What Are You Doing Here?
To continue the dialogue with Marc Ambinder over the press’s role in the campaign environment one should concede what I take to be his two main points namely that (a) there are reasons the public is susceptible to deception that have nothing to do with campaign journalism, and (b) it would be difficult to do campaign journalism in a way that wouldn’t be open to some form of arguably legitimate criticism from some quarters.
That said, to dial down the tone of accusations a bit is only to leave us with the more fundamental issue — what is all this campaign journalism for? A few news organizations still maintain large bureaus in Baghdad. They do this, it seems, to inform people about events in Iraq. But if lying works as a campaign strategy, rather than backfiring and getting the liar branded as an untrustworthy character, then what’s the campaign journalism for? On some level, like everything else in the media, it’s there to make a profit. But what’s the intended audience? ESPN News’ coverage doesn’t have any higher purpose, but it’s there for people who want to learn about the day’s sports news and it gets the job done. But what’s the campaign press doing? It seems to me that if the practitioners of campaign journalism can’t figure out a way to make it so that lying is punished, rather than amplified and rewarded, by the press then they ought to pack up their bags and go do something else. Pretty much all the other branches of the press — from the film critics to the foreign correspondents to the weathermen to the investigative reporters to the “news of the weird” guys — seem to have a clear role in the ecology.
114 Responses to “What Are You Doing Here?”
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September 10th, 2008 at 2:14 pm
Historically, most of the campaign lies have been of the 70-30 variety. It’s pretty rare that we get a chance to refute the 100-0 lies, but McCain seems to be testing the limits this year.
September 10th, 2008 at 2:18 pm
I remember this whole song, and all the lyrics, straight from 2004. Might as well be a full bad-acid deja vu flashback.
Bottom line: rural red-state Americans are more Murcan than the rest of us, those not-all-white folks in those “decadent enclaves” on the coasts.
And to be a real American journalist, you have to ostentatiously plant your nose right in that red-state plumbers’ crack, and keep it there until election day, and then say “I told you so–the winners are more Murcan than the losers!”
September 10th, 2008 at 2:19 pm
Well, just as sports reporters are properly considered part of the entertainment industry, so too could be political reporters. In other words, to the extent following politics for some people provides a similar entertainment that following sports provides for other people, reporters in each field could just be serving a similar role (a mix of scorekeeping, promotion, emotion-tugging, and so forth).
September 10th, 2008 at 2:19 pm
Oh, c’mon, Bill: Can you say “Swiftboat”? The lying liars know what works, and who won’t call them on it.
September 10th, 2008 at 2:22 pm
“But what’s the campaign press doing? It seems to me that if the practitioners of campaign journalism can’t figure out a way to make it so that lying is punished, rather than amplified and rewarded, by the press then they ought to pack up their bags and go do something else.”
You misunderstand their jobs.
Journalists who cover electoral politics are there to report on electoral politics, not to report on “objective truth” as it appears to Matt Yglesias.
The job of conveying a particular version of the truth to the electorate belongs to the campaign, not to the folks covering electoral politics.
September 10th, 2008 at 2:28 pm
And would this, perhaps, be a good moment to revisit Matthew’s constantly repeated belief that campaigns don’t actually matter? After all, “the fundamentals” have determined that the Democrats are going to win this year, so we can disregard the grubby business of electoral politics, right?
The Obama campaign has spent all year bragging about how they don’t play the game of winning news cycles. Well, when you lose news cycle after news cycle, you end up not liking the news coverage. Funny how that works…
September 10th, 2008 at 2:30 pm
I think there’s a parallel between political press and ESPN/Sports news that you haven;t seemed to pick up on yet.
he drift from reporting and news, to consumable TMZ gossip.
Seriously, watching sports pundits blavate is just as bad at the crap on E and even cable news.
It’s all gone down the shitter, in the name of easily packaging headlines to sell for a profit.
Face it, network/professional journalism is dead.
September 10th, 2008 at 2:33 pm
Exactly. Tell Marc Ambinder to take a fucking hike. He seems to get off on the “wow, look what they said, let’s so who takes the bait.’ Seriously, Ambinder is not a journalist, he’s more like Perez Hilton. I wish these political journalist would grow a spine and call out lies when they see it.
Like, am I taking fucking crazy pills. She supported the bridge to nowhere, even ran for governor as a supporter of the bridge, and now she claims she was against it from the beginning?!? Do facts not matter anymore?
September 10th, 2008 at 2:34 pm
DTM hits it on the nose. Political coverage is basically the same as sports coverage, and it has been ever since constant polling and 24/7 talking head panels on cable channels have become the norm. It used to be a mix between horserace and issues, now it’s all horserace and gaffes. It’s just like sports, where ex-athletes are the hosts and commentators, ex-politicians and political operatives are the hosts and commentators.
The hope a lot of people had was that this election would be SO important, and the candidates were SO honorable, that we might break out of that – but how was that supposed to happen when the key players and infrastructure of the media were the same? Only maybe worse, because the internet made spreading information so much faster, and the news cycle so rapid that most people can’t even follow it?
It’s as structural as the institutional aspects of government that you talked about in the earlier post. And it won’t change EXCEPT that possibly, people simply ignore the political media and treat the election in terms of issues and direct engagement. Then, the political media will continue to entertain people who like to be entertained by politics, but without the same general impact.
September 10th, 2008 at 2:34 pm
DTM and huh? are on the right track. Campaign “coverage” is for exactly what all the other entertainment is for: to attract an audience for the advertisers. Period.
September 10th, 2008 at 2:36 pm
I would take this further — the reason that some papers still maintain Baghdad bureaus is because their audience wants more than a recylcing of what the U.S. versus Iraqi spokespeople say. We want someone there to check the key claims. The same for sports anchors who weigh in with their analysis — independently of the competing claims of sports organizations, coaches, and players. We want reporters who provide perspective, not peddlers of press releases.
September 10th, 2008 at 2:37 pm
ESPN News’ coverage doesn’t have any higher purpose, but it’s there for people who want to learn about the day’s sports news and it gets the job done.
But that’s the thing — even ESPN’s straight-up news broadcasts point out when the party line diverges from what ESPN’s journalists believe to be the truth, or even just believe to be the better opinion.
September 10th, 2008 at 2:39 pm
Interesting to see Petey adopting the Bush/Cheney/Rove view, and now McCain/Palin/Rove view, that the job of the press is just to give politicians an outlet for saying whatever they want to say, and never, ever to actually do any factual reporting or independent analysis with respect to what the politicians are saying.
Of course it would be a great convenience to those politicians who lack any internal constraints against lying to have the press removed as an external constraint on lying, thus leaving only the politicians’ opponents as such an external constraint. But bad as things may be, it appears there is indeed still some sort of market for things like fact-checking, so Petey/Bush/Cheney/McCain/Palin/Rove have not yet entirely gotten their way.
September 10th, 2008 at 2:40 pm
There is no such thing as a particular version of the truth.
September 10th, 2008 at 2:41 pm
Petey’s a Republican. A version of the truth?
Are you practicing for the role of Pilate?
September 10th, 2008 at 2:43 pm
If journalists aren’t being journalists, and instead are just reporting what the campaigns say – and nothing more – they are propagandists. Not journalists.
September 10th, 2008 at 2:46 pm
>>Do facts not matter anymore?
As Pat Buchanan said on the TV this morning, “Facts are boring.” The truth is just boring to these people. It is so much more entertaining to work yourself and everyone else into a frenzy of fake outrage over complete falsehoods. Those are truthier.
September 10th, 2008 at 2:49 pm
I guess Ambinder’s approach is simply this: “The McCain stated today that the earth is flat and Obama once killed a pimp. Let’s see how that plays out.” This is called being “objective.” They say something, you go home and write it down.
September 10th, 2008 at 2:49 pm
Interesting comparison to sports media, but consider that the sports media is actually held to a higher standard of truth. If someone went on the air and claimed that the Yankees were in first place or they expect Tom Brady to have a great season, it wouldn’t be considered biased to point out that person was mendacious or delusional.
September 10th, 2008 at 2:50 pm
Petey: It isn’t Matt Yglesias who is claiming that journalism is covering more than electoral gamemanship.
That’s what the media itself is claiming. That’s how major news producers sell themselves — as legitimate.
Watch the network self-promotion commercials on CNN: they don’t just say they’re the most entertaining political news, they say they’re the most trusted. Now, yes, it’s possible that they mean that they’re trusted even though they’re not trustworthy, but I don’t think that’s the message.
If that’s what campaign coverage is about — we repeat to you what different politicians are saying today — then there’s little cause for them to have jobs and for people to tune in, is there?
And if that’s what it is about, then they should clearly identify their product. If it’s not independent news & investigation, then say that it isn’t. Stop trying to sell yourself as though you were.
September 10th, 2008 at 2:50 pm
Any attack on a Democrat today is “swiftboating”. The fact that Kerry’s fellow officers almost to a man denounced him and his brief time in Vietnam is ignored. Don’t you think if Kerry had had an effective response he would have used it? He’s of at least average intelligence, and the damage that was being done was obvious.
I was amused this morning to see Obama allude to swiftboating in trying to clean up his own “lipstick on a pig” quip. The remark and his handling of the reaction are revealing of his character. When he made it, the crowd went wild and he smirked in that arrogant, self-satisfied way of his. He obviously didn’t think they were cheering so lustily because he had used a worn-out cliche. But then later, like the passive-aggressive wuss he is, he pretended he wasn’t attacking Palin.
He did the same thing against Hillary. Remember when he slyly flipped her the bird and the crowd went wild? It’s on YouTube.
Later, he acted incredulous and said he was only scratching his face.
Passive-aggressiveness is not a presidential trait. It’s the trait of weak people who deliberately attack or annoy others, then feign innocence. Compare the ineffectual little twit Obama with John McCain who has fought his many battles like a man and, as he says, has the scars to prove it.
September 10th, 2008 at 2:55 pm
“Interesting to see Petey adopting the Bush/Cheney/Rove view, and now McCain/Palin/Rove view, that the job of the press is just to give politicians an outlet for saying whatever they want to say, and never, ever to actually do any factual reporting or independent analysis with respect to what the politicians are saying.”
Not what I’m saying in the least.
The press definitely has a responsibility to fact check. If you sit through two hours of CNN or MSNBC, if you read the NYTimes and WaPo throughly, you’ll indeed get a good picture of the factual accuracy of what really happened. The system works.
However, this has nothing to do with winning the news cycle. You win the news cycle on soundbites and pictures.
Political reporters have no responsibility to help one side or the other win the news cycle.
My view is not a Republican view. It’s the view from any winning campaign of either party. The modern (cable TV universe) news cycle strategy was pioneered by both Republicans and Democrats. Lee Atwater used it for Bush the Elder in ‘88. Carville and Stephonopolous used it for Clinton the Maler in ‘92. It’s a strategy that has nothing to do with whether you’re liberal or conservative.
Given how badly this campaign has played out for us over the past six weeks, I don’t think it’s any coincidence that Team Obama brags about not playing the game of trying to win the news cycle, while The War Room is the favorite movie of a bunch of the folks on Team McCain.
Again, when you lose news cycle after news cycle, you end up not liking the news coverage. It’s not that complicated.
September 10th, 2008 at 2:55 pm
Holy Crap. It doesn’t matter what the truth is. The Republicans figured that out 20 years ago. It matters how you utilize various narratives. Elections are about narratives and expressive politics. They are not about public policy. They never WERE about public policy. The Democrats have 50 days to learn and practice that lesson, or else they are going to lose badly.
September 10th, 2008 at 2:57 pm
Which is why this country is falling apart, and will totally collapse, in the near future.
September 10th, 2008 at 2:58 pm
Ambinder isn’t really the target here… or shouldn’t be at least – he’s distinctly set himself up in the role of reporting on the political campaign meta-narrative, as has Politico.com, Mark Halperin, etc. Even in our vision of the perfect political reporting world, there’s a place for people like that who report and analyze the spin. Let’s face it – people who are reading Ambinder’s blog are “high-information” enough that they don’t need to be told if someone’s lying or not. The same goes for people watching CNN, MSNBC, or Fox. (Maybe not people watching Larry King, but if you’re watching Hannity or Olbermann, you’ve pretty much made up your mind.)
September 10th, 2008 at 2:58 pm
Mr. E. Meat,
Good point, and I think there is a relatively simple explanation. In the end, sports contests are decided by well-documented events in the physical world. In contrast, political contests are ultimately decided by an expression of popular preference, namely voting.
So, imagine if you will that the champion of a league was decided not by the outcome of actual games, but rather by a vote of the fans of the league. I bet you a lot more lying by team representatives would arise, and the pressure placed on sports reporters by those team represenatives to allow that lying to go unchecked would be similar (e.g., I am sure team representatives would use tactics like threatening to cut off access if sports reporters were not suitably “deferential” about their lies).
September 10th, 2008 at 2:59 pm
How come our right-wing trolls rarely contribute to these discussions on the media? Even “O’Neal” doesn’t actually discuss substance of the “what is political report for?” question.
September 10th, 2008 at 2:59 pm
Matt commented a few days ago that, in his experience, the day-to-day efforts of journalists were primarily consumed not with serving some higher calling, but with pursuing their own self-interest — as is true for the rest of us. That stills seems correct and relevant to me.
Just like the rest of us, journalists have a job. For better or for worse, ultimately that job is to provide the public with content for which the public is willing to pay, either directly through purchases and subscriptions or indirectly through the viewership ratings that are valuable to advertisers.
I would push responsibility for all of this back on us, the public and citizenry. To the extent that journalists and news organizations do a poor job of rewarding objective truth or justice, it is directly attributable to the fact that we the people do not in sufficient numbers reward content providers for those same virtues. DrudgeReport.com is a much more successful site than FactCheck.org and that’s beyond the influence or responsibility of Marc Ambinder. Is that a bad thing? I don’t know.
Regardless, we get the news we deserve.
September 10th, 2008 at 3:01 pm
“A version of the truth?”
Welcome to electoral politics. This is how the game has been played for 200+ years.
September 10th, 2008 at 3:03 pm
“Petey: It isn’t Matt Yglesias who is claiming that journalism is covering more than electoral gamemanship. That’s what the media itself is claiming … Watch the network self-promotion commercials on CNN”
TV commercials tend to lie.
September 10th, 2008 at 3:05 pm
Petey at 2:22PM: “The job of conveying a particular version of the truth to the electorate belongs to the campaign, not to the folks covering electoral politics.”
Petey at 2:55PM: “The press definitely has a responsibility to fact check.”
Okey-dokey.
Generally, it looks like Petey now wants us to ignore his 2:22PM post, and I am inclined to grant him that favor.
September 10th, 2008 at 3:06 pm
“The job of conveying a particular version of the truth to the electorate belongs to the campaign, not to the folks covering electoral politics.”
So Petey, if you say that George W. Bush is the President and I say no, it’s Franklin Pierce, how do we sort out which “particular version of the truth” to believe?
It’s funny. I once heard a former federal prosecutor on a broadcast say that prosecutors use leaks to the press, sometime illegal leaks of grand jury testimony, to put pressure on those under investigation or indictment. He said that they do it because they know the press will report anything they say whether or not it’s true (grand jury sessions are secret).
There were reporters on the broadcast who were furious at being accused of printing lies and of being used by the prosecutors. He just laughed.
Campaigns and elected offcials have long since figured out how to use the press to serve their ends. And it goes on because the press is so deeply in denial and so incapable of accepting criticism that it won’t admit that it’s happened.
September 10th, 2008 at 3:06 pm
On Monday, Obama will be back up 2-3 points in national polls as the completely predictable McCain convention bounce wears off. He’ll continue to have the inside track to 270 electoral votes and we’ll all look back on the last week or so with embarrassment. Except the McCain campaign, who have shown they lack the capacity for shame or embarrassment.
September 10th, 2008 at 3:07 pm
almost to a man denounced him and his brief time in Vietnam
Even those who’d earlier praised him.
Even those who hadn’t served with him and had never met him. That’s testimony that would have shamed the Mob.
The secret behind the “swiftboating” was the fact that the huge bulk of the book was opinion and opinions can’t be disproved. Even those which were contradicted by earlier statements.
Then there were actual charges. Like the doctor who charged that Kerry’s wound was a scratch. He remembered treating a scratch in the midst of the carnage of war even though the record doesn’t put him at the sight.
The unprovability of the opinions were then used to bootstrap credibility for the substantive charges. This is old stuff and it doesn’t do you jackasses any credit to try to resurrect it.
September 10th, 2008 at 3:07 pm
It seems to me that politics is now construed as entertainment and that, unlike sports, the coverage — the talking heads — is the game. The only problem with this arrangement is that it leaves little room for effective government, which is usually not at all entertaining. (Remember the curse about living in interesting times.)
September 10th, 2008 at 3:09 pm
Welcome to electoral politics. This is how the game has been played for 200+ years.
You’re restating the premise of Yglesias’s complaint as if it’s a conclusion. And, worse, you’re endorsing it. You’re a Republican.
QED
September 10th, 2008 at 3:14 pm
Political coverage is basically the same as sports coverage
No, it’s not! If the coach of the NY Giants claimed his team was going to win the Superbowl this year because they were favorites, and they’d won the Superbowl last year after they went in as favorites, he’d be called on it in every story!
At this point, there’s a huge credibility gap between the two campaigns. But only the political reporters know about it! There’s no reporting on the credibility gap.
It’s weird. The reporters talk about it amongst themselves. But the reaction to it doesn’t seem to be “I should let viewers know this is a poll-tested lie and let viewers know why a campaign would use this particular poll-tested lie,” or even “I should inform the viewers of the actual facts.” It’s “I should repeat the lie and speculate as to whether uninformed viewers will find this poll-tested lie to be persuasive.”
The answer is of course uninformed viewers will find poll-tested lies to be persuasive. That’s why they poll test the lies on uninformed people. This isn’t rocket science.
At this point in the McCain campaign, shouldn’t the response to these lies be: “Why is this campaign relying so overwhelmingly on poll-tested lies?”
September 10th, 2008 at 3:16 pm
Andrew has it right. Seeing such naked evidence of this country’s lack of critical and moral resources is heart-wrenching. Whatever further form America’s “collapse” takes, the United States is, right now, a malfunctioning state. The theories about how exactly journalism has gone to pot, how the two political parties are extremely cynical, etc. are important to develop. But they are quite beside the larger point: the United States has no real politics to speak of.
September 10th, 2008 at 3:19 pm
Petey’s just having flashbacks to Hillary’s sleazy primary campaign.
McSame’s campaign has surpassed Hillary’s in sleaze, and is impressively sleazy even by Republican standards. He was going to lose, now it will be dishonorably.
September 10th, 2008 at 3:19 pm
Rob Fightmaster,
One complicating factor in all this is that just because there is demand for something doesn’t necessarily mean there is a good way to make a profit on filling that demand. And I personally believe there is indeed plenty of demand for things like fact-checking and independent analysis, but ironically the number of people willing to serve that role for little or no profit is making it a less attractive market for large media corporations.
Incidentally, I think it is worth noting that from a broader perspective, even the political entertainment market is still a small niche in the overall entertainment market (e.g., outside of limited periods like the conventions, political programs on cable typically are dominated in the ratings by things like The Closer, WWE Raw, and Spongebob Squarepants).
Which is why I also think the long term solution is not to somehow try to get the large for-profit media corporations back to better coverage, but for the public to simply recognize that those outlets are no longer a good source for factual reporting and independent analysis with respect to politics.
September 10th, 2008 at 3:20 pm
Not that this applies to MY, since he’s not on cable a lot, but another issue in getting to “truth” on these news and chat shows is the hapless ‘liberal’ writers and commentators who frequently don’t even know the basic facts on the controversies they are there to discuss, or if they do refuse to confront the host for fear of not being invited back.
September 10th, 2008 at 3:22 pm
“And, worse, you’re endorsing it. You’re a Republican.”
Unlike you, Jeffrey Davis, I don’t think that playing to win must mean one is a Republican.
I’m a lefty who thinks waging effective general election campaigns is a good thing, not a bad thing.
September 10th, 2008 at 3:24 pm
Jeffery Davis, the fact that virtually every one of Kerry’s fellow Swift Boat officers denounced him was damning. Imagine how thrilled you would be if McCain’s fellow POWs were coming forward to say that his war narrative was a fraud? Instead they are all testifying to his almost incomprehensible, to me at least, courage and resolve.
Kerry tried to pose as a hero and was exposed by his fellow officers. McCain is the real thing.
September 10th, 2008 at 3:25 pm
Obama is doing everything the Clinton ‘92 and ‘96 campaigns did to win the news cycle. The difference is that in 1992 elections, there were THREE strong candidates, so it didn’t degenerate into a back and forth. And in ‘96, Clinton basically ran on the right against Dole, triangulating agsinst his own party (and Perot was back as well anyway). Going back to ‘92, Perot essentially hijacked the news cycle by buying infomercials to force Americans into hearing about the budget deficit, and turning the campaign onto issues, and Bush raising taxes made him weak in his base (something McCain avoided by choosing Palin).
The moral of the story is that Obama has to force this campaign back on to one about issues, and to one about a nation in crisis. It’s not really about McCain winning *political* coverage news cycles, it’s about him covering news cycles anyway. He’s not drowning out Obama stories – he’s drowning out stories about continuing terrorism in Iraq (yes, it is continuing, despite the “success” of the surge), a declining situation in Afghanistan, and of course a disastrous economy.
Obama shouldn’t try to “win” the political coverage – he may not be able to, and he most likely does not have to. The problem isn’t with political coverage – it is more or less the same it has ever been. The deficiency is DOMESTIC NEWS COVERAGE in general – where the political back-and-forth is considered the ONLY issue worth covering on cable 24/7 and the dominant issue on network news (though not in the print media or local news, interestingly).
September 10th, 2008 at 3:29 pm
“I’m a lefty who thinks waging effective general election campaigns is a good thing, not a bad thing.”
And what “effective” campaigns are you talking about? The Clinton campaigns that never got 50% of the vote, left the Democrats in the minority in Congress for the 1st time in two generations, screwed up the best chance at health care reform in 20 years and generally ended up advancing a moderate Republican agenda at the expense of liberal priorities and values? THAT’S what you’re embracing?
Mike
September 10th, 2008 at 3:30 pm
Passive-aggressiveness is not a presidential trait. It’s the trait of weak people who deliberately attack or annoy others, then feign innocence. Compare the ineffectual little twit Obama with John McCain who has fought his many battles like a man and, as he says, has the scars to prove it.
E O’neil, vote for whomever you like in the upcoming election but please work those masculinity issues out on your own time.
September 10th, 2008 at 3:30 pm
“And, worse, you’re endorsing it. You’re a Republican”
I mean, seriously, the folks who think tactics and personality are substitutes for ideology and policy have got to be the stupidest folks on Earth.
But that’s pretty much how we’ve ended up with the most conservative Democratic nominee since Jimmy Carter, no?
September 10th, 2008 at 3:37 pm
So Petey, if you say that George W. Bush is the President and I say no, it’s Franklin Pierce, how do we sort out which “particular version of the truth” to believe?
Are you really this unsophisticated? Look, the McCain Campaign isn’t changing the truth when it runs ads on Obama’s support of a bill to teach kindergartners about sex predators and claims Obama supported “sex education for kindergartners.”
BUT the McCain Campaign has effectively communicated to large numbers of voters the story that Obama supports “sex education for kindergartners.” It’s a lie, but at the end of the day a campaign is about narratives and forcing your narrative out into the media so that people like Marc Ambinder drive YOUR story and not the other campaign’s.
There is no narrative out there about TRUTH and the importance of telling the truth. If there was, then Obama should be showing all the ways that McCain lies. But he’s not doing that, and consequently he’s losing this media war badly.
I’ve been home sick watching MSNBC report on this lipstick and education ads that McCain for the past 2 hours. Obama surrogates are being asked why they’re so defensive. They replay these ads every 30 minutes. It’s a friggin’ NIGHTMARE for the Obama campaign.
GET OUT THERE AND ATTACK, for god’s sake.
September 10th, 2008 at 3:39 pm
“But that’s pretty much how we’ve ended up with the most conservative Democratic nominee since Jimmy Carter, no?”
I think you forgot that Hillary didn’t win the nomination. Oh, and Bill Clinton was more liberal candidate than Carter? Really?
Time to get some better drugs, Petey.
Mike
September 10th, 2008 at 3:40 pm
the fact that virtually every one of Kerry’s fellow Swift Boat officers denounced him was damning.
But of coursse, as everyone here, including you, knows, nothing like that occurred. You are lying about Kerry, you lied about Gore, you lied about Clinton, you lied about Dukakis, you lied about Mondale, you lied about Carter, you lied about McGovern–hell, you even lied about Hubert Humphrey. And you are lying, and will continue to lie, about Obama.
September 10th, 2008 at 3:40 pm
Where’s the Obama ads? Where are the attacks? What are they DOING all day? This Obama Maverick ad has been up there for 4 days. They should be churning out ads every day. They shouldn’t be allowing Obama to speak off script. DISCIPLINE in MESSAGE is what the Obama campaign lacks.
September 10th, 2008 at 3:41 pm
“Obama is doing everything the Clinton ‘92 and ‘96 campaigns did to win the news cycle.”
Have you been paying attention this year? The Obama campaign has been adamant that they don’t need to win news cycles, that they don’t play that game.
They’ve spent all summer sneering at the fact that the McCain team was “a war room masquerading as a presidential campaign”. That’s a compliment, not an insult.
To take one example, check out the Dem’s VP rollout. That’s the first VP rollout in at least twenty years that wasn’t done with the intention of winning at least a few news cycles.
Like Dukakis in ‘88, Team Obama really thinks that they can ignore the news cycle and still prevail, though I’d imagine they’re beginning to have second thoughts at this point. It’s how they’re turning an un-losable election into a very losable one.
September 10th, 2008 at 3:42 pm
Petey’s still sore over every single prediction he made in the primaries being wrong. Good thing it’s not up to him or we’d have had Edwards ensuring a loss for us!
So, since none of his preferred candidates won, he’s decided to spend every day being King Concern Troll and basically about as unhelpful a “Democrat” as one could possibly be to one’s party, all in the hopes that on November 5th he can screech “I told you so!!! I told you so!!!”.
I know a lot of creationists and fundamentalists, and Petey may well be more vile and ignorant than the lot of them.
September 10th, 2008 at 3:42 pm
“GET OUT THERE AND ATTACK, for god’s sake.”
What makes you think the media is going to follow the Obama narrative about McCain no matter the Obama campaign does?
Mike
September 10th, 2008 at 3:44 pm
“To take one example, check out the Dem’s VP rollout. That’s the first VP rollout in at least twenty years that wasn’t done with the intention of winning at least a few news cycles.”
Better drugs, Petey. The Biden selection DID dominate the news cycle. I suppose Obama could have picked an unqualified nobody that thrilled hard core liberals and generated more news coverage, though.
Mike
September 10th, 2008 at 3:50 pm
“DISCIPLINE in MESSAGE is what the Obama campaign lacks.”
They lack almost every element of how you drive a national message through the news cycle.
Their problems with message discipline are definitely part of it, but not nearly all of it.
They really began this summer thinking they were running ten individual Senate campaigns, and could ignore the national narrative.
September 10th, 2008 at 3:52 pm
“Better drugs, Petey. The Biden selection DID dominate the news cycle.”
Dude. They dropped it into the Friday night newshole. That’s where you put the stuff you want to disappear as quickly and quietly as possible.
Single most psychotic bit of scheduling I’ve ever seen.
September 10th, 2008 at 3:56 pm
“They really began this summer thinking they were running ten individual Senate campaigns, and could ignore the national narrative.”
And yet, after 6 supposedly terrible weeks they’re still basically tied with McCain. But you’re right, Petey. If they were doing a better job I’m sure a black guy with a muslim-sounding name would be 15 points ahead of the white war hero.
Mike
September 10th, 2008 at 3:58 pm
Petey, here’s the problem for us liberals: the news-cycle, faux-outrage, bad-faith-argument driven nature of political coverage is fundamentally conservative, and furthers conservative goals. Liberals want to do big things: action on climate change, universal health care, and so on. But doing big things (domestically, at least, less so on the foreign policy front) requires mustering a sizeable portion of the electorate behind them. And in the current news environment, it’s impossible to get a sizeable portion of the electorate behind anything, because conservatives are constantly operating, with the aid of the media, to cloud every issue and make the whole debate so rancorous and contradictory that people will tune out. Yes, liberals could, like Clinton, just try to “outplay” the GOP, but just playing by those rules means that the game is already over, and while it may win them an election or two, the goal is not to win elections, the goal is to implement policies. What, exactly, was Clinton able to accomplish once the Ragin’ Cajun spun him into the White House?
September 10th, 2008 at 4:01 pm
Imagine how thrilled you would be if McCain’s fellow POWs were coming forward to say that his war narrative was a fraud? Instead they are all testifying to his almost incomprehensible, to me at least, courage and resolve.
All?
http://www.vietnamveteransagainstjohnmccain.com/
Are these guys crazy? No crazier than those who praised Kerry in the 70s and 80s, then joined the swiftboating campaing against him.
September 10th, 2008 at 4:01 pm
Petey – Just because Obama’s campaign has said they are ignoring news cycles doesn’t mean they aren’t – they’ve had rapid response on everything, they pounced on “seven houses”, they went after the lies on bridge to nowhere. I’m not saying it’s been successful, but it compares with anything Clinton’s team did in ‘92.
Again it’s NOT ‘92. There are 2 candidates, not 3, with Perot’s money actively influencing the narrative and bringing everything back to the budget and the economy, and with 3-way dynamics preventing an all-out war on character/culture from dominating the race.
As for Biden’s scheduling – given that his pick angered Clinton supporters and led to a drop in Obama’s poll standings, it’s quite possible that the campaign had internals that suggested they should delay the announcement until as close to the convention (and the public Clinton endorsements) as possible.
September 10th, 2008 at 4:05 pm
Petey was wrong all through the primaries, but he’s making a lot of sense today. As distasteful as it might be, winning campaigns is a tough business–it involves spinning, manipulating flip-flopping and occasionally lying. Acknowledging this does not make you a Republican.
September 10th, 2008 at 4:13 pm
“Petey, here’s the problem for us liberals: the news-cycle, faux-outrage, bad-faith-argument driven nature of political coverage is fundamentally conservative, and furthers conservative goals.”
I do understand that you are speaking for many when you say this, but I think you are dead wrong.
The rules of the game are ideologically neutral. There is nothing to prevent the left from winning at this game, though it requires us to select better standard-bearers than we have the last few cycles – candidates matter.
One secret is that the game is heavily weighted away from ideology. You win these things through culture and personality married to a campaign team that can drive a coherent governing message through the clutter.
There is no reason that can’t be done in the service of lefty policy.
The discourse was no more elevated when FDR and Truman and LBJ won than it is now.
September 10th, 2008 at 4:15 pm
winning campaigns is a tough business-it involves spinning, manipulating flip-flopping and occasionally lying.
First, this only works if the media act like it isn’t their job to broadcast the truth and fact-check the candidates lies, rather than amplifying them.
Next, the operative problem is that Iowa Democrats don’t like candidates who spin, attack, and manipulate, so Democratic candidates competing in Iowa are given incentives to behave in ways that are not advantageous in a general election.
September 10th, 2008 at 4:37 pm
“Next, the operative problem is that Iowa Democrats don’t like candidates who spin, attack, and manipulate, so Democratic candidates competing in Iowa are given incentives to behave in ways that are not advantageous in a general election.”
This thought is not without merit. (Though there are also some advantages to the Iowa process – it keeps Dems from cutting each other up in the year before the primaries, for example.)
I’d suggest the more fundamental problem is that liberals tend to fall in love with “process” liberals over ideological liberals. And “process” liberals are incredibly unsuited for the rough and tumble of the national stage. I highly recommend this piece as tangential reading on the subject.
Democratic activists love the candidate who seems to be above playing the grubby game of politics. And then they are shocked when September comes around and the candidate indeed proves to be above playing the grubby game of politics.
September 10th, 2008 at 4:39 pm
winning campaigns is a tough business-it involves spinning, manipulating flip-flopping and occasionally lying.
Didn’t do Hillary any good. Won’t do McSame any good. They will be held in contempt for many years after they lose because of it. I get your point though.
Maureen Dowd used to call Obama “Obambi” and the Hillary campaign would do the same thing and Obama would laugh it off incredulously and reply that he learned the ropes in Chicago politics.
September 10th, 2008 at 4:45 pm
“First, this only works if the media act like it isn’t their job to broadcast the truth and fact-check the candidates lies, rather than amplifying them.”
Indeed. It should also be noted that when the Clinton campaign supposedly did such a marvelous job with their “War Room” tactics, they did it during two elections when the media were heavily tilted in their favor. Between the New Hampshire primaires and the 92 election, the media LOVED Bill Clinton. And in 96, the media though Dole was a pathetic joke.
Mike
September 10th, 2008 at 4:48 pm
Petey, you say that the rules of the game are ideologically neutral, and that you win these things through “culture and personality.” But part of the cultural persona you have to project, according to the current rules of the game, is anti-intellectualism. And that’s not ideologically neutral.
September 10th, 2008 at 4:48 pm
First, this only works if the media act like it isn’t their job to broadcast the truth and fact-check the candidates lies, rather than amplifying them.
But that is how the media acts, whether Matt complains about it every day between now and the election or not. I’m not placing a value judgment on it — in an ideal world we’d have, to borrow a phrase, “a better press corps” — but that’s not how it is.
They will be held in contempt for many years after they lose because of it. I get your point though.
How many Presidential losers can you think of offhand who are “held in contempt” for their dirty campaign strategy? I can’t really think of any.
Winners, on the other hand, are notoriously dirty campaigners: think LBJ and the daisy ad, Nixon obviously, Bush I and Willie Horton, the Clintons and Dubya/Rove (especially in ‘04).
Politics is a nasty game.
September 10th, 2008 at 4:51 pm
But part of the cultural persona you have to project, according to the current rules of the game, is anti-intellectualism. And that’s not ideologically neutral.
Of course it is. There are just as many dumb liberals out there as there are dumb conservatives; the Democratic party just needs to learn to speak their language better. Clinton (Bill, that is) knew how to do it, but the string of Ivy Leaguers who have followed him have unsurprisingly had a harder time.
Incidentally, I think Hillary doesn’t do this all that well either, but Biden is pretty darn good at it.
September 10th, 2008 at 4:54 pm
in an ideal world we’d have, to borrow a phrase, “a better press corps” — but that’s not how it is.
You go to war with the press you have, not the press you wish you had.
September 10th, 2008 at 5:01 pm
PeterK: “Didn’t do Hillary any good.”
Well, if barely losing and getting 18 millions votes=no good, I guess you’re right.
But really, the issue isn’t whether or not Obama doing a better job attacking and going on the media/ad offensive will work or not–the issue is Obama NOT attacking will definitely fail. How many times do we have to see this movie?
September 10th, 2008 at 5:02 pm
“Petey, you say that the rules of the game are ideologically neutral, and that you win these things through “culture and personality.” But part of the cultural persona you have to project, according to the current rules of the game, is anti-intellectualism. And that’s not ideologically neutral.”
In terms of cultural persona, one can avoid appearing professorial without being dumb.
Correct: FDR, Truman, Humphrey, Clinton
Incorrect: Stevenson, Carter, Gore, Kerry
September 10th, 2008 at 5:06 pm
You know who knew how to play the game?
John Edwards, that’s who.
What a player.
September 10th, 2008 at 5:13 pm
So there’s four things to cover:
(1) Campaign claims.
(2) Whether the claims are accurate or not.
(3) Arguments between campaigns about the accuracy of the claims.
(4) Voter reaction to the claims of the campaigns.
I suspect that many campaign journalists do think their role is to report on whether the facts support or contradict a campaign claim, but only if they are absolutely, positively certain.
The problem is the double-effect of covering (2). The press seems to have an ideal standard for itself of connecting events and audience as though it weren’t there. Now, if you connect the audience to the reality that a claim is about, the press is a transparent medium. But making that connection implicitly evaluates the campaign claim, and adjudicates the debate. This affects how people vote, so now the press is a full-blown participant in the electoral process, what they think they’re supposed to avoid. So they are very shy to go there. So the “events” that are covered are primarily–overwhelmingly–the claims, counter-claims, and voter reactions.
I wish the press would get over whatever inhibitions they have about reporting on (2) that comes from the aspiration to avoid participation. The press doesn’t worry that when they report on the traffic, it influences their audience’s decision about what roads to take, and thus participate in determining traffic patterns. I guess if the side-roads could yell at the press and tell them the main arteries aren’t all that crowded, so goddamn it do your job better, they’d start to shy away from saying directly what the traffic is like. Instead, they’d report what others are saying about the traffic and avoid the hassle. But, really, they should call it the way they see it, and accept that what they do is supposed to affect people’s decisions, that they’re supposed to be participants in collective self-government, along with the rest of us.
I also suspect that most campaign journalists get into the business to get an inside look at the spectacle of this great big important social happening that everyone’s talking about. They are natural observers, not participants. So they seem disinclined to adopt the viewpoint of a voter who has to make up his mind about how to vote, and do their job guided by that perspective. Plus, if they did, it’s a short step from there to making a judgment about the merit of the candidates. Which brings things back around to the (perceived) conflict with professional standards.
September 10th, 2008 at 5:17 pm
Well, if barely losing and getting 18 millions votes=no good, I guess you’re right.
Barely losing is still losing. I bet she would have won if she hadn’t have listened to her sleazebag consultants and acted as the “inevitable one” at the beginning.
She was mathematically out of the race a long time before conceding. If Obama loses I will blame Hillary. Period.
September 10th, 2008 at 5:42 pm
Imagine how thrilled you would be if McCain’s fellow POWs were coming forward to say that his war narrative was a fraud?
You mean like Dr. Philip Butler?
September 10th, 2008 at 5:43 pm
Petey, here’s the problem for us liberals: the news-cycle, faux-outrage, bad-faith-argument driven nature of political coverage is fundamentally conservative, and furthers conservative goals. Liberals want to do big things: action on climate change, universal health care, and so on. But doing big things (domestically, at least, less so on the foreign policy front) requires mustering a sizeable portion of the electorate behind them
Bullshit. Clinton came this close to doing those things, and he did it because he knew how to run a campaign and get elected. Now, he lost discipline on the health issue, and so lost the universal health care thing.
You can pretend about how liberals are these “big thinkers” and so forth. Once upon a time – in the 1930s, 40s, and 60s for instance – liberals knew how to win elections. Johnson had “big ideas” in a sense. But he also knew how to crush the opposition. Conservatives have big ideas. If you think starting two wars isn’t a big idea, you’re insane. Conservatives once didn’t know how to run a decent campaign. No longer.
Conservatives simply have the talent. The Democrats incidentally have talent, it’s just all in the Clinton wing. Obama’s success in the spring was singularly about winning those caucuses. But as far as I can tell, David Plouffe and the rest of them are incompetent.
September 10th, 2008 at 5:44 pm
ESPN News’ coverage doesn’t have any higher purpose, but it’s there for people who want to learn about the day’s sports news and it gets the job done.
Job swap, anyone? Or how about sending Ambinder and co. up to Canada and getting a Canadian reporter to fill in until mid-October?
September 10th, 2008 at 5:50 pm
Petey’s right this time. Obama’s biggest weakness has been his inability to define the debate on a day to day basis. The Republicans have a stable of surrogates ready to mouth that day’s talking point clearly and loudly. The democrats always seem to come out slow and befuddled.
That and the Republicans have better/more memorable ads.
September 10th, 2008 at 5:55 pm
One secret is that the game is heavily weighted away from ideology. You win these things through culture and personality married to a campaign team that can drive a coherent governing message through the clutter
This is exactly right. The whole game is culture and personality and narrative. Being right about the facts and about the policy is practically – although not entirely – meaningless. Obama was right about the war and right about the surge. He was right about the death penalty (before he changed it) and right about this sex education thing. He’s right about a whole host of things.
But he wants to talk about those things almost to the exclusion of talking about personality and cultural symbols that will align him with the sentiments that Americans care about. What’s more, he’s got to get his surrogates in unison on a single message over a 48 hour period.
I’ve been watching CNN, Fox, and MSNBC. There have been a half dozen surrogates for each party on talking about this lipstick shit and this education ad McCain has up. First, the news cycle has been driven by the McCain campaign. That’s a huge disadvantage for Obama. Second, EVERY SINGLE SURROGATE HAS SAID BASICALLY THE SAME THING. At this point, I know what the talking points email that went out this morning to Surrogates this morning said. That’s incredibly powerful. It’s not incredibly nuanced or thoughtful. But it’s effective.
I don’t know why I’m writing all this advice on this blog, but god knows I want this to be a more interest and even fight. And it’s not. Bitch about Steve Schmidt and his dirty tactics all you want, but I’ll say this: this man can run a campaign.
September 10th, 2008 at 5:56 pm
Petey says I’m a lefty
Obviously, Petey, some people don’t believe you. I don’t. Mostly (e.g. the barrage of infantilism about Yglesias and the “trust fund”) you’ve just been rude to your host here. Like Al or this O’Neal person.
September 10th, 2008 at 6:04 pm
“Bitch about Steve Schmidt and his dirty tactics all you want, but I’ll say this: this man can run a campaign.”
In sheer warrior terms, Team Sedona are golden gods.
They had the smaller army, held the lousier ground, and were equipped with worse weapons. But they are now in position to win the war nonetheless.
September 10th, 2008 at 6:19 pm
Matt’s original post somewhat misses the point. Marc Ambinder, and the rest of them, are useful idiots. They think of themselves as objective and thoughtful. They’re not: they’re reflexive and reactive stenographers who are manipulated by campaigns.
Liberals don’t control the media. But they do control, at least putatively, a campaign. It’s that campaign that’s got to put out shit that makes Ambinder and the rest of them react in the ways that get the campaign’s message out there.
What’s more, political reporters are different in kind from, say, sports reporters. Sports teams are primarily interested in producing good sports teams. While they may care about how they are reported in the press, the product they’re pushing is independent of how it’s reported. The same is more or less true of, say, most other things people cover. War, for instance, succeeds or fails independent of the reporting done about it. Consequently, it’s possible to conceive of good reporters who accurately cover the nuances of war.
The same is NOT true of politics. Political candidates and campaigns are focused on winning an election, which means reaching as many people as possible with the right messages. Consequently, political reporters aren’t independent of the thing they are covering. They are part of it, even if they are blind to that fact. That’s why political reporting is so bad, and why the Marc Ambinders of the world get so far in it. Because they don’t actually have to report anything.
September 10th, 2008 at 6:53 pm
Shorter Petey: I admire grifters like myself.
September 10th, 2008 at 7:21 pm
“Shorter Petey: I admire grifters like myself.”
I respect warriors who fight well, even if they’re fighting on the other side.
September 11th, 2008 at 1:21 am
It seems to me that if the practitioners of campaign journalism can’t figure out a way to make it so that lying is punished, rather than amplified and rewarded, by the press then they ought to pack up their bags and go do something else.
Hear, hear.
September 11th, 2008 at 2:54 am
Campaign journalists are no different than journalists overall. They accept the spin as the story and do not ferret out the truth. Post 9/11 and Iraq War illustrate this point. “Journalists” now appear to be mere conveyers of “information”. Seldom do “journalists” challenge the individuals interviewed and if they do then they risk being excommunicated, to wit John McCain’s cancellation of his appearance on CNN/Larry King after Campbell Brown did challenge and request real information from his campaign. This whole lipstick on a pig farce should be called out for what it is, but it won’t. I wonder just how pointedly Charles Gibson will challenge Gov Palin re the Bridge to Nowhere!
September 11th, 2008 at 6:39 am
E O’Neal is either a swiftboater himself or a prime example of how effective swiftboating can be. He claims that “Kerry’s fellow officers almost to a man denounced him and his brief time in Vietnam,” which is demonstrably false.
The group that spread the swiftboat smears were largely fellow officers with no direct eye-witness knowledge of Kerry’s service. Still angry about Kerry’s war protests after he left the Navy, they’re hardly dispassionate, disinterested observers.
The guys who actually served with Kerry on real Swift boats in Vietnam, and presumably would be in a better position to know, staunchly defend Kerry’s record. In June 2008, a group of Swift boat veterans sent a letter to T Boone Pickens taking up his challenge to pay $1 million to anybody who could prove that anything in the Swift boat campaign against Kerry(which he financed) was untrue. The veterans provided extensive documentation, and offered to meet with him to give access to Kerry’s journals, videotapes, and a copy of his full military record certified by the Navy.)
Not surprisingly, Pickens brushed off their letter, and never paid the $1 million. He blandly explained that his bet actually applied only to the TV ads run by “Swift Boat Veterans for Truth” (which were largely teasers to raise questions about Kerry’s war record) and not to their bestselling book or the media interviews that generated more attention than the ads themselves — and did the real damage.
Pickens Says No Deal on $1 million
As for McCain, forty years ago he certainly showed courage and resolve. Whether such raw physical courage is relevant to the job of being President at age 72 is debatable. But McCain’s campaign is certainly exploiting his POW service as an all-purpose get-out-of-jail-free card to deflect criticism and/or as “evidence” that his judgment must be perfect on every issue.
Thus McCain can imply that anybody who differs with him on policy is unpatriotic and can launch despicable attacks against Obama with impunity. If anybody complains, the robotic answer is: “McCain = POW. POW = Honorable. Whatever McCain Does = Honorable.” (Thus McCain can say with a straight face that he’s running a “respectful” campaign and still attack Obama for advocating “sex education for kindergartners. The “basis” for this was an Illinois bill supported by Obama, which mandated age-appropriate sex education. For very young kids, that mean protecting them from sexual predators by explaining what to do if somebody touched them inappropriately.)
September 11th, 2008 at 6:49 am
I came to read from the Daily Dish but the idiotic “TV” on the top right irritated me and I could see no pause/go away button so I’m out of here.
Byeeee
September 11th, 2008 at 6:58 am
Lots of good comments on this site.
But let me also add that Obama just needs better surrogates. Every time I turn on TV I see Republican surroagates and operatives tearing into news anchors and Democratic surrogates, gleefully falling on their swords if need be for their guy. Look around for effective Democratic surrogates on our side and you just hear crickets chirping. So far, Biden—who was supposed to be a big-time attack dog—has been a dud and may just turn out to be the John Edwards of this electoral cycle.
The simple truth is that the MSM doesn’t do journalism or analysis—just stenography and reffing the banalities of ‘lipstick-gate’ and all the other trivial worthless shit. They only way to get back in this game is to have effective attack dogs on our side—and the Democrats don’t really have any. This forces Obama to come out in public himself to refute these charges like he did on Letterman last night—while John McCain can “stay above it” and let his surrogates do the dirty work. In the end, Obama’s greatest liability may not have been his race, his inexperience or his age, but limp-dicked Democratic officials and the fact that the party apparatus which was supposed to take shots and draw fire is MIA.
I suspect the Obama team realizes it may be surrounded by those who smile—but yet be villians. Or are, at the very least, completely useless. And I think Obama’s response may be to focus on demographics and turnout—the ground game—and the debates. They may think none of the other shit really matters in the end. I hope they’re right.
September 11th, 2008 at 7:42 am
Joe Strummer says: “Once upon a time – in the 1930s, 40s, and 60s for instance – liberals knew how to win elections.”
Well it wasn’t because liberals were such brilliant campaigners. One of Lyndon Johnson’s finest acts was his destruction of the Democratic Party’s ability to “crush the opposition”, since it depended on the segregationist South being solidly Democratic since the Civil War.
Democratic domination started to crumble in 1948, when in response to Harry Truman’s desegregation of the military, a number of southern Democrats split off as the Dixiecrat Party, with Strom Thurmond as their Presidential candidate.
In 1964-65, when Johnson used all his persuasive skills to pass Civil Rights legislation, it wasn’t a focus-group tested maneuver to win votes. It was a gut-level decision to do the right thing, with clear-eyed knowledge that it would significantly damage his own and his party’s chances of re-election (as the White House tapes demonstrate). Whatever criticisms Johnson deserves for his mistakes in Vietnam, he deserves even greater praise for being right on civil rights. In March 1965, when Johnson told a national TV audience “We Shall Overcome”, he meant it.
During the 1960’s most of the segregationists switched parties, and the South, solidly Democratic in the 1930’s and 1940’s, is now solidly Republican.
Let’s not romanticize the Good Old Days — which weren’t so good if your skin was the wrong color.
September 11th, 2008 at 8:27 am
Rob Fightmaster: I agree. I think the MSM is between a rock and a hard place in many ways because so many people don’t care about policy, but rather care more about personality and spin.
I realize it’s not the job of the media to educate, but my guess is, unless there’s a collective agreement among all of them to stop with the gossip/press release approach and go instead with a clear reporting standard, it’s not gonna change. In other words: Disown the ratings stuff – probably for a year? – in order to get things on track. Don’t go down that old road of soundbites and snippets and rumors and inane talking points anymore. Instead, go down the road of intelligent discourse.
No doubt many in this country would have withdrawal symptoms, and might even rebell for a while. But I sense it’ll take a collective effort – MSM included – to wake up from this nightmare.
Bottom line: Last night I saw more in-depth, even-handed discussion of issues with David Letterman as an interviewer (of Barack Obama)than I’ve seen with most MSM or cable journalists.
That about says it all, doesn’t it?
Regards to all.
September 11th, 2008 at 9:43 am
They, They, They, Lies, Lies, Lies. This is the mantra of those who feel entitled, who think they have the clear moral high ground, and cannot face the fact that they can’t close the deal because they are not the paragons of moral purity they think they are. Spin and gloss are a part of every election, and always will be, and voters are well able to detect the hype while seeing how much of reality it reveals or conceals. The only outright lie I know of from the past week was the utterly shameful Andrew Sullivan-Daily Kos concocted fantasy out and out asserting that Palins baby was that of her daughter. This I call a lie because no evidence for it every even justifed a rumor or gossip. And because Daily Kos headlined it as a fact. Most of the ugly character assassination directed at her flowed from that disgusting attack and the public rightly reacted and is still reacting. All the b.s. here about conservative media maniplating stupid voters (which is how many of you see us all) had nothing to do with the spread of this sick joke.
September 11th, 2008 at 9:43 am
Have a look at my blog
http://neumann103.wordpress.com/2008/09/11/american-dualism/
where i discuss
Americans – more strongly and distinct from most similar cultures – have a dualistic notion of how everything is organized that is so deeply ingrained as to be a perverse blinder to the truth. It is pervasive.
“There are two sides to every story”
September 11th, 2008 at 10:31 am
The sports analogy actually does work, but not in the black/white way that people are considering.
Instead of “objective” sports, with a measurable winner or loser (most points, fastest time, heaviest weight, etc.) look at the JUDGED sports, figure skating and gymnastics, particularly. There’s a reason that the scoring systems have been changed several times in our lifetimes: there’s no “objective reality.”
Sound familiar?
September 11th, 2008 at 4:12 pm
I liked the sports analogy. Can you imagine if sports reporting was treated like campaign reporting? I can’t resist: The anatomy of a sports scandal.
1 (Play-by-play): “It’s a long fly ball down the left field line…”
2 (representative from the opposing team): “No it’s not”
1: “Yes it is! It’s going, going…”
2: “YOU say it is, we challenge your assertion that it was a home run. While we admit there was recent contact between the bat and ball we don’t say it was actually a hit and we’d like to point out that you’re reporting has clearly been biased towards the home team”
1: “But the ball went over the fence! Look! He’s rounding the bases, It’s a home rrr…”
2: “We’re tired of your misrepresentations of our great game. Clearly you have an ax to grind and the fans are not going to put up with that.”
1: “Oh…I saw”
2: “The integrity of the game has been damaged enough. No more access to, or interviews with our team for the sake of the fans.”
1: “OK. Well, folks there’s definitely a controversy about whether the ball was just hit or not. Many witnesses say a home run was committed by the home team (film of home run), but the opposing team clearly disputes that (film of representative talking). So, some say it was a hit, while others say it was not really a hit, although both sides do agree that there was some contact made between the bat and the ball.”
2: “We think the home team really is demonstrating unsportsmanlike behavior (home team player rounding the bases and other players jumping up and down celebrating the home run). This appeal by the home team to the referees – not the paying fans – about their supposed home run diminishes the game for all of us fans.”(film of home run again and referees conferring). I’ve never seen such a gratuitous display of mockery for a visiting team and elitism. We feel the involvement of supposed “referees” disenfranchises the fans. It should be the fan’s decision, not some supposed experts paid by the league.”
1: “Clearly the opposing team is upset. (film of angry representative) The home team is also upset (film of home run going over the fence and home team players jumping up and down celebrating). We’ll be back in a moment to talk about the home team’s unsportsmanlike behavior (film clip in slow motion of home team players jumping up and down celebrating). Why can’t they accept the other team’s view about there not being a home run? When did professional baseball lose its professionalism? Have these gratuitous emotional displays crossed the line? Are referees ruining the people’s game?”
2: “Well, we think clearly it has It’s not about hitting home runs, it’s about how the game is played. (film of slow motion celebration) What’s at stake is the integrity of the great game, now and in the future. Clearly the home team needs this home run controversy, one of their own making I have to add, to deflect from what we think is a much, much larger scandal.”
1: OK, the supposed home run scandal deepens! Is the home team using their home run claims as an attempt at covering up a larger scandal? (film of home run… again) And what about us up here in the box? (audio “It’s going, going…”) Are we sportscasters too ready to jump on the home team bandwagon and facilitate the cover up as well? We’ll talk to a representative of the opposing team about play-by-play bias during games. Also, after the break: the home team and rampant steroid use! (film of same home run) A new story is out questioning whether the recent binge of hitting by the home team is due to illegal drug usage. We’ll have a representative from the opposing team fill us in right after the break!!”
Joel
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April 7th, 2009 at 5:24 am
I am new to this guest book and I think you all will help me to enhance my knowledge.
I am from Singapore and learning to read in English, please tell me right I wrote the following sentence: “Information on polish airports and domestic and international flights.”
Regards
Gitel.