Monday evening in Baltimore was a tense time, full of powerful images and the voices of people seeking answers to questions about their cherished city. And in the midst of this, you had Fox News, doing their very best to make it seem like anarchy and mass violence were the only issues.
Among the worst culprits was Fox reporter Leland Vittert. Looking back at his reporting, it instantly strikes you how he is operating from one viewpoint: This is a war zone and things are out of control. But then Vittert decided to interview Baltimore City Councilman Nick Mosby, and Mosby quickly gave Vittert a lesson on the real message of what was happening in the city.
Vittert began by asking a fair question of Councilman Mosby:
“When you watch this go on, does it break your heart to see this happen?”?
Mosby replied:
“Definitely.?What it is, is young folks in this community with decades’ [worth] of anger and frustration for a system that has failed them.?This is bigger than Freddie Gray. This is about the social economics of poor urban America. These young guys are frustrated, they’re upset and unfortunately they’re displaying it in a very destructive manner. When folks are undereducated, unfortunately they don’t have the same intellectual voice to express it the way other people do, and that’s what we see through the violence today.”
But Vittert didn’t want to have a serious discussion about what might have caused the anger and frustration being felt by the residents of Baltimore, and he once again had to focus on the criminal acts of a small group of people:
“We just watched this liquor store being looted, and there’s a bunch of folks running in and out. Is that right?”
At this point, Mosby can no longer hide how much Vittert is annoying him:
“Is it right for people to loot? No. I think you just missed everything I tried to articulate to you.?Everything that’s happening out here is wrong. The violence is wrong. That’s never acceptable… There’s a symptom of something that’s going on here, and what I’m trying to articulate to you is that when you look at communities like this in urban America, it’s lack of education. Lack of commercial development. Lack of opportunities. It’s the socioeconomics of it. It has nothing to do with West Baltimore or this particular corner in Baltimore. This could erupt anywhere in socially-economically deprived America.”
You would think Vittert would try to change the subject and ask a question on another matter, but he went right back to the well again:
“We’ve certainly seen this in other cities. Ferguson comes to mind — “
And this is where Councilman Mosby took the Fox reporter to school, telling him:
“We also see it at rallies like at Kentucky, when Kentucky lost that basketball game.?We see crowds that loot and flip over cars and stuff.?But unfortunately, [despite] all the 95 percent of the positive rallying that’s been happening here in Baltimore, the national media is going to focus on this, and that’s the problem.”
Do I think Leland Vittert learned anything from this exchange with Mr. Mosby? Of course not; he works for Fox News.
Watch The Exchange Between Mosby And Vittert!
https://www.facebook.com/ricky.kelly.948/videos/vb.100000172839719/1083402581675493/?type=2&theater
