Those of you who are cursed with good memories may recall my previous reference to my disdain for the White House Press Corps. Well, maybe they are to be pitied rather than vilified.
I credit TheColumbiaRecord.com blogger Bob McAlister for pointing out The Washington Post‘s revelation that what really keeps those nabobs nattering is a mental illness. And we should not blame the victims of affliction, should we?
The Post reports that Clinical Psychologist Renana Brooks has even named this malady: "White House Reporter Syndrome." She has treated several poor sufferers. And they do suffer, poor things:
"We’re one of the most reviled subsets of one of the most reviled professions," Dana Milbank, a Washington Post reporter who covered the White House during Mr. Bush’s first term, said. "We’re going to lose the battle every time."
Awww. There, there.
And after all those mean things I said. Turns out they’re just plain nuts, just like those people over there.
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It was a pleasant surprise to read (in that WaPo link) Ari Fleischer’s acknowledgement of the Bush Administration’s penchant for secrecy. Given those conditions, I would be interested to know how you would conduct yourself differently if you were a member of the White House Press Corps.
They may be a grandstanding bunch, those White House press corps guys and gals, but if we’re patient, perhaps things will change and we’ll end up with more responsible correspondants like this guy and more independent columnists like this one.
Yeah, I’ll bet that Bob would, a compassionate conservative to the core, advocate replacing the WH “reporters” with absolutely professional stenographers.
But they’d have to have strong somachs.
Of course, the key issue that everyone— especially the press— should keep in mind is that Darth Cheney’s sensitive psyche should be protected at all costs.
Bwahahhahahhhhhhaha.
Frankly, I think Mike McCurry summarized the problem quite well: Live TV coverage. It makes the reporters act like animals, and the rest of us in this profession look bad.
It’s a sort of sociopolitical manifestation of the "observer effect" (which I have in the past confused with the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle): The observer and the observed interact through the process of observation. If we weren’t watching, neither the press nor the White House officials would act the way they do — the White House stoically stonewalling the jabbering mob, and reporters going further nuts as a result, and the White House getting public sympathy as a result of that.
Mr. McCurry, with whom I sympathized greatly when he was in that job, regrets making the decision. Scott McLellan, who holds the job now, would never undo this phenomenon, though he sees it as “a theater of the absurd.” Why do you suppose that is, folks?
Is 93% of that press corps voting for Clinton and Gore one of the symptoms of their dementia?
I don’t believe this. As many times as I get slapped in the face with it, I still can’t believe it.
I carefully explain how I formed my initial impression of the press corps as a bunch of nuts when they were giving Clinton hell, and do so within the context of my contempt toward their behavior with regard to the Bush administration — and I get nothing but partisan responses?
Why am I always surprised? And why do I keep trying? It’s 8:15 on a Thursday night. I’m going to go down and have the workout I’ve been putting off all day, and then go home.
Well, I’m trying to still keep my New Year’s resolution and not write about anything I know nothing about. Not sure if I’m accomplishing that, or not.
Brad, you must be kidding. Maybe you wanted the topic to be a discussion of reporter mental status but how can you deny basic facts? Any American, and that includes many people of both parties and independents, had to be really disgusted at the nasty snarling redundant ludicrous questions posed recently at these WH press briefings. How about the one where they asked if Cheney had now contemplated resigning because he accidentally shot a hunting partner? How about Gregory calling McClellan a jerk? These people are not even decent – let alone people to look up to. I rate 98% of these WH reporters much lower than snakes. It really is a collective disgrace to watch how they don’t ask questions, but instead pose confrontational statements. I watched Russert stating that “if Whittington dies, there will have to be a full scale grand jury convened”. These people were salivating over the tragedy of this accident like sharks on a bleeding fish. Mapes, Rather, Roberts, what other examples does one need? I hope your workout went well.
If there is no connection between most so-called journalists voting Democrat and the different treatment they give to Republicans, Democrats, and others, then these media hounds really are dumber than I previously thought them to be.
I can’t speak for Dave and Lee on approaching this issue from a partisan basis…but even as much as I find most TV “journalism” shallow & distasteful (aside from Lehrer News Hour, Tim Russert and a few others) relative to print & radio which I prefer, it’s just that I can’t get too worked up about an aggressive, even obnoxious press. I’d rather they err on that side than the other, and that goes for a presidency of either party.
It will be interesting to see what happens if the American people somehow manage to elect an intelligent and thoughtful dedicated public servant to the Presidency in 2008 (McCain? Biden?). It would be fascinating to see how a President who treats the American people as adults would in turn be treated by the press.
The workout was great, Dave.
And Lee, what does the way those obnoxious people vote have to do with them giving irrational hell to Republicans and Democrats alike?
And Phillip, the thing is that so much of that stuff is just for the cameras. Reporters and sources — even White House reporters and sources — tend to have pretty civil relations one-on-one. If they didn’t, neither could get their jobs done.
What’s news is when the pattern departs from that, and it did so in the Cheney case. If you read my earlier post, you’ll see that just such a breakdown of off-camera relationships is a distinguishing feature of this particular flap, and one of the reasons I started writing about it.
Do you really believe that the 93% of reporters who voted for Clinton and Gore actually were as tough on them?
We know how chummy the press is with the oligarchs. Just look at Dan Rather hosting a DNC fundraiser, or all those star-struck journalists agreeing to censorship in order to hang out with Slick Willie at Renaissance Week(end). That’s why I call them the “lapdog press”.
Lee, obviously you didn’t see the media on your home planet during the hunting of Clinton.
Oh, and Lee, are you sure that it was not 93.7 % voting for both Clinton and Gore?
Jeez, what an ludicrously unbelievable statistic. Where’d you get that? NewsMax? Drudge? Fox? National Enquirer? The voices that you hear when you’re off meds?
Lessee, who was it yukking up the entirely fallacious Repub talking points about Gore claiming to be the role model for Love Story or inventing the Internet or discovering Love Canal?
Either that 7% are sure powerful or the other 93% didn’t do a very good protecting “their” candidate.
Even Bill Kristol has publicly acknowledged that the rightwing bogeyman of the “Liberal Press” was, for the most part, BS— a way to “work the refs” in favor of the right.
RTH – The American people are voting on the media with their eyeballs and remote controllers. There is a reason why Fox News is grossly ahead of CNN, MSNBC, and the network news combined. Fox is balanced and credible while the others and their “stars” display and act out a leftist agenda. The WH reporters fall into line the same way and mimic the outlet they work for. If you think the NY Times, CNN, Wa POst, and CBS, NBC, and others aren’t anti-Bush and anti-conservative, that must be a big rock you are living under. Come on out into the sun occasionally. See the light.
Oops. Sorry about that. I asked Phillip to check an earlier post (about the fifth comment above this one), and neglected to link to it. When I tried to go back and do that just now, I found that it was a post that I had never gotten beyond draft form, and therefore never published. Anyway… Here’s a link to the pertinent material. You’ll note that this is missing from a transcript of the actual press briefing that day.
If you don’t want to follow the link, here’s the pertinent part:
Note that this is a departure from the usual rule — which is that the rowdy, confrontational stuff happens on camera, while private communications tend to be much more civil.
Hey, Brad, here’s an additional reason why you can disdain at least one member of the WH press corps. (And, that member isn’t some gay Republican male prostitute.)
John Dickerson, WH correspondent for TIME MAGAZINE writes in Slate:
[…]
Based on what I’d been told by White House aides over the years, I expected to see the president asking piercing questions that punctured the fog of the moment and inspired bold action. Bush’s question-asking talents are a central tenet of the president’s hagiography. He may not be much for details, say aides, but he can zero in on a weak spot in a briefing and ask out-of-the-box questions. I have been repeatedly told over the years that he once interrupted a briefing on national defense to pose a 30,000-foot stumper: What is the function of the Department of Defense?
[…]
Excluding purple kool-aid drinkers like Lee and Dave, even the most casual observer would have to know that Bush has always been far more of a canny political animal than any sort of administrator.
Seeing through the “CEO meme” that his handlers promoted as a smokescreen for his incompetence would take little actual effort.
Even with the backing of his Daddy’s cronies, Bush couldn’t make a go of two companies. He was essentially handed his fortune— again by folks more interested in his political connections than his administrative acumen— as the Walmart greeter and bagman of a professional baseball team. Bush is so famously incurious that he ventured outside the U.S. just once before 2000— and that was to go to Mexico, a short drive away from Texas.
Most shockingly, Dickerson has had five years to observe Bush from close range. Yet, he seems to have unquestioningly accepted from world-class, professional liars and spinmeisters the picture of Bush as some insightful behind-the-scenes powerhouse CEO.
What a dork— both Bush and Dickerson.
Oh, sure…”fair and balanced” NOT.
Check this out.
Debating with an FNC fan about bias is like debating the colors of the rainbow with a blind man— a pointless, waste of time.
RTH – I clicked your link and no one is more fair and balanced than Cavuto. If Fox News airs actual verbatim comments from Dean, Clinton, Reid, Jimmy Carter and other Dem leaders, you think that makes them biased. Weird way to look at letting facts be put on the table for all to see and hear. Fact is, Dean, Hillary (let’s socialize the medical profession), Reid (Yippee, we killed the Patriot Act), and Carter (I want America to fail in the UN) all hate capitalism. So Fox was simply reporting the truth..
As an aside, Fox also has the best looking news “experts”. Julie Banderas, Laurie Dhue, et. al.
Dave, how you keep your head from spinning off with so much circular logic confounded with ignorance or lies must be a medical marvel.
You’re the perfect example of a Fox News fan.
You prove my point, Dave: blind man/rainbow colors.
In your beknighted state, reporting rightwing BS equals “truth” so FNC just confirms your ignorance and prejudices. Smearing Democrats as hating capitalism isn’t even worth a response.
And, as an aside, when was looking like a tarted-up prostitute necessary for a journalist?
Oh, we’re discussing FNC. Yep, they fit right in. Roger Ailes, “former” GOP operative gives them the daily propaganda message and they faithfully parrot it.
Oh, I couldn’t resist a great story about Neil Cavuto, business commentator extraordinaire.
March 03, 2006
Fox ‘Business’ News: Strippers, Not Enron
You could never tell it from watching Fox News’ business show, but there is a big financial story unfolding about the fate of millions of American investors. So why has “Your World with Neil Cavuto” been ignoring it?
The major story that is getting nearly no coverage from Cavuto is the five-week-old trial of former Enron bosses Ken Lay and Jeff Skilling, who are accused of a conspiracy to defraud investors by concealing losses in 2000 and 2001. The collapse of Enron left investors and employees — whose pension funds were in company stock — with nothing.
Instead of taking a peek at the trial, Cavuto offered more than five minutes of discussion with two comely blondes who have formed a group to bring strippers to Jesus. The lengthy interview was paired with split-screen images of strippers in action. Its relevance to a business show was never explained, although the word “financial” did come up once. One of the blondes said that the industry often is a “financial trap” for “the girls” and so many cannot just quit their jobs on the spot.
Fox News’ black-out of news on the Enron trial stands in stark contrast to its saturation coverage given the 2004 trial of Martha Stewart, who was convicted on a much less serious charge in a matter that produced no measurable harm to anyone. During the Stewart trial, Fox News offered updates throughout the day of the trial, from beginning to end, with additional segments of speculation about the effect of the trial on Wall Street and whatever else its reporters and producers could dream up.
Yet with Enron, Cavuto has not even told us of Lay’s financial problems, how Enron lobbyists worked to prolong the energy crisis in California, or followed up with interviews with former Enron employees who are watching the trial and asking what they are feeling.
====================================
Just as aside, maybe those strippers were testing for an anchorette position on FNC. Keep your eyes open, Dave!
RTH – I guess you would rather see Helen Thomas doing the news. Now that is a sight for sore eyes, or a sight to make eyes sore, or both. As for Enron, no network or news outlet is steadily covering the boring details of this bit of yesterday’s news. No more than anyone paid attention to Terry McCauliff’s virtual theft of $100,000,000 from Global Crossing right before it went bankrupt.
Then again, maybe you are one of the five or six people who watch MSNBC on a regular basis. Fox has the resources and coverage to provide a fair and balanced vantage point and that is why they dominate the news. No wait, all of us who watch FNS are misled by Ailes, maybe he has hypnotized all of us.. haaaaaaaaaahaaaaaaaaa
RTH, go back and read my posts where I gave the source for the fact that most journalists LABEL THEMSELVES as “liberals” and “Democrats”.
Several polls of various groups have found them to vote between 86% and 93% for Clinton and Gore, and to use the above labels to describe themselves. I challenge you to find these journalists disagreeing with the poll results.
Lee, now you want me to read every one of your posts on this site to see if you can support your statement? You can’t just, you know, repeat it?
Wow.
Have you talked to a therapist about your unwillingness (inability?) to substantiate what you type?
Your “challenge” is so weak I’ve got to laugh. I just want to get this straight. “Some” journalists are supposed to disagree with “some” poll results and then they’re supposed to— what? write a counter article? Join the GOP stenograpners detachment? Sign a petition that they think the ratio should be more like 60-40? Swear that Dubya is doing the Lord’s work?
Here’s a clue for you, Lee. Unlike the fakes on FNC who daily get a memo from Ailes on how to spin the news, most mainstream journalists separate their personal philosophies from their professional actions. They actually attempt to provide “fair, objective and balanced” coverage in the news pages.
In fact, a pretty good case can be made that the coverage of Clinton and Gore prove that the rightwing’s 40-year-campaign to “work the refs” has been successful.
Most objective observers (which obviously excludes you and Dave) would look at the never-ending coverage of basically non-existent Clinton “scandals”. Then, they’d look at the incredible cornucopia of serious, national security, governmental corruption scandals under Dubya with short-term or no coverage.
The ultimate conclusion would have to be that the media is giving free passes all over the place to the current administration.
Wait, I’ll have to hand it to them. They really held Cheney’s feet to the fire— for about a week. The VP merely shot his friend in the face with a shotgun and refused to cooperate with local investigators until he sobered up.
RTH – Brad has the right approach to editorials and journalism. Many of the posters on this site want him to consistently skew left or to the right to show his “true colors”. He incurrs the wrath of left and right by veering back and forth as the issue unfolds. You would be surprised to know that I look for a few voices of reason who are not necessarily right leaning. Michael Barone and Kathleen Parker come to mind. Britt Hume is probably my favorite but he has earned that with his style and wit moreso than his ideology. I also like Mort Kondracke who is not right leaning in any sense.
As far as your animus toward Fox News, I still wonder how you reconcile their amazing success at ruling the news world of video if they are so rightwing. It doesn’t really matter as we are all free to watch what we want to watch. I catch most of the interesting C-Span episodes for example.
There is no use rehashing all of the pros and cons of the Clinton scandal years. He has his legacy and he earned it. No one else disrespected the oval office, the Lincoln bedroom, and other components of the presidency as he did, and even the most leftist voices will admit that. Bush’s legacy is not established yet, he still has till Jan. of 2009 to add to it.
RTH –
I just want you to do some getting up to speed on the subject instead of using the rhetorical device of challenging public information as if it were some new revelation (thought it may be to you). Having to constantly remediate you slows down the discussion, which I suspect is your intent.
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