CBS plays favorites at Republican Presidential Debate

From The Hill newspaper:

Ron Paul's campaign was the first to cry foul after the debate, with his chairman, Jesse Benton, accusing CBS News of arrogance and of thinking they could choose the next president. Two hours later, Paul supporters received a message with the subject line "What a joke."

"Ninety seconds. That's how much of the first hour of tonight's GOP debate was given to Ron Paul. 90 measly seconds out of 3,600 seconds," wrote campaign manager John Tate.

But it was Michele Bachmann whose complaint came backed up by evidence that concerns about candidates’ being sidelined were raised even before the debate took place.

Just after the debate ended, Bachmann's campaign accused CBS News of deliberately keeping her questions to a minimum and planning a biased debate, with campaign manager, Keith Nahigian, reportedly calling CBS's newly anointed political director, John Dickerson, a "piece of s**t."

Bachmann's campaign sent reporters a screenshot of an email exchange that took place before the debate in which Dickerson said Bachmann wouldn't be getting many questions and the network should make plans to interview another candidate during a post-debate webcast. The email to CBS News staffers to which Dickerson had been responding included a note that Alice Stewart, Bachmann's spokeswoman, was included in the email chain, but Dickerson appeared not to have noticed.

"Okay let's keep it loose though since she's not going to get many questions and she's nearly off the charts in the hopes that we can get someone else," Dickerson wrote. . . .