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Marc Cooper, who edited the piece on HuffPo that exposed Barack Obama’s Bitterness Gaffe, celebrates this as an instance of the brave new world of “citizen journalism” influencing the national conversation [e.a.]:
I, personally, would have written her piece much differently than the way she chose. It would have been less about me and more about Obama. But Mayhill has developed quite a loyal and appreciative audience and with her most recent work demonstrates that citizen journalism can do many, many things still inaccessible to the MSM. It’s also quite a bit of fun to see how a report like hers can actually set the agenda for the entire national press. I’ve also been impressed with the way that Mayhill has struggled with her own conscience, her own values and as well her hopes and desires. She was and remains an Obama supporter. And it wasn’t easy for her to write a piece that she knew, while truthful and accurate, would nevertheless be used by his political opponents. Not an easy task, I assure you.
I’d say the national “conversation” wasn’t influenced so much as hijacked. In his lede, Cooper confirms this; and he’s proud of the scoop:
Writer Mayhill Fowler’s story – now with more than 2500 comments on it — was picked up by The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, CNN.com, the Associated Press, Fox News, Reuters, Politico, the Lou Dobbs Show, Hardball, Olbermann’s Countdown, The Atlantic.com, The DailyKos, TalkingPointsMemo and myriad other outlets.
McCain and Clinton quickly jumped into the fray. And Obama released a video to respond to the controversy (posted below).
I’m not saying the HuffPo crew shouldn’t be proud of the scoop. But I’m still trying to sort out the ramifications of the blogosphere being both a source of information for news consumers and a catalyst of viral gossip—because that’s what this “story” was: the blogospheric equivalent of “psssssst! did you hear what Barack said?”
And it caught fire. I haven’t seen this much heat in the blogosphere in a long time—and it’s Saturday night. (Sweeney Todd is playing in another room; I’m not in the mood for buckets of blood.)
By the way, I don’t think it does us any good to deny that we get hooked on these sensational stories because they’re sensational. All we can do is step back from time to time and marvel at how we’re being entertained by current events (or by, more properly speaking, current pseudo-events—because nothing actually happens in these media storms, except some trash-talking back and forth, and then there’s a lot of color commentary, and then things calm down … or not).
This seems to confirm that the “contest” between Clinton and Obama will have nothing to do with political triumph and everything to do with personal survival through all the elimination rounds [just as Andrew Tyndall said, and, yes, a little bit like the Tonya Harding story—except that Hillary didn’t kneecap Obama, much as Andrew Sullivan would like to blame her and her style of politics.
Obama has no one to blame for this debacle but himself; let’s see how good he is at sucking it up and moving on].
Is this any way to elect a president?
Um, probably not. It certainly doesn’t sound like a very responsible way for “journalists” to present information about presidential candidates to voters, or a very informative way for voters to get information about the candidates’ positions.
But for now, it’s the media-campaign nexus we’ve got.
And I also have to say that it’s an open question as to how much information voters actually need in order to choose the candidate who best represents their (self-perceived) interests. (We can argue about whether this is the best use of democracy; but we have to cede the right to individuals to vote even their frivolous whims rather than their most thoughtful choice. See P. G. Wodehouse, who I quoted here last October. Freedom of the sort we enjoy in the West means the freedom to be frivolous, too. I’m not endorsing this behavior; I’m just sayin’.)
In 2006, the political scientist Matthew Baum published a paper about the impact of “soft news” on low-information voters. It was called [e.a.]:
The Oprah Effect: How Soft News Helps Inattentive Citizens Vote Consistently
Do the news media provide voters with sufficient information to function as competent democratic citizens? Many have answered “no,” citing as evidence the proliferation of entertainment-oriented “soft news.” Yet, public affairs-oriented “hard” news is often unappealing to politically inattentive individuals. We argue that news “quality” depends upon how well it enables citizens to determine which candidate best fits their own preferences. In this regard, for politically inattentive citizens, we argue that soft news is more efficient than traditional hard news. Drawing on the logic of low-information rationality, we derive a series of hypotheses, which we test using the 2000 National Election Study. We find that politically inattentive individuals who consumed daytime talk shows (a popular form of soft news) were more likely than their nonconsuming, inattentive counterparts to vote for the candidate who best represented their self-described preferences. This suggests soft news can facilitate voting “competence” among at least some citizens.
The paper was published long before Oprah endorsed Barack Obama; it had nothing to do with Obama and everything to do with the effect of soft-news (like daytime talk shows) consumption on otherwise completely politically disengaged individuals. And Baum found that even a little bit of information is better than no information at all when it comes to helping voters choose the candidate who’s the closest fit for them.
Interviewed a year later, after Oprah had endorsed Obama, Baum predicted that it would have its biggest effect on Oprah, not on Obama (although he did say that Oprah’s audience is not particularly partisan and is persuadable) [e.a.]:
Political science professor Matt Baum, who published a research paper “The Oprah Effect” for a 2006 study, described Winfrey as a “nonpartisan, above-the-fray, trusted source for women” who politically “has been difficult to pigeonhole,” which Baum said, “furthers her ability to come into it now.”
Acknowledging the power of Winfrey’s glitter, Baum believes that ultimately she’ll have little effect on whether or not Obama can harness the numbers necessary to seize the Democratic presidential nomination.
“By virtue of having endorsed Obama, she’s no longer above the fray — she’s in the fray,” said Baum, a decision he said could erode Winfrey’s capital, since she probably has “more credibility than any other celebrity that lives.”
A piece published recently indicated that Oprah’s popularity has (supposedly) declined since she endorsed Obama. Meanwhile, we don’t know what impact, if any, her endorsement has had on him (beyond helping to launch him, which is of course a huge leg up—not at all to be discounted as a factor in his rise). She hasn’t appeared with him in public for many months now—since the rallies in California in early February.
Interesting times indeed.
Not to put too fine a point on it, but I’m wondering when TV “journalists” will face the truth about their profession—namely, that what you see below is not just the future of “the news” but also the present.
Fishbowl quotes some of the “juicy bits” from the upcoming NYT Mag article:
“By the way, have you figured me out yet?” Matthews said at the end of another phone conversation the following day. “You gotta under-stand, it’s all complicated. It’s not like Tim.” Tim — as in Russert, the inquisitive jackhammer host of “Meet the Press” — is a particular obsession of Matthews’s. Matthews craves Russert’s approval like that of an older brother. He is often solicitous.
In an interview with Playboy a few years ago, he volunteered that he had made the list of the Top 50 journalists in D.C. in The Washingtonian magazine. “I’m like 36th, and Tim Russert is No. 1,” Matthews told Playboy. “I would argue for a higher position for myself.”
Friends say Matthews is wary of another up-and-comer, David Gregory, who last month was given a show at 6 o’clock, between airings of “Hardball.” It is a common view around NBC that Gregory is trying out as a possible replacement for Matthews.
According to people at NBC, Matthews has not been shy in voicing his resentment of Olbermann. Nor, according to network sources, has Olbermann bothered to hide his low regard for Matthews, although when I spoke to him, Olbermann denied any personal animosity toward Matthews and told me that he appreciates his “John Madden-like enthusiasm for politics.”
Hmmm. Recognize anyone?
Laurence Olivier as Archie Rice, in The Entertainer
London, 1957, photo by Snowden
p.s. The last time I used that image was here, in May 2007.
The last time I wrote about Matthews was here.
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*** When I claimed my blog on Technorati two years ago, this is how I described it:
They call it news. I call it infotainment.
No one can say that we weren’t warned well in advance. See, for example, Neal Postman and Michael Schudson and Joshua Gamson.
Just in time for the Episode Two of The Petraeus Show, which pre-game “reviewers” analyzed and critiqued well in advance of opening night (see the headlines on Memeorandum (at 9:30 a.m., just before showtime),
Gallup releases poll results on Americans’ attitudes toward the war in Iraq.
Upshot [e.a.]:
The 2008 presidential election will present voters with a clear choice on Iraq, with Republicans putting forth one of the Senate’s fiercest supporters of the war and Democrats choosing one of two leading Senate opponents, including Obama, who has made his opposition to the war from the beginning a major focus of his campaign. If McCain is elected, U.S. policy on Iraq will likely continue as it has under the Bush administration, with slower troop drawdowns tied to progress in establishing security in Iraq. If Obama or Clinton is elected, finding a quick end to the war will likely be the new president’s top priority.
In general, the public tends to side with the Democrats from the standpoint of favoring a timetable, but relatively few advocate a quick withdrawal. And most seem sympathetic to the Republican argument about the United States needing to establish a certain level of security before leaving Iraq.
Call me crazy, but it looks to me as if, all things considered, Americans would rather stick around and do the right thing by Iraqis than just get out.
It’s my opinion, based on an anthropological reading of the culture, that Americans would like to win in Iraq—as we like to win everywhere, because we Americans are a profoundly competitive people—but the conventional wisdom these days says otherwise.
See Glenn Greenwald, for example, in a post titled “Cokie Roberts speaks out on the war on behalf of the American people”:
Yesterday, Cokie Roberts — while expressing scorn for the “Responsible Plan for Withdrawal” advocated by 42 Democratic Congressional candidates and numerous military experts, and described by fellow panelist Katerina Vanden Heuvel of The Nation — said this:
VANDEN HEUVEL: It is not, but you know what, the responsible thing to do is withdraw. [you hear Cokie odiously chuckling at this point]
VANDEN HEUVEL: If we withdraw responsibly, the region would be more stable in the long term, America will be restored as a responsible global leader, and there are 42 challengers, you are absolutely right Cokie, who have a responsible plan to withdraw.
ROBERTS: Convincing the electorate of that I think would be very difficult, and I also agree that the notion that Sen. McCain and Sen. Graham you heard this morning putting forward, that Americans would prefer to win, is–
VANDEN HEUVEL: But what is winning? This war is unwinnable, there are no military solutions.
The video is also here. Roberts’ claim — that Americans agree with McCain, Graham and her that withdrawal is a bad idea and that they want to stay until we win — is just a lie. There’s no other way to put that.
Really? I don’t see any evidence to back up your claim, Mr. Greenwald. We may quibble about whether Americans want to “win” (since they’re repeatedly told by the MSM that we cannot win) or whether they just want to do the right thing, but the polling (for what it’s worth) suggests that relatively fewer people want to just get the hell out of there and call it “responsible.”
All things considered, people seem much more interested in the political theater surrounding The Petraeus Show. Here’s a gem from the NYT:
Testimony by General Will Test Candidates for President
All three senators running for president — John McCain of Arizona, Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York and Barack Obama of Illinois — will have a chance to question General Petraeus and Ryan C. Crocker, the American ambassador to Baghdad. Each of the three is determined to use the spectacle to advantage, but all face political risks as well as opportunities in the back-to-back hearings before the Senate Armed Services and Foreign Relations Committees. …
Mr. McCain, a Republican, has the logistical advantage in appearing before his two Democratic competitors. General Petraeus is set to testify first to the Armed Services Committee, beginning at 9:30 a.m., and Mr. McCain, the ranking Republican member, will be the second to speak, after the committee chairman, Senator Carl Levin, Democrat of Michigan.
Mrs. Clinton, a more junior member of the panel, will speak later. Mr. Obama, a junior member of the Foreign Relations Committee, which is holding its hearing in the afternoon, will be the 13th on that panel to speak, perhaps after the evening news.
The headline of this piece (referring to a “test”) is yet more evidence of Andrew Tyndall’s thesis about the nexus between the campaigns and the media and the gameshow-type coverage that has evolved during this election cycle.
As for the substance of the NYT’s Elizabeth Bumiller’s piece: she suggests that Obama’s testimony occuring “after the evening news” would be a bad thing.
What century is she living in? Her own paper today cites the woes of the networks’ news divisions. The “evening news” is a woolly mammoth.
Cable “news” is the thing, dontcha know? Who cares if Obama’s “test” occurs last on the floor of the Senate? It will happen just in time for Campbell Brown of CNN and Keith Olbermann to lead with it!
I’ll try to follow up tonight. Stay tuned.
