NBC Bay Area's Janelle Wang On Her Way To Sochi To Cover Olympics; KGO-TV Still Mum on Heather Ishimaru; Classy; Tuesday Fast Starter

Janelle Wang/NBC Bay Area

 Janelle Wang is excited about going to Sochi, Russia to cover the Olympics for KNTV and has absolutely no trepidation given the terror alarms affecting the games.


NBC's Winter express begins Feb. 7th.


I asked Wang whether she had any jitters. "No trepidation at all. Just excited to cover it and our NorCal athletes. Security will be extremely tight. "


Normally, a two-week vaunted franchise like the Olympics would be a valuable entity to build up both local and national programming. But this Olympics, (set to begin February 7), has been littered with endless potential terrorism stories.


Combine that with a lack of American athlete star power and the dank surroundings of a relatively obscure and remote city in Southern Russia and you could have the least-watched games ever.


*Speaking of KNTV, they've added a new face to replace Marla Tellez; Peggy Bunker has been installed as the new 11 AM anchor and will also fill in on various news blocks as a general assignment reporter. Bunger comes to NBC Bay Area from Seattle's ABC affiliate, KOMO.


*To show you what the local TV News ND's and  assignment editors priorities were Sunday night post-game, just note the fact at least a pair of news choppers hovered over both the Mission district and Marina; downtown too. Wonder why.


*No class dept: KGO-TV has not said a word about its fallen reporter, Heather Ishimaru. Not a word. How about an acknowledgement? How about just showing some common human decency by telling its viewers about Ms. Ishimaru's condition. But of course that would require common sense which apparently is a foreign concept at 900 Front. Yeah, I know about the legal implications but this has nothing to do with lawyers and everything to do with class. That's a bad scene over there.


*Follow me on Twitter

KGO-TV's Ashley gets White House 'Exclu' with Obama, (Sort of)

Dan Ashley, lead anchor at KGO-TV, (ABC7), was in Washington last week and got an exclu with the President.

Sort of.

The White House made Mr. Obama available for five minutes with an assortment of local TV stations across the nation. One of those that made the cut was KGO-TV, presumably because the White House wanted to give some love to a big station on the West Coast, (among others).

With barely five or so minutes, you can't ask a lot of questions. Even tough questions.

My friend, Mike James, editor of Newsblues, (paywall), gave a little ribbing to Ashley's interview:

"Ashley asked Obama about playing golf with Tiger Woods last weekend. "He plays a different game than I do. He's on another planet," said the president.
 
Proof positive that local news anchors CAN ask the tough questions."

To be fair, these local stations that make the WH cut, are in a mostly controlled environment. In that respect, it's difficult to imagine that Ashley had any chance to offer something more substantive. He did ask Obama about Prop 8, (the same-sex marriage act that the Supreme Court will rule on in June) and the possibility of a sequester budget.

And keep in mind that had Ashley tried to go Mike Wallace on the POTUS, I'm sure he and KGO probably would have been on the future WH cut list.

It's a local TV-news catch-22 deluxe: you get a coveted interview with the President and sure, you'd like to be able to ask a few pointed questions that don't appear to be too cushy; in that respect, I think Ashley did about as well as could be expected.

In any event, KGO got the gig.

*Follow me on Twitter


*Tips-E-Mail: Rich.Lieberman@Gmail.com

*ADVERTISE ON 415 MEDIA: Rich.Lieberman@Gmail.com