Some TV, Radio Stations to Air Video Unedited

By BRIAN LOWRY

Sept. 19, 1998 12 AM PT

This story was reported by Times staff writers Greg Braxton, Paul Brownfield, Brian Lowry, Judith Michaelson and Greg Miller. It was written by Lowry

Several television and radio outlets will again take to the high-wire without a safety net as they rush to air President Clinton’s grand jury testimony Monday morning, providing instant, unedited feeds of the videotape as soon as Congress releases it.

All-news channels CNN, MSNBC and Fox News, as well as C-SPAN and Court TV, say they will immediately begin airing the testimony in its entirety at 6 a.m. PDT, as will at least one local radio station, KABC-AM (790).

The cable networks--some of which plan to rerun the testimony later in the day--will air periodic disclaimers warning that its content may be unsuitable for children.

“The public has a right to hear American history as it unfolds,” said Drew Hayes, program director at KABC-AM.

ABC, CBS and NBC plan for the most part to exercise more restraint, airing only portions of the four-hour tape and trying to quickly screen most footage before putting it on the air.

All three primary news anchors will handle the release with live special reports. NBC is expected to run excerpts throughout the day and make the story the focus of Monday evening’s “Dateline NBC.”

A CBS spokeswoman said how long the story stays on the air Monday morning “will depend on the story,” adding that because of the sensitive nature of the material, the footage will be reviewed before it is broadcast.

ABC’s report will likely include President Clinton’s opening statement to the grand jury. There will be no unedited broadcast of the president testifying, but the network will break in “when news warrants,” a spokeswoman said. The network’s coverage will also include special one-hour editions of ABC’s “World News Tonight” and “Nightline.”

This latest media chapter in the investigation into whether the president committed impeachable offenses in seeking to hide his relationship with former White House intern Monica S. Lewinsky underscores the explosion of news outlets now tapping into and benefiting from the furor surrounding the story, which has spurred a sharp increase in viewing of low-rated cable news channels.

At least one company, MPI Home Video, has announced plans to distribute “the uncut, unedited version” of the tape at a price of $14.98. The company said the tape will be in stores within 10 days of the footage’s release.

The grand jury testimony will be disseminated via pool feed--one copy that every TV news outlet will get simultaneously, effectively eliminating the race to be the first to have it.

John Moody, vice president of news editorial at cable’s Fox News Channel, said: “The question will be, do you use it directly to air.”

The videotape’s release also means that the Internet, which got so much attention from the posting of Starr’s report last week, has to relinquish the spotlight to television and assume a supporting role. Viewing video online remains a clunky process simply because it requires a much larger data pipeline than most Internet users have.

Several TV networks and a few online companies, including Broadcast.com, also planned to stream the tape across the Net along with 2,800 pages of Starr’s evidence that also is being released by Congress on Monday. But even online advocates agreed that, by and large, this would be a TV moment.

Some academics and media critics have questioned the decision to immediately show the videotape, saying that by hurrying the testimony or Starr report onto the air, TV journalists abdicate their responsibility to provide context.

Fox News’ Moody defended the decision to go straight to air with the video, saying the Clinton-Lewinsky affair has been reported so extensively that its content isn’t likely to yield big surprises.

“It’s like a press conference live,” added CNN spokesman Steve Haworth. “The analysis . . . the journalism comes after you’ve had a chance to see the tape itself.”

Most networks plan extensive analysis after the testimony is shown.

Joe Saltzman, a USC professor in broadcast journalism, said once Congress chose to release the video, TV outlets had no choice but to put it on. His larger concern is saturation, as with coverage of O.J. Simpson’s murder trial.

“It isn’t that these stories shouldn’t be told, it’s that they’re being told in such excess that they crowd out the other news of the day,” Saltzman said.

Those channels airing the testimony in its entirety won’t cut away for commercials.

Cable channel CNBC, meanwhile, will track reaction on Wall Street and other financial fronts, cutting back to the Clinton-Lewinsky story with clips and analysis.

Coverage of the Starr investigation has proved a boon to the all-news channels, which generally draw low ratings. On Sept. 12, Fox News, the least-watched cable news service, averaged an audience of 209,000 households, its highest tune-in during a 24-hour period. Ratings leader CNN scored its second biggest rating of the year, surpassed only on Aug. 17, when the president admitted he lied.

Local radio stations are employing a variety of approaches.

Talk-radio station KABC will air the tape in its entirety, commercial-free and unedited, a spokeswoman said. But other news and talk outlets are waiting to hear the videotape’s content before deciding how much of it they will air.

News station KNX-AM (1070) plans sequential and continuous but delayed coverage of the Clinton grand jury testimony, beginning at 6 a.m. News Director Bob Sims explained that the CBS radio network, of which KNX is a part, will have a news producer listen to a feed in New York and transmit it to stations with a delay of several seconds to screen out “those words or phrases that are particularly offensive.”

At all-news KFWB-AM (980), News Director Crys Quimby said: “We’ll have to make that decision after we hear it. We’ve been cautious about avoiding the more salacious details because people can find those every place else. We will give the news and [say] why this matters to the country. We’ll tell them why it’s important, [but] people have their kids in the car when they’re listening to us, so we’re respectful of that also.”

KFI-AM (640) will record the video and air excerpts in 20-second cuts, News Director Mark Austin Thomas said. KIEV-AM (870) Vice President and General Manager Dave Armstrong said the various hosts will “probably use segments.”

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

How TV Will Handle

President Clinton’s videotaped testimony to the grand jury will be shown early Monday after its release to the public. Here are the plans of the major networks and cable channels for the graphic testimony, which is expected to be released at 6 a.m. PDT.

Outlet: CNN

Broadcast Plans: Complete testimony when it is released, with rerun Monday night.

Will edit?: No

Outlet: C-SPAN

Broadcast Plans: Complete testimony when it is released, with rerun at 5 p.m. PDT.

Will edit?: No

Outlet: Fox

Broadcast Plans: Complete testimony when it is released.

Will edit?: No

Outlet: ABC

Broadcast Plans: Clintons opening statement, with excerpts throughout the day.

Will edit?: Yes