THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, August 7, 1996 TAG: 9608070032
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E1 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Column
SOURCE: Larry Bonko
LENGTH: 92 lines
WVEC reporter Mike Gooding and photographer Bryan Barbee have joined the pack covering the Republicans' national convention in what one TV news executive called ``the worst place for such an event I have ever seen in my life.''
When he said that to a gathering of TV reporters in Los Angeles recently, Jeff Gralnick of ABC News was referring to the San Diego Convention Center, where Republicans gather Monday through Aug. 15 to annoint their candidates for president and vice president.
Said Gralnick, executive producer of special events for ABC News: ``I've been covering conventions for 32 years and never before have I seen a hall so small and so cramped. San Diego is a wonderful city but the Convention Center is inadequate for such a large event. It's microscopic.''
Memo to Gooding and Barbee: Pack your deodorant and expect to get your toes stepped on a lot.
There will be 5,000 delegates. And 10,000 guests. And 15,000 media with credentials.
Gooding, president of the Virginia Capital Correspondents Association with 11 years as a TV reporter behind him, said he will keep his eye on the Virginia delegation, as well as the impact that Virginia Beach televangelist Pat Robertson is having on the convention. (WTKR says it has no plans to send a reporter to San Diego, while WAVY's plans were uncertain at press time).
Robertson's presence was felt even before the first gavel falls in San Diego. He sold time on his Family Channel worth $1.5 million to the Republican National Committee. The GOP says it will show 10 hours of ``unfiltered'' convention coverage on The Family Channel duringprime time and use the USA network in the mornings to preview the night's schedule.
``We're telling people not to get snookered by the networks, to get what is happening at the convention straight from the horse's mouth,'' said Republican National Committee Chairman Haley Barbour when he announced GOP-TV.
Even without The Family Channel's involvement, TV coverage of the Republican convention would be extensive. ABC, CBS and NBC plan to be on the air from San Diego for a combined six hours in prime time Monday through Thursday, while C-SPAN on cable and PBS offer longer, commercial-free coverage starting at 8 p.m.
CNN said it will devote more than 100 hours to covering the Republicans in San Diego and, later in August, the Democrats in convention in Chicago. In MSNBC, the recently launched news and talk channel from NBC and Microsoft, CNN will find new competition on the convention floor.
MSNBC's coverage will be a double-barreled one. It includes cable and the Internet, courtesy of Microsoft at http://www.msnbc.com.
CBS, too, will be using a web site (http://www.cbsnews.com/ campaign96) to augment the TV coverage anchored by Dan Rather.
Yes, Andy Rooney will be in San Diego with Rather to offer commentary, as will be reporters Harry Smith and Paula Zahn, late of the CBS morning news broadcast.
NBC and PBS continue the collaboration that began in 1992 with Jim Lehrer of public broadcasting's ``The News Hour'' and Tom Brokaw of NBC teaming up in San Diego and Chicago. Brokaw will be seen on PBS from 8 until he breaks away at 10 Monday and Tuesday and 9 on Wednesday and Thursday to anchor NBC's nightly coverage.
After that, PBS will press on without him, with Lehrer supported by correspondents Elizabeth Farnsworth, Charlayne Hunter-Gault and others. PBS' ``Washington Week in Review'' will air from San Diego Aug. 16, and from Chicago on Aug. 30 at 8 p.m.
If you want something in TV talk totally unlike the slightly stuffy ``Washington Week,'' check into Comedy Central's ``Politically Incorrect'' with Bill Maher at 11 p.m.
The gang of reporters and anchormen, from Gooding of WVEC in Norfolk to Peter Jennings of ABC to Portsmouth's very own Bill Schneider of CNN - will be jammed together in a hall that looks like a telephone booth compared to the Houston Astrodome, where the Republicans once gathered.
It will take a director with superior skills to make the convention hall look telegenic, said Gralnick.
The conventions this year are only a week apart, which is also giving the networks a headache. No way will the networks be able to tear down and move equipment from San Diego to Chicago, where it would have to be set up again.
``There's no time for any of that,'' said Lane Vendaros, vice president of news and special effects at CBS. ``We'll have to establish two fully equipped television sites. That will double our expenses.''
Why the time crush? Because the political parties did not wish to convene in July in competition with the Atlanta Olympics.
So, now the scrambling begins.
The Republican convention promises little of interest outside of a scuffle or two about a platform plank on abortion. The Democrats will have even less to do in Chicago, except maybe debate if First Brother Roger Clinton should be invited to sing at the convention.
Why bother to beam any of this live into America's living rooms?
``To witness the symbolism and ceremony, to see an important part of the Democratic process,'' said Jennings in his meeting with the TV press. If he, a Canadian, can get all fired up about these conventions, why can't the rest of us scare up a little interest?
Tune in or log on. Rooney's commentaries are worth waiting for. by CNB