Reporter Jim Wooten began: "Clearly frustrated by his stalled campaign, Senator Dole was fiercely critical today not only of the American media, but of the American public as well for not recognizing his virtues and the President's vices....As for the press, he was practically livid, telling an audience of the faithful in Pensacola that the sins of the Clinton administration are being concealed by partisan newspapers and networks."
Dole: "Now we know the liberal media's not going to report on all these things because they want him re-elected. They like it the way it is. We need the media to tell the American people the truth and the truth is Bill Clinton ought to be voted out of office in a landslide."

NBC Nightly News did run clips of Perot's attacks on Clinton, but in trying to lessen the damage to Clinton Gwen Ifill failed to distinguish between accepting money from foreign nationals, which is illegal, with getting money from U.S. subsidiaries of foreign companies or from naturalized citizens, which is legal:
Gwen Ifill: "Ross Perot attempted to blast his way back into contention today with a scathing indictment of President Clinton and the Democratic party's fundraising tactics, which includes accepting money from abroad."
Perot: "If you love this country and your children, how could you even consider voting for a candidate that has huge moral, ethical and criminal problems facing him as our country has problems to solve."
Ifill: "Perot barely mentioned Republican Bob Dole, even though he also accepts contributions from overseas."

Next, David Bloom reported in from the Dole campaign. His piece began:
"Spurned by Ross Perot, an admittedly frustrated Bob Dole lashed out today at voters"
Dole: "Wake up America."
Bloom: "At President Clinton's ethics."
Dole: "This is a disgrace."
Bloom: "And especially at the liberal media, who Dole blamed for trying to engineer his defeat."
Dole: "We need the media to tell the American people the truth, and the truth is Bill Clinton ought to be voted out of office in a landslide."
On the CBS Evening News this is how Phil Jones concluded his story on Perot and Dole: "Perot says he finds the whole Dole request to be weird. Was it an act of desperation? No says one top Dole aide. He calls it determined, determined to try anything."

Brian Ross on John Huang: "In Washington today, a federal judge ordered Democratic Party lawyers into court and told them to produce John Huang to testify in a civil lawsuit alleging favoritism at the Commerce Department for big Democratic contributors. The judge's unusual action came after Huang could not be found at his home in Glendale California or when U.S. Marshall's went to an address yesterday in Washington that the judge had ordered the Commerce Department to provide..."

Reporter Mark Litke followed with a dispatch from Jakarta on the Lippo conglomerate's Asian empire and ties to Clinton.

While ABC thus updated viewers on the Indonesian scandal, neither CBS Evening News or NBC Nightly News mentioned the scandal or Huang's name. (CNN's Inside Politics did offer an anchor-read brief.)

Of course, Rather didn't bother telling viewers that the bill Clinton vetoed had a life or health of the mother exception.

Lisa Myers: "The heart and soul of Dole's agenda is his economic program, built around the bold, some say extravagant, promise."
Bob Dole: "We'll have a President who will cut taxes 15 percent across the board for every taxpayer in America."
Myers: "With that promise, that half a trillion dollar tax cut, Dole seems to have cast aside the most enduring commitment of his 35 year career -- balancing the budget."

Brokaw asserted: "Helen Chenoweth, a controversial first term Republican Congresswoman."
Chenoweth: "I don't have a clue why they would target me. I come from an innocuous state. I'm just a plain-spoken Western woman."
Brokaw: "Not exactly. In her first term Chenoweth was a cheerleader for the New Right. Voting against an increase in the minimum wage, trashing traditional environmental organizations. She was a hardliner on gun laws. So, she is a target of big labor and conservationists."

Brokaw didn't make any negative comments about the views espoused by the Democratic candidate. He concluded by noting that the two candidates have debated, "But their campaigns are trapped in a cloud of money, saturating the air, polluting the political process, and that's a loss for everyone."

So is a campaign trapped in a cloud of media distortion, polluting the fair and balanced dissemination of political views.