The NY Times’s Alessandra Stanley takes issue with NBC’s coverage of the 2010 Olympics in Vancouver. It’s just too damn pro-American!
Technology evolves, organizers add new sports — this year it’s ski cross — but NBC’s Olympic reportage, up close and way too personal, never seems to change. And in Vancouver the best exploits of what the network unfailingly refers to as “Team USA” only bring out the worst in network heavy breathing.
At a time when American athletes are amassing record numbers of medals, and NBC is drawing an impressive number of viewers, sports fans couldn’t ask for more fulsome, pro-American coverage — they could ask for a little less. NBC anchors, including those paid by the news division, glom onto the glamour and reflected glory of winsome champions, as per Matt Lauer’s no-boundaries embrace of the skier Lindsey Vonn on “Today” after she won the downhill race.
Yeah, Americans don’t want to hear about their fellow countrymen (or is it comrades now?) winning a bunch of gold medals. Screw that shit, tell us about the other countries instead.
NBC has been so intent on fellowship and the thrill of victory that it has neglected the thrill of an agonizing defeat, namely Russia’s. NBC paid only cursory attention to Russian bitterness over Yevgeny Plushenko losing the gold medal to the American Evan Lysacek, even after the Russian Prime Minister Vladimir V. Putin weighed in with neo-cold-war disdain. The 2014 games are to be held in Sochi, a Black Sea resort, and Russia will be the host. For viewers seeking an international playing field, CNN may be a better bet.
I don’t really know how much more they could have devoted to that story. Vladimir Putin bitching about America in a posturing cold war tone is certainly nothing new. I think the better part of the story is the part NBC gave the most coverage to. During his interview with Bob Costas, American gold medalist Evan Lysacek spoke about his win over the angry Russian. He wondered if Putin would allow him into the country to compete at the 2014 games being held in Russia.
Alessandra Stanley’s bitterness over the pro-America tone of the NBC coverage is typical of the left. Leftists don’t view America as anything special. If anything, it’s an embarrassment (or it was until Obama was elected). In their view America is no better than any other place in the world and coverage of the Olympics should reflect that.
Fortunately, the leftist view of America is a minority one. A sad, lonely, pathetic minority.
-Chris Jones
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