Media Matters for America - Columns by Eric Boehlert

Media Matters for America - Columns by Eric Boehlert http://mediamatters.org This link is for use by RSS-enabled software to retrieve the latest items from Media Matters for America. en-US Copyright 2008, Media Matters for America The New York Times rewrites its Swift Boat history http://mediamatters.org/items/200807020007 The Swift Boat Veterans for Truth remain hovering like <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fswiftvets.eriposte.com%2F" target="_blank" title="http://swiftvets.eriposte.com/">unwanted guests</a> over the current campaign cycle. Sen. John McCain, who four years ago criticized the Swift Boat smears, is now <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.usatoday.com%2Fnews%2Fpolitics%2Felection2008%2F2008-06-30-swiftboat_N.htm" target="_blank" title="http://www.usatoday.com/news/politics/election2008/2008-06-30-swiftboat_N.htm">accepting</a> their donations. And this week, he even dragged one of the Swift Boat Vets, Bud Day, out into public view to, of all things, <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.politico.com%2Fblogs%2Fbensmith%2F0608%2FMcCain_surrogate_defends_Swift_Boaters.html" target="_blank" title="http://www.politico.com/blogs/bensmith/0608/McCain_surrogate_defends_Swift_Boaters.html">condemn</a> what the vet claimed were political attacks on McCain's Vietnam War record. The notorious group also remains a hot topic because the same publisher of the anti-Kerry Swift Boat book, Regnery Publishing, is <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.politico.com%2Fnews%2Fstories%2F0608%2F11263.html" target="_blank">planning to release</a> an August book on Sen. Barack Obama called, The Case Against Barack Obama. The book's roll-out will be pushed by the same well-connected conservative public relations firm, Creative Response Concepts, that was behind the Swift Boat blitz. Conservatives hope to catch lightning in a bottle again and derail the Democratic nominee with the release of this sensational book, but in order to disrupt Obama, the publisher will have to do more than lob all sorts of wild accusations. It will have to enlist the help of the Beltway media. Because what elevated the <a href="http://mediamatters.org/items/200408130004?f=s_search" target="_blank">outlandish</a> Swift Boat allegations that Sen. John Kerry had lied about his war injuries in Vietnam, and what gave the allegations legitimacy and legs, was the fact that the mainstream press not only showered the Swift Boat attacks with voluminous coverage (CNN aired nearly 300 segments on the topic), but that the press completely failed, in a timely fashion, to ferret out the lies the Swift Boat Vets were peddling as part of their elaborate campaign season hoax. That's the sad truth. And that's why a line from a recent New York Times <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fthecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com%2F2008%2F06%2F21%2Fstill-fighting-the-swift-boat-battle%2F" target="_blank">report</a> caught my attention. The article was on how billionaire Swift Boat backer T. Boone Pickens was basically welching on the reported wager he'd made to give $1 million to anybody who could disprove the Swift Boat Vets' claims against Kerry. (A group of Kerry-backing veterans took Pickens up on his challenge; he promptly changed the ground rules of the wager and <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fthecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com%2F2008%2F06%2F25%2Ft-boone-pickens-says-no-deal%2F" target="_blank">refused</a> to pay. But the Times piece suggested that, regardless of Pickens' refusal to pay up, it was common knowledge back in 2004 that many of the Swift Boat accusations were hollow and that the accusers were often at odds with the facts and themselves. "Of course, none of this is really new," the Times reported. "Extensive media accounts undermined the Swift Boat charges in 2004, pointing out that some of the Swift Boat critics had written statements during Vietnam lauding Mr. Kerry for extraordinary bravery in the incidents they later said he made up." Really? Is the Times actually suggesting that the media did their due diligence during the dog days of August 2004 and quickly highlighted the holes in the Swift Boat allegations? That the press unmasked the Swift Boat accusers and dirty tricksters and held them accountable? That Beltway journalists stepped forward and conducted robust fact-checking and concluded that the partisan Swift Boat accusers were not to be taken seriously? What campaign was the Times watching? (Reminds me of that great Kim Richey <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DK7yDm-5fS4s" target="_blank">song</a>, with the chorus, "You remember the way it never was.") By patting the press on the back for its role in "undermin[ing] the Swift Boat charges," the Times is simply rewriting media history -- a history that it is imperative we understand as the current general election gains momentum. The sad truth is that the Swift Boat hoax (and that's what it was -- a hoax) did not represent some sort of unvarnished truth-telling by the press. It represented a low point in timid campaign journalism. "Instead of acting as filters for the truth, reporters nodded and attentively transcribed both sides of the story, invariably failing to provide context, background, or any sense of which claims held up and which were misleading," <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.alternet.org%2Fstory%2F19665%2F%3Fpage%3Dentire%26ses%3D2ee9deb6f2486a84523ed3e8d414eb4c" target="_blank">wrote</a> Brian Montopoli, Zachary Roth, and Thomas Lang at CJR Daily, back in August 2004. The press, in other words, got used. Badly. It was painful enough in 2004 to watch the intimidated press corps stand down while the GOP rolled out its smear campaign. But to watch the press four years later try to pretend it shot down the smears in real time is infuriating. In terms of the Times, I'm not saying the newspaper did not produce any helpful reporting on the Swift Boat accusers. The newspaper did. But the Times' sterling contributions were few and far between. And the paper routinely reported on the Swift Boat story while ignoring crucial developments and without regularly informing readers that most of the Swift Boat accusations were unsubstantiated. For instance, in the final week of August 2004, when the controversy was raging in the press, three Vietnam vets independently stepped forward to support Kerry's version of events surrounding <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fswiftvets.eriposte.com%2Fkerrybronzestar.htm" target="_blank">his Bronze Star award</a>; a Bronze Star the Swift Boat accusers claimed was a fraud because Kerry had lied about being under fire. The three vets were Wayne Langhofer, Jim Russell, and Robert Lambert. Together, their stories obliterated any claim the Swift Boat Veterans had made about Kerry's Bronze Star being undeserved. But how did the Times treat those revelations? It mostly ignored them. Neither Langhofer nor Lambert was ever mentioned by the Times, while Russell garnered just brief, passing mentions in the paper of record; a newspaper that published more than 100 articles and columns in 2004 mentioning the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth. And note that, on August 23, 2004, the Times published a Page 1 piece regarding the political toll the Swift Boat attacks were taking on Kerry's campaign. Nowhere in the 1,500-word article was it suggested that the Swift Boat claims were unsubstantiated. Tactics were of paramount concern to Times campaign reporters, not so much the facts. In that regard, the Times was hardly alone in that approach. It became the newsroom norm: <ul><li>The August 20, 2004, PBS' Washington Week hosted a detailed round-table discussion about the Swift Boat controversy, featuring editors and reporters from The Wall Street Journal, the Houston Chronicle, the Los Angeles Times, and USA Today. There was no mention of the glaring gaps in the Swift Boat allegations. </li></ul> <ul><li>An August 24, 2004, Boston Globe front-page article about the Swift Boat controversy and made no mention about the glaring gaps in the allegations against Kerry. </li></ul> <ul><li>August <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.washingtonpost.com%2Fwp-dyn%2Farticles%2FA26519-2004Aug23.html" target="_blank">24</a>, <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.washingtonpost.com%2Fwp-dyn%2Farticles%2FA29821-2004Aug24.html" target="_blank">25</a>, <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.washingtonpost.com%2Fwp-dyn%2Farticles%2FA33874-2004Aug25.html" target="_blank">26</a>, <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.washingtonpost.com%2Fwp-dyn%2Farticles%2FA36650-2004Aug26.html" target="_blank">27</a>, and <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.washingtonpost.com%2Fwp-dyn%2Farticles%2FA39956-2004Aug27.html" target="_blank">28</a>, 2004, Washington Post front-page articles on the Swift Boat controversy made no mention of the glaring gaps in the allegations. </li></ul> Yet today we're told that "[e]xtensive media accounts undermined the Swift Boat charges in 2004"? Please. There were other ways the newspaper of record could have clued readers into the absurdity of the Swift Boat allegations. For instance, why didn't The New York Times publish a timely review of the Swift Boat attack book, Unfit for Command. The book was released in August 2004, dominated campaign news that month, and was obviously being taken seriously by the press corps. Shouldn't Times editors have pressed for a timely review of the thin book to help put the unfolding story in some perspective? You'd think. But then that would have meant drawing the curtain back on the entire charade. Because, as the Daily Howler <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.dailyhowler.com%2Fdh010305.shtml" target="_blank">wrote</a>, "When [co-authors] John O'Neill and Jerome Corsi published Unfit for Command, it was clear -- to anyone who read it -- that the pair were deeply kooky themselves. The book self-contradicts on page after page, and its gonzo chapter on Kerry-the-commie was straight from a mid-50s fever swamp." The key, as the Daily Howler noted, was that "[a]ny sensible person who read it would have known that its authors had emerged from those corner bars and were now engaging in 'crackpot theorizing' and 'ill-informed rumor-mongering' right out in public!" Yet the Times' influential Sunday Book Review waited <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.nytimes.com%2F2004%2F10%2F10%2Fbooks%2Freview%2F10MEADOWS.html%3Fpagewanted%3Dprint%26position%3D" target="_blank">six weeks</a> before it published a review of Unfit. (The book took, at most, six hours to read.) The review ran on October 10, 2004, several weeks after the book had exited the national stage. The Times reviewer's conclusion? Unfit for Command "is totally unconvincing." John O'Neill "is so curdled with hatred for Kerry that, as though he were an unreliable narrator in a Nabokov novel, you can't trust what he says," and yet he "refuse[s] to back down, even in the face of logic or history." But hey, at least The New York Times beat the tortoise-moving Los Angeles Times to the punch. The West Coast newspaper waited nine weeks after Unfit for Command was published to inform readers, via a book review, that it was a farce. (i.e. "This book is not journalism.") Please note that The New York Times' recent attempt to rewrite the Swift Boat media history was just the latest in a long line of revisions that began almost the instant the Swift Boat story expired. (Why? Collective guilt, I suspect.) Following the campaign, Trent Gegax, who covered Kerry for Newsweek, <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.prospect.org%2Fcs%2Farticles%3Farticle%3Dswifter_than_truth" target="_blank">told</a> The American Prospect that the Swift Boat controversy "was a ridiculous story," and that it "was ridiculous to carry on for weeks when the ads were built on claims that weren't backed up by any documentation. There were misstatements and out-and-out lies that kept this going." But in real time, back in August 30, 2004 -- back when it actually mattered to the unfolding campaign -- Gegax co-wrote a Swift Boat piece for Newsweek in which he and Evan Thomas very gently suggested the Swift Boat accusers' "credibility has proved to be questionable." Gegax and Thomas then meekly concluded it might not be possible to figure out "what really happened on the waterways of the Mekong Delta in the Vietnam War." No mention of what a "ridiculous story" the Swift Boat attacks were given how they "weren't backed up by any documentation." Instead of holding the Swift Boat accusers accountable, the press played dumb and abandoned its traditional campaign role. "We are not judging the credibility of Kerry or the (Swift Boat) Veterans, we just print the facts," Washington Post executive editor Leonard Downie Jr. <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fatheism.about.com%2Fb%2F2004%2F09%2F01%2Fabandoning-journalism.htm" target="_blank">proclaimed</a> in 2004; a quote that ought to haunt him into his <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fnymag.com%2Fdaily%2Fintel%2F2008%2F06%2Fwashington_post_editor_leonard.html" target="_blank">retirement</a> years. Think about that mindset: A campaign dispute erupted that pitted a sitting United States senator and Democratic presidential nominee, who had official Pentagon records to back up his wartime service, against a bunch of contradictory veterans who did not have a shred of paperwork to back up their claims but decided to float malicious allegations, 35 years after the fact, about his conduct in Vietnam. And The Washington Post's top newsman looked at the conflict and announced he was not going to judge the credibility of either side? Why the hell not? Downie simply turned the Post into a conveyor belt of information, of allegations, of "facts," as he called them, and steadfastly refused to help readers -- to help voters -- understand which side was telling the truth in the Swift Boat conflict. Wasn't judging the credibility of the previously unknown Swift Boat accusers precisely what the Post and the Times and the rest of the press should have been doing in August 2004? Instead, the press demurred and let the GOP smears run wild. But now, as the 2008 campaign heats up, the Times wants to pretend the opposite occurred. It wants us to remember the way it never was. http://mediamatters.org/items/200807020007 Wed, 2 Jul 2008 17:20:13 EST Obama, McCain, and Gershon agree: The press needs to get off the stage http://mediamatters.org/items/200806170003 Two hopeful sparks were visible from the campaign trail last week that suggested there is growing support for the idea of pushing the press off the stage and letting voters get on with the important business of picking the next president. For years, the press played a central and welcome role in that decision-making. But over the past 12 months, the increasingly self-absorbed Beltway press corps has shown that it's no longer up to the job, that it cannot be trusted to oversee it. The first thanks-but-no-thanks signal to the press came when the campaigns of both Sen. Barack Obama and Sen. John McCain quickly <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.examiner.com%2Fa-1430873%257EMcCain__Obama_reject_NYC_offer_on_town_hall.html" target="_blank">rejected</a> an <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fabcnews.go.com%2Fprint%3Fid%3D5021604" target="_blank">offer</a> made by ABC News to exclusively air the first of the proposed town hall forums that the candidates agreed, in principle, to have during the general-election campaign. ABC News, as part of its pitch, offered to have Diane Sawyer act as moderator. But both campaigns insisted that any citizen-based town hall event had to be open to all television outlets, as well as be seen on the Internet, and not be sponsored or organized by a single news organization. More important, the campaigns stressed that the town hall meeting would not be moderated by the press. The other refreshing forum being proposed for the general election is a Lincoln/Douglas-style event, which would also let the candidates address voters unfiltered and keep journalists on the sidelines, where they belong. I cheered that bipartisan rejection of ABC's offer because, for me, at least, the entire appeal of the citizens-first town hall format is that the television networks would have virtually no role and that their millionaire moderators (like Sawyer) would be nowhere in sight. What was the point of letting ABC News brand a town hall forum as its own by putting its host in the chair, building space-age sets as it did during the winter debate sessions, selling lots of advertising time off the event, and then turning it into prime-time programming? The town hall forums aren't about the networks, they're about the larger electoral process. By smartly swatting down ABC's proposal, the message seemed clear: The campaigns want to get the media off the stage. Journalists are not the collective third candidate in this election, although at times it's obvious they consider themselves to be just as important as political leaders. That runaway narcissism has severely damaged the craft, and the campaigns have wisely decided to give the press a time-out. A sharp reader at the New York Times blog The Caucus nicely <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fthecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com%2F2008%2F06%2F08%2Fa-new-york-moment-waiting-to-happen%2F%23comment-1098670" target="_blank">captured</a> the sentiment: <blockquote> Too often the media has trivialized our national dialogue with innuendo, scandal and gossip. It has also reduced complex social and economic issues down to trivial sound bites that conform to the technical constrictions of their medium. I suggest that these 'town hall meetings' be moderated by the leading political writers and activists working today. Union leaders, business leaders, economists and professional diplomats could also add value to the discussion. Someone like Ms. Sawyer can only add glitz and surface distraction to the issues of the day, reducing our political dialogue to mere entertainment. </blockquote> The other media spark that flew last week came from a much less likely source than the Obama and McCain camps, but I thought it was equally telling and, in a way, just as persuasive. It came when Hollywood star Gina Gershon <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.huffingtonpost.com%2F2008%2F06%2F09%2Fgina-gershon-breaks-silen_n_106023.html" target="_blank">appeared</a> on the morning chat show Live with Regis and Kelly, where she denied the rumors published in a jaw-droppingly insidious <a href="http://mediamatters.org/items/200806020003?f=s_search" target="_blank">article</a> in Vanity Fair. The piece suggested, as part of a never-ending laundry list of smears, that former President Bill Clinton had had an affair with the actress. (Days before her television appearance, Gershon's lawyer formally <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.huffingtonpost.com%2F2008%2F06%2F03%2Fgina-gershon-demands-emva_n_104936.html" target="_blank">demanded</a> a retraction and correction from VF; the magazine refused and stood by its nonexistent sourcing for the gossip.) On TV, Gershon, speaking as a celebrity, denied the rumor and scolded the magazine for its ethics-free approach to journalism. ("Vanity Fair never even did fact-checking.") Then, speaking more as a concerned citizen, Gershon expressed total shock at how the political press -- as opposed to the TMZ, Hollywood gossip-chasers she was accustomed to -- maintained no standards. "You know what's disgusting to me?" she asked. "These journalists, these irresponsible journalists, they are not accountable for anything. There's no accountability. And I don't know. I just think it's wrong." And finally, she urged voters to ignore the campaign's media filter and seek out answers on their own, directly from the candidates: <blockquote> GERSHON: [I]t's so important just to watch the candidates' debates with your own eyes and make your own decision. You know, and I think -- you know, I've been guilty of being lazy. I read a publication that I think is reputable or I see a TV show, and you can't do it anymore. You really -- I know for -- I'm going to watch the debates myself. Watch these guys talk, you know, for themselves and then decide for yourself, because you just can't really believe anything you read anymore, which is so scary. </blockquote> Together, the two rejections, one from the world of serious politics and one from the spillover region of entertainment gossip, were hitting the same point: Less press is better for voters who are trying to learn about presidential candidates. How's that for the ultimate insult? The campaign press has become so completely wrapped up in tactics and personality and trivia and absurdities that more and more of its users -- its consumers -- are quietly telling journalists to just stop, to unplug their keyboards and leave voters alone. That this election is simply too important to be hijacked by members of the media, who appear to be so caught up in intramural navel-gazing that they've lost all connection with everyday voters. And trust me, that connection has been completely severed. As Columbia Journalism Review <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.cjr.org%2Feditorial%2Fwho_will_tell_us.php" target="_blank">noted</a> last week, "The ever-growing armies of pundits deployed by cable outlets on Big Nights -- the debates, Super Tuesday, etc. -- yammer on about What It All Means, though nary a one goes out knocking on the doors of the folks who might tell them." Specifically, the message from both of the campaigns, the blog reader, and the actress was the same regarding presidential forums and debates: We need to see the candidates unfiltered, without high-paid journalists prancing around onstage, in mad pursuit of <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.memeorandum.com%2F080416%2Fp158%23a080416p158" target="_blank">gotcha moments</a> or spinning incidental debate encounters furiously afterward, and generally mucking everything up. In other words, campaign journalism is dead. Maybe town hall forums and old-school debate formats, with a diminished role for the media, will save us this campaign cycle. Editors, producers, reporters, and pundits have only themselves to blame as the campaigns move to shove the press to the sidelines -- a move that will likely be cheered by voters. Because, again, if we look at the primary season as the media's audition for the general election, the media failed miserably. For instance, did you notice the excuse the media used, at least during the Democratic primaries, that because the candidates were so similar in terms of policy positions, that of course the coverage revolved more around personality? So what's the media's excuse now? McCain and Obama couldn't be further apart on the major issues facing this country (war, the economy, the Supreme Court), yet the press remains conveniently entrenched in its personality-and-tactics-only mode. That's why we see The Washington Post's Dan Balz going <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fblog.washingtonpost.com%2Fthe-trail%2F2008%2F06%2F09%2Fthe_content_of_their_character.html%3Fhpid%3Dtopnews" target="_blank">on and on</a> about McCain and Obama and the "content of their characters"; because for journalists, campaigns are all about character sketches. Whereas voters, I assume, tend to see the contests in more concrete terms, like which candidate can help turn the economy around and which one has a plan to head off $6-a-gallon gas. For the chattering class though, elections are about anything but substance. So it was no surprise that in April and May, the media <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.msnbc.msn.com%2Fid%2F25048160%2F" target="_blank">spent more time</a> talking about when Sen. Hillary Clinton might quit the race than they did addressing how the candidates running for president might actually handle looming crises such as Iraq and a sick economy. That, according to the Project for Excellence in Journalism's analysis of political coverage in newspapers, on Internet sites, and on television news. (Press vet Tom Brokaw called all the incessant discussion about Clinton's exit a product of "too much time and too little imagination.") And that's why the campaigns and voters want the media to move aside, to step down from their unelected role as election arbitrators. The media are no longer enlightening and informing. Now they're just taking up space and producing pieces of inanity. Examples? You can pretty much toss a dart at the board and hit a stinker. But just for the sake of argument, look at this pointless -- yet breathless -- New York Times <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.nytimes.com%2F2008%2F06%2F07%2Fus%2Fpolitics%2F07meet.html" target="_blank">dispatch</a> about the private meeting Obama and Clinton recently had at the end of the primary season. Read it and try not to cringe: <blockquote> Several early reports suggested that Mr. Obama and Mrs. Clinton were holding the secret session at her home on Whitehaven Street, which sits in the shadow of the vice president's residence in Northwest Washington. In the end, aides said, the meeting did not take place there, a development that for hours injected a cloak-and-dagger-like element into the drama and set off a mad scramble for reporters to find the secret location. For a time, the search took place live on cable television, unfolding like a Washington spy thriller, with the two leading characters sneaking around with the help of decoys and diversions. Was it taking place at the home of Senator Dianne Feinstein, a California Democrat, who supported Mrs. Clinton but is also friendly to Mr. Obama? (If so, where does she live? Property records indicated an address on Nebraska Avenue, which turned up nothing.) </blockquote> Obviously, the location of the Obama and Clinton meeting was completely, and without question, irrelevant. Nonetheless, the press corps whipped itself into a frenzy and chased the non-story with abandon -- a pointless media exercise that the Times then chronicled in detail. Adding to the dark comedy, The Daily Howler <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fdailyhowler.com%2Fdh060608.shtml" target="_blank">noted</a> how CNN's Candy Crowley read all kinds of deep significance into the location of the Obama/Clinton sit-down, even though Crowley reported the wrong location. As the general election picks up momentum, more and more people seem to be sending the political press the same simple message: Thanks, but no thanks. Can you blame them? http://mediamatters.org/items/200806170003 Tue, 17 Jun 2008 12:43:14 EST Me and Scott McClellan, brothers in arms http://mediamatters.org/items/200806030001 "Some Bush defenders, including former press secretary Ari Fleischer, [suggested] that McClellan may have had a ghostwriter or undergone heavy-handed editing." <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.washingtonpost.com%2Fwp-dyn%2Fcontent%2Farticle%2F2008%2F05%2F29%2FAR2008052901238.html" target="_blank">Washington Post</a>, May 30 "McCellan's publisher, Peter Osnos, denies that a ghostwriter worked over McClellan's draft." <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.slate.com%2Fid%2F2192266%2F" target="_blank">Slate</a>, May 28 Now that Scott McClellan has <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.npr.org%2Ftemplates%2Fstory%2Fstory.php%3FstoryId%3D90931444%26ft%3D1%26f%3D1001" target="_blank">come clean</a> in his book about the real nature of the Bush White House, I'll confess my own secret: Scott McClellan was a ghostwriter for my 2006 book, <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.amazon.com%2FLapdogs-Press-Rolled-Over-Bush%2Fdp%2F0743289315" target="_blank">Lapdogs: How the Press Rolled Over for Bush</a>. No, really. But let's be honest, prior to McClellan's new <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.amazon.com%2FWhat-Happened-Washingtons-Culture-Deception%2Fdp%2F1586485563%2Fref%3Dpd_bbs_1%3Fie%3DUTF8%26s%3Dbooks%26qid%3D1212268894%26sr%3D1-1" target="_blank">turncoat book</a>, What Happened: Inside the Bush White House and Washington's Culture of Deception, where the formerly loyal aide confirms so many liberal critiques of the White House, as well as chastises the complacent media for rolling over for Bush, how many people would have even believed my unlikely tale of collaboration? Talk about a possible career-killer for McClellan. And trust me, he understood the risk of colluding with a liberal media critic, especially while he was on the White House clock. I remember back when he was secretly helping me with the book, I'd say, Mac (that's what I called him), are you crazy? What would Republicans say if they found out you were being disloyal to Bush, as well as aiding to puncture the long-running myth about the "liberal media"? I warned him that party elders like Bob Dole would open a can of <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.boston.com%2Fnews%2Fpolitics%2Fpoliticalintelligence%2F2008%2F05%2Fdole_rips_mccle.html" target="_blank">whupass</a> on him if they found out. But McClellan was committed to my project and insisted on helping me craft my critique of how the press adopted a flagrant double standard when covering the Bush administration. He was especially angry about the media's lapdog performance during the run-up to the Iraq war. That's why I wasn't surprised by the revelations in his new book last week. In fact, they sounded a little bit too much like Lapdogs, if you know what I mean. (But Mac and I are buds, so it's all good.) This passage from his new book certainly had a Lapdogs ring to it: <blockquote> And through it all, the media would serve as complicit enablers. Their primary focus would be on covering the campaign to sell the war, rather than aggressively questioning the rationale for war or pursuing the truth behind it. ... [T]he media would neglect their watchdog role, focusing less on truth and accuracy and more on whether the campaign was succeeding. [Page 125]</blockquote> So did this blast: <blockquote> If anything, the national press corps was probably too deferential to the White House and to the administration in regard to the most important decision facing the nation during my years in Washington, the choice over whether to go to war in Iraq. ... In this case, the "liberal media" didn't live up to its reputation. If it had, the country would have been better served. [Pages 156-157]</blockquote> And, man, did the press act shocked last week, or what? Tim Russert on NBC was stunned that McClellan was using "MoveOn.org" language to describe the Bush White House, and the Politico's Mike Allen <a href="http://mediamatters.org/items/200805300008?f=h_top" target="_blank">likened</a> it to rhetoric used by the "left-wing haters." (C'mon, Mike, don't be a hater hata.) Me? I knew years ago that McClellan was privately fuming over the press' lapdog performance. Oh sure, he stood stoically at the press briefing podium day after day robotically repeating administration talking points and amplifying the White House's contempt for the press. But inside, he was actually eager for the press to challenge the administration. To show some backbone. I must say McClellan was indefatigable in his Lapdog research, ducking out of White House meetings to call me and emailing at all hours of the night with new media outrages, examples of the press' complicity in leading the nation to war. (One annoying point: Mac kept badgering me to call the book Complicit Enablers, but my publisher thought Lapdogs packed more of a punch.) Lapdogs just wouldn't have been the same -- wouldn't have been as complete -- if it weren't for the sharp media critique eye of my pal Scott McClellan. And maybe NBC's David Gregory and his Beltway pals should give it another close read if they really think they did <a href="http://mediamatters.org/items/200805290008?f=h_latest" target="_blank">nothing wrong</a> with their war coverage, that they asked all the right questions and refrained from cheerleading. Mac and I disagree with Gregory on that one. After all, it was McClellan who fired up the White House Nexis account and tallied up the number of times the "liberal" Washington Post editorialized in favor of the war from September 2002 to February 2003: 26. He smartly tipped me off to a study conducted by the McCormick Tribune Foundation that found a majority of Americans thought the news media could have done a better job informing the public about Iraq and the stakes involved in going to war. He flagged a <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.fair.org%2Freports%2Firaq-sources.html" target="_blank">study</a> by Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting that focused on the first two weeks of February 2003, when the debate about the war should have been raging on the public airwaves, and found that of 393 people interviewed on camera for network news reports about the war, just 6 percent were people who expressed skepticism about the looming invasion. And yes, it was McClellan who turned me onto research compiled by analyst Andrew Tyndall, who found that almost all the 414 Iraq stories broadcast on NBC, ABC, and CBS from September 2002 until February 2003 could be traced back to sources from the White House, the Pentagon, or the State Department. Only 34 stories, or just 8 percent, were of independent origin. Mac was livid when he <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.medialifemagazine.com%2Fnews2005%2Faug05%2FAug22%2F1_mon%2Fnews7monday.html" target="_blank">discovered</a> that an ABC affiliate in Utah owned by Clear Channel Communications informed backers of an anti-war ad that it was an "inappropriate commercial advertisement for Salt Lake City." And Mac couldn't believe it when a CBS affiliate in Boise, Idaho, also refused to air the ad, insisting its claim that Bush lied about Iraq's WMDs was not provable. In 2004, when Seth Mnookin's book Hard News was published, Mac immediately told me to dog-ear the page where The New York Times' former investigative editor, Doug Frantz, recalled how Times editor "Howell Raines was eager to have articles that supported the war-mongering out of Washington." And how Raines "discouraged pieces that were at odds with the administration's position on Iraq's supposed weapons of mass destruction and alleged links to Al Qaeda." McClellan just shook his head in 2005 when he <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.msnbc.msn.com%2Fid%2F8122581%2F%23050607" target="_blank">read</a> Newsweek's Baghdad bureau chief Rod Nordland admit that when he arrived in Iraq two years earlier he had been "an unabashed believer in toppling Saddam Hussein." Can you imagine, I remember McClellan asking me, Newsweek in 2003 assigning as Baghdad bureau chief somebody who was an "unabashed" opponent of the war? We both scoffed at the notion. Mac and I are no longer in touch (that was a prerequisite of our strict ghostwriting pact), but I'm sure he was fuming last week when CNN's Wolf Blitzer, responding to Mac's allegation that the press was too timid prior to the war, noted how often CNN had hosted war skeptic and former weapons inspector Scott Ritter to discuss the war. Scott Ritter! Oh, that was rich. See, it was McClellan who dug up this quote <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.dailyhowler.com%2Fdh020404.shtml" target="_blank">(via the Daily Howler)</a> from Ritter when he appeared on a C-SPAN call-in show in January 2004. Mac insisted that Ritter's response to a question about why he was rarely seen on television anymore discussing the war perfectly captured the media's complicity and he urged me to include Ritter's quote in Lapdogs in full, which I did: <blockquote> Unfortunately, I don't believe the mainstream media acted responsibly in regard to Iraq. Back in the fall of 2002, I was belittled, I was called a traitor, I was called crazy -- Paula Zahn of CNN accused me of drinking Saddam Hussein's Kool-Aid for making accurate statements in response to aluminum tubes and uranium allegedly coming from Niger. I think we have a problem here in that the media is culpable for the misleading of the American public. They bought into the Bush administration's rhetoric and war fervor, they sold the war to the American public, and now they have to deal with the fact that they're the ones that were out there beating the war drums and you have this guy, Scott Ritter, who was saying something different and -- maybe they just don't know how to deal with me. [Page 273] </blockquote> With What Happened, McClellan has become a big media star and revealed himself as a left-leaning media critic. His ghostwriting days are over. But at least Mac can blurb my next book. http://mediamatters.org/items/200806030001 Tue, 3 Jun 2008 11:56:41 EST Why did the press ignore Ted Kennedy in 2002? http://mediamatters.org/items/200805280002 The <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.washingtonpost.com%2Fwp-dyn%2Fcontent%2Farticle%2F2008%2F05%2F20%2FAR2008052001278.html" target="_blank">sad news</a> last week that Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-MA) has been diagnosed with a malignant brain tumor triggered an extraordinary amount of news coverage, making the front pages of newspapers across the country and producing more than 2,000 television mentions, according to TVeyes.com. Aside from sitting presidents, there aren't many politicians who can generate that kind of play with a health-related bulletin. The avalanche of interest in Kennedy's cancer battle stems not only from his famous family and his last-of-a-generation, living-legend status, but also because Kennedy symbolizes -- and serves as a de facto spokesman for -- an entire political leaning in America: liberals. That's why what Kennedy does and says is important, and it's usually treated that way by the media. Indeed, this is the second time this year the illustrious lawmaker has made big headlines. The first came in January when Kennedy endorsed Sen. Barack Obama for president. That was also front-page news across the country and completely dominated television's political coverage for days. In fact, news of Kennedy's endorsement, made on the morning of January 28, nearly eclipsed President Bush's <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.whitehouse.gov%2Fstateoftheunion%2F2008%2Findex.html" target="_blank">State of the Union address</a>, which was delivered later that evening. This year, the press has treated Kennedy as a singularly powerful figure in the Democratic Party and a commanding spokesman for the American left. Unfortunately, that hasn't always been the case. Just a few years ago, when Republicans were riding high on Iraq war fever and Democrats were seen as on the retreat politically, the press cavalierly snubbed Kennedy. Specifically, back in September 2002, with the Bush administration and much of the Beltway media rushing to embrace war with Iraq, Kennedy delivered a passionate, provocative, and <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.commondreams.org%2Fviews02%2F0930-05.htm" target="_blank">newsworthy speech</a> raising all sorts of doubts about a possible invasion. Unlike today, the political press wasn't very interested in Kennedy or what he had to say about the most pressing issue facing the nation. Back in that media environment, being the voice of American liberals didn't mean much. I've been thinking about Kennedy's speech a lot lately. Not just because the senator has been in the news, but also because of the Pentagon's still-unfolding <a href="http://mediamatters.org/action_center/military_analysts/archive" target="_blank">propaganda scandal</a> involving retired U.S. generals who, at times, were used as puppets on network and cable television during the war, where they repeated administration talking points while presenting themselves as independent analysts. That outlets eagerly embraced the Pentagon's pro-war generals while mostly dismissing Kennedy's warnings perfectly captured the media's mindset during the run-up to the war. To really get a sense of the damage done by that propaganda initiative and to appreciate just how badly the press fell down as professional skeptics who are supposed to hold people in power accountable, it's instructive to revisit the media environment of late 2002 and early 2003. And looking back, a key turning point during that public rush to war was Kennedy's fervent and thoughtful speech. It was a turning point because it highlighted, months before the invasion even took place, how the press was going to deal with high-profile, articulate critics of Bush's war policy. The press was going to <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.fair.org%2Freports%2Firaq-sources.html" target="_blank">downplay them, marginalize them, and ignore them</a>. Even if those critics included high-wattage political stars like Ted Kennedy. In retrospect, I can't help thinking that if the media treated Kennedy in 2002 the way they treat him today (and the way the press treated him before 2002), as somebody whose actions command respect and attention, that the doomed public debate about the war would have, or at least could have, been much different. It could have been more critical, more thoughtful, and more illuminating. Instead, much of the political press in 2002 treated Kennedy as a bystander in the passing Bush parade, and specifically, they treated Kennedy's September 27 speech as little more than a political maneuver that deserved only passing mention -- literally. That night on NBC's Nightly News, just 32 words from the Kennedy address were excerpted. On ABC's World News Tonight, it was 31 words. And on the CBS Evening News, 40 words. In all three instances, the brief mention of the Kennedy speech was part of a larger report on the looming possibility of war. Meaning, on none of the networks did Kennedy's speech qualify as a stand-alone news event. The address was given on a Friday. Two days later on the Sunday talk shows, where Iraq was discussed in detail, Kennedy's name never came up on NBC's Meet the Press, on CBS' Face the Nation, or on ABC's This Week. For the network pundits, Kennedy's anti-war speech did not exist. It was irrelevant to the around-the-clock media chatter about a looming war. The Kennedy coverage in the major newspapers wasn't much better. At The Washington Post, Kennedy's newsworthy speech, a clarion call against Bush's pre-emptive war, garnered exactly one sentence -- 36 words total in coverage. Keep in mind, during 2002, the Post published more than 1,000 articles and columns about Iraq, nearly 1 million words. But the Post set aside just 36 words for Kennedy's farsighted war speech. What was so remarkable was that Kennedy delivered his address at the time when there was already a media narrative unfolding about how Democrats, anxious about the political ramifications of not supporting a then-popular president, were not voicing stiff opposition to the planned invasion. Two days before Kennedy gave his speech, the Post detailed in an <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fcommondreams.org%2Fheadlines02%2F0925-01.htm" target="_blank">A1 article</a> how "[d]ozens of congressional Democrats are frustrated with their leadership for rushing to embrace President Bush's Iraqi war resolution and fostering an impression the party overwhelmingly backs a unilateral strike against Saddam Hussein." When Kennedy stepped forward and answered the specific issue raised by the Post, what did the newspaper do? It devoted 36 words to Kennedy's address. What was lacking from the limited coverage that did exist was even the slightest attempt to relay the key points of Kennedy's address, which represented the same central points that White House critics had been raising for months and continued to raise after Kennedy's speech. Some key passages from the Kennedy speech: <ul><li> "[T]he Administration has not made a convincing case that we face such an imminent threat to our national security that a unilateral, pre-emptive American strike and an immediate war are necessary."</li> <li> "[T]he Administration has not explicitly acknowledged, let alone explained to the American people, the immense post-war commitment that will be required to create a stable Iraq."</li> <li> "A largely unilateral American war that is widely perceived in the Muslim world as untimely or unjust could worsen not lessen the threat of terrorism."</li> <li> "War with Iraq before a genuine attempt at inspection and disarmament, or without genuine international support -- could swell the ranks of Al Qaeda sympathizers and trigger an escalation in terrorist acts."</li> <li> "[I]nformation from the intelligence community over the past six months does not point to Iraq as an imminent threat to the United States or a major proliferator of weapons of mass destruction." </li> <li> "[T]here is no clear and convincing pattern of Iraqi relations with either Al Qaeda or the Taliban."</li></ul> Talk about a greatest-hits performance. Kennedy nailed virtually every major problem and shortfall that emerged in the wake of the invasion. Yet in real time, the press, which was producing voluminous reports and commentary about the possible war, showed only superficial interest in Kennedy's prophetic comments. For instance, Kennedy's hometown paper, The Boston Globe, ran a Page One story about the senator's war speech. But the article itself contained just three quotes from the address and did not include most of his most stinging assessments. The New York Times did the same thing in a September 28, 2002, <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fquery.nytimes.com%2Fgst%2Ffullpage.html%3Fres%3D940CE4D61638F93BA1575AC0A9649C8B63%26sec%3D%26spon%3D%26pagewanted%3Dall" target="_blank">article</a>, leading with a reference to Kennedy's address. But the Times included just two Kennedy quotes in the entire article, an article that mostly focused on upcoming war-related votes in Congress and the United Nations. Also, both the Globe and the Times set aside nearly as much space for Republican hit man Rep. Tom DeLay (R-TX) to attack Kennedy's speech as the papers did to explain what Kennedy actually said about waging war. Note: I mentioned earlier that it's instructive to go back and actually read the articles and transcripts from 2002 and 2003 to get a sense of just how dreadful the prewar coverage was. But that kind of research is not for the faint of heart, because what you'll find is often just gruesome. That's my way of prefacing how MSNBC's Hardball dealt with Kennedy's speech on September 27, 2002. I kid you not, host Chris Matthews took the news of Kennedy's smart, provocative speech, which represented the most sweeping and prominent indictment of Bush's war plan delivered by an in-office Democrat, and the MSNBC host packaged it with war pronouncements made that same week by Hollywood stars: <blockquote> MATTHEWS: Tonight on Hardball, Barbra Streisand, Senator Ted Kennedy, and Tom Cruise speak out as debate picks up in Washington and in Hollywood over whether this country should attack Iraq. </blockquote> Don't you love how Babs got top billing over Kennedy? And yes, the program's guests spent nearly as much time discussing (in a serious manner) what celebrities thought about the war as they did debating Kennedy's thoughts about launching an unprecedented pre-emptive war against Iraq. (FYI: Cruise supported the war; Streisand, not so much.) Not gruesome enough? Note this teaser that Matthews read at the top of the program that night, which perfectly captured the tone and tenor of the times: "Tonight, do the radical protesters shutting down Washington have a legitimate cause or do they simply hate America?" Incredibly, Hardball was not alone in grouping Kennedy together with the Hollywood actor and singer in terms of the day's top political news. From CNN's Inside Politics on September 27, 2002: <blockquote> Senator Ted Kennedy joins the ranks of Democrats raising red flags about war with Iraq, but is his take on Iraq that different from the president's? Then, Barbra Streisand is emerging from partial retirement Sunday, lending her voice to a star-studded event in Los Angeles, expected to bring in $4 million for House Democrats.</blockquote> And yes, you read that correctly. The pros at CNN suggested that Kennedy's laundry list of reservations about a war with Iraq wasn't all that different from what Bush was saying publicly at the time. As CNN's Candy Crowley reported that day, "What was remarkable was the extent to which they [Kennedy and Bush] seemed to be saying the same thing." Just amazing. As we hope for the best regarding Kennedy's health condition and await the latest update, which will likely spark a flurry of press reports, let's not forget that it wasn't that long ago that the media did their best to ignore what Kennedy had to say. And when it ignored Kennedy, and when it ignored the voice of liberals, the press -- and the country -- paid a dear price. http://mediamatters.org/items/200805280002 Wed, 28 May 2008 12:15:41 EST Karl Rove's pundit problem http://mediamatters.org/items/200805200001 If Rep. John Conyers (D-MI) holds true to his recent <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.politico.com%2Fblogs%2Fthecrypt%2F0508%2FConyers_Were_closing_in_on_Rove.html" target="_blank">promise</a> to slap Karl Rove with a contempt of Congress charge for refusing to answer questions about explosive abuse-of-power <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.annistonstar.com%2Fshowcase%2F2008%2Fas-open-0518-mricks-8e18a0747.htm" target="_blank">allegations</a> and whether Rove unleashed the Justice Department on a prominent Alabama Democrat, it will be interesting to see how Rove's newfound media employers at Newsweek, Fox News, and The Wall Street Journal handle the story. It will also be worth noting how Beltway opinion-makers in the press, who in recent weeks have been <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.nytimes.com%2F2008%2F05%2F12%2Fus%2Fpolitics%2F12rove.html%3F_r%3D1%26partner%3Drssnyt%26oref%3Dslogin" target="_blank">praising</a> Rove for his second act as a full-time pundit, deal with the messy development. When Rove began lining up media jobs following his 2007 White House departure, there were howls of protest about such an obvious and controversial partisan being embraced by media outlets as a news analyst. The politics-to-press revolving door is not good for journalism. (We need more reporters, not pundits.) But the trend is not going away, and history shows the media are far more willing to <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fafp.google.com%2Farticle%2FALeqM5gCu8aLkX8NyRL-u8ncjxVfyfFrOw" target="_blank">hire partisan</a> Republicans than Democrats. My beef with the Rove hiring, though, centers on two issues related specifically to him. The first is about the still-unfolding saga out of Alabama (more on that below) and the way Rove's new employers consistently downplay that troubling story. As do journalists now busy handing out kudos to Rove for his talking-head talent. But secondly, and perhaps more importantly, why is Rove being held up as a paragon of political analysis at the very moment the Republican president he helped mold, and the Republican Congress he helped steer, are both in complete <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fshakespearessister.blogspot.com%2F2008%2F05%2Fblowout.html" target="_blank">free falls</a>? I don't remember the mainstream media clamoring to sign up the political insights of Hamilton Jordan just as President Jimmy Carter plummeted in the polls. According to the most <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.cnn.com%2F2008%2FPOLITICS%2F05%2F01%2Fbush.poll%2F" target="_blank">recent surveys</a>, President Bush's current second-term debacle exceeds any other White House calamity in modern times. Yet the man who made it all possible, the "brains" behind the president who has become "<a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fbriefingroom.thehill.com%2F2008%2F05%2F16%2Frep-davis-bush-is-absolutely-radioactive%2F" target="_blank">radioactive</a>" inside his own party, is toasted in the press as a political wise man. Since when do the spoils go to the loser? And do editors or producers at Newsweek or The Wall Street Journal or Fox News even broach the topic with Rove and ask him to pontificate, in print or on the air, about why the Republican Party that he helped shape for much of the last decade is now spiraling downward, and why Bush has made history as the most disliked president ever to sit in the Oval Office? Or do news executives not want to highlight to their readers and viewers the fact that their vaunted political expert, whose insights are advertised as being so valuable, actually helped design the GOP's modern-day Edsel? It makes no sense, but I can't say I'm surprised by the lack of reality that surrounds Rove and the glowing reviews he's collecting from the press. It's simply a continuation of the gooey, ongoing <a href="http://mediamatters.org/columns/200611140003" target="_blank">crush</a> the Beltway press has had on Rove, who for years was credited in the media for building the Republican Party into a sleek, hardball-playing, election-winning vessel that could out-race the dawdling Democrat boat with ease. Rove, the press cheered, had literally cracked the code to winning elections, and poor Democrats were powerless to slow down his juggernaut. Forget that Bush has suffered a <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pollingreport.com%2FBushJob.htm" target="_blank">historic plummet</a> in the polls, bottoming out at a depth never before measured with modern polling. None of that matters, because as MSNBC's Norah O'Donnell <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Ftoday.msnbc.msn.com%2Fid%2F24596713%2F" target="_blank">proclaimed</a> just last week, Rove "is a brilliant political tactician." That has been the <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fnymag.com%2Fnymetro%2Fnews%2Fpolitics%2Fcolumns%2Fnationalinterest%2F11617%2F" target="_blank">divined media narrative</a> on Rove for years, and nothing will change it. Not even the fact that Republican pros now publicly admit the number one challenge facing the party come November is Bush's dismal standing among most Americans. "As the head figure of the Republican brand, President Bush continues to flounder," Rep. Tom Davis (R-VA) <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.texasmonthly.com%2Fblogs%2Fburkablog%2Findex.php" target="_blank">wrote</a> to his colleagues last week, stressing the political climate for Republicans "is the worst since Watergate." The carnage come November could be historic, especially in the wake of the GOP's stunning <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fmarcambinder.theatlantic.com%2Farchives%2F2008%2F05%2Fthe_republican_loss_in_mississ.php" target="_blank">Mississippi loss</a> last week in the kind of congressional district Democrats don't even usually compete in, let alone win by eight points. The Republican Party spent more $1 million trying to salvage the race. As the Politico <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.politico.com%2Fnews%2Fstories%2F0508%2F10366.html" target="_blank">noted</a>: <blockquote> Many House GOP operatives are privately predicting that the party could easily lose up to 20 seats this fall. Combined with the 30 seats that the GOP lost in 2006, that would leave the party facing a 70-vote deficit against Democrats in the House -- a state of powerlessness reminiscent of Republicans' long wilderness years in the 1960s and '70s. </blockquote> And for that, all-star pundit Karl Rove deserves the blame. Why won't the media assign it? Sweet Home Alabama Meanwhile, the Alabama saga continues to gather momentum. The short version is that former Gov. Don Siegelman, a Democrat who was convicted on corruption charges in 2006, has accused Rove of engineering the prosecution through the Justice Department in order to make sure Siegelman could not run again for re-election. The politician also claims Rove helped steal the bitterly contested 2002 Alabama governor's election, which Siegelman lost by just 3,000 votes. Siegelman led as returns came in on Election Day and throughout the night. It was only when the <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Farchives.cnn.com%2F2002%2FALLPOLITICS%2F11%2F07%2Felec02.al.g.dispute%2Findex.html">ballot count</a> from Baldwin County changed drastically from its initial tally that the Democrat lost. Siegelman claims the incidents were part of a sinister, by-any-means-necessary effort by Rove to politicize the Justice Department to ensure a permanent Republican majority. ("I think this will make Watergate look like child's play," Siegelman insists.) Backing up the heart of Siegelman's claim about the political prosecution is a longtime Republican attorney from Alabama named <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Frawstory.com%2Fnews%2F2008%2FIn_exclusive_interview_Alabama_whistleblower_says_0225.html" target="_blank">Dana Jill Simpson</a>. She signed an affidavit last year and claimed she took part in a conference call with Alabama Republican operatives where Rove's role in Siegelman's prosecution was discussed. Both Siegelman, currently released from prison on bond following an appeals court ruling, and Simpson have appeared on 60 Minutes to make their claims against Rove. (For more details on Siegelman, go <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.time.com%2Ftime%2Fnation%2Farticle%2F0%2C8599%2C1627427%2C00.html" target="_blank">here</a>, <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Frawstory.com%2Fnews%2F2007%2FThe_Permanent_Republican_Majority_1125.html" target="_blank">here</a>, or <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.talkingpointsmemo.com%2Farchives%2F014891.php" target="_blank">here</a>.) The Alabama story has been picked up by congressional Democrats, who are already investigating what role Rove played in the Bush administration's <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fdir.salon.com%2Ftopics%2Fus_attorneys%2F" target="_blank">unprecedented firing</a> of eight U.S. attorneys. Conyers, chairman of the Judiciary Committee, requested that Rove testify about Siegelman. Despite the fact that he claims to have had absolutely no involvement in the matter, Rove has <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Ftheboard.blogs.nytimes.com%2F2008%2F05%2F13%2Fwhere-isnt-karl-rove-talking-these-days%2F" target="_blank">refused</a> to testify. (Wouldn't that be the easiest type of testimony to give?) Instead, Rove offered to speak privately with committee staff off the record and with no transcript. The problem with that kind of arrangement, as Salon.com's Joe Conason <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.salon.com%2Fopinion%2Fconason%2F2007%2F03%2F23%2Frove%2F" target="_blank">wrote</a> in 2007, is that the Valerie Plame <a href="http://mediamatters.org/columns/200702060006" target="_blank">leak investigation</a> has already highlighted how "Rove is a proven liar who <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fdir.salon.com%2Fstory%2Fopinion%2Fconason%2F2005%2F10%2F07%2Frove_inquiry%2Findex.html" target="_blank">cannot be trusted to tell the truth</a> even when he is under oath, unless and until he is directly threatened with the prospect of prison time." Still, most the media have been too busy <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fgawker.com%2F368792%2Feveryone-loves-karl" target="_blank">toasting</a> Rove the pundit -- they love his disarming on-air charm! -- to dwell on the looming controversy. (MSNBC's Dan Abrams and CBS' 60 Minutes have <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.crooksandliars.com%2F2008%2F04%2F08%2Fverdict-with-dan-abrams-don-siegelman-speaks-out%2F" target="_blank">proven</a> to be two key <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.crooksandliars.com%2F2008%2F04%2F07%2F60-minutes-gov-siegelman-challenges-rove-to-testify-under-oath%2F" target="_blank">exceptions</a>.) When <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.nytimes.com%2F2008%2F05%2F12%2Fus%2Fpolitics%2F12rove.html%3Fref%3Dpolitics%26pagewanted%3Dall" target="_blank">The New York Times</a> and <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.washingtonpost.com%2Fwp-dyn%2Fcontent%2Farticle%2F2008%2F03%2F16%2FAR2008031602748.html" target="_blank">The Washington Post</a> ran lengthy, flattering profiles of Rove, totaling more than 2,000 words, the newspapers set aside just 68 words, combined, to reference the Siegelman story. As for Rove's new media employers, I searched Nexis and could find only a single sentence published in Newsweek that referenced the allegations Siegelman has lodged against Rove. At Fox News, there have been, at best, just a handful of passing references that appeared in Nexis in the last month. And the Journal has devoted virtually no coverage to Siegelman's allegations against Rove. A search of the Factiva database turned up one reference in a story about an Alabama TV station blacking out the 60 Minutes broadcast in which Siegelman's claims were investigated. The press is too busy employing -- and praising -- Rove to notice his mounting legal jeopardy. I can't help thinking that the media reaction would be much different if a Democratic adviser were at the center of attention. I'm thinking specifically about 1997, when longtime Clinton presidential adviser George Stephanopoulos left the administration and took a job at ABC News as a full-time pundit. What if just months after arriving at ABC News, it was alleged that Stephanopoulos had been at the center of an abuse-of-power scandal within the Clinton administration, as has Rove? Would the press have reacted the same way? Let's play that out a bit and see. First, a quick history lesson in how the overcaffeinated political press operated during the Clinton '90s. Webster Hubbell was a longtime friend of Bill and Hillary Clinton's. Hubbell was named associate attorney general at the outset of Clinton's first term but had to step down when investigators found that while previously working at the Rose Law firm in Little Rock (where Hillary also worked), Hubbell had billed clients for work that was never performed and that Hubbell never reported the earnings to the IRS. Hubbell was sentenced to 21 months in prison for tax evasion. Throughout the 1990s, Hubbell repeatedly clashed with independent counsel Kenneth Starr, who pressed the Clinton friend for more damning information about the ongoing Whitewater-related investigations. Over time, the press joined Starr's <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fdailyhowler.com%2Fh050398_1.shtml" target="_blank">conspiratorial obsession</a> that Hubbell was the key to unraveling the Clinton's criminal empire. The press went even further, suggesting the Clintons were somehow muzzling Hubbell (<a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.time.com%2Ftime%2Fmagazine%2Farticle%2F0%2C9171%2C985915%2C00.html" target="_blank">hush money</a>?) from talking about their business dealings. In the end, Hubbell was of <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fmembers.fortunecity.com%2Feditor_oj%2FSenate%2FCN_Hillary%2Fcn_hillary.html" target="_blank">no use</a> to Starr because he had no damning inside information about the Clintons. Now, let's tweak the script just a bit to make the Hubbell story more analogous to the current Rove-Siegelman controversy and see what it would have looked like if Stephanopoulos, having just joined ABC News as a pundit, had been at the center of the allegations. Let's say that while sitting inside the Cumberland Federal Correctional Institution in Maryland, Hubbell claimed that Stephanopoulos had served as his go-between with the Clintons as they discussed their conspiracy of silence. Then a Democratic attorney from Arkansas and longtime party loyalist released a signed affidavit in which she claimed to have overheard a conference call where party operatives made open reference to the fact that Stephanopoulos was applying pressure to the Justice Department to make sure it backed off any further Hubbell prosecutions, thereby ensuring Hubbell wouldn't become a political problem for the White House. Imagine the Democratic whistle-blower then went on 60 Minutes and made her charges on national television. Then Hubbell was released on bond while a retrial was contemplated, and he went on 60 Minutes and claimed Stephanopoulos, in coordination with the Clinton White House and Justice Department, had tried to silence him. And then the Republican-controlled House demanded that Stephanopoulos testify under oath about the allegations, but Stephanopoulos refused to cooperate, thereby initiating possible contempt of Congress charges. If all of that took place, do you think A) ABC News would have kept Stephanopoulos on the air as a political pundit, the way Fox News, Newsweek, and The Wall Street Journal have kept Rove on their payrolls? B) ABC News would have essentially boycotted reporting on Hubbell's allegations, the way Fox News, Newsweek, and the Journal have mostly stayed clear of Rove's Siegelman mess? And/or C) The Washington Post and The New York Times would have published glowing reviews about what an insightful pundit Stephanopoulos had turned out to be, while basically ignoring the explosive allegations made by Hubbell and the Democratic attorney in Arkansas? The media's double standard seems obvious. To recap: The Siegelman saga gains momentum while the GOP disintegrates, and Karl Rove continues to harvest media kudos as a masterful political tactician. Which one of those three just doesn't belong? Update: On May 22, Conyers' House Judiciary Committee <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1153ap_rove_subpoena.html">subpoenaed</a> Rove. The subpoena reportedly orders him to testify about the Siegelman saga before the House panel on July 10. http://mediamatters.org/items/200805200001 Tue, 20 May 2008 13:08:14 EST The press polishes the McCain "brand" http://mediamatters.org/items/200805130007 Campaign aides for Sen. John McCain want very much to sell the American public on the "McCain brand" and to pitch the Republican candidate as a sort of stand-alone, untarnished political entity, according to a recent Washington Post <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.washingtonpost.com%2Fwp-dyn%2Fcontent%2Farticle%2F2008%2F04%2F11%2FAR2008041104150.html" target="_blank" title="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/04/11/AR2008041104150.html">article</a>. The marketing ploy, if successful, would not only create distance between the candidate and the rest of the Republican Party, which currently suffers from widespread <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fabcnews.go.com%2FPollingUnit%2FPolitics%2Fstory%3Fid%3D4836138%26page%3D1">voter disapproval</a>, it would also effectively elevate McCain and make him a larger-than-life figure, the spokesman for his own maverick brand that's built on political independence. "The campaign's general-election strategy is to sell the McCain brand to show voters that he is distinct from President Bush and other Republicans," the Post reported. So guess what members of the press, including those at MSNBC, CNN, NBC, The Washington Post, <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.blog.newsweek.com%2Fblogs%2Fstumper%2Farchive%2F2008%2F05%2F05%2Fthe-mccain-veepstakes-vol-1-bobby-jindal.aspx">Newsweek</a>, the Politico, and The Boston Globe, have been doing incessantly in recent weeks. They've been making glowing references to the durability and appeal of the "McCain brand." I mean, how lucky can the Republicans get? The press is echoing precisely the message that the candidate's advisers want repeated again and again. What are the odds? I assume the sarcasm is coming through loud and clear here. We all know McCain is supposed to be a <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DxXjFK4vcHY8">maverick</a>. That phony meme has been drummed into voters' heads for nearly a decade now. Yet as Media Matters for America <a href="http://mediamatters.org/items/200712180005#0411">has shown</a>, the media use the label "maverick" despite the many times McCain has <a href="http://mediamatters.org/items/200612050007">fallen in line</a> with the Bush administration or the Republican Party establishment, a <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservative.org%2Farchive2%2F2008potus.asp">lifetime rating</a> of 83 by the American Conservative Union, and his recent <a href="http://mediamatters.org/items/200802050007">rightward shift</a> on high-profile issues such as <a href="http://mediamatters.org/items/200801220002">immigration</a> and <a href="http://mediamatters.org/items/200801250011">taxes</a>. (For the longer, in-depth dissections of that McCain's media free ride, go <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fmediamattersaction.org%2Ffreeride%2F">here</a>.) Now, in a sort of Phase Two, McCain's all-around maverick-ness is being elevated into an iconic brand status, right alongside Ford and Nike. The media, which admire the corporatization of campaigns, are hugely impressed by the development. Successful branding represents a kind of marketing nirvana in which you're able, via a collection of images and idea, to differentiate yourself -- or your product -- from others that appear to be identical. (High-profile political journalists understand the career significance of branding and work feverishly during the campaign season to create their own media brand.) Indeed, the term "brand" conjures up an impenetrable, irrevocable image, an entrenched vision that cannot be altered. In the business world, it often takes a catastrophic event to change people's perception of a well-established and respected brand. As the Post article noted, "The selling of McCain is rooted in one of the oldest theories of product marketing: that a successful brand identity, once established in the American psyche, is virtually impossible to blunt or damage." So in a way, this becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy for the press. By discussing McCain in terms of a formal brand, they're suggesting that McCain's reputation as a maverick has become so embedded, so ingrained, that it has transcended into a formal trademark. And since it's a brand, who are journalists to question it or to alter it? Of course, when reporters and pundits fawn over the mighty McCain brand, almost none of them acknowledges the central role they played in building it. In fact, the press is almost entirely responsible for the marketing of McCain. So when admiring the McCain brand, journalists are really just admiring their own handiwork. Branding, and brand management, is certainly nothing new in politics, nor is there anything inherently wrong with it. Campaigns today are often less about the candidates running as themselves and more about them running as an extension of who voters perceive them to be. As Fast Company magazine recently <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.fastcompany.com%2Fmagazine%2F124%2Fthe-brand-called-obama.html">noted</a>, "Politics, after all, is about marketing -- about projecting and selling an image, stoking aspirations, moving people to identify, evangelize, and consume." In fact, Sen. Barack Obama's campaign has won widespread <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mydd.com%2Fstory%2F2008%2F2%2F28%2F62811%2F6923">acclaim</a> for the innovative steps it has taken, from social networking and <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.blog.newsweek.com%2Fblogs%2Fstumper%2Farchive%2F2008%2F02%2F27%2Fhow-obama-s-branding-is-working-on-you.aspx">graphic design</a>, to successfully launch the Obama brand. "Barack Obama is three things you want in a brand," Keith Reinhard, chairman emeritus of the advertising giant DDB Worldwide, told Fast Company. "New, different, and attractive. That's as good as it gets." But Obama's campaign, like most truly national marketing endeavors, has spent an enormous amount of money on mass communications to help build his unique and durable brand. With the often cash-strapped McCain however, all that heavy lifting has been done by the press, pro bono. Or can you name a single McCain television ad that solidifies his brand, or the ground-breaking communications approach that has become synonymous with his campaign? I suspect you cannot, because in terms of forward-thinking, creative marketing, McCain's campaign remains utterly forgettable. But what he does have is an entire political press corps doing his marketing and branding for him by incessantly tagging him as a maverick. What's also unique with McCain is that the press itself constantly and openly refers to the McCain brand as its own entity. It wraps the candidate in his own brand and openly refers to his candidacy in that kind of reverential language. By contrast, how many articles and headlines in the political press do you see touting "the Obama brand"? Here's a recent sampling of the media's obsession with pushing the McCain brand: <ul><li>"Senator John McCain commands one of the strongest brands in American politics: maverick Republican, reformer, willing to challenge the party hierarchy." [<a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.boston.com%2Fnews%2Fnation%2Farticles%2F2008%2F04%2F20%2Ffor_mccain_a_2d_run_a_shifting_image%3F">The Boston Globe</a>] </li></ul> <ul><li>"McCain has cultivated an image that has branded him as an independent maverick now for more than a decade." [<a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.washingtonpost.com%2Fwp-dyn%2Fcontent%2Fdiscussion%2F2008%2F04%2F13%2FDI2008041302582.html">Jonathan Weisman</a>, The Washington Post]</li></ul> <ul><li>"[McCain's] got a pretty strong brand identity as being a maverick and being anti-politics and anti-Washington." [NBC's <a href="http://mediamatters.org/items/200804210005">David Gregory</a>] </li></ul> <ul><li>"John McCain's brand ... has been pretty well-established since 2000. He's likable. He's a maverick." [<a href="http://mediamatters.org/items/200805010005">John Harwood</a>, CNBC and The New York Times] </li></ul> <ul><li>"The maverick brand is intact for John McCain." [<a href="http://mediamatters.org/items/200804160010">John Harwood</a>]</li></ul> <ul><li>"[T]he perception right now of McCain is someone who's experienced, someone who they see not of the Republican brand or the Bush brand, but of the maverick brand." [NBC's <a href="http://mediamatters.org/items/200804110011">Tim Russert</a>] </li></ul> <ul><li>"McCain's poverty tour builds his brand but raises questions" [McClatchy Newspapers <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2F64.233.169.104%2Fsearch%3Fq%3Dcache%3A9TPWpVGSQGsJ%3Awww.miamiherald.com%2F692%2Fstory%2F510118.html%2B%25E2%2580%259DMcCain%2527s%2BPoverty%2BTour%2BBuilds%2BHis%2BBrand%2BBut%2BRaises%2BQuestions%25E2%2580%259D%26hl%3Den%26ct%3Dclnk%26cd%3D1%26gl%3Dus%26client%3Dfirefox-a">headline</a>]</li></ul> <ul><li>"By virtue of his maverick brand, nontraditional stances on key issues and his Western roots, McCain may be able to compete in states that were far out of reach for Bush and that have otherwise been trending away from Republicans." [the <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fdyn.politico.com%2Fprintstory.cfm%3Fuuid%3DA76A96D8-3048-5C12-00F02F23824E4AE2">Politico</a>]</li></ul> <ul><li>"Polishing the McCain Brand" [<a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww2.nysun.com%2Fopinion%2Fpolishing-the-mccain-brand%2F">headline</a> of a Kenneth Blackwell column in The New York Sun]</li></ul> <ul><li>"[McCain's] out there working on his brand: I'm a different kind of Republican. I'll fight Bush here. I'll reach out with Democrats there. I'm a guy you can trust. I'm a patriot." [CNN's <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Ftranscripts.cnn.com%2FTRANSCRIPTS%2F0805%2F01%2Facd.02.html">John King</a>]</li></ul> And again, what's completely missing from the brand discussion is any acknowledgement of the media's central role in its creation. There literally would be no McCain brand if the press hadn't methodically built it and then enthusiastically promoted it. Worse, the press rarely details instances in which McCain obviously flip-flops -- political maneuvers that any neutral observer would say damage a maverick brand of integrity. A recent and glaring example was highlighted on May 1, the fifth anniversary of President Bush's Iraq war speech aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln with the infamous "Mission Accomplished" banner hanging behind him. Asked about that five-year remembrance on the campaign trail, McCain <a href="http://mediamatters.org/items/200805020005?f=s_search" title="http://mediamatters.org/items/200805020005?f=s_search http://rawstory.com/news/2008/McCain_Mission_accomplished_banner_not_Bushs_0501.html">said</a> using a banner that asserted "Mission Accomplished" "was wrong at the time." But back on June 11, 2003, during an <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Ffiredoglake.com%2F2008%2F05%2F01%2Fjohn-mccain-conflict-in-iraq-is-over-because-mission-accomplished-banner-said-so-video%2F" title="http://firedoglake.com/2008/05/01/john-mccain-conflict-in-iraq-is-over-because-mission-accomplished-banner-said-so-video/">appearance</a> on Fox News, when the topic of the "Mission Accomplished" event came up, McCain did not criticize the banner or the speech. Instead, he suggested the event proved that "the major conflict is over" and that, "the regime change has been accomplished." McCain also said on the "Mission Accomplished" anniversary that while he didn't blame Bush for the "specific banner," "I do say that statements are made, 'a few <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/iraq/2003-06-18-rumsfeld_x.htm" title="http://mediamatters.org/rd?http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/iraq/2003-06-18-rumsfeld_x.htm">dead-enders</a>,' '<a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/05/30/cheney.iraq/" title="http://mediamatters.org/rd?http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/05/30/cheney.iraq/">last throes</a>,' those are, as opposed to the banner, direct statements which were contradicted by the facts on the ground." But this, too, is revisionism on McCain's part. While he did criticize the administration's overly optimistic descriptions of progress in Iraq at a 2006 <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.msnbc.msn.com%2Fid%2F14475828%2F" title="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14475828/">campaign event</a> for then-Sen. Mike DeWine (R-OH), three days later, under criticism from the right, McCain backed down, putting out a <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fmccain.senate.gov%2Fpublic%2Findex.cfm%3FFuseAction%3DPressOffice.PressReleases%26ContentRecord_id%3D660aca38-037e-469f-a2fd-daca0c2009ec%26Region_id%3D%26Issue_id%3D" title="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http://mccain.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=PressOffice.PressReleases&ContentRecord_id=660aca38-037e-469f-a2fd-daca0c2009ec&Region_id=&Issue_id=">press release</a> "commend[ing]" President Bush "for his public statements offering Americans an honest assessment of the progress we have made in Iraq." McCain has also performed unsightly flip-flops on immigration and taxes. Yet even in the wake of those political contortions, which the <a href="http://mediamatters.org/items/200801220002" title="http://mediamatters.org/items/200801220002">press</a> routinely <a href="http://mediamatters.org/items/200801250011" title="http://mediamatters.org/items/200801250011">ignor</a><a href="http://mediamatters.org/items/200801250011" title="http://mediamatters.org/items/200801250011">es</a>, reporters and pundits actively embraced the "brand" talk -- the same rhetoric that the McCain campaign is actively touting. Still, reporters defend the incessant maverick hyperbole. <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.washingtonpost.com%2Fwp-dyn%2Fcontent%2Fdiscussion%2F2008%2F04%2F13%2FDI2008041302582.html" title="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/discussion/2008/04/13/DI2008041302582.html">C</a><a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.washingtonpost.com%2Fwp-dyn%2Fcontent%2Fdiscussion%2F2008%2F04%2F13%2FDI2008041302582.html" title="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/discussion/2008/04/13/DI2008041302582.html">hatting</a> with readers online recently, The Washington Post's Weisman insisted the maverick label stuck because McCain often "clashed" with Bush. Providing an example, Weisman noted that McCain "fought the GOP over tobacco in 1998." It's true that in 1998, McCain backed legislation to regulate the tobacco industry that most of his GOP colleagues did not support. And McCain stressed he would "<a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pbs.org%2Fnewshour%2Fbb%2Fcongress%2Fjan-june98%2Fmccain_4-21.html" title="http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/congress/jan-june98/mccain_4-21.html">never</a>" give up his efforts to regulate the industry. However, as the blog Think Progress <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fthinkprogress.org%2F2008%2F04%2F21%2Fwash-post-reporter-sticks-up-for-mccains-maverick-brand%2F" title="http://thinkprogress.org/2008/04/21/wash-post-reporter-sticks-up-for-mccains-maverick-brand/">pointed out</a>: <blockquote> Weisman's defense of McCain's self-ascribed "maverick" label falls short of the facts. The reality is that McCain's "never" pledge didn't last very long. Not only has he since <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fprojects.washingtonpost.com%2Fcongress%2F110%2Fsenate%2F1%2Fvotes%2F307%2F">voted against a bill</a> that would have raised tobacco taxes by 61 cents in order to pay for an expansion of the State Children's Health Insurance Program, but McCain is now <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.boston.com%2Fnews%2Fnation%2Farticles%2F2008%2F03%2F26%2Fmccains_stand_on_tobacco_is_put_to_test%2F%3Frss_id%3DBoston.com%2B--%2BLatest%2Bnews">backing away</a> from a tobacco regulation bill that he co-sponsored.</blockquote> Forget all those facts, though. Because according to Weisman, when it comes to McCain the maverick, "It's going to be hard to break the brand." And even harder with the press so busy promoting and polishing it. http://mediamatters.org/items/200805130007 Tue, 13 May 2008 17:37:50 EST NBC News' bad week: Russert, Williams, and Huffington http://mediamatters.org/items/200805070004 Progressive author and Internet powerhouse Arianna Huffington has appeared on MSNBC more than 30 times over the last 12 months, offering up her combative opinions on current events. The tally probably would have been double that if the stretched-too-thin writer and editor had accepted all the channel's requests that flood her office. So when Huffington set out late last month to promote her <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.amazon.com%2FRight-Wrong-Hijacked-Shredded-Constitution%2Fdp%2F0307269663">new book</a>, MSNBC seemed like an obvious first stop. In fact, producers had already been in touch, asking about Huffington's availability during her book push. And I hear an informal memo circulated within MSNBC detailing the order in which Huffington would appear on the various MSNBC news programs in coming weeks. But then suddenly, the doors were slammed shut and Huffington's camp was told thanks, but no thanks; it was an across-the-board <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.deadlinehollywooddaily.com%2Fis-tim-russert-blackballing-arianna-at-nbc-during-her-book-tour%2F">shutout</a> from both MSNBC and its big brother, NBC. Huffington told me she was surprised by the snub, considering she's had such good working relationships with the MSNBC programs for years. The channel's spokesman, Jeremy Gaines, emailed to inform me that Huffington "was never booked on MSNBC," and that "[a]t NBC News, we receive countless books from authors and publishers, in hopes that they get on our air. Some of them do, many of them do not. This one did not." NBC and MSNBC fill hundreds of hours each month with political programming, and Huffington -- perhaps the most high-profile progressive writer in the country right now -- is releasing a political tome amidst a heated campaign season. But sorry, no room at the inn for her. Those close to Huffington said the word inside NBC was that the unofficial boycott stemmed from the fact that her new book, Right is Wrong: How the Lunatic Fringe Hijacked America, Shredded the Constitution, and Made Us All Less Safe, <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.huffingtonpost.com%2Fjason-linkins%2Ftim-russert-doesnt-want-y_b_99693.html">takes</a> long, page-after-page jabs at NBC Washington bureau chief Tim Russert, portraying him as a hapless, "conventional wisdom zombie." And that it was because of Russert's bruised ego that the company's anti-Huffington edict was issued. Truth is, Russert has been a target of Huffington's for years. She launched <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.huffingtonpost.com%2Ftag%2Frussert-watch%2F">Russert Watch</a> on her site to dissect the host's often-lacking Q&A approach on Meet the Press. (That weekly feature was recently <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.cjr.org%2Fcampaign_desk%2Frussert_watch_sunday_42708.php">picked up</a> by the Columbia Journalism Review.) And Huffington was <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.huffingtonpost.com%2Farianna-huffington%2Fthe-libby-trial-why-did-_b_40697.html">especially critical</a> of the NBC newsman's less-than-forthcoming role in the Valerie Plame leak investigation. In that context, it sure looked like payback: Huffington was critical of NBC News heavyweight Russert, and suddenly Huffington was banned from NBC and MSNBC at a time when she's looking for exposure to help promote her new book. Such is the state of affairs at NBC News, where last week it was not only reportedly boycotting Huffington, but also steadfastly <a href="http://mediamatters.org/items/200805020010?f=h_top">boycotting</a> a <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.nytimes.com%2F2008%2F04%2F20%2Fwashington%2F20generals.html%3F_">blockbuster</a> New York Times report from April 20 that detailed how the Pentagon, during the run-up to the war with Iraq and for years after that, had worked closely with retired military officers now working as talking heads. The Pentagon selected scores of officers, many of whom had defense industry clients, and worked to "transform the analysts into a kind of media Trojan horse -- an instrument intended to shape terrorism coverage from inside the major TV and radio networks," according to the Times. The Pentagon did that by, among other things, treating the analysts to special briefings and taking them on guided tours of Iraq. But this wasn't simply a fact-finding initiative. According to the Times, when at least one of the analysts eventually began to criticize the war, he was promptly suspended from the Pentagon program. Among the participants -- witting or unwitting -- in the Pentagon program were NBC and MSNBC, which threw open their studio doors to the Pentagon pundits without ever disclosing their closed-door prep sessions with the pro-war administration. Yet two weeks after the Times billboarded the news above-the-fold on Page 1, neither NBC nor MSNBC had seriously examined their roles in the Pentagon program. In fact, the news teams at both outlets appeared allergic to the controversy. Despite the fact that the Times story ignited congressional inquiries, raised doubts about <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mydd.com%2Fstory%2F2008%2F5%2F1%2F19036%2F09018">the legality</a> of the program, and prompted the Pentagon to suddenly <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.nytimes.com%2F2008%2F04%2F26%2Fwashington%2F26analyst.html%3F">halt</a> the initiative altogether, NBC considered the issue to have zero news value. NBC Nightly News anchor Brian Williams did belatedly address the propaganda story, not on the air but on his daily blog, where last week he <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fdailynightly.msnbc.msn.com%2Farchive%2F2008%2F04%2F29%2F958477.aspx">assured</a> readers that neither the network nor the retired generals did anything wrong (i.e., trust us). So to recap NBC News' revealing performance last week: It continued its on-air boycott of the story about the Pentagon's pro-war propaganda program -- a program NBC willingly participated in. And it reportedly banned one of the nation's top progressive writers from appearing on its news programs. Behold your so-called liberal media at work. Of the two sad tales last week, one seemed petty; the other rather profound. In both cases, NBC News appeared more interested in protecting egos and holding off honest critiques than it did being held accountable. The reason NBC/MSNBC's heavy-handed blackout of Huffington is so important is that it highlights precisely why so few prominent voices from the left openly criticize the media. They fail to do so because it's personally awkward to disparage their colleagues. But more importantly, they resist doing it because it comes with a professional price attached: If you present sustained, damning critiques of the media (and name names in the process), you run the risk of being locked out by those same media outlets, and at inopportune moments. Like when you're out trying to promote a new book. Bob Somerby at The Daily Howler has written about these phenomena for years -- why mainstream liberal columnists and pundits almost never tell you the truth about the media. And trust me, they don't. As Somerby has noted, there was almost universal, real-time silence from them back in 2000 when the press unleashed perhaps the most sustained, <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.rollingstone.com%2Fnews%2Fstory%2F5920188%2Fthe_press_vs_al_gore">unfair attack</a> on a U.S. presidential nominee in modern times. Virtually none of the A-list liberal commentators came to Al Gore's aid when it mattered most; when the press was at times depicting him as unstable and pathological. (Conservative pundits never would have stood by silently if their nominee were torn apart by the media like that.) Huffington, thanks to the online empire she has amassed at The Huffington Post, is among the few who don't really need NBC or MSNBC to help her sell books. She already has access to an extraordinarily wide audience. And it's true she was invited on scores of other TV news outlets in recent days, some of which she criticized in her book. So it's not as if the press automatically locks out every liberal critic. But NBC's Russert has for years been a key Huffington media target, and he came under the roughest treatment in her book, so it was NBC's allegedly petulant reaction that was the most telling. Keep in mind that NBC News has a history of overreacting to Huffington. In 2006, when she was raising questions about Russert's ethics (specifically, when he used Meet the Press to hype the launch of a new XM Radio sports program co-hosted by his son, Luke Russert), an NBC News flack resurrected old allegations -- which Huffington has repeatedly <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.huffingtonpost.com%2Farianna-huffington%2Fnbc-news-pr-department-ge_b_14540.html">denied</a> -- that a decade ago she hired a private investigator to snoop on a writer who was profiling her for Vanity Fair. That writer was Russert's wife, Maureen Orth. By suddenly refusing to book Huffington, NBC and MSNBC came across as petty and insecure. Executives claimed they were not retaliating against the writer for the Russert critiques she's posted. But it sure looked that way. There is a simple way, however, for the news giant to prove it holds not grudge against Huffington, or against honest media criticism. And that's to have Russert invite her on Meet the Press. Then all will be forgiven. By contrast, it's probably impossible to repair the damage done to NBC by its refusal -- like the rest of the broadcast network news teams -- to tackle the Pentagon propaganda story. What made NBC's sins even more egregious last week was Williams' attempt to explain the story away as no big deal, when he tried to play his readers, and NBC News viewers, as rubes. The trouble began when Williams used his Daily Nightly blog to <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fdailynightly.msnbc.msn.com%2Farchive%2F2008%2F04%2F28%2F953442.aspx">mock</a> The New York Times for being out of touch with everyday Americans. Williams' hook was that announced Sunday circulation was down at the Times. Poring over the newspaper, Williams insinuated readers were fleeing the paper because of the goofy articles being published. He noted that Elizabeth Edwards had recently written an op-ed in the Times decrying the state of serious journalism in the presidential race. But Williams, after dissecting the Sunday paper section-by-section, scratched his head and wrote, "It's tough to figure out exactly what readers the paper is speaking to, or seeking." Meaning, the Times is out of touch with regular folk, like himself, the coiffed TV anchor. And where did Williams turn to prove the Times was publishing too many wacky articles that alienate the common man? Williams singled out purposefully light pieces from the Times' Travel section, the Styles section, and the Food section. And, oh yeah, he snickered at a New York Times Magazine cover story about gay people. After blogger Glenn Greenwald <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.salon.com%2Fopinion%2Fgreenwald%2F2008%2F04%2F29%2Fwilliams%2Findex.html">chided</a> Williams for taking the time to poke fun at the Times lifestyle coverage while NBC itself remained silent about the Times' penetrating Pentagon propaganda story, Williams' blog was inundated with commenters demanding that he address the issue. So the next day Williams did. Keep in mind, NBC had never broadcast a single story about the Pentagon article, but Williams did, y'know, blog about it. Reading <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fdailynightly.msnbc.msn.com%2Farchive%2F2008%2F04%2F29%2F958477.aspx%23comments">his explanation</a>, no wonder NBC hasn't wasted its time with the silly Pentagon controversy -- it's a non-story. At least at NBC. Because the news team did nothing wrong and its military analysts were above reproach. (Why did the Times waste 7,000 words on such nonsense?) Here was the nub of Williams' defense of NBC and the Pentagon-friendly analysts they paid for years: <blockquote> All I can say is this: these two guys never gave what I considered to be the party line. They were tough, honest critics of the U.S. military effort in Iraq. If you've had any exposure to retired officers of that rank (and we've not had any five-star Generals in the modern era) then you know: these men are passionate patriots. In my dealings with them, they were also honest brokers. [...] At no time did our analysts, on my watch or to my knowledge, attempt to push a rosy Pentagon agenda before our viewers. I think they are better men than that, and I believe our news division is better than that. [emphasis added] </blockquote> What's the fuss, people? Millionaire anchor Brian Williams, who thinks Democratic-bashing <a href="http://mediamatters.org/items/200804250004?f=s_search">columnist</a> Peggy Noonan <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fdailynightly.msnbc.msn.com%2Farchive%2F2008%2F04%2F28%2F953442.aspx">should win</a> a Pulitzer, who <a href="http://mediamatters.org/items/200501240007">frets</a> that Rush Limbaugh might not get enough credit as a broadcaster, and who has been dubbed by GOP pollster Frank Luntz as the Republicans' <a href="http://mediamatters.org/items/printable/200502070007">"go-to network anchor,"</a> says NBC and the generals did nothing wrong. Period. Nothing to see here, folks, keep moving ... Note how Williams vouched for the generals' patriotism and insisted they were "better" than spinning Pentagon talking points. (In his blog post, Williams noted he had entered "close friendship[s]" with the generals.) That's all well and good. But the facts are clear: The generals did participate in the Pentagon program and they often did spout Pentagon spin. (The anchorman expressed little interest in the fact that some of the generals stood to profit from their defense industry connections while they promoted the costly Iraq war on NBC.) That the pro-war Pentagon spin campaign existed and that NBC's military media analysts participated is not in dispute. Yet Williams wants us to believe that NBC News represented some sort of oasis from the pro-war spin between 2002 and now, that it was an honorable exception to the broadcast rule. For the record, retired Gens. Wayne Downing (who has since passed away) and Barry McCaffrey appeared on, or were quoted by, MSNBC and NBC regarding the Iraq war at least 500 times since late 2002. But Williams suggested the men never engaged in Pentagon spin. And to prove that the men didn't roll over, Williams reproduced a quote from 2006, three years after the war began, in which one of the NBC military media analysts expressed "harsh criticism" of the war. For Williams, that's case closed. For any thinking observer, that's just plain dumb. It was a very bad week for NBC News. By so obviously snubbing Huffington, NBC looked petty. By stubbornly refusing to acknowledge its role in the Pentagon propaganda program, NBC looked weak. News organizations are supposed to shed light, not cower in the shadows. Last week, NBC News got it backward. http://mediamatters.org/items/200805070004 Wed, 7 May 2008 13:42:43 EST So now the press tells candidates when to quit? http://mediamatters.org/items/200804300001 History continues to unfold on many levels as the protracted Democratic Party primary race marches on, featuring the first woman and the first African-American with a real shot at winning the White House. Here's another first: the press's unique push to get a competitive White House hopeful to drop out of the race. It's unprecedented. Looking back through modern U.S. campaigns, there's simply no media model for so many members of the press to try to drive a competitive candidate from the field while the primary season is still unfolding. Until this election cycle, journalists simply did not consider it to be their job to tell a contender when he or she should stop campaigning. That was always dictated by how much money the campaign still had in the bank, how many votes the candidate was still getting, and what very senior members of the candidate's own party were advising. In this case, Howard Dean, the head of the Democratic National Committee, said he was "<a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fonline.wsj.com%2Farticle%2FSB120692054573175525.html%3Fmod%3Dgooglenews_wsj">dumbfounded</a>" by public demands for Clinton to drop out last month. (He now wants one of the candidates <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fap.google.com%2Farticle%2FALeqM5hLPqTxd4Fe7e5EymHU-kTUgweRDQD90B3RUG1">to quit</a> after the final June 3 primary.) Yet lots of pundits have suggested that in a neck-and-neck campaign in which neither candidate will likely secure the nomination based on pledged delegates, Sen. Hillary Clinton must drop out before all the states have had a chance to vote. I realize the political debate surrounding the extended Democratic campaign remains a hot one, with people holding passionate opinions about the delegate math involved and what the consequences for the Democratic Party could be. I'm not weighing in on that debate. I'm focusing on how journalists have behaved during this campaign. And the fact is, the media's get-out-now push is unparalleled. Strong <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fhnn.us%2Froundup%2Fentries%2F48015.html">second-place candidates</a> such as Ronald Reagan (1976), Ted Kennedy, Gary Hart, Jesse Jackson, and Jerry Brown, all of whom campaigned through the entire primary season, and most of whom took their fights all the way to their party's nominating conventions, were never tagged by the press and told to go home. "Clinton is being held to a different standard than virtually any other candidate in history," <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.realclearpolitics.com%2Farticles%2F2008%2F04%2Fpost_28.html">wrote</a> Steven Stark in the Boston Phoenix. "When Clinton is simply doing what everyone else has always done, she's constantly attacked as an obsessed and crazed egomaniac, bent on self-aggrandizement at the expense of her party." Indeed, even after Clinton won the Pennsylvania primary convincingly last week, she awoke the next morning to read an <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.washingtonpost.com%2Fwp-dyn%2Fcontent%2Farticle%2F2008%2F04%2F24%2FAR2008042400999_pf.html">angry</a> New York Times editorial, "beseeching her to get the hell out of the race," as Howard Kurtz put it at washingtonpost.com. On the Times opinion page that day same, Maureen Dowd actually turned to <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.nytimes.com%2F2008%2F04%2F23%2Fopinion%2F23dowd.html%3F_r%3D1%26ref%3Dopinion%26oref%3Dslogin">Dr. Seuss rhymes</a> to make her point: "The time is now. Just go. ... I don't care how." And across town at the New York Daily News, a bitter Mike Lupica <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.jabberwonk.com%2Fflinker.cfm%3Fcliid%3D1fg3xd">was steamed</a> over the fact that Clinton "won't quit" the race. Weeks earlier, New York magazine <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fnymag.com%2Fnews%2Fpolitics%2Fpowergrid%2F45604%2F">fretted</a> about which senior Democrats would be able to "step in" and "usher Clinton from the race." Or if Clinton, obsessed with her own "long-range self-aggrandizement," would finally figure it out herself. Meanwhile, Slate.com's snarky <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.slate.com%2Fid%2F2189890%2F">Hillary Deathwatch</a> was created to document, day-by-day, the demise of her campaign, complete with a damsel-in-distress cartoon drawing of Clinton atop a sinking ship. That represented just a fraction of the <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.huffingtonpost.com%2F2008%2F04%2F25%2Fkeith-olbermanns-idea-for_n_98557.html">often offensive</a> get-out-now proclamations that have become a staple of this campaign. No longer content to be observers of the campaign, journalists now see themselves as active players in the unfolding drama, and they show no hesitation trying to dictate the basics of the contest, like who should run and who should quit. It's as if journalists are auditioning for the role of the old party bosses. It's a new brand of political commentary that leaves some veteran journalists perplexed. "The idea that it's your job to tell candidates when to get out, and really trying to control the whole process -- putting it in the hands of the journalists or the reporters or the columnists -- I find that to be new and different," Haynes Johnson told me last week. A Pulitzer Prize-winning <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pbs.org%2Fnewshour%2Fforum%2Fmay96%2Fbackground%2Fhaynes_johnson_bio.html">journalist</a>, Johnson has covered more than a dozen presidential campaigns and is currently working on a book about the unfolding 2008 contest. Johnson says he was astonished to read some early calls in March from the media for Clinton to get out of the race. He was stunned by "the pomposity and the arrogance of it." Indeed, a very strange leap has been made this year by lots of media commentators who argue against Clinton's candidacy. Rather than simply detailing her deficiencies and accentuating the strengths of her opponent, which political observers have done for generations, time and again we saw pundits take the unprecedented step of announcing not only that voters should not support Clinton, but that she should also quit. She should stop competing. More often than not, the analysis ends up resembling poorly argued temper tantrums. For instance, The New Republic's Jonathan Chait has written three essays about why Clinton must abandon her race for the White House, each <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.latimes.com%2Fnews%2Fopinion%2Fla-oe-chait4mar04%2C0%2C2968669.story">increasingly</a> <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.tnr.com%2Fpolitics%2Fstory.html%3Fid%3Dba30ff16-a5af-4035-a883-cf15ffee406c">petulant</a> in <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.tnr.com%2Fstory_print.html%3Fid%3D6b3d9c26-7c9e-4814-badd-a124edc68718">tone</a>. (We learned the "rationalizations" for Clinton's "kamikaze campaign" are "wretched.") Last month Chait wrote that Clinton's chance of winning the Democratic nomination this year were closer to Ralph Nader's than they were Barack Obama's or John McCain's. It's a reasonable comparison, if you ignore the nearly 1,600 delegates Clinton has amassed, compared with Nader's zero. Chait also <a href="http://mediamatters.org/rd?to=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.latimes.com%2Fnews%2Fopinion%2Fla-oe-chait4mar04%2C0%2C2968669.story">compared</a> Clinton to former presidential candidate Sen. Joseph Biden, suggesting that if Biden could figure out when it was time to quit the rac