Leave your feedback Share Copy URL https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/health-care-coverage-tests-perceptions-of-the-media Email Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Pinterest Tumblr Share on Facebook Share on Twitter Transcript The more heated the fight over health care reform becomes, the more many Americans grow skeptical of how the media is covering the fiercely partisan debate. Jeffrey Brown reports. Read the Full Transcript Notice: Transcripts are machine and human generated and lightly edited for accuracy. They may contain errors. JIM LEHRER: Finally tonight: coverage of the news coverage of the battle over health care reform, and to Jeffrey Brown. PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA: TV loves a ruckus. JEFFREY BROWN: It's one statement from President Obama this contentious August that no doubt everyone can agree with… REP. BARNEY FRANK, D-Mass., Financial Services Committee Chairman: Trying other have a conversation with you… JEFFREY BROWN: … as the debate over health care reform has played out on television and other media — the town hall meetings. SEN. JOHN MCCAIN, R-Ariz.: We don't shout at my town hall meetings. JEFFREY BROWN: The cable TV talk.BILL O'REILLY, host, "The O'Reilly Factor": When we cover the town hall meetings, we don't describe the protesters as loons.RACHEL MADDOW, host, "The Rachel Maddow Show": Will Democrat do what they did last time Republicans changed the rules? JEFFREY BROWN: Political scorekeeping. REPORTER: The president's aides continue to insist that he supports a public option and dismiss talk of division among Democrats. JEFFREY BROWN: And the attempts to sort fact from fiction. REPORTER: Opponents of health care reform insist the proposed changes would put private insurance companies out of business. That's false. JEFFREY BROWN: No surprise the issue has also dominated newspaper and magazine coverage this month and stirred strong back-and-forth on the Internet — all in all, a lot of heat, but how much light? CAMPBELL BROWN, CNN: The truth is getting lost amid all the noise. JEFFREY BROWN: And we talk about quantity and quality in the health care coverage now with Trudy Lieberman, contributing editor at the Columbia Journalism Review and director of the Health and Medicine Reporting program at the City University of New York, Roger Sergel, managing editor of medical — of medical coverage at ABC News, and Tom Rosenstiel, director of the Project for Excellence in Journalism, a research group that analyzes news coverage from numerous outlets every day.Well, Trudy Lieberman, as a general proposition first, what stands out to you about the coverage?