Matt threw some good questions his way: "You say you're not gay. Is it possible that you're bi-sexual?"
Actually, the consensus is that Matt Lauer did a very poor job in that interview.
NBC's Matt Lauer, Making the Least Of an OpportunityBy Tom Shales
One thing, at least, was made painfully clear by Matt Lauer's interview with Sen. Larry Craig on NBC last night: Matt Lauer is no Mike Wallace. Lauer was anything but hard-hitting or confrontational with the Idaho Republican, arrested in June for alleged homosexual solicitation in a Minneapolis airport men's room.
For Lauer, self-important co-host of NBC's "Today" show, the interview was obviously seen as a potential career- and credibility-builder, but even when he did ask an arguably tough question, he essentially apologized for it. He prefaced a question about whether the senator might be bisexual by saying to Craig, "You're going to have to forgive me for this."
What? This is a journalist practicing journalism? Lauer's like a virgin veteran, an old hand who seems inexperienced. Diane Sawyer, to name one example, would have done a much better interview. Anyone on "60 Minutes," Wallace or another member of the vaunted team, would have done a better one. Lauer's former "Today" co-host, the much-maligned Katie Couric, also would likely have done a more effective job.
Craig -- seated on a couch in what looked like the family den next to his wife, Suzanne -- pleaded guilty to nothing during the interview except having pleaded guilty (to "disrupting the peace") in the first place. "It was a very, very big mistake," he said of his hasty decision to enter the plea to a lesser charge of disorderly conduct. He should have called his lawyer immediately, he said: "I sought no counsel. I made a very big mistake."
Lauer wore his concerned, caring face throughout the interview, but he appeared to be an actor in a role, with every facial expression, gesture and use of props (a pair of glasses, a pen) calculated for effect. Craig was less than convincing in his denials, even if the airport incident did sound, as it has from the beginning, like a case of entrapment . . .
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/16/AR2007101602494.html?nav=hcmodule
