One of my regulars said on a previous post, and not for the first time:
But I’m sure the endorsement is ready to go…
Since I responded at length to that assertion, I’m turning it into a separate post, for the edification (or something) of all…
No, the endorsement is not "ready to go." I wish. That is, I wish it was done and behind me. In fact, I haven’t even set the meeting to discuss it. We have scrupulously avoided discussing it, but that will be at an end soon. Sometime in the next week to 10 days, we will sit down and do that. (On Monday, we had a brief discussion about HAVING the discussion, but even that was inconclusive.)
It promises to be a difficult decision, and however we end up, we’ll be somewhat divided by it — as we were in both 2000 and 2004, both in the primaries and the general. Endorsements by their very nature — you’re choosing one or the other, and there’s no room for compromise on that point, although there’s lots of room for compromise on the explanation — strain the consensus that we try to achieve on all issues. The presidential endorsement tends to do so more than usual. It’s why some newspapers don’t do presidential endorsements. Or rather, it’s related to why some newspapers say they don’t do presidential endorsements. Personally, I think they’re copping out and trying to rationalize it.
I had my break from that in January. It was wonderful. We were completely unanimous in our support for both McCain and Obama. But I knew then, as I know now, that IF we got our way and they won their respective nominations, our decision in the fall would be far more difficult. It will be.
I appreciate that y’all think you know me and my mind. The purpose of the blog is to help you do so, so it’s nice in a way that you feel comfortable extrapolating my decisions from what I’ve written in the past. But you ignore something very important: I’m the only person on the editorial board who blogs. And even the person you know through the blog has a very serious responsibility to lead a group of people you DON’T know as well through a very delicate decision-making process.
Hopefully, those of you who actually READ THE PAPER know Warren and Cindi better than you would know the board members at most newspapers. That’s the result of a deliberate policy that I instituted when I became editorial page editor in 1997 — we started writing fewer editorials (the unsigned pieces that speak for the full board) to give people time to write signed columns, so that you could get to know the people who participate in setting editorial policy. My blog is a continuation of that, taking the transparency thing to the nth power.
I don’t know how much management experience you have — "you" referring to those of you who believe our endorsement is set and everyone knows what it will be — but even if you’re the greatest manager in the world, it’s highly unlikely you’ve ever been in the situation that I deal with every day: Bringing a group of people with a variety of opinions and life experiences — very opinionated people — together in a consensus around controversial issues. Sometimes legislative leaders cry the blues to me about how hard it is to bring their members together around a piece of legislation over the course of a session, and I have little sympathy. I have to bring people together around definite positions, on deadline, every day. (Add to that the fact that it involves managing up as well as down, since the publisher is always a member of the board. The publisher stays out of most of our decisions, but he or she always participates to some degree in the presidential ones.) It’s not easy. And the presidential endorsement carries with it such baggage that it’s one of the toughest. And it’s a decision that is never gone. If y’all out there remember it (and you do), rest assured that we remember these internal struggles very vividly. And we’re very conscious of the tension going into the next such discussion.
Related Posts
In order to help the State make an informed endorsement I thought I’d help by providng a ranking of the stuff that bothers me about the presidential campaign:
McCain’s torture flop-flop – 10
This is the bigee with me. Nothing has been more disgusting in all my years of following political campaigns. Why McCain voted to allow the CIA to torture is a mystery and very disgusting.
McCain’s Gramm pick – 7 That choice shows McCain as a partisan. Why pick someone as destructive as Gramm?
Obama’s backtrack on prosecuting telecoms – 6 This was Obama’s worst moment of the campaign. He should have stuck to his guns and demanded the telecoms be held accountable for their enabling the government to invade our privacy.
McCain’s Palin Pick – 6 Terrible pick. Seemed brilliant at the time. It certainly wasn’t something that showed he had the people’s best interests at heart.
McCain’s “Sex in Kindergarten” and other negative ads – 4 Pretty inflamatory and uncalled for. Shows McCain as a political hack and disengenous in his “maverick” persona.
McCain and Keating – 3 This happened a long time ago so I’ll discount it. Still, McCain was given a mild censure and it does call into question his overall judgement.
McCain’s age – 3 With a smart choice for VP this could have been a zero. Now it’s fairly important.
Obama’s softening his position on Iraq – 3 I wish he would be more assertive in demanding our withdrawal. I’d also like to see him push for military cuts. He’s playing the politics of nesessity and I understand that. Still, it’d be nice to have a true peace candidate.
Obama’s Ayer’s association – 2 Much ado about very little. He would get a zero except that Obama was not entirely honest about his association. Serving on board’s with Ayers is really not a big deal.
McCain’s preachers – 2 Why would McCain associate with such scoundrels? Not really all that important though.
Obama’s Wright connection – 1 He only gets a 1 because he didn’t get rid of the idiot immediately. Wright really didn’t say all that much out of line when put in context. Wright was certainly far less vitriolic than McCain’s preachers.
Obama’s experience – 0 He’s a brilliant man with a great sense of judgement. His choice of Biden solidified his credentials on this even further. I have no problems with this.
Endorsing Ron Paul at this point would say something ironically significant.
Endorsing Obama would align you safely with your media comrades and allow all of you to assume the wagging-finger pose.
Endorsing McCain would actually make sense.
Let’s not over-think this endorsement thing. We’re looking to choose the most effective leader, manager, communicator, and…improviser.
At least, I hope that’s something along the lines of our collective goal as a concerned citizenry.
Let’s throw out each man’s compelling biographies, competing ideologies, and occasionally dubious associations. We’ve had many weeks now to see how effectively these two men lead, manage, communicate, and…perhaps most importantly…improvise.
Every new administration comes into office with a raft of plans and policy ideas. But as we’ve seen so painfully with the Bush years, crises emerge and the best laid plans get chucked out the window in a mad scramble to do…something.
Foresight matters. Clarity matters. Temperament matters. Mental preparedness matters.
What we need is a dynamic, flexible administration that can think deep and act fast, an administration that won’t be tempted to strain a world of complexities and ambiguities through the filter of rigid, simplistic conviction.
And, of course, we certainly need an administration that can motivate and inspire common citizens of all ages to get informed and get involved.
Isn’t a presidential campaign supposed to be a dry run for the Presidency? Aren’t you as the candidate supposed to demonstrate how well you and your organization will hold up under a withering fire of unpredictable events and moments? Aren’t you supposed to demonstrate just how bloody good you are at leading, managing, communicating, and improvising…and…inspiring?
Again, let’s not over-think this. We have to guess about what the future of our fast-moving world might look like, and decide which candidate, in his PRESENT incarnation, has the best potential to do something more than merely survive his term in office and get his own library…
Well, if EDS can “herd cats“, I don’t know why Brad can’t manage the editorial staff or other businesses can’t …
Actually, I don’t expect members of the editorial staff to all be in agreement on every issue or candidate. We are all individuals with our own beliefs and opinions. You blog helps explain the editorial decisions and endorsements and sometimes, not everybody is in agreement.
Lee,
This post is a pun comparing management to herding cats. Oh never mind, you don’t understand puns. Go ahead and post one of your standard anti-Obama posts that everybody has read at least four or five times on each of Brad’s posts.
This year was in the bag for the Democrats from day one. That is why Hillary couldn’t let it go. She knew whomever was teh Democratic candidate would be President.
Politics is cyclical and repititious.
In the 1970’s, even after Nixon, the American people had had enough of the Democrats. Reagan was hardly qualified to be President, but just like Obama, looked and acted just Presidential enough for Americans to buy into him and elect him. Reagan won in a landslide against Carter.
Years later, the slow trickle of the House & Senate went from Democrats to Republicans.
This year, the pendulum has swung back and you are seeing that Americans have had enough of the GOP and are voting Democrat in mass numbers for the same reasons nearly 30 years ago.
Voter registration for Democrats is up over 2 million new voters while the GOP has lost nearly 600,000 voters during the same time. That’s nearly 3 million more registered Democrat leaning voters when the last two Presidential elections were decided by less than a few thousand votes.
The only difference today is how quickly Americans are shedding the GOP versus the Democrats 20 years ago. Some attribute that to the GOP having internal turmoil within its own party which has turned off voters. Having the most un-popular and worst President in the history of the Union doesn’t help either.
The pedulum is swinging and with it, a veto proof House & Senate and Democratic President will be the result because people want a change. It will remain this way for another 20 years when the pendulum will swing again giving it back to the GOP…if the GOP doesn’t immoliate itself first due to its internal strife.
McCain was a fool if he even thought he had a chance.
Just this, wtf: If Nancy Pelosi and Barney Frank are the soul of the Democratic Party, I’d rather see the sole of John McCain’s shoe serve as president.
I knew it was a mistake when they started letting non-land owners vote, much less people younger than 21 and people who can’t read or write.
Oops. That would be the heart and soul of the Democratic Party, wouldn’t it? The people Jay Leno interviews on Jaywalking. Those who can’t let current events, history or any knowledge whatsoever intrude on life in their ratholes.
So this is their turn. Well, when the blade falls, we’ll know who to blame.
Funny, pm, I think of the ones who call Obama an “Arab” or “terrorist” as the ones who “can’t let history or any knowledge whatsoever intrude on life in their ratholes,” as you put it. That’s ignorance and prejudice talking, and Sarah Palin (who embodies both those traits) is only too happy to encourage that. Anyway, don’t we hear Obama accused of being “professorial”?
As David Brooks put it a few days ago, within the conservative movement “what had been a disdain for liberal intellectuals slipped into a disdain for the educated class as a whole. The liberals had coastal condescension, so the conservatives developed their own anti-elitism, with mirror-image categories and mirror-image resentments, but with the same corrosive effect….The political effects of this trend have been obvious. Republicans have alienated the highly educated regions — Silicon Valley, northern Virginia, the suburbs outside of New York, Philadelphia, Chicago and Raleigh-Durham. The West Coast and the Northeast are mostly gone.”
It’s not uneducated people you have to worry about, pm. It’s
I tried to watch Bill O’Reilly last night. Seems important to see what the Fox folks have to say. I gotta tell you that network is completely out of touch. In the context of the presidential campaign he kept harping on the fact that Barney Frank and Chris Dodd are in charge of the respective finance committees in the House and Senate, suggesting McCain should bring that up during the debate. When one of the democratic strategists pointed out that McCain is associated with Phil Gramm what was Bill Os response? He said that would bore the audience. Really Bill, even for you that was a pretty stupid response. The fact that McCain is using Gramm is critical to this campaign. Obama would do well to remind the viewers of Gramm’s stunning “whiners” comment.
Then he started in on Acorn again. Fox is really getting desperate at this point. With the latest CBS poll showing Obama with a 14 point lead this race is all but over. At least McCain could go out with a little dignity and stop with the Ayers nonsense. He should stay above all that tonight and simply state his policy positions in a respectful way. Perhaps he can mend the legacy of this atrocious campaign.
oops, got cut off there. “the college-educated population that is deserting McCain in droves.” is the rest of the phrase.
But on to Brad. Brad, re the endorsement, all I can say is “Go Cindi and Warren!” You said:
“McCain has never been about philosophy; it’s always been about whether you trust him, based on his record, to deal with the unforeseen.” Indeed, and I think the way he has run his campaign, especially his flailing around as the economic crisis unfolded, has called that into question. I think Obama wins on this count.
You went to decry partisanship on both sides. Look, Brad, nobody can complain about McCain’s attacking Obama on taxes, foreign policy, whatever. But which campaign has gone BEYOND partisanship, into encouraging the kind of fear of “the other” that was going to naturally occur in such an unusual situation as this year’s election?
It just blows my mind that you can say that the line about “McCain=Bush” is “deeply, profoundly offensive to me” yet you can’t summon up anywhere NEAR that kind of outrage for “palling around with terrorists” etc, in fact the whole Ayers thing “doesn’t really bother me” as you put it, or rather McCain “raising it”. As if raising the question were all he (or he through his vile surrogate) was all it amounted to.
This relates to a comment a Pam made on the other post, and also to John Lewis’ reaction. Maybe I have your biography wrong, Brad, but I think you only moved back to the South in the late 1980’s? If so, maybe you missed some very bad times here. Maybe the codespeak and the mob mentality that is being appealed to by the Schmidt-Eskew-Palin-McCain campaign is not “deeply, profoundly offensive” to you.
You like to self-deprecatingly refer to yourself as the “clueless white guy,” but the strange way you weight “McCain=Bush” versus “palling around with terrorists” starts to go beyond “clueless” into areas I don’t think you really want to go: “insensitive” and beyond, words that I really don’t think apply to you at heart but sometimes I have to wonder.
As I said elsewhere, for horrible things to happen it’s not just the perpetrators that are to blame, but all the rest of us who failed to condemn what we needed to condemn. Are you going be among that crowd that fails to condemn, are you still going to be complaining about the “McCain=Bush” line? I don’t think people in the Obama rallies are shouting “terrorist” or “kill him” when they hear that “McCain=Bush” line by the way, Brad.
Think about that when you’re in church next Sunday.
It’s time to vote for optimism, hope, love, positivism, folks. Let’s reject fear, and the politics of the old. I’m out till Nov. 5, see you then to celebrate.
Let’s not miss this opportunity, folks. Obama is the man for this time in our history. See you in a few weeks.
I thought about mentioning the McCain=Bush thing in my first comment to this post but decided not to. Frankly this is a big fat zero on my list of things that bother me about the campaign. Why? It’s a legitimate point to make, so it doesn’t even fall into the context of negative campaigning. McCain HAS voted with Bush 90% of the time. That’s just a fact. If the McCain people want to defend his voting record, fine, defend it. But don’t deny that McCain, in many important ways, is like Bush. That’s disengenous.
But as I’ve told you before, the standard Democratic Party line, which Obama hammers at every opportunity, that McCain=Bush is deeply, profoundly offensive to me. As for things I haven’t liked that McCain has done, it’s lots of little things — no one of which is as offensive as the McCain=Bush thing on its own, but there are a bunch of them.
-Brad
This says it all. Brad finds the McCain=Bush line offensive. I find it spot on and very relevant to the campaign. How could 2 people see something so differently?
Darn. I was really wanting to see Lee’s crazy post here. Oh well. Maybe I’ll check back later for a good laugh.
Bud, however out of touch you think Fox is, it has more viewers than any other cable news network, and O’Reilly leads the pack.
The re-run of O’Reilly’s show nightly at 11 p.m. gets better ratings than any other cable news show, and the first run in prime time is more watched than any other show by a long shot.
Monday, Sept. 8, for example:
All day: FNC 367 CNN 259 MSNBC 203 HLN 146
Prime: FNC 871 CNN 416 MSNBC 467 HLN 303
FNC O’Reilly: 1143, 656
MSNBC Countdown: 607, 312
CNN Cooper 453, 341
HLN Grace 470, 240
CNN Larry King 383
In the second quarter of this year, Fox News Channel had nine of the top 10 cable news programs, with O’Reilly #1. The top CNN program Larry King, in sixth place, and the top MSNBC program was Countdown with Keith Olbermann, in 20th place.
Here are the Cable News Ratings for Saturday/Sunday, October 11-12
October 11, 2008
Total Day
FNC – 1,040,000 viewers
CNN –835,000 viewers
MSNBC – 381,000 viewers
CNBC – 195,000 viewers
HLN – 304,000 viewers
Prime Time
FNC –1,546,000 viewers
CNN – 1,334,000 viewers
MSNBC – 296,000 viewers
CNBC – 236,000 viewers
HLN – 380,000 viewers
25-54 Total Day
FNC – 268,000 viewers
CNN – 283,000 viewers
MSNBC – 165,000 viewers
CNBC – 100,000 viewers
HLN – 135,000 viewers
25-54 Prime Time
FNC – 337,000 viewers
CNN – 409,000 viewers
MSNBC – 140,000 viewers
CNBC – 128,000 viewers
HLN – 163,000 viewers
35-64 Total Day
FNC – 495,000 viewers
CNN – 408,000 viewers
MSNBC – 191,000 viewers
CNBC – 106,000 viewers
HLN – 165,000 viewers
35-64 Prime Time
FNC – 597,000 viewers
CNN – 589,000 viewers
MSNBC – 123,000 viewers
CNBC – 143,000 viewers
HLN – 182,000 viewers
Cable News Ratings for October 12, 2008
P2+ Total Day
FNC – 1,024,000 viewers
CNN – 752,000 viewers
MSNBC – 450,000 viewers
CNBC –127,000 viewers
HLN – 294,000 viewers
P2+ Prime Time
FNC – 2,019,000 viewers
CNN – 1,249,000 viewers
MSNBC – 701,000 viewers
CNBC- a scratch w/121,000 viewers
HLN – 421,000 viewers
25-54 Total Day
FNC – 259,000 viewers
CNN – 246,000 viewers
MSNBC –211,000 viewers
CNBC – 56,000 viewers
HLN – 138,000 viewers
25-54 Prime Time
FNC – 420,000 viewers
CNN – 392,000 viewers
MSNBC – 422,000 viewers
CNBC –a scratch w/51,000 viewers
HLN – 170,000 viewers
35-64 Total Day
FNC – 493,000 viewers
CNN – 384,000 viewers
MSNBC – 235,000 viewers
CNBC – 73,000 viewers
HLN – 174,000 viewers
35-64 Prime Time
FNC – 843,000 viewers
CNN – 579,000 viewers
MSNBC – 414,000 viewers
CNBC –70,000 viewers
HLN – 239,000 viewers
If you add up all the other cable news networks, yes, all of them put together do outpoll Fox. But not by so much that you could call Fox out of touch.
If any thing, the NBC channels are so deep in the tank for your guy that they’re drowning, and they’re the ones who’re out of touch.
Many of O’Reilly’s viewers are probably liberals like me who want to gather information from all sides. Conservatives won’t watch Keith or Rachel on MSNBC because it challenges their pre-conceived ideas about the world. They’re basically cowards who follow along the safe, conservative path like good little puppies. Liberal, on the other hand, are courageous sorts who are not afraid to watch FOX sometimes. It’s usually junk but occassionally they have a valid point. If they do I’ll consider it, even if FOX in general is pretty silly.
But wait, p.m. I thought it was the “mainstream media” that was the reason why Obama is doing so well?
As far as I can tell, the right wing has:
1) The top radio talk shows (Rush, O’Reilly, Hannitty, Ingraham, Savage, Beck, etc.)
2) The top cable news and political shows
3) The most visited political web page (Drudge)
4) The second largest daily newspaper (Wall Street Journal)
Hmmm…. if you’ve got all the top media outlets covered and STILL can’t win the election, what does that tell you?
Phillip, I have called Obama professorial several times, and had you said those of college AGE are deserting McCain in droves, I would agree with you.
Around here, anyway, the demographic of college-educated people who support Obama is more restricted.
Once upon a time I was headed down the road to being a professor myself, until the unworldliness of academia finally pushed me away, but (or so) I would NEVER want a professor as a president.
I want someone who chooses the right course, not someone who mulls the possibilities.
Doug, cable news is one thing. Broadcast news is something else again, I think. Ratings-wise, anyway.
So now I’m going to run off to Google world and see what I can find out about such ratings.
But, first, let me assure you that the slant in all these cable news networks, be it left, right, forward or backward, makes it harder and harder for me to take any of them oh so seriously.
And, bud, saying “many of O’Reilly’s viewers are probably liberals like me who want to gather information from all sides” is as big a stretch as Rosie O’Donald and Oprah sharing a size 1 bikini.
Brad, while the ugly turn of the McCain/Palin campaign may amazingly not be “deeply, profoundly offensive” to you the way that the “McCain=Bush” line is, but I’m happy to say that today indications are that the American people have a very different sense of what is offensive from yours, and that indeed this is the factor that seems to have caused the bottom to fall out of the McCain poll numbers. Turns out America is ready for Unparty politics after all, just as you’re abandoning some of those principles, winking at divisive hateful identity politics out of blind loyalty to one candidate (or a memory of what that one candidate once was).
Rosie in a size 1 bikini. Indeed, that is a stretch (for the bikini).
Hey Bud, 9:51 am, 10-15, thanks a bunch for the ad hominem attack. Lemme ask you this: Who are Tim Mahoney and Herb Moses? Don’t seem to have heard much about them on CNN, NBC, etc. Check up on it and get back to us. I admit I am really afraid of Black Democratic leaders, mayors for example — you may wish to check Glenn Beck’s article on this topic. Racist? maybe so, read the facts and make up your own mind. Check the leadership in Durham, Detroit, DC, Birmingham etc. Please do not feel free to point an accusing finger at me, though, for just raising the issue. Just wait until Obama is President — well, just check his track record of progressive legislation. Look at all the people he helped in Chicago. Look at the outstanding record of the Chicago schools. Hmmmm…. maybe you could give me one example in each of the above categories. Can you people not see that there is nothing there? That the emperor has no clothes?
p.m.
Keep in mind that the three major network news programs are 30 minutes per day (actually 22 minutes when commercials are factored in)… and they don’t just talk about politics that whole time. If America’s view of politics is based on that, then we have the government we deserve.
Plus the average age of a network news viewer probably skews about the same as that of newspaper readers (about 50-52).
I would be willing to bet that more people listen to Rush Limbaugh than watch all the network news shows combined.
OK, Doug, here ya go:
CBS’s 60 Minutes has 15 times the viewership O’Reilly has. NBC’s Dateline has 5 times the viewers. ABC’s 20-20 sextuples O’Reilly’s ratings.
And ABC’s Dancing With The Stars has 20 times O’Reilly’s ratings.
I’m having trouble finding the ninghtly news ratings, but I think you can see that the MSM and reality TV pablum still rule the day.
It really is pathetic no matter where you’re standing when you look at it. TV news is like a sea of babies crying.
More people listen to Rush Limbaugh than watch all the network news shows combined?
Could be. If you’re in your car between noon and 3 p.m., whatcha gonna do? The idiot box at 6:30 p.m. offers more choices, and there’s that lawn to mow, too.
p.m.,
USA Today has the news ratings in the paper today. ABC and NBC get 7.9 million, CBS gets 5.9 million.
But again, as with 60 Minutes and Dateline, what percentage of the program time is spent supposedly pushing liberal views? And who is being influenced by these views? Is the “liberal media” an unavoidable presence or is it responding to demand?
Personally, I think America’s problem is related to an apathetic and uninformed electorate on both sides. Politicians exploit the stupidity — otherwise what would be the point of all the TV ads that are obviously biased and mostly distort the truth?
Rush Limbaugh has 20,000,000 listeners a week who listen to a substantial portion of one or more programs.
Rush and the rest of talk radio gathered a huge audience by providing lots of genuine news which the networks and big newspapers were intentionally witholding.
Now there are even more cable TV shows run by very qualified professional journalists who got tired of working for the dishonest air networks and big print conglomerates. Astute readers can find lots of details of FACTS on the Internet, which show them just how dishonest the networks and local editors are, leading to further erosion of audience share for the MSN.
So with Rush and a others providing us with the real “facts” how is it that the MSM is able to push their “liberal” agenda onto the unsuspecting, gullible masses? Seems like the right-wing propaganda machine is doing quite well.
Bud, 10-15 3:16. Well bud, I see you have not done your homework, but I will try to shed a bit of light on your question:
“If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth is the greatest enemy of the State.” Joseph Goebbels.
“A lie told often enough becomes truth” Vladimir Lenin.
Example: Chris Dodd, Barney Frank, and their “oversight” of the Fanny/Freddie disaster.
How does the Drive-by Media push its Democrat Party propaganda into the minds of so many Americans?
ANSWER: Because only about 30,000,000 Americans bother to seek out news from other sources. Just as most people sit around waiting for someone else to create a job for them, or tell them which school their children must attend, they also sit around and soak up whatever indoctrination is repeated to them on the networks which supply their entertainment.
I saw a poll today of Obama followers who said they liked his VP candidate, Sarah Palin. That sort if ignorance is the mainstay of the socialistic liberal Democrats.
As Uncle Weldon said
From his hospital bed
Woe be to the nation
That watches but sees only
Sarah Palin’s legs and
Barack Obama’s shine.