the story? why did they rush to judgment? and what about the pundits who have been saying for months that the health care mandate was toast? it was an extraordinary, an extraordinarily uncomfortable television moment. ann curry bidding farewell to the "today" show couch. >> i love all of our brilliant, brilliant producers. and for all of you who saw me as a groundbreaker, i'm sorry i couldn't carry the ball over the finish line. but man, i did try. >> was the veteran correspondent humiliated by nbc? plus, a magazine article by a woman who quit the obama administration because she couldn't juggle the demands of motherhood strikes a very deep chord. >> no one says any more this is no job for a woman because, a, that's discrimination. but plenty of people say this is no job for a mother. >> but have women in the media trumpeted this because they're all part of a privileged elite? i'm howard kurtz, and this is "reliable sources." let me say at the outset, it is not easy to grab a long, dense, legal opinion at the supreme court and instantly decipher what the esteemed justices decided. it's understandable that there was confusion when the ruling was handed down thursday. >> we got the opinion, i'm taking a quick look. it's very long. a very brief look at it. >> it appears the decision has been affirmed in part -- >> invalid -- >> reversed at part -- >> pete williams is ready at the supreme court. pete, good morning. take us through. >> reporter: okay. the bottom line here is the supreme court has upheld the health care case. >> here's how it played out on cnn, and it wasn't pretty. >> we're still going through the reading -- the opinion, but i want to bring you the breaking news that according to producer bill mears, the individual mandate is not a valid exercise of the commerce clause. so it appears as if the supreme court justices have struck down the individual mandate. the centerpiece of the health care legislation. >> wow, that's a dramatic moment if, in fact, the supreme court has ruled that the individual mandate is, in fact, unconstitutional. that would be history unfolding now. >> the court striking down that mandate is a dramatic blow to the policy and to the president politically. >> as we're reading through this again, we're reading that the entire law has been upheld, wolf. >> if in fact that is the justification, then it's a huge, huge victory for president obama. >> fox news also started down the wrong path. >> we have breaking news here on the fox newschannel. the individual mandate has been ruled unconstitutional. >> we're getting conflicting information. if you follow -- covering the high court, they say despite what shannon just read, that the individual mandate is surviving as a tax. >> be cautious with us, we're trying to do the best we can right now as we sort through it. >> joining us to scrutinize the media's performance, in seattle, host of the syndicated radio show "the michael medved show." in washington, margaret carlson, columnist for "bloomberg view." markfeld stein, broadca journalism professor at the university of maryland and former correspondent for abc and cnn. mark, let's not mince words. how big a blunder for cnn and fox news? >> it was a pretty big blunder. there's egg on the face. face it, cable news is not known for depth. people turn to it for immediacy and for accuracy. and it was immediate, but it was wrong. there's no way to spin it. and, you know -- but it wasn't deliberate. it wasn't intentional. it wasn't political bias. it was, you know, reading page one. the first few pages and not getting to the end. and we watched the sausage being made. that's what happens in this hyper warp speed where we live in. the public now sees the sausage being made, and it's not always an appetizing sight. >> what drives me crazy, michael medved, is if the cable news channels had waited an extra two or three minutes for producers and correspondents to keep reading in the opinion to see the part where justice -- chief just roberts actually upheld as a tax the individual health care mandate, then they would have been right. they don't seem to have the patience to do that. >> they don't have the patience, and it's competive who's going to be up first with the story. everyone was breathlessly awaiting this. i think the bigger problem is that there was not the proper preparation. in other words, you said earlier and you were exactly right, the general consensus was that the obamacare was toast. it was going to be overruled all based on the oral arguments. and people hadn't read the briefs. in the briefs submitted by the government, they attacked the whole basis on the taxing power which is the way that the -- chief justice roberts ruled. so i think that the setup for the entire thing, to make it dramatic, to make it huge, to make it confrontational left people open for this kind of mistake. >> we'll come back to that. barbara carlson, you're a former cnn contributor. you know about the pressures of cable news. this is the kind of mistake that people remember for a long time. >> they do. and it's a stain on cnn, unfortunately, your network now. but -- >> as well as fox. >> yes, yes. since we're here at cnn, i thought i would dump particularly on you. >> okay. >> i think there was actually some overpreparation because, kate, your reporter, quoting bill mears, producer said, oh, under the commerce clause, the individual mandate has been struck down. she's absolutely right. they've been waiting for that. that the commerce clause was the big kahuna of the argument. and so 90% of it was the commerce clause. so they went with it instead of reading down. if you're a more -- out there more and if, by the way, you've made a mistake in your career, if you've had egg on your face, as mark says, you'd go to the end because you've made that mistake before. and you don't want to do it again. >> we have all made mistakes, but if cnn or fox or anyone else had waited two or three more minutes, maybe some tv critics would have said, boy, they were slow, other people had it first. i think they'd rather have it right. let me make this point, as well. cnn owned up to this pretty quickly. cnn apologized. cnn statement, cnn regrets to that it didn't wait out the full and complete reading of the mandate. we made a correction within a few minutes and apologized for the errors. a long few minutes, i must say. fox news says, we gave our viewers the news as it happened. fox reported the facts as they came in. no apology, no regret. that statement sounds orwellian to me. they got it wrong. >> well, fox's identity is as -- depicts the bad boy of the broadcast outlets. they have a hard time admitting when they make a mistake. this isn't ideological like it so often is with fox. but everybody makes mistakes. do you own up to them, how do you correct them, do you acknowledge them? and cnn was belated in getting to it, but they got to it. fox still hasn't gotten to it. that's what's really troubling. >> michael medved -- go ahead. >> what was extraordinary about this thing is there were members of congress who responded immediately who also were so unwilling to wait, who responded based upon the erroneous -- the erroneous reports initially about the mandate being overruled. i do -- i do want to come back to this idea that somehow no one expected until the oral arguments in march that the entire law could be or would be overruled which, of course, four members of the supreme court voted to do. but the fact is that expectations comes up to this changed in march during oral arguments where it seemed that the justices had doubts about it. and everything shifted. the betting was 75% according to in-trade that the mandate would be struck down. >> i want to get to that in a moment of the first, this question for margaret -- what is this whole mentality, the scoop mentality that it's a great exclusive if you get to read a piece of paper that everyone else has 20 seconds before the other guy? >> right. cnn is the breaking news network. and you have a lot riding on being first. that's what you're selling. so of course -- >> as mark said, you're selling being first and -- >> and right. you know, of course, they thought they were right given what they read. you know, pete williams is a lawyer. and he got it right because he knows to keep going. now -- >> nbc correspondent who covers legal issue. >> yes. in the cnn/fox dichotomy, fox seemed to be delighted -- you know, there was a certain amount of delight on fox's part that cnn didn't have -- and i think therefore that's why their apology was so grudging. and cnn's was a full admission. >> well, to clarify, fox did not apologize because fox -- fox's statement was -- reading along with justice roberts. >> grudging statement. >> didn't do anything wrong. i want to get to the issue that michael keeps shore shadowing, the oral arguments -- >> sorry. >> there were pundits and straight news reporters as well who said the mandate looked to be in deep trouble. none more prominent than cnn's jeffrey toobin. here's what he said in march. >> reporter: it looked like there were five votes to strike down the mandate. this was a train wreck for the obama administration. i think it's a possibility it might be a plane wreck, as well. >> so it was a transportation disaster. i told toobin if he was wrong i was going to play that tape again. again, even if you look at the straight news accounts, mark, you see a lot of leaning toward, well, this is not going to survive based on the skeptical questions asked by the justices. >> right. it shows an ignorance, with all due respect, to jeffrey toobin who's an sclenlt constitutional expert -- >> former prosecutor. >> former prosecutor. the problem with speculative journalism, horse race journalism, who's ahead, behind, who's going to win -- if ene jeffrey toobin had been reading the supreme court brief when it was handed down, maybe cnn wouldn't have got ten wrong. by having him focus on predictions that nobody can know, intrinsically unknowable, you're asking for trouble. >> the justices apparently hadn't made up their minds yet at least based on reports suggesting that john roberts may have switched his view to the majority opinion. so what about this notion of predictive journalism, michael medved? we do it in horse race political campaigns. but with complicated legal decisions, it's tricky business. >> it's a very tricky business. and that, again, i think shows some of the lack of perspective now. the truly extraordinary thing about all of this is -- first of all, this had worked its way up. there were appellate court decisions where they had split decisions. it was clearly closely divided. and we now have a situation -- and it troubles me, and it should trouble every single american, where this huge change in all of our lives was dependent upon the decision of one individual. there's something inherent leap un-democratic about that and i think that's probably why chief justice roberts pulled back is the idea of taking that responsibility in your own hands. of basically you personally overruling the decision made by 535rected representatives over two years of very bitter debate. that's an awesome sort of power to confer in one individual, and it should trouble everybody. >> well, our system of government does put a lot of power in the lifetime appointments to these -- these jurists to the high court. to round it out here, toobin was not the only person staking his reputation on that prediction. here back in march is fox's bill o'reilly saying no way that the high court would uphold this health care mandate. >> and it's going to be 5-4. if i'm wrong, i will come on -- i will play your clip, and i will apologize for being an idiot. >> all right. >> so o'reilly was -- >> where's the clip? where's the second clip? i'm an idiot. >> o'reilly was off thursday and friday, but he did phone in and discussed the supreme court decision, no apology. >> well, this provided so many hours of cable tv in the weeks leading up to this that cab drivers knew what -- that this decision was coming. so everybody expressed an opinion, and the drama of the court arguments led many of us to believe that it was going to go the other way because the government's argument was not as per sways of, and the justices got held up on the broccoli mandate. if you cannot be forced to eat broccoli, and that was picked up by pundits in the press. so you end up with this fairly, you know, simple -- simple choice that cable news has made it into. >> i am all for informed analysis. i think predictions are not just inherently risky but can make you look very, very silly. when we come back, very different take on the bicyclecare ruling and the role of john roberts depending on which channel you're watching. the court and the partisan media next. now count the number of buttons on your tablet. isn't it time the automobile advanced? 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[ chirp ] talking about the initial m misreporting of the supreme court decision on obamacare which misled the president of the united states for a few brief moment among others. by the way, jeff toobin, we talked about his prediction, cnn's jeff toobin, that the justices would strike down the individual mandate. he was forthright in saying i was wrong. meanwhile, one we found out what the ruling was, here's how it played on some of the cable shows. >> today will be remembered as the day that the supreme court of the united states of america upheld the largest tax increase in american history. >> today's hero -- chief just john roberts who walked to the forefront of history and said yes to progress and no to the role prescribed for him by the right. >> what's specialing to ing ti interesting to me is the way conservative commentators didn't grapple with what he did but talking about the original debate over the health care law. >> well, that's exactly right. i think that's appropriate because one of the things that i think where the media was mall fees ant about was actually sketching out before this case. and even before the vote in congress exactly what this sweeping legislation means to people. and the president seemed to acknowledge that in his reaction. you'll notice he spent six or seven minutes describing what's in the law. this is part of the problem, and i think you're so right about this, howard, is the idea that everything has been reduced to a horse race or does this help democrats, does this help republicans, who's ahead, who's behind. what this really involves is a change in the way that every american is going to live and experience health care. >> right. well, i certainly think we tried during two years through to see illuminate that complicated argument. >> yeah. go ahead -- >> there's been no media malfeasance, there's been media feasance. it's been covered to a faretheewell. and to people because it comes through some partisan networks, fox, msnbc, i'm thinking of, your view of the health care law is somewhat warped. but wow has this been covered. and wow has the media laid it out. >> but what do you make of not just some liberal commentators but, you know, the front page of "the new york times," other mainstream press accounts giving john roberts a halo, this guy who had been portrayed as a conservative ideologue, boy he had the wisdom and the stature and the independence to rule with the court's liberal wing on this. >> well, it's premature to say the least. that's the thing it court decisions. you just don't know what roberts is doing. and there have been some analytical articles saying that actually roberts may be running a stealth campaign to gut the commerce clause as an engine of liberal reform. so i think both msnbc and fox in the clips you played, they're playing to their audience, playing to talking points. the republicans are pivoting to call this a tax increase, lambasts obama for the fall. msnbc is temporarily making john roberts a hero. that very much remains to be seen if it will emerge that way in liberal circles. >> i think that john roberts was a statesman here because he did not want the court to be politicized and said let us follow elections. in the long run, mark is right. if what he wrote about the commerce clause is carried out in other decisions, we'll lose a lot of civil rights law. >> we'll see about the decisions. go ahead, michael. >> no, i was going to say, this whole idea of people turning around and saying, yes, this is a tax, is appropriate. you now have a majority of the supreme court of the united states including all four of the so-called liberal justices saying, yes, it was a tax all along. that the president and his associates and his spokespeople have said, no, no, no, there's no tax increase in this. this has nothing to do with taxes. the entire thing was found constitutional only on the basis that it actually was a tax t. the president was wrong. >> to clarify, the tax will be imposed on roughly 1% of those who don't go ahead and comply with the mandate by getting health insurance. i want to get one sentence from each of you because we're short on time. completely overshadowed on thursday of the house voting to hold attorney general eric holder in contempt of congress for not turning over documents in the squall fast and furious gun running legislation. is this whole thing being painted by the media as a republican vendetta? and did it end up amounting to a hill of beans? mark? >> again, where you stand depends on where you sit as the old expression goes. fox news is painting it for their constituency as a major slapdown for obama. msnbc is portraying it as a partisan witch hunt. and this is narrow casting as opposed to broadcasting. >> briefly, margaret carlson? >> alternate realities as mark says. a fast and furious contempt citation. it's going to mean nothing in the long run. >> michael medved, briefly? >> very briefly, 21 democrats total actually voted with the republicans on the civil contempt citation. 17 democrats otherwise -- only two republicans voted on the other side. that's the undercovered and very important aspect of this dispute. >> right. some might say they reacted -- under pressure of the national rifle association. has been covered -- >> the democrats are more split on this than republicans. there's no question that the democrats are surprisingly split when you have 20 members of the house voting on the other side. >> all right. i got to leave it there as they say. michael, mark, and margaret. thank you very much. up next, there was one web site that nailed the supreme court's obamacare decision, it's called scotus blog. we'll talk to its founder in a moment. founder and publisher of scotusblog as the name implies. we heard megyn kelly quoting scotusblog, how did you get it right and so qui