As Crikey goes to press today, Gough Whitlam’s former press secretary Kerry O’Brien will sit down opposite Barack Obama for an exclusive 15-minute yak deep inside the White House.
O’Brien’s employer, the ABC, is in celebration mode over the 7.30 Report coup, to be aired tomorrow, vigorously spruiking the interview in press releases and on its website. The discussion is the centrepiece of a two-night Washington bonanza, with O’Brien also pressing the flesh with freshly-minted Ambassador to the US, Kim Beazley.
The ABC was jubilant this morning with ABC Managing Director Mark Scott telling Crikey that O’Brien’s scoop was “a great get”.
But the mood inside the rival Sky News bunker is much darker, with the network smarting over the snub that saw its 35-year-old wunderkind David Speers overlooked for the greatest prize in the political interviewing game.
Other network heavyweights, including Nine’s Laurie Oakes and Seven’s Mark Riley were also cast aside in favour of the ABC veteran, who has interviewed numerous world leaders including Margaret Thatcher, Mikhail Gorbachev and Colin Powell.
Speers famously snagged the presidential gig last time, flying into Washington for a 10 minute chat in 2007 with George W Bush before he boarded a plane for APEC, despite fierce lobbying from all the other networks.
Aunty were forced to make do with a subsequent chat with Condoleezza Rice, conducted by Leigh Sales on Lateline.
Crikey understands that the White House’s decision to go with the national broadcaster came after feverish lobbying of the US embassy in Canberra, the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, and the White House press office.
The deal-clincher was a multi-page pitch delivered by the ABC direct to the embassy, which was then passed along to decision makers in Washington. But the secret weapon in the war may have been the ABC’s North American correspondent Lisa Millar, who has been hammering her local contacts to stitch up the interview, as reported by Crikey last month.
Millar has been pressing the flesh among White House flacks, vigorously promoting the idea of returning the prestigious gig to the ABC as speculation mounted over who would sit down with POTUS before he cancelled his initial Australian visit last month. At the time, Millar said the ABC was “doing what we can” to secure the scoop, despite the embassy’s doubts that a one-on-one interview would happen. Hours later, Obama pulled out of the trip to get his health reform bill over the line.
ABC Director of News Kate Torney told Crikey this morning the ABC was the “natural choice” for Obama, given the broadcaster’s “multi-platform” reach.
“Like most other broadcasters we certainly put in a bid. Kerry O’Brien’s experience as a broadcaster helming a national current affairs program of the quality of the 7:30 Report was paramount,” said Torney.
“We do serious current affairs and have the biggest reach of any network.”
Torney said the ABC had been engaged in extended discussions with the US Embassy and the White House following last month’s frenzy and would be pushing the President to talk “for as long as possible.”
An excited Millar had this to say on Twitter this morning as O’Brien made himself comfortable inside the Beltway: “Quiet relief that Prez O heads to funeral in Poland on Sat and not earlier given he has an appointment with Kerry O’Brien!”
The reaction is in contrast to the ABC’s bitter reaction to the 2007 choice of Speers, with Insiders host Barrie Cassidy blasting Sky: ”Why on earth would George Bush give one TV interview in Australia and allow it to go to air at 10.30 on a Friday morning on Sky TV?”
Then-ABC political editor Jim Middleton responded: ”You’ve got me there…the White House is a mysterious beast. And so is the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs, which I suspect were very deeply involved.”
Speers was reluctant to comment when contacted by Crikey, but admitted he was disappointed over the decision to hand the interview to O’Brien. He said multiple requests had been lodged with the US embassy by Sky “ever since Obama became President.”
He denied DFAT was involved in the 2007 decision, after rumours swirled that the choice was payback for John Howard’s hatred of the free-to-air networks’ backing of Kevin Rudd in the lead-up to the federal election.
Until Mr Speers improves his interviewing standards and approach he will fail to be anything but the Sky News political head boy out of 3 and there isn’t much competition from his two collegues. I spent 30 years as a trainer of on air staff in interviewing techniques in both radio and television, Mr Speers would fail dismally were I marking him as a performer. One of his worst ‘habits’ is to jump in all over the subject mid stream, mid sentence, sometimes after a couple of words. I appreciate many interviewers do it to some extent, not with the frequency of Speers.
I do not know if he models himself on Fox News Bill OReilly, they share a few poor habits, but I am not surprised the Obama minders were not interested in Sky News. Their audience is small and the majority would certainly be more Republican persuaded, given Sky spend most of their time being critical of the Labor Government.
The obvious choice for an interview with a representative Australian broadcaster would be the national broadcaster, so commercial advantage is not given any one of the commercial networks who would of course commercially exploit such an opportunity to the hilt.
Furthermore I doubt that President Obama would be giving any favours to any broadcaster associated with Rupert Murdoch/Fox News/Sky News because of the recent appalling misrepresentation of Obama’s health reforms in the Murdoch media channels in the US.
Critics of Obama’s proposals receiving widespread publicity on the Murdoch media channels included the “Tea Party” advocates who regard Australia’s “socialist” medical system with disdain even though it provides equivalent health care to the whole population at almost half the US level of spending as a percentage of GDP, whilst likening President Obama to Adolf Hitler for pursuing those reforms.
What is “helming”?
Kerry O’Brien is the epitome of interviewers, next best choice would be Andrew Denton, none of the commercials spring to mind….
Yawn….