Meet the Press

Tim Russert is a great host for "Meet the Press". He has never made any real bones about having been raised in a working-class union Catholic household in Buffalo, or acted as if this has in no way shaped his thinking. This background does not, however, prevent him from asking real, probing questions of his guests, Democrats and Republicans alike. He is less objective about his beloved Bills than he is about politics, but he is at his very best when he asks people their stance in light of their own past comments which he has at his disposal on videotape. Russert, contrary to some of the other opinions posted here, has in my opinion been far less of a Democratic partisan than his MSNBC counterpart, Chris Matthews.

This show went south with C Todd as an awful, inept replacement for Tim Russert. Used to be a Sunday ritual my Dad and I watched and when I moved out we would still compare notes. Now? It's ratings reflect what it's worth: nobody's time.

Please get someone more forceful to host show. Chuck Todd lets Republicans run ALL OVER him. He NEVER asks the HARD HITTING QUESTIONS and DOESN'T HOLD their feet to the fire on their responses. He is embarrassing and its painful to watch the show any more. Entertainment Tonight would be a better venue for him. Margaret Brennan on Face the Nation makes Chuck Todd like a wimp

Today is my last day of watching Meet The Press, this guy doesn't listen. He argued about what wasn't in the bill with his guest after saying that no one knows what's in the bill. He's on a power trip. I would tape this show every Sunday, No More, I'm turning him off, I'm Done!

Meet the Press is a must-see for anyone concerned with current events, if for no other reason than that it's a must-show for the participants in those events. It's a show with a clear liberal bias, but compared to most of today's news programs I would call it pretty even-handed.

Russert is a skilled interviewer, able to pose a question and then shut his mouth for however long it takes the guest to respond fully, but he has a tendency to become overexcited about his hypothetical constructs, as in "If you knew then what you know now, would you still do what you did?" It's hard to imagine any sane, self-respecting person trying to answer a question like that, but somehow they all take a stab at it. (In fairness to the guests, Russert is so over-enthusiastic with these that he rarely takes "I really don't know," as an answer to such questions.

In my opinion the greatest strength of the show is the way it confronts guests with their own press and allows them to respond to it. Russert is well-known for describing a video clip of the guest that's about to be played, and then saying briskly "Let's watch!"