Columnist Roger Friedman asks, “was Jerry Springer not available?”
You should know that Jackson’s attorney Tom Mesereau played the outtakes video for the jury in full. It was a brilliant move, because Bashir is so awful that Jackson comes off as a victim. Mesereau counted on the outtakes to help get Jackson acquitted, and he was 100 percent right… [snip]
His method of getting headline-making answers is as dishonest as it could possibly be. Not only does he heap adulation on Jackson, but he then turns to the singer’s makeup woman, Karen Faye, telling her what an injustice it is that Jackson is so misunderstood by the public.
“It’s terrible,” Bashir says. “How can we tell the world who the real Michael Jackson is?” He then goes on and on at length about what a great parent Jackson is, and how if only the world could see him with his kids they would think more of him.
This is all off-camera. Then the lights go on, and Bashir begins slicing Jackson into little pieces. That’s what Cabinet secretaries and the like can expect I suppose when they come to “Nightline.”
I suppose we can be relieved that ABC didn’t go with Connie Chung.