Jack Cafferty | |
|---|---|
| Born | (1942-12-14)December 14, 1942 (age 83) Chicago, Illinois, U.S. |
| Occupation | Commentator |
| Notable credit | CNN'sSituation Room |
| Spouse | Carol Cafferty (died 2008) |
| Children | 4 |
Jack Cafferty (born December 14, 1942) is a formerCNN commentator and occasional host of specials. In the summer of 2005, Cafferty joinedThe Situation Room. He left CNN after November 15, 2012.[1]
Cafferty started his career inReno, Nevada in 1961, as a children's show host atKOLO-TV. He later moved toKCRL-TV, where he served as the station's production manager, and followed that with daytime talk showCafferty & Company onWDAF-TV inKansas City, Missouri. In 1974, he became the weeknight co-anchor, and later news director, atWHO-TV inDes Moines, Iowa.[2]
In 1977, Cafferty moved toWNBC-TV inNew York City as a weekend, then evening co-anchor on the station's 6:00 p.m. news hour. In 1979, Cafferty became co-anchor of WNBC-TV's 5:00 p.m weeknight newscast, and the following year he was joined on the program bySue Simmons. In 1979, he became an owner of theUnterrified Democrat, a Missouri newspaper;[3] he sold his share of the paper in 1980.[4] Their show was reformatted asLive at Five, and its mix of news, features and celebrity interviews would prove successful for much of the 1980s. Cafferty left WNBC-TV around Thanksgiving 1989 due to a contract dispute and at Christmas, he joined rivalWNYW, where he anchored theFoxflagship station's 7:00 p.m. news and a short-lived late night show,Newsline New York. In 1992, Cafferty moved to then-independent stationWPIX, and co-anchored its 10:00 p.m. newscast until joiningCNNfn in 1998.[5]
In the summer of 2005, Cafferty joinedThe Situation Room, CNN's weekday afternoon newscast. Cafferty also formerly co-anchored CNN's weekday morning broadcast,American Morning. OnThe Cafferty File, his nightly segment onThe Situation Room, he offers commentary and personal opinions.
In October 2006, Cafferty hosted a five-part miniseries on CNN titledBroken Government detailing problems with the two political parties, government bureaucracy and the federal court system. Viewer e-mail messages replaced thenews crawl that usually appears on the bottom of the screen.
Cafferty has earned many distinctions in his career, including theEdward R. Murrow Award, anEmmy award and the New York Associated Press State Broadcasters Award.[5]
Cafferty is the author of the bookIt's Getting Ugly Out There: The Frauds, Bunglers, Liars, and Losers Who Are Hurting America, published on September 10, 2007 by John Wiley & Sons.[6] The book is a satirical critique of political and social issues, including the long arm of big business, theIraq War andHurricane Katrina, expanding on many of themes covered on Cafferty'sSituation Room segment and chastising the growing culture ofsensationalism andtabloid journalism in modern news media.[6]
Portions of the book are autobiographical, describing Cafferty's childhood and short-lived military career as well as his foray into journalism. According to Cafferty: "Very little of my back story qualifies asHallmark Card material, but it may help you to make sense of the way I see and interpret what's going on around me."[6]
Cafferty's second book, entitledNow or Never: Getting Down to the Business of Saving Our American Dream was published by Wiley on March 9, 2009.[7]
Cafferty initially supported the2003 invasion of Iraq. He says he "bought the whole song and dance aboutWMDs. I was caught up in the national hysteria that followed9/11, and was captive to the political manipulation, if you will, that took place in all of us."[8] He revised his position when theDowning Street memo was leaked in 2005 and became a harsh critic of the administration.
On theIraq War, Cafferty stated, "The Bush administration used 9/11 as an excuse to start the war in Iraq. People make a lot of money during wartime – $600 billion we've spent there so far – and a lot of that money has gone to friends of the administration, and of course there is all that oil. I don't think for a single second there was anything honorable about the decision to invade a sovereign country. They had nothing to do with 9/11 and had done nothing to the United States. But hey... what do I know?"[9]
On February 15, 2006, whenFox News Channel commentatorBrit Hume interviewed Vice-PresidentDick Cheney after he had shotHarry Whittington in ahunting accident, Cafferty remarked, "I would guess it didn't exactly represent a profile in courage for the vice-president to wander over there to the F-word network for a sitdown with Brit Hume. I mean, that's a little likeBonnie interviewingClyde, ain't it?"[10] As this is a common euphemism used at CNN to refer toRupert Murdoch's network, Cafferty later clarified: "Get your mind out of the gutter. The F-word is Fox."[10]
Cafferty was reprimanded by the president of CNN when he calledDonald Rumsfeld "an obnoxious jerk andwar criminal" on the eve of the2006 midterm election.[11] He made an on-air acknowledgment of having "stepped over the line", but later told the interviewer, "I will go to my grave as Jack Cafferty, private citizen, believing that these people committed war crimes."[11]
On August 19, 2008, he wrote an article comparingJohn McCain toGeorge W. Bush, concluding that "I fear to the depth of my being that John McCain is just like him."[12]
Cafferty repeatedly accused theDemocratic Party of failing to honor their campaign promises to end the Iraq War: "The Democrats were handed a golden opportunity to challenge President Bush on the war when they were given control ofCongress in the midterm elections in 2006. So far they have done absolutely nothing."[9] Cafferty once stated that "It seems the Democrats are the greatest thing theRepublicans have going for them sometimes."[9] WhenHouse SpeakerNancy Pelosi said that Republicans were usingfilibuster tactics to block measures to withdraw American troops fromIraq, Cafferty declared: "Baloney, Madam Speaker. Appropriations bills for the war must pass theHouse of Representatives by a simple majority. It is completely within your power to stop the funding of the war in Iraq. You have simply chosen not to do so. In fact, I did a little homework. The Speaker of the House of Representatives decides which pieces of legislation even come to the floor of the House debate and/or a vote."[13]
Cafferty's outspoken and provocative style of commentary has on occasion led to public outcry. Though he acknowledges his habit of "saying some pretty outrageous stuff", Cafferty has characterized this as part of his job description: "I get paid to ask questions I don't know the answers to and to complain about the things that bother me."[6]
During Cafferty's time as a co-anchor of CNN's morning program, he reported on March 31, 2004 that "It's a red-letter day here in America. Air America, that communist radio network, starts broadcasting in a little while." Cafferty was unyielding when CNN colleagueSoledad O'Brien responded by saying that the new talk-radio network was not communist but liberal. He replied: "Well. Aren't they synonymous?"[14]
TheAmerican-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee has accused Cafferty of having a "simplistic"[15] view of the Middle East. Cafferty courted controversy on September 23, 2004 while discussingterrorist demands for the release of two women scientists from anIraqi prison and remarking: "Given the way these mutants treat women in their societies, the women are probably better off in U.S. custody. They treat women like furniture in those countries. If I was a woman, I think I’d rather be in an American jail cell than I would be living with one of those, whatever they are over there."[15]
On November 17, 2004, touching on the kidnapping and murder of theWall Street Journal's South Asia Bureau ChiefDaniel Pearl, Cafferty remarked: "TheArab World is where innocent people are kidnapped, blindfolded, tied up, tortured and beheaded, and then videotape of all of this is released to the world as though they’re somehow proud of theirbarbarism. Somehow, I wouldn’t be too concerned about the sensitivity of the Arab world. They don’t seem to have very much. It's going to come down to them or us."[15] The next day the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee accused Cafferty of "hateful rhetoric" and stated that he had "a history of insensitive remarks towards many minority groups".[15]
On the April 9, 2008 broadcast of CNN'sThe Situation Room, asked to comment on theUnited States' relationship with China, Cafferty responded: "I think they're basically the same bunch of goons and thugs they've been for the last 50 years".[16] The Legal Immigrant Association started anonline petition calling for a formal apology, indicating that Cafferty's rant wasanti-Chinese and had the effect of exacerbating negative attitudes held by Americans toward Chinese andChinese Americans. On the April 14, 2008 broadcast of CNN'sSituation Room, Jack Cafferty clarified his remarks: "Last week, during a discussion of the controversy surrounding China's hosting of theOlympic Games, I said that the Chinese are basically the same bunch of goons and thugs they have been for the last 50 years. I was referring to theChinese government, and not to Chinese people or toChinese Americans."[17] CNN issued a controversial apology on April 14, to "anyone who has interpreted the comments to be causing offense."[18] Not satisfied with CNN's response, several thousand demonstrators picketed CNN'sAtlanta, Georgia[19] andHollywood offices and demanded that CNN remove him from the network.[20]
A protest was held on April 26, 2008 in front of CNN headquarters inAtlanta.[21]On the same day, a few thousand Chinese and Chinese Americans protested in front of a CNN office in San Francisco.[22][23]
On May 15, 2008, according toChinese Foreign Ministry spokesmanQin Gang, CNN PresidentJim Walton sent a letter toZhou Wenzhong,Chinese ambassador to the United States: "On behalf of CNN I'd like to apologize to the Chinese people for that. CNN has the highest respect for Chinese people around the world and we have no doubt that there was genuine offense felt by them over the Jack Cafferty commentary."[24] CNN, however, denies that an apology to the Chinese government was ever made, stating that it was meant for the Chinese people alone.
On the September 26, 2008 edition ofThe Situation Room, Cafferty criticized Republican presidential candidate John McCain's vice presidential nominee,Alaska governorSarah Palin after she did what he referred to as a "disastrous interview" withCBS news anchorKatie Couric when she could not clearly answer Couric's questions about the federal government's intervention into Wall Street. Cafferty went on to say that "if John McCain wins, this woman will be one 72 year old's heart beat away from becomingPresident of the United States, and if that doesn't scare the hell out of you, it should!" He went further to say that her interview with Couric was the most pathetic tape he had ever seen. WhenWolf Blitzer came to Palin's defense, Cafferty snapped back indicating "there's no excuse for that, don't make excuses for her, that's pathetic!"[25]
Cafferty was outspokenly critical ofHouse SpeakerNancy Pelosi for failing to call for animpeachment against President Bush, calling her the "most awful" Speaker Congress has ever had. Cafferty sparked some national controversy among some liberal watchdog groups, particularlyMedia Matters for America during the January 12, 2010 broadcast ofThe Situation Room, in which Cafferty called her a "horrible woman" for refusing to disclose the precise cost of her trip to theCopenhagen Climate Summit, that Cafferty felt was a complete waste of tax payer money.[26]
Cafferty pleaded guilty to leaving the scene of an accident andmisdemeanor charges of reckless driving,assault and harassment after striking a cyclist and knocking him off his bike on May 14, 2003. The bicyclist was slightly injured. A traffic officer and several pedestrians ran after Cafferty's car, but he ran at least two red lights without stopping, according to a police complaint. Cafferty was sentenced to a $250 fine and 70 hours of community service.[27]
Cafferty was born inChicago. He is a recoveringalcoholic, an addiction he later attributed to his father's influence. "I was actually taught to drink, without even realizing what was going on, by my dad", he said.[28]
On the September 5, 2008 episode ofThe Situation Room withWolf Blitzer, it was revealed that Cafferty's wife of 35 years, Carol, had died that day of unknown causes.[29] Cafferty acknowledged on his CNN blog that his wife had been responsible for his decision to quit drinking.[30]
Cafferty has been a resident ofCedar Grove, New Jersey.[31][32]
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