On May 12th, Media Matters sponsored a panel discussion called "Why Media Matters: The Role of the Media in the Democratic Process" which details the essentials of the differing perspectives of media critics and the members of the press who are on the receiving end of that criticism. Often a hot topic in netroots circles, to be sure.
Many of the arguments that I’ve heard from both sides were detailed and eloquently stated. And it provides a one-stop shopping spree for those of us like me who are obsessed with the discussion of — as Greg Sargent puts it the tagline of his blog Horse’s Mouth — the reporting of politics and the politics of reporting. Or, as Brattlerouser and Jamison Foser would remind us: It’s the media, you rather-less-than-super-sharp person.
Media Matters described the panel, moderated by Media Matters founder, David Brock this way…
Eric Boehlert is an award-winning journalist who has written extensively about media, politics, and pop culture. His new book is Lapdogs: How the Press Rolled Over for Bush.
Kathy Kiely, Congressional reporter, USA Today
Lynn Sweet, Washington D.C. bureau chief, Chicago-Sun Times
Dick Polman, national political reporter, The Philadelphia Inquirer
Paul Waldman is a senior fellow at Media Matters for America. His new book is Being Right Is Not Enough: What Progressives Must Learn From Conservative Success.
Now, of course, Boehlert, Waldman and Brock represented the conventional wisdom of today’s active progressive media watchdogs. Kathy Kiely and Lynn Sweet provided the media insiders perspective. But Dick Polman was there as the media insider who backed up the critics’ claims.
The two sides, thought not mutually exclusive, boil down to this…
From the critics, Boehlert…
I think the press needs to be held accountable for what happened in the 2000 campaign, and the 2004 campaign. And I think what’s happening today in terms of not being fair with Democrats and not giving them, you know, whether it’s keeping them off the Sunday shows, as Media Matters has documented, or lots of other ways.
They’ve held the Bush administration to a completely different standard, and I think again, there was sort of a titanic shift when Republicans came to town in how the press was going to deal with the White House.
Polman adds this perspective from the trenches…
And when I finally got [a story about the Downing Street Memo] in, we ran it on a Sunday, but we ran it on page six, which of course, anybody that knows newspapers, or is within the newspaper business — the left-hand side is six, and that’s not considered a good page either. The right-hand side — you know, the eye goes to the right when you open it up. So if you’re on page six, it’s a bad page. I rarely, if ever, have been on page six. Ever. In the Sunday paper. So it was very interesting it was for that story, and there was no reference to it on the front page. It was just sort of stuck in there in this little funny, space…
…now there’s so much sort of "bad news" or true news about intelligence snafus and covering up stuff that didn’t go with the program and the White House — there’s so much of it out there, that now it’s like it’s almost not news. So you know, the paradox is that the White House in some ways gets an advantage there, because you know, a lot of — a lot of media won’t consider it to be news to report yet another person coming forward. So I think all these factors come into play here.
But both Lynn Sweet and Kathy Kiely provide what seems to be the most common first kneejerk defensive response to media criticism, which doesn’t actually address the critiques… To me, this always seems simply a way to dismiss all this evidence as just tinfoil hat stuff from those annoying peasants with pitchforks out in flyover country…
Monolithically, Sweet says…
…the media’s not monolithic, there is no we, it’s me. You know, I don’t get my instructions from central — from the central office. You know, here’s the plan today, what to do or not. And actually if you saw how papers really get out each day, you’d be surprised that we — you know, that everything comes together from the crosswords to the front page, because it’s an incredible process. It is. So the kind of — with all respects, when I get broadsides about the press, we’re talking about a lot of different organisms that live independently…
Monolithically, Kiely adds…
…I can tell you from a first-person standpoint that the press definitely is not monolithic. In fact, if anybody tells you that there’s a media conspiracy, just know this — we should be so organized.
But, within some rather well-stated comments which provide a fuller picture of the daily lives of reporters, they ultimately come to kind of agree with the critiques (and echo the Daily Howler) and suggest that because of reporters’ — as well as the minority Democrats — lack of subpoena power, it’s just too darn hard to challenge the Bush administration.
Which Brock couldn’t help using for this jab…
I think Lynn and Kathy have given us one of the stronger arguments I’ve heard to turn over the Congress this Fall to the Democratic hands, because then we’ll have a press that isn’t acting like lapdogs.
But, whether one thinks corporate media is controlled by fat white men in closed rooms, or not, Boehlert uses the lack of reporting on Stephen Colbert’s recent performance in front of Bush to say this (my emphasis)…
…if we have all these independent news organizations, how can they routinely come to almost the exact same editorial decisions? A quick point about liberal bias I stay away from it, too. I mean, if you think about liberal bias, what — the argument is that essentially all reporters are essentially Democratic operatives who purposely spin the news in order to achieve a political agenda. That is probably one of the most far reaching conspiracy theories ever hatched, and yet people take it seriously. So thankfully, most people on the left do not ascribe to any sort of conspiracy. It’s not a bias. People don’t do this purposely because they’re all trying to advance the Republican agenda.
My argument, and I think, other people, is there’s a mindset, and there’s this group thing. And I understand it’s dangerous to, describe all media outlets as the same, and you can’t. And yet you come back to the same thing. Downing Street Memo. How could literally every news organization in America know that that memo was out there? And every news organization in America, for six weeks decide we’re not going to print and we’re not going to talk about it.
And Kiely’s response?
I think one thing that a lot of people don’t understand who are in politics who are advocates for a cause, which is wonderful. Reporters generally aren’t like that. Reporters are people who psychologically have a problem with commitment, and we love being sort of in the middle, and looking at the one side and on the other side…
…I’m going to let Dick talk about the Downing Street Memo, because I personally haven’t — that’s not my area of coverage and I don’t know that much about it.
Boehlert responds…
The — Stephen Colbert and the Downing Street Memo may in fact be two symptoms of the same thing. Which is that in both cases I said it was part of I think the problem is that he made fun of the reporters, and that may have made people a little unhappy. With the Downing Street Memo, when you go back now and look at — do a critique of some of the things that the Bush administration said in order to bring us into Iraq, you are also doing a critique implicitly if nothing else, of the press’s performance during that time. And I don’t think there are a lot of reporters who are very proud of the — of their profession in general regardless of what they wrote their organization did, who are all that proud of how the press performed in the run up to the Iraq war. And so when you start to go back and look at things like the Downing Street Memo, or look at things like what Tyler Drumheller was saying, I think it makes a lot of people uncomfortable because you’re naturally raising those sorts of questions about why the press didn’t do its job.
So besides the groupthink, what’s really at play here? Paul Waldman speculates on what might be a bit of self-loathing and projection by members of the news media concerning the idea of Democratic elitism.
Eric talked about this whole liberal bias critique that the right has thrown at the media for a few decades now. What you hear them say is that reporters are a bunch of out-of-touch liberal northeastern elitists. Now, as it happens, that’s largely true. The irony though is that that doesn’t mean that Democrats get better coverage, and progressives get better coverage. In fact, a lot of the times it’s just the opposite, and to illustrate that I’m going to tell you a little story that Media Matters uncovered a while back.
As a reporter I may as well say who she is — Candy Crowley from CNN was giving a speech right after the 2004 election, talking about the election and her coverage. And she told a story about how she was in Iowa in the early part of the campaign with John Kerry, and they sat down at a diner to have lunch, and the waitress came over and asked him what he wanted. And Kerry asked if they had green tea, and the waitress said no, we only have Lipton’s. And he said okay, I’ll have Lipton’s. And as Crowley told her audience she informed the Senator that if he wanted green tea, he was going to have to bring his own to Iowa. And probably a lot of other places in the — in the country. And she said that she remembered this, it stuck with her because it just showed what an out-of-touch elitist Kerry really was.
Well, when Media Matters checked this out, they found out that she was a little bit mistaken. First of all, green tea accounts for about 20% of Lipton’s sales in the United States. And if you’re in Dubuque, and you want some green tea, you can get it at that snobby elitist grocery known as K-Mart. (Laughing)
So what does this tell us? Well, first of all, it tells us that the out-of-touch elitist in this case was the reporter. But that didn’t mean that it manifested itself in scorn for the people of Iowa. No. It manifested itself in scorn for John Kerry, because he supposedly was the out-of-touch elitist. And so what do you see kind of running through so much coverage of social issues and politics when it comes to these sorts of questions? It’s the idea that places here there are a lot of Republicans are truly American. Places where there are lot of Democrats, are not so much.
So, what does this mean for Vermont? Does the same kind of elitist clubbiness exist here?
Since odum’s "Vermont’s Own Tony Snow?", I’ve been trying to answer this for myself. But, because there is so little political reporting in Vermont — from so few reporters — I’m not sure I’ll be able to. (Though I am keeping score on Darren Allen‘s snark to see if it is more commonly directed left or right. Jury’s still out.)
But, I thought the exchange I had with Peter Welch during some live-blogging on Blog for America, was interesting…
I asked this question:
In your view, how does Vermont media compare to the national media in terms of these kinds of hurdles to getting a Democrats message out? (It seemed to be a major problem for Peter Clavelle.)
His response was simply: "Governor Dean is the guy to ask how the Vermont media compares to the national media!!"
Reading way more into that comment than perhaps is warranted, I took his comment to mean a few things…
One, it was a way to say ~Hey Dean supporter person, I’m on your side… Dean was railroaded!~ But I also felt that it reflected the small town civility (or perhaps arguably small town clubiness?) that likely exists in the tight circle of Vermont politics. Or maybe the same concern national Democrats seem to have; that directly confronting the mechanisms of press coverage is political suicide. Or both.
Anyway, there’s lots and lots more great comments in this discussion. And though my obvious bias is for the critics, the reporters are quite honest about how the day to day operations of a news organization. If you get a chance, you would be well-served to read the whole thing.
[Crossposted at What’s the Point?]