalinda

n/t

She got her undergrad at NC State (maybe her class president) and is a second year grad student in J School.

I posted the following earlier:

I don't know whether some unnamed senior staff at Edwards HQ did something stupid, but I suspect the story is being spun pretty hard. FYI both Charlie Tuggle and Carla Noel Babb appear to be registered Republicans. It might make their memory of all this and their retelling to reporters be less positive than if they were Dems. Maybe no bias. I don't know yet.

It was first reported by the reporter at the N&O who write "Under the Dome", sort of the NC political gossip column -- typically loaded with gotchas of everyone in NC gov/politics, R OR D, elected, appointed, staff, family.

AP, WRAL, Fox have all been pushing it relatively hard for a minor story. Check out wral.com for the comments posted on this. They even mention DU in one of the comments!

Haha... 90s style cheese always wins in TV journalism. I thought the piece was fair though.

I don't know why they bothered fighting it, it just makes them look worse. first off, how old is the interviewee who closes the piece with his 'brilliant' insights, fourteen? Give me a break. Oh god, his campaign headquarters are in a rich area. This is just hot air.

...Much ado about nothing! Like we don't KNOW he's well off? Who's the poorest of the Demo field? Is he/she a real contender? I doubt it.

They even have a Barbie doll with a wind-blown blonde hairstyle from 1994 doing the standup. Notice it's all messed up at her close.

No doubt FDR had no care for the poor because of his Hudson River mansion. LBJ owned airplanes and TV stations so I guess the historic dip in poverty rates during his presidency wasn't real.

made into a bigger one by the over-reaction by Edwards' staff.